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A jam submission

Shadow ChaserView game page

Platforming game where your previous runs come back to haunt you.
Submitted by blargansmarf — 2 days, 6 hours before the deadline
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Shadow Chaser's itch.io page

Results

CriteriaRankScore*Raw Score
Gameplay / Fun Factor#113.4673.467
Can't Wait For The DLC / Sequel#142.6672.667
Ready to Release for Money!#151.9331.933
Overall#202.4802.480
Art / Aesthetic#212.7332.733
Music & Sound#271.6001.600

Ranked from 15 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.

Concept Jam Submission Link
https://blargansmarf.itch.io/shadow-chaser

Prototype Jam Submission Link
https://blargansmarf.itch.io/shadow-chaser

Production Jam Submission Link
https://blargansmarf.itch.io/shadow-chaser

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Comments

Submitted(+1)

Love the concept, the movement and jumping along with trying to use the dash on the other side of the keyboard all felt a little clunky, but I still enjoyed playing through and the difficulty was just right, Fairly solid game, didn't run into anything game-breaking, enjoyable experience, keep it up!

Developer(+1)

Thanks for the play :)

Yeah keyboard controls and platformers don't go together. Fortunately I was able to get controller support up and running and that feels a million times better. 

Submitted(+1)

Really fun platforming concept. It seriously made me question myself when I would continuously dash to the exit on my first attempt and then every subsequent portion would be hell to run through. I also kept backing up to get a running start, which didn't work out well for me. That being said, I think it might help to add a button to reset the whole level back to the first shadow that way if you screw up and make the level harder to platform maybe you can try to make it easier by thinking through the process. 

I also think that it would help to add some coyote time on the jumps, I think it's really helpful in most platformers to have a small grace period after leaving the platform to still perform the initial jump.

Great aesthetic and concept! A lot of fun and a lot of interesting directions it could go from here!

Developer(+1)

Thanks for the play!

Coyote time is an amazing term that you've just taught me. I will for sure add that to the list of post jam work. Also a stage reset option is definitely coming as well.

Appreciate the feedback :)

Submitted(+1)

This sprint I'm glad your vision for the game appears to have come together. I fell like at 2-3 it just got a bit too punishing as the monster are basically 2 shadows camping you and there's no where to go.

I fell victim to getting stuck in the wall and had to start over. I think that for the purposes of this jam it would have been great if you could hit 'R' to restart the level as I got to 2-2 and got stuck :(

Developer

Thanks for the play :)

I will definitely be adding a stage restart option. That is definitely the most requested feature.

Second most requested feature is make the game easier lol :D

Submitted (1 edit) (+1)

I like the designs of the shadows. There's a nice contrast in design between the shadow you control and the shadows that come after.

Now that I got a chance to play in the levels, I think the controls shine the best in the flat horizontal levels where you can take advantage of your speed and dash. The vertical movement is extremely difficult to work with as you drop too quickly. This becomes a problem on the later levels, as reaching higher platforms requires being at the absolute peak of your double jumps, or in the case of 8-1, lining up the the character's hit box to go between the set of spikes. This makes the vertical element of the controls feel unreliable, which is detrimental for a precision platformer where you need to have confidence in all aspects of your manoeuvrability. Introducing some leeway on such sections, as well as having the downward acceleration from gravity be gradual instead of immediately falling at near full speed would make the vertical component of the movement feel consistent and controllable.

The level layout designs were quite interesting, especially levels 6 and 7 where the variety of starting points starts showing up. I think a nice addition to have would be a reset button for a restarting the current stage from level 1 in order to give them a chance to plan things out better. It's a shame that the spikes were only used in the last stage. 

The controls could use some improvements, but I still enjoyed the game and it's varied levels.

Developer(+1)

Thanks for the detailed feedback, super appreciated.

The vertical movement was something I definitely wanted to know how people felt about it. It's the only part that's not speed capped. There's no terminal velocity so the player can fall very very fast. I wanted the game to have a high jump but not feel too floaty. I'll need to work on it and see what feels good.

Also I appreciate you trying out the expert levels. I wasn't sure if anyone would actually try them.

Thanks for the play. I will definitely be saving this comment for notes :)

Submitted(+1)

I love the mechanic. Its simple, straightforward, but adds a dynamic to the levels beyond just adding new levels.

Just polish the sprites, add a background, add some animations, add more levels and I could see this released.

Developer

Thanks for the feedback! And I do fully intend to polish this up for an actual release.

Appreciate the play :)

Submitted(+1)

I love the premise of the game, I also quite like the visuals though admittedly it's quite simple, I would have loved to see a bg and even some small animations, it would have gone a long way in terms of art. I found little to no bugs and it's a well polished concept, all the levels are well done and designed, though stage 7 level 3 I could not finish as the platforming was almost impossible. Awesome work keep it up guys

Developer

Yeah you nailed my biggest regrets for sure. Music, sounds, animations, and background art were all unfortunately chopped for life reasons. I will however definitely be adding them post jam.

Thanks for the play :)

Submitted(+1)

It's an interesting premise for sure, though I think for the existing levels the difficulty the shadow imposes on me was diminishing as I went further. I hope to see this idea developed further with more complex levels, and maybe allow the player to restart a single stage and re-plan their movement from the start after learning what the later levels look like.

(The fourth stage was not meant to be beaten right?)

Developer

thanks for the play!

And yes the fourth stage can be beaten. You need to utilize the full gamut of your movement options. That means you need to be running, get a full first jump, a full second jump, and then a dash. There are actually 7 stages for the basic levels. Then 3 very difficult bonus stages :)

Submitted(+1)

Quite interesting mechanic, i didn't catched up the mechanic until like stage 2? Then it clicked in me what was happening and starting to see everything with different eyes, its definitely an interesting game, i recommend you to check out collisions with the ground, because some platforms require really precise input and it can be quite hard with the shadows.
Nice concept, keep going!

Developer

Thanks for the feedback!
And yeah I was watching some peeps play it and saw they were having trouble with some platform edges. I think the player's bottom part of the hitbox is too small. Need to tweak it a bit :)