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Box+Box's itch.io pageResults
Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
Gameplay/Fun | #3 | 3.214 | 3.214 |
Graphics/Art | #3 | 3.429 | 3.429 |
Audio | #3 | 3.071 | 3.071 |
Overall | #3 | 3.129 | 3.129 |
Devlog | #4 | 3.571 | 3.571 |
Theme | #9 | 2.357 | 2.357 |
Ranked from 14 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
Game Engine / Tools
Unity
Devlog link
https://maxnitals.itch.io/boxplusbox/devlog/335765/making-of-boxbox
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Comments
Solid puzzle game 👍. And I made it to the end 😁!
Gameplay
The puzzles were fun. Not super difficult but not too simple either. Had to think a little bit at the last one. Level design was good. The controls could be better. The cubes roll slowly and sometimes get stuck. The sliding of the orange cube in the last slot was a nice feeling and fun animation. More levels with smoother controls would be cool for a possible update.
Graphics
Not super special but it all fit together. The main character is nicely designed. The cubes are of course a bit simple but they fit the environment and ambiance. Some more effects when the cubes merge or split or even roll through the barrier would polish the whole thing up a bit. The credits and end screen looked pretty.
Audio
Calm background track. So you can focus on the puzzles. Would have been nice if the pushing of the cubes or passing the barriers would have had a nice sound effect as well.
Theme
Enhance the cubes fit the theme, but maybe a little more could have been done. Character upgrades or something like that.
Devlog
Good devlog with explanations and images. Nice to read how and what. Top!
Nice puzzle game and would definitely be curious for more levels and increased difficulty in an update of the game. Keep up the good work💪.
Thank you!
I really like the look of this game! I felt that the movement speed was a bit too slow for some of the puzzles, but I still thought this game was really cool! The puzzles you came up with were very fun to solve too, nothing too difficult but still taking a second to figure out.
Thanks! Next time I will take a closer look at the speed of the character and how it works with the gameplay
Rated the game… Hope that you would rate my game too…
Good work…
Thank you!
😃
I'm evidently a pretty impatient person so for me the movement speed seemed unnecessarily slow. I found moving the boxes also quite tedious as the interactions seemed buggy/inconsistent, like they'd randomly stop being dragged/pushed by me, and then sometimes the fact that you can't easily stop them was annoying, rolling green cubes into an orange gate in the last level by accident, for example. Speaking of the last level, I encountered a bug where it never gave me the option to press space to jump up the green cube - I pushed the green cube into blue cubes counter-clockwise around the map, I dunno if that caused some weirdness?
I liked the music, and the art was generally good though the way the character interacts with the barriers was very visually confusing, especially in the first area. It seems it works okay towards the top of the screen, but around halfway to the bottom the character just walks over them. Not a huge deal, but felt I'd point it out if you plan to keep going on this.
I think overall this is a really solid game and you did a great job, even if I do have my complaints. This is definitely something to be proud of! :)
Thank you! Yeah, in the future I will be testing character movement and interactions more.
Interesting game, I have much fun while playing this game. But i found few bugs.
Thanks for playing! Yeah, there are always bugs :D
Spectacular game, love the theme and that puzzles, are very good ones.
A good level design to learn in progress, the final scene was very interesting, and the music is very good.
I will love to see moreof this game x3 really nice one.
Thanks! I was afraid that the puzzles would seem very simple to everyone, or very difficult :D
Ayyy really nice!
I really, REALLY like the 2D character on 3D ambient you've made; really really nice.
The gameplay was simple and nice although learning it was pretty tricky - if you don't notice the block falling on the other at the beginning you can get kinda stuck, which I did. Also, kinda weird that there's a button to push the cubes rather than to pick up/down the cubes.
These issues aside, I really liked everything else - the music, the sound, the graphics, all very solid. Nice job!
Thanks! For some reason, the idea popped into my head that I wanted to drag the cubes like physical objects so that they flip, roll. Although I understand that for such a game it would be more logical to make a static movement. I wanted to create situations where you carry a cube, let it go, and it accidentally rolls into a force field of the wrong color and comes back. And you're like: "Damn!" Haha
That did happen a lot - and it was more annoying than fun, really. Doing a wrong move manouvering a cube and having to go all the way back and slowly and carefully bring it around to complete the puzzle isn't reallly fun in a puzzle game; the game's about solving the puzzle, not about executing it, after all.
Great job! Really fun , nice simple mechanic but the level design gave it a god level of difficulty, I like the 2.5d art style too , keep it up this is good work!
Thanks! Thank you for playing
SOLID WORK!
In your devlog you mention trying to create an atmospheric game, well good job on that.
I like how the little consoles show the current color of the wall so that even if wall if out of view you can know.
Also the splitter mechanic introduces good gameplay.
The camera controller could be a teensy bit better tho as it was nauseating at times, as well as the box grabbing mechanic it sometimes didn't register and had to go and grab box again.
p.s. In your devlog you talk about mesh colliders, they should generally never be used in games as they are too performance intensive, most gameobjects can be approximated using a set of primitive colliders. Like in FPS shooter games the player hit box is not a mesh collider rather a set of mostly capsule colliders fit into each body part.
Thank you! Yeah, a lot of feedback mentioning camera movement problem and grabbing cubes, i will surely check on this problems in the future works.
About Splitter mechanic
You know, when i'm started making levels there was just a change color of a force fields mechanic. And previosly i never made a puzzle game before, so i started to notice that such a small number of mechanics transforms game into "Find a very obvious course of actions". So i added new ones, and there was no such problem for me after that.
About mesh colliders:
Yeah, I understand that primitive shapes are easier to calculate on a computer and I totally agree that it's better to place primitive colliders. But if only Unity had an easier way to arrange colliders. They have to be moved for a long time and each is a component of the object. Perhaps there are some tools for this that make this process easier.
I had a great time playing this game. It wasn't too easy, I had to use my head for a quick minute but it wasn't too hard that I was sitting at my desk with steam coming out of my ears either. The aesthetic combined with the puzzle mechanics gave me hardcore portal vibes but it also had some Assassin's Creed Brotherhood vibes with the Animus puzzles when you played as Desmond.
Noticeable bug that I encountered: on the first level that block splitting is introduced (Level 3 I think?), there is a noticeable bug where if you push one of the green cubes a little too far to the left of the split pillar, it will get stuck in the floor and prompt you to press Space. I assume this is because that level still has whatever code/prefab you used for the mechanic from the previous level where you could jump on the green cube. Just a heads up! I thought it was intentional at first cause it happened like right away when I first started the level, I didn't realize it was a bug until I realized what the purple pillar actually did.
Below, I will post my ratings for each category and my reasonings behind each rating I can be detailed with my feedback
Gameplay/Fun (5 Stars) - Honestly didn't see anything wrong with the gameplay design. It was honestly a triple-A design. The game just needs some more levels, puzzle mechanics and programming polish (bug fixing) and I'd believe it to be a triple-A title if I didn't know any better. I did, however, get a little frustrated with your behavior for moving the cubes around. It was a little annoying and quirky but honestly I'll let that one slide in terms of the rating since it was just something I could probably get used to. However, I would suggest that you make it snappier or find a different way for the player to move the boxes.
Graphics/Art (3 Stars) - The graphics were very simplistic but I did like the sprite for the player. Simplistic doesn't always mean bad so I can't give it anything lower than 3 but I also can't give it too much more since there wasn't really anything impressive about it. I was content with it.
Audio (4 Stars) - There wasn't much in terms of quantity when it came to music and sounds but the quality of those few present audio files were enough to prompt me to give it 4 stars. Good job!
Theme (3 Star) - This game does fit the theme but the theme doesn't play much of a role in terms of game design. It is essential that you enhance all of the cubes in order to get to the door at the end but most of the gameplay involves figuring out how to navigate the cubes. I give this a middle rating of 3 since it isn't a bad take on the theme but it doesn't play that significant of a role in the game either.
Devlog (4 Star) - Honestly, I have to be in a mood to read devlogs as it isn't something I always enjoy doing (I much prefer watching video dev logs cause I had crippling ADHD lmao) and I don't even know why there's a rating for the devlog when the devlog is optional. I did skim through it and it seems like you put some effort into it. I like the structure of it and your use of images and your placement of said images so it seemed 4 star worthy. Nice job!
Bro give us more levels and expand on this game please. I could genuinely see it becoming a popular game on Steam with some more content. I'll be following its progress if you decide to continue on it! Also, check out my game if you get the chance!
Very extensive comment, thank you! I thought about continuing development, but i'm afraid it's not top priority right now. Maybe in the future :) Thanks
I absolutely loved playing this game! Thank you for submitting it! There was one spot on the 3rd level where the green cube would get stuck in on of the lift spaces (so you could jump on it) that wasn't actually there which made me have to restart the level a few times, but that is a small bug. I really enjoyed the animation, sounds, and feel of the game overall! The camera could be a little jarring at times, but truly a really solid game. Thank you!
Thanks for playing!