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Rigged Referee's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Creativity | #1783 | 3.479 | 4.400 |
| Overall | #2723 | 3.004 | 3.800 |
| Presentation | #2752 | 3.004 | 3.800 |
| Enjoyment | #3454 | 2.530 | 3.200 |
Ranked from 10 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
How does your game fit the theme?
Our game reverses the roles of a traditional fighter game: instead of being one of the fighters, you are the referee trying to rig the match in favor of one fighter -- all without provoking the suspicions of the other.
Did your team create the vast majority of the art during the 48 hours?
Yes
We created the vast majority of the art during the game jam
Did your team create the vast majority of the music during the 48 hours?
Yes
We created the vast majority of the music during the game jam
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Comments
This is a great game, and a cool interpretation of the theme! Have to say, though - it was kinda unclear at first what the difference was between a blocked and a hit punch, since the sound effect and the boxers' poses was the same, until I noticed the flashing red effect. The game was still really fun once I got the hang of it, though!
Thank you, glad you enjoyed!! If we had more time, we would have definitely made the visual/auditory cues a little clearer for blocked hits versus punches, but it’s good that you were able to figure out the difference anyway. Appreciate you checking the game out :)
Jeffery the referee's smug look during the fight is the best part. Great work with this!
Thank you!! Glad you appreciated Jeffery — he’s quite a character :)
"The power of suspicion... in the palm of my hands."
GG Evan :)
Haha, perfect tagline. Thank you!! :D
Interesting concept, however the execution is lacking. The way you made the fighters fight makes this more of a waiting game; in addition, since there are really only 2 moves (punch and blocked punch), there is hardly any strategy: you just wait until someone punches someone, and if it was blocked, you give a point if the left guy punched but not the right guy. A game like this could work if the combat was more nuanced:
I realise the time constraints (don't ask about how only I made an actual model for my frogs in the last 10 minutes xD) but this concept sadly requires mode variety, unlike some arcade game concepts.
Also, it's common practice to upload the executables/game files for each platform separately. :)
Yeah, I can definitely agree with those criticisms. Unfortunately due to time constraints we weren't able to flesh out the fighter behavior and game loop as much as we'd hoped; ideally, they would have been a bit more aggressive, had more varied movesets (ducking, jumping, dashing, knockback, knockouts, and recoveries were all on the table at one point), and had some more personality. Your idea about fighting with other parts of the body (e.g. kicking) would have also been pretty cool!
We did consider working in penalties, too -- in that case, the referee would be removing from a fighter's score. It just became a bit of a control scheme nightmare and we abandoned that idea in favor of a minimum viable product. If we'd had more time to think about implementation, that would have been another great way to extend the game's mechanics!
As for the build situation -- yeah, that would have been the move. I was scrambling to get builds together in the last few minutes and this was my first time trying to support multiple operating systems. MacOS was especially tricky since it packaged it up as a folder with ".app" at the end of the name which I can't really upload. I guess the standard solution is some external application from itch, but I didn't think I had the time to try to set that up. Anyway, lesson learned for next time :)
Thanks for the constructive comments and thanks for taking the time to play!
Very interesting concept and great execution! The music is very catchy and the sound effects are perfect! In my last run I got some good RNG where my player punched 3 times in a row giving me an easy win haha
Thank you!! Super glad you enjoyed the game (plus the sounds and music!). Congrats on the win -- guess the stars aligned for ya :)
Yes they did, good luck on winning the game jam! You're definitely talented :D
Thank you so much!! You're pretty talented yourself, too! Best of luck :D
Thanks my friend!
Great idea and gameplay is nice but it could be a bit more fast-paced. Although I am someone who likes my things faster than most so take this advice with a pinch of salt.
Totally fair criticism -- we definitely would have tweaked the pace given a little more time to develop the mechanics. Glad you enjoyed nonetheless!
I love this concept. I see a lot of potential in the mechanics. And the music really brings out the mood.
Great job!
Thank you so much!! The music was one of my particular focuses during development, so I'm really happy to hear it helped make things more engaging. Glad you enjoyed!
Thanks for the feedback! Definitely agreed about the pacing issues, but I’m glad the core mechanic was engaging enough.