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The Blocky Diemen Inc. Team Bonding Dodgeball Bonanza's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Creativity | #57 | 4.309 | 4.309 |
| Presentation | #64 | 4.527 | 4.527 |
| Overall | #71 | 4.200 | 4.200 |
| Enjoyment | #295 | 3.764 | 3.764 |
Ranked from 55 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?
Team of dice playing Dodgeball
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?
No
We used pre-existing audio
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Comments
The artwork and music are great. The animations and scene transitions are great. The concept of the game is good, but i feel falls to much to randomness. in my third match, just due to chance, the AI was able to take out all but one member of my team before I got my turn. The changing numbers every shot means how far you go each turn is luck based more then skill, and you can easily end up in a no-win scenario. Adjusting gameplay to somehow favor strategy over rng would help. however the idea is good and the presentation was well done.
Oh, this one's a definite standout! Really original spin on the theme, intuitive gameplay with surprising strategic depth, energetic presentation-- What's there not to like?
Amazing game for a 48h game jam ! You did a great funny puzzle game and art and music fit very well ! Congrats !
Looks and feels are really nice, gratz. I really like how You went all in with the mechanics and explored almost all possibilities in the field, like this randomizing points to the ally when hitting it. I also liked that the dead dice stay in the field and block movement.
Honestly I think the mouse control was almost okay, though its not that good on touch (there's no way to see the number on the dice above because it says "pass"). And I see You apparently have no idea how to fix it. The throw button could very well be in the middle of the screen and there would be no problem with pressing beneath it. You could also utilize double taps, like a confirmation to pass, to move, or even You could do changing modes (move/pass/throw) but this could slow down the flow of game. If You focus only on mouse, then you could also utilize right mouse button to pass, simple - though probably not so if You have a touchpad.
I really disliked the RNG. The game can go well and then suddenly it flips on its head and you lost. Great. You could fix this by just providing what values will come next. Like in tetris, where You see what piece will be next, You could just show the next number and change only one each time. This would however change the game a bit, minimized the chaos factor. You could also just show all next numbers, but it would be difficult to do it in a visually pleasant way.
Maybe it could go completely another way around, like displaying the numbers on the field, and have them randomly move left, right, up down. Or randomize only at the beginning of the game, but when You kill the enemy You get its weaker number, which would balance the game evenly. Possibilities are probably endless;)
Yeah I really only made it for mouse (with the undocumented hotkeys WASD + space to support it too). And I think it works decently but of course there are some arrangements where multiple passes and throw are too clumped together. Touch should work pretty similarly except of course it's way less accurate and hover is an awkward hold and then your hand is covering it (and can't even release on the same spot or it will trigger the click too). But yeah, loads of options what to do if I were to target touch devices, especially on smaller screen, too.
Yeah the RNG can get quite RNG indeed. I think it serves its purpose ok enough in the current small but of course were I to extend on the game, something needs to be done. As you've explained too, loads of options on different ways to go.
Thanks for the feedback! ❤️
What a game! What an excellent game! The moment I understand passing and realized it's kinda puzzle game.. Oh my.. It is turn based but still a lot of action there. Music helps a lot. Even that small detail when I tried overshoot my teammate and it decrease his value with that ouch animation.. And it has multiplayer.. This has to go to top 10!
Thanks! Yea I did intentionally leave the mechanics "untold" so that player could have their own aha moments when they figure them out. Of course it can bite me in the ass too if the mechanics aren't simple enough. That's where proper testing would fit in in a normal scenario. 😅 And the bonking mechanic doesn't just decrease the value but fully randomizes it so it's a tool to be used defensively (though of course a bit of a gamble).
Oooooh, I used it twice and it always generated X-1 value so I didn't tried it again. Good to know, now I don't have to idle 20 turns in the last level :D
Stellar presentation! One of the most beautiful game I have seen so far. The art is cute and the game has its own thingy, really liked that!
Gameplay-wise, I had a decent amount of fun but it felt a bit too random maybe? (well, we’re talking about dice right?). I had one session where my whole team just got butchered round 1 by the PC without being able to do anything.
Apart from that I really liked it. Additions and improvements are limitless! Special powers, special terrain, characters (team captain with bending shots?)…
Sooo juicy! I like it
the way the music shifts around keeping it from getting too repetitive. the art looks excellent very clean, and readable, the color choices work great to contrast the background and both come together for a nice cute and wholesome look.
I certainly didn't die on the tutorial level trying to figure it out and I don't know who told you that but after a round of messing around the gameplay was intuitive and reminded me of a light version of tactics style gameplay.
Unfortunately There's not much feedback I have in regards to improvement, one pretty tiny thing was I didn't know what hot seat was on the menu until I clicked it. I suppose there is room for a few quality of life things like a slightly more comprehensive tutorial and level select but again I'm really digging deep for that. Over all excellent job!
Haha yeah, I guess the "hot seat" is a bit of a blast from the past. As both a term and a play mode as well.
For the tutorial, I really intentionally went very minimal this time as the main mechanics are so simple. The player is bound to notice the options they have, pass and clear come up in text form as soon as you get the ball and movement squares are highlighted too. With a little bit of experimentation those everyone should find how to do those. And most likely even before that, you've already witnessed one round of enemy giving you an example. The base "if attack value > defender -> ko" mechanic can of course be not immediately understood either but shouldn't take too long.
And yeah, losing in it is of course very possible and I don't even think that unlikely. All it really takes is one majorly awful throw for your team and then the enemy not having that bad luck. And of course if you derp around learning the mechanics, the enemy will have even more of a chance for that. 😅 At least there is pretty much zero impact on losing, especially if it happens quick and not from a long drawn out battle.
Don't think level select would really bring anything to it on the current state. But of course if I were to continue developing it further. Well depending on what route I took it of course. Right now I'm mostly thinking of the roguelite route where you can acquire new skills that change up the functionalities and dice interactions and make interesting combos etc and you see how far you can take your team. But of course that way needs a good amount of thought on how to do it so that the RNG doesn't screw you too hard.
Thanks for the feedback! ❤️
After reflection hot seat might have just been a gap/brain fart for me. It didn't impede my experience. It feels weird to clarify but I think it was simply useless feedback by me in the first place.
But it's a good point though. The term is indeed archaic and not that widely known anymore as games nowadays don't really have such mode. Hell, even all local multiplayer modes are a bit of a dying breed unfortunately. And if someone doesn't know the term, there is a risk of them clicking on it to see what it does, if it toggles something etc. Exactly what I wouldn't want and that's why the button is smaller than the play button and so on. So I think more clarity would have been good there. If the button said "hot seat multiplayer", at least most people would get the point that it's some sort of multiplayer mode.
Damn. You're clearly a game jam pro. The visuals are really fun and bouncy and the game mechanics are satisfying. It feels great to decimate the enemy team in one round with some clutch passes and good rolls. Even though there's a ton of luck you can mitigate a lot of it though sometimes that can involve playing chicken against the AI for several turns in order to cheese out a win.
Fantastic game! Thanks for this.
Everything about this game was excellent. The visuals were very charming and unique. The core mechanics had the perfect blend of strategy and RNG, meaning that it was mainly strategy with RNG to spice things up. Even when the AI knocked down all of my troops, I still could strategize and win. The AI in this game is really smart. It felt like it was almost like a player! Overall, probably one of the best games of the jam! Great job!
The presentation and core mechanics are really neat! The AI is excellent, and this game definitely manages to keep me engaged... Well done!
Very interesting mechanics!
Now I see why you complained about my AI when I see this clever one you've made, it was fun watching it putting it's plan to work.
I'm guessing it's some sort of backwards targeting? Like it knows what dice it wants to hit and then brute forces its way to see if it is possible from it's current state? Or maybe it's just brute forcing from the current state forward and picking the best result. I would like to know what method you use.
The only thing I had troubles with was clicking on the square behind another dice, but I guess your hotkeys probably helps with that.
Great work!
Yea just brute forcing all the way. 😅 Checking all the possible option combinations up until throw and from those picking a random option with the highest knock out target.
Polished and really fun to play. It feels super satisfying when your plans go the right way and when the other side rolls higher dice, it surprisingly doesn't feel unfair for me. Overall a very well-designed game and I absolutely love it!
Thanks! ❤️ Yeah I thought that it wouldn't feel too bad either as both sides are playing by the exact same rules. Well the enemy does get better dice in the end but the AI not playing at all perfectly kinda balances that out. And the even if you get completely wiped out without any chance of fighting back, you don't really lose anything and restarting is quick.
First of all, Kudos on the visuals. I love goofy animations and the music, it does really set the tone for the game. The gameplay is solid too, a unique twist to the tactics game genre. I can completely obliterate my opponent with the RNG nature and good placement (although the same can be said about the opponent )
Very cute game! I love how when they celebrate and jump is how they reroll haha
Very, VERY well made and polished game, its amazing! Gameplay-wise I think its a little unforgiving and too much luck based, you get bad dices, you lose, thats it. Maybe add a way for players to counterbalance bad luck somehow, maybe bad dices allow you to move 2 squares instead of one, idk. Anyway, great great submission, congratulations!!
Great polish and presentation. I had some troubles with the UI blocking my view, and I feel like balance could be improved a bit. Its annoying when you get wiped out in one turn without a chance to fight back. I loved the puzzle movement aspect of it, of getting the ball to the best die for the job. Good job.
This game has a great vibe, really well polished and presented. I really love the simplicity and the set-up-and-spike rhythm that the passing mechanic gives, something about it is so satisfying to me. The donk mechanic was a neat touch, and it really had me pining for more systems with which to manipulate the dice and play defensively until the rolls were in my favour.
I also have to agree about the team colour comment - I was irrationally upset that those yellow D6s turned against me!
Awesome work overall, I really hope you keep working on this or something similar - it's really captivating!
Great job — as always your games are second to none in terms of juice and polish!
The good:
Graphics, audio, animations. Everything is bouncy and the UI is responsive and has character.
I really liked the passing mechanic, and the “bonk” mechanic once I realized how it worked. There’s a good amount of strategy for planning out moves while making sure you have your best odds of reducing damage the next turn.
Your team slowly gets more and more hats
Areas of improvement:
The UI for passing and throwing could be better. There was at least one time I got confused which player was holding the ball, and at least one time I clicked “throw” on accident while trying to pass the ball to the player ahead of me (lost me the finals too!)
Obviously the die rolling is a central mechanic given the theme of the jam, but there were times it felt pretty bad — especially given that there are certain enemies that are literally impossible to kill/block if they get slightly lucky. I’m not sure if you had some behind-the-scenes logic to help the player out on the RNG, but if not that might be a way to help a little. (Something like power-ups, such as shields or damage multipliers, might help give the player more tools to fight against the odds as well)
I think this might be a game where having really good enemy AI might actually be a bad thing. There were a few times the enemy AI pulled some crazy maneuver to take out my highest numbers that involved a four or five member pass, and proceeded to wipe my team in one turn. Given that the enemy’s dice are so much stronger than the player’s, maybe it’s okay if the AI blunders a little more often.
Honestly all of those are pretty nitpicky in the scheme of games made in 48 hours. Amazing work!
Cool, you actually noticed the bonk mechanic (exactly the same name I called it in code too) and the correct use of it. The bonk failing the throw was there pretty much since the beginning but it was actually quite a late addition to add that re-randomization to it too making it a (pretty much the only) defensive tool.
Yeah definitely the pass/throw UI could be better. Just not quite sure how. 😅 I myself too did quite a lot of accidental bonks while trying to quickly pass to the other dice right on front. I guess one easy improvement at least could be to tweak the throw button placing so that it doesn't cover other dice so much.
There is no nudging on RNG going on at all so yeah, the bigger dice are obviously outclassing you by a lot and you'll require some good luck to take them out (and not get one round wiped by em). I think for the current state of the game it's fine but if I were to continue it, I think I'd add more of a progression and skills etc which can balance out the odds.
The AI does indeed always pick the biggest die they can take out. It's not perfect by any means, at least it doesn't take bonks into account and sometimes loses track of all the passing/moving steps. I thought those (and the big advantage of going against D4s on the early stages) were enough to balance the AI. Usually I add some random chance for the AI to do "derp" and pick some option randomly which I can then decrease to slowly increase the difficulty but didn't feel like this needed that treatment.
Thanks a lot for the detailed feedback! ❤️
Everything about this game is just really pleasant and enjoyable. Good work all around!