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Brave New Town's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Originality | #3 | 3.769 | 3.769 |
| Graphics | #4 | 3.308 | 3.308 |
| Ingredients | #5 | 3.538 | 3.538 |
| Fun | #6 | 3.231 | 3.231 |
| Overall | #6 | 3.282 | 3.282 |
| Gameplay | #6 | 3.231 | 3.231 |
| Audio | #7 | 2.615 | 2.615 |
Ranked from 13 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
Judge feedback
Judge feedback is anonymous and shown in a random order.
- Lovely game! I like the usage of the "New life" ingredient, I'm really into the "let's rebuild the world" theme. I like the desert sounds, it would be great if even in the camp there was some chill relaxing music playing or something like that. I really enjoyed exploring the desert and having all those conversations! I would appreciate some way to interact with the game even when waiting in the camp for the resources to generate. I love the gradual visual upgrades of the camp itself. Just a last minor piece of advice: it would be really great if you could visually indicate that the player can/can't buy an upgrade for a building just by looking at the buildings in the camp view. The player could then buy the upgrade that they can afford the first. Thank you very much for your participation and such a great game!
- A game with promising story. Seems like a project with a big plan and solid base gameplay in it. Graphics is slightly naive, but perfectly readable, UI could have more presence on some screens. To game play - I like the town building mechanics, movement outside and dialogues, but each of these parts needs a lot of polish; buildings in town should do something, the outside should not be easy to explore (think HoMaM where movement takes a time; here it should take materials, time, turn based play could be more suitable), the dialogues should be more with more decisions, with various character interplays, animosities etc. It may be like GTA with various missions for the characters... the outside should pose danger to player, risks and rewards... there is a lot to do. But solid base anyways. I see new life, underground, some touch of joker depending on the story, some liminal space regarding the outside barren world. Keep up the good work.
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Comments
This is a larger project that could be developed more, although its technical aspect is ok.
The main problem is that the game presents a story and building mechanics… but there is not much to do with these. There is some exploration, but it falls flat as there is no danger in the world and no obstacles to overcome.
The game reminds these:
Heroes of Might and Magic and other rpg/strategies, where you build cities and explore world. HoMaM is turn based, and hero has to fight various monsters (and other heroes) that are blocking their passage. You are spending resources on better army and sometimes on story advances.
Various story based open world games, where you explore world, meet various characters and converse with them. In many such games you have to fend off monsters, wild animals, bandits on your way from A to B, so you can visit C… In many games you get quests (even side quests) that are not only about dialogues, but also about some more exploration a resource management. Most of these games are real time… but they usually don’t have city/base building mechanics.
It might be very hard to combine these approaches. The game needs some more baking in a designers’ oven before any development continues. The key is to offer the player deep story and interesting choices and dilemmas, risks and rewards.
Brave New Town is a relaxing idle strategy game with unexpectedly addictive gameplay
The game stands out both with excellently mastered ingredients and attention to detail, which can be seen both in graphics, texts and animations. It can be seen that just such a small thing as the animation of collecting raw materials will do a lot for the playability and fun of the game.
When playing, the player is really interested in what the next levels will look like, who else I can meet, etc.
The disadvantage of the game is that its development seems to be very horizontal (with the exception of the brilliant line of the joker). It would be appropriate, for example, to chain building development one to another, or add some mini-quest (like go and dismantle the radio tower and i will join you, find a shack and bring solar panels from it and we can use them, ...).
The texts are fine, but there could be a lot more of them. The graphics are pleasant, nice, in the style I'm used to from the FW team and which we all like :)
minor minuses:
- I repeatedly left the camp, automatically clicked (LMB) and was back in the camp... and again. maybe some small timeout for morons like me.
- the buildings are floating in the air, it would like some create some shades, or some platform under them
- I don't mind the motorbike driving on mountains, but the water is too much :-) But it is true that a slight slowdown in some areas (mountains, forests) would be nice
- building upgrades should be made onscreen - i.e. wait until the dialog box disappears and then make changes, perhaps with some flash effect.
- what happend to joker? I need to know it!
- some short text lines with characters in town would be nice!
minor pluses
+ iconographic and simple tutorial (mouse control)
+ production of materials is very cool! love it!
+ ingredients <3
This is likely the most underrated game of this game jam. I feel I can’t express my opinion fully with words, but I’ll try.
Brave New Town has some kind of special atmosphere to it. It’s just so simple, but at the same time so much more. Despite there being no concrete goal, I was left wanting to play more, find another settler, find out what the Joker will say next, or maybe convince them to stay. (On a side note, I’d love to see some continuation or ending to the Joker storyline, or maybe some actually implemented character quests.)
I love how the visuals work. The hidden desert buildings fading in and out. The dialogue boxes. And the town changes visuals with each upgrade!
This game doesn’t need points, stars, useless puns, arbitrary goals, or even risk (there is no way to lose anything) to motivate the player. Playing this game is its own reward. You should try it too.