Play game
Allen the Alien's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Jam Theme | #9 | 4.115 | 4.115 |
| Graphics | #12 | 3.885 | 3.885 |
| Overall | #15 | 3.600 | 3.600 |
| Crafting Mechanics | #18 | 3.769 | 3.769 |
| Gameplay (Fun Factor) | #33 | 3.192 | 3.192 |
| Audio | #35 | 3.038 | 3.038 |
Ranked from 26 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
Which theme was used for the game, and in what way?
Alien (playable character) & Expire (when use a gem on the pickaxe, it gets conusmed over time) & Crafting :-)
Leave a comment
Log in with itch.io to leave a comment.
Comments
I am really enjoying this one! Needing to gather from different colors in order to craft stronger and better tools to inevitably escape the planet is really cool! I just have a small complaint that for some reason the ui on my computer was huge so the bottom that displays the socket timer consumed 1/9 of my screen which made it annoying going downward since I could not see in that direction. It also be nice if in a future update/patch you'd add a simple save system since I somehow got stuck in between some red and orange trees and couldn't get out (I was just exploring at that moment). Loving this little game a lot! Sensational work!
Glad you like my game. I will upload today a new version with a few fixes and improvments.
Could you post a screenshot of your resolution issues? On which resolution do you play? For the jam I created all the UIs to fit on 1920x1080. It is possible that some elements get cut off on smaller resolutions.
I will not spend much more time on updating the jam-version. But I started to make a version with more features based on the same core mechanic. That means I rewrote the whole item/inventory/crafting system and added a new system to create much larger maps. Currently I am rewriting the player input system.
Since the game will be much bigger and will have tones of items I even created my own editors inside Unity.
And of course - there will be a save system. Currently I save the inventory to a json file which can actullay be modified. This is kind of cheating but if players like to do so, that's fine with me. ;-)
Really nice game. I think for the jam you should have made it a little quicker to get through though! It's a bit of a grind! Though I see from your other comments that you're actively updating this and improving it, so I'm sure you'll fix a lot of these issues. :)
It would have been nice to have 2 or 3 music tracks, just to mix it up a bit.
Thanks for your feedback.
There are many things I could have done better but since this was my first jam I am happy with the result. ;-) I think my 2nd jam will be JamCraft 6 :-P
And as you already noticed - the post jam update is ready with fixes to all issues that were reported.
I will keep the music thing in mind for the next jam.
I really like what you’ve built here. Expecially your art, sound effects and animations are incredible! A also think the design is very nice, it’s very clear what you are supposed to do and how you can interact with the environment (like the red outline for resources you can’t yet mine etc). I expecially liked the crafting mechanic with the different gems, it really was something refreshingly different.
The main problem with the game is that there is (really) only one thing to do, and that is grind resources like crazy (which i’ve seen you already adjusted in the new version) and therefore it gets boring quite fast. (In case you’re thinking of expanding the game, you should give the player something else he can do)
PS: I downloaded the desktop version and was noticing the lines between the background tiles, the issue is easily fixable if you use Unity`s Pixel Perfect Camera :)
Thank you for the detailed feedback. I am glad you like my game!
My goal was to create a full playable game with a (realy short) story so that the player now what's going on and what he/she is supposed to do. Of course I had tons of ideas I wanted to implement but 10 days is a rater short time frame. So I had to focus on one thing and make that one thing as good as possible with the risk that it gets repetitive and quickly boring. I see this game as a prototype to test the gem mechanics to get some feedback to see how players like it.
I wrote a short concept of how this prototype could turn into a full game - based on this core mechanic. I already started to work on the new version.
I noticed the lines between background tiles as well. I am actually using the Pixel Perfect Camera but I am also using the Cinemachine package from Unity for camera moving and camera bounding box. And instead of the default renderer I am using the Universal Render Pipeline with the new 2D renderer. I guess the issue came in the combination of those things. I will fix it eventually. :-)
I found the issue with the pixel perfect camera.
During the jam I was experimenting with a paralax effect with forground elements and changed the camera to perspective. Later I removed the forground and forgot to change the camera back to orthographic. :-(
I added this change to the upcoming update. It should look fine now.
I really liked the game, you used a lot of creativity in small details. I really liked the art and the music. They combined well with the alien theme.
Regarding performance, my game lagged insanely. I assume you’re loading the map at runtime but something didn’t work out lol
(I played on web)
Thanks - makes me happy to hear you like my game.
I am really sorry, that you have such bad experience with lags.
The video I uploaded in the previous comment is from the update I will upload after the rating is over. I noticed lags as well in the browser version - but it was too late to fixed before submission ended. In the current version the entire map gets loaded and is active even the stuff the player doesn't see. The Windows version can handle the large amount of objects better. In the coming update I load and unload stuff dynamically and let you run the game at solid 60 frames.
You can try to download the Windows version - it should run with better performance, hopefully.
Here is a short update preview video with upcoming changes:
The update will be available on 4th of May 2020 with following changes:
* Massive performance optimization
* Game runs now on solid 60 frames
* Chunk system added for dynamic map loading
* Display amount of items in inventory available when crafting
* Decreased amount items needed for crafting * FPS counter added (F9 show/hide)
* Custom mouse cursor added
Good work, however the game needs a liitle bit more indication
Thanks!
how do you mean - more indication?
I am working on an update right now - if you can tell me what you exactly mean, I can implement that as well in the coming update.
At first I had no idea how to get gems at all :/ Maybe you can indicate that a little bit better
OK, thanks.
I added new hints on the ground. It might look a little cryptic - but it is basically the loot table with drop chance :-D
Looking great!
Such a great art , its simple , but really interesting, really polish. it sure seem short but totally understandable for the time limits. Congratualation! You do an excellent job.
this is the best game in this jam
Wow - thank you!!
I'm so happy that you like my game so much!
Nice Game, Cool graphics, a little grindy but it is ok... I like it! Keep it up!
Thanks - I will upload a balanced version of the game once the rating is over.
Great job! I enjoyed playing this. Using the different gems on the pickax was a clever idea.
Thanks - the idea was also to use the gems on the sword to fight different enemies. but I guess you already noticed - there are no enemies or swords (yet). :-)
On a similar note of what others said, the game is interesting and the graphics are nicely done. Unfortunately, the game can feel repetitive at times and that may be where it falls short. Overall, I think it is a good game for this jam since you were on a limited time frame.
Thanks - unfortunately the 10 days past by to quickly and I had the reduce the amount of features. I will upload a post-jam update with a more balanced crafting mechanic.
I actually played the game through completely, and it was very cute and creative. My one complaint would have to be the 'grindiness' of it. I spent more time searching for things than I did discovering anything new. It also had some bad lag + vsync issues on my end.
I have to say that it wasn't my type of game, but I can appreciate all of the effort that clearly went into it, and I wish you the best of luck with the Jam!
Thank you for your kind words!
Regarding the "grindiness" you are right. I will upload an update with balancing adjustments once the rating is over. I had more ideas about crafting and some more depth for the gameplay but I had to reduce the scope for this jam in order upload a fully functional game.
Did you play the browser version or the Windows version? I noticed bad performance in the browser as well but it runs smooth on Windows (I have a high end gamer PC). I havent done any performance optimization yet. With the post jam update I will add some dynamic loading/deloading of map parts.
Thanks for playing the game to the end!
I'd love to see a more balanced version of this game :) I played the browser version, so I'll actually give the executable a download and see how that works out. Will update my review based on the Windows version.
I am working on a huge performance boost. Since the game has tons of gameobjects (a few 1000 trees and rocks) it makes the level on slower PCs a bit laggy.
I created a chunk logic and load only objects that are actually visible to the player. On my PC I increased the frame rate from 50 to 640!!! :-P
This new version will be available after the rating period.
Lots of details like sound effects and little animations on interactions. Feels a bit grindy but great job on the polish though!
Thank you for your nice comment!
Yeah, you'r right - it is a bit grindy. I will upload an update with balancing adjustments once the rating is over.
I am thinking about making it a bigger game with more features and a deeper crafting system.
Lots of details like sound effects and little animations on interactions. Feels a bit grindy but great job on the polish though!
Charming game with cute graphics. Resource collecting felt nice.
Thanks - I am glad to hear you enjoyed my game.
Very fun game!
Thank you for your feedback!
Thanks - glad you liked it.
I enjoyed the game. It has a simple mechanic but well-executed, good work!
Thank you! I had a lot of fun making the game - even though I spent way more time than I actually wanted. :-)
Nice!