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A jam submission

Fish in the DarkView game page

Night has fallen and you're sitting in front of a mysterious pond...
Submitted by LaClobiche — 10 hours, 42 minutes before the deadline
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Play Fish in the Dark

Fish in the Dark's itch.io page

Results

CriteriaRankScore*Raw Score
Setting, story, characters, and world#14.6504.650
Fun gameplay#24.1004.100
Blind-friendly and good use of audio#24.6504.650

Ranked from 20 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.

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Comments

(+1)


I really liked that the game uses different mechanics for catching fish. Great sound. Thanks for this work.

Developer

thanks!

(+1)

I really enjoyed this game. The gameplay was really enjoyable and fun, the different ways to catch fish was very interesting. I did like the voice since it really brought me intot he game and immersed me, i think the voice was really soothing to listen to. I really liked the sound of the fishing rod, the noise the fish made and the bubble sound. The gameplay was easy to grasp and understand. I think for a game like this, you don'tneed to make it too complicated with the controls. I think it is enough.

I did encounter a small issue where i had to catch fish, i cst my lure and i was trying to move it left or right. I noticed the response was a bit slow at times when i was moving back and forth. I also noticed if i didn't press either left or right arrow keys, the lure moved on its own. I tried to find the position to catch fish wen i heard the bubble sound, but it didn't stop on its own.

Another issue i noticed was when I was tasked with moving the arrow keys in the opposite direction of the fish. I was clearly pushing the right key since i heard the bubble sound, but i still failed since my rod broke.

I still enjoyed this game and i like what i heard so far. Good job with waht you did so far. I look forward to seeing more improvements and want to play more.

Developer

Thank you a lot for playing the game and giving precious feedback! Could you please tell me on what platform you played the game (of html, on which browser), to help me reproduce those issues?

For the lure scene, the sound is also moving, sometimes really slowly. Maybe that add too much confusion? Also there is a lot of inertia / floating movement due to high acceleration & friction. It adds difficulty but is maybe also confusing . (on the contrary of the gazing mini game where the movement respond immediately).

For the catching when you have to move to the opposite direction, that seems like a bug that someone had also found. I think I fixed it but I'll have to try on different platforms first!

(+1)

Hi there!

So i play on windows 10. I normally use google chrome as my browser.

But i did actually download the game to my pc so did not play in browser.

Submitted(+1)

Good fishing game 🎣 The audio is great and the narration works very well. Well used of the controls that make it easy to play. Furthermore, it seems  very polished. Well done 👍

Developer

Thanks!

Submitted(+1)

Very interesting atmosphere and storytelling! The audio design is very effective at setting the mood. I only had time to catch a couple fishes, but the game captured my curiosity and I think I'll play again when I have more time. I feel like there is a lot more story lurking below the surface, waiting for me to come closer...! 😱

Developer

Thanks! Each zone is a little story, but there should be a broader narration in later versions!

(+2)

Oh, another fishing game. Yay, I’m so excited about pressing the key it tells me to when it tells me to. I suppose I’ll just have to make this fun for myself somehow. Say, what happens if I just never let go of this key?

“You should be fishing, not hurting.”

Oh. I … did not expect to get called out by a fishing game today. But … thank you.

It’s the little details like this that make this game stand out for me. The sound design’s alright, the gameplay works, but the fish! The otherwordly fish! Not to mention the great sense of humour, witty but never mean-spirited. If you ever update this game to fix the bugs and add a little more I will pay you for it.

And the narration! I was so sad when I read it’s done by ElevenLabs, because I’d already written a sentence congratulating you for excellent voice acting. Fuck, the machines really will replace us soon. But at least they’ll gently tell us stories about fishing on a vaguely eldrich shore beforehand. Perhaps that’s not such a bad way to go.

Speaking of, I’m impressed with the story you managed to tell between the lines of this seemingly simple fishing game. Who are we playing as? Why is this person fishing ig in the dark? Are they there of their own free will or being compelled to do it? Why do they die/fall unconscious when their rod breaks? I genuinely want to know the answers to these questions.

Not that the game is perfect. In addition to the bug you’re already aware of, I’m pretty sure that the minigame where you have to press the key in the opposite direction of the fish’s sound isn’t quite working right; I keep killing the poor protagonist. The one where you have to reel the fish in only when it isn’t struggling gave me trouble at first, because I kept waiting for it to tire out before realising that no, it wouldn’t, I had to reel it in during the short pauses. It also wouldn’t hurt if there was a proper menu where you could move in both directions, using enter or space to select an option instead. But over all, this is the start of something beautiful, and I really hope you keep working on it.

Developer(+1)

When I read the first paragraph I grumbled and stressed thinking "you need to forget that this is a fishing game, you shouldn't stop at that aspect!!!". And then I read the rest of your comment and was very happy to see that someone had received what I wanted to deliver with this little experiment!

I wasn't happy about working with an artificial narrator. But with the time available, it was a good compromise. I really like the voice I found, though, and the whispered aspect gives the experience a lot of identity. But, we agree: the result would surely be better with an actor.

Thanks for the valuable feedback, I think the gameplay issues can easily be improved. I hope to be able to finish this game (add at least 3 zones, a highscore mode, and above all complete the narrative loop. It just takes time (and that's not always easy to get).

Submitted(+1)

Loved the narration and the theming here. It might be good to add some visuals (bubbles or ripples when operating successfully), but otherwise really awesome submission!

Submitted(+1)

wow my favorite game so far, I love fishing games! Everything just works, intuitive controls, great atmosphere, and sound,  I also liked the fish's description every time you catch one!

Developer

Thanks A LOT! That encourages me to continue gamedev!

Submitted(+1)

Very cool entry!
The left / right button was a bit confusing for me, but thats probably just something to get used to. The voice over is awesome, the game seems very polished, and I personally like the idea of the almanach. Good job!

Developer

Thank you for the feedback and playing the game ♥️

(+1)

This game is really awesome!

The sounds, voice, and writing really come together to give it allot of atmosphere.

The fish names are not just good puns, but also manage to make you think.

I love the inclusion of the almanac, and the audio volumes sliders are very much appreciated.

Once you get used to the right left only interface, it is quite simple really...

The gameplay is challenging, lengthy, and changes as you progress, which I love. I always appreciate devs who don't take our skills as gamers for granted just because we're blind, and actually seek to give us something to work towards.

I feel that the actual catching of the fish could use some work. Right now it feels like there are essentially two modes. One where the fish rapidly moves left and right, so fast that it's almost instant after you press the key, and almost never stops moving, and the second where the fish moves left and right, but also moves in the center sometimes and pauses more often.

With the first scenario, I feel as though I can never really do well, because the fish changes sides so fast that no matter how fast I am I get lots of cracking sounds, and the intervals at which it stops are very short so reeling is very difficult. This wouldn't be as much of an issue, but it seems that their is some lag when starting to use the left and right keys alternatingly, so most of that time gets used up before I can really begin reeling.

In the second scenario, I feel as though I can brute force the reeling if the fish is in the center moving, even though that shouldn't work.

I love the gaze minigame, that one is challenging at higher levels. Though I feel like the "choose your own path" ends a little too quickly.

As for the voice, it seems like I get a cracking sound as soon as the voice spawns if I'm not near it. And since from what I can tell, the pole shattering has to do with how many cracks you've gotten, that feels a bit unfair.

Honestly though it's still a great game. I'll be playing this one outside the jam, and if the few bugs and timing issues could be ironed out a little bit, this game would be something I'd really be happy to suggest to people.

I love your storytelling and game design style, and finally having an audio fishing game with some real challenge is seriously awesome.

Thank you so much!

Developer(+1)

Wow that's super encouraging and motivates me to polish the game a lot once the Jam is ended!

I'm happy to read that players receive what I wanted to share with this game idea! 

Thank you so much for playing & this very helpful feedback!

(+1)

Yeah it really is quite good man. I appreciate the clear work you put in to make this game feel like a unique experience.

Submitted(+1)

This is a well crafted game, you solved the menu in a very clever way, as well as the increase in difficulty and the mechanics. I love everything about this game, I think this is the perfect entry for these jams. I only noticed a minor bug: the rod is crackling while reeling the fish even when it should not, but it's not a big problem at all. Hats off!

Developer(+1)

Thhhaaaaaanks ♥️ Yes I'm going to make a simple state machine for the rod, It should solve that!

Submitted(+1)

This game really moved me! I love how it is narrated :)

Developer (1 edit)

Thanks a lot! And you probably haven't enjoyed it as intended: an ugly bug made the luring mini game completely broken if using a resolution different than 720p! (It' s fixed)