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Interspellar's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Audio | #17 | 3.630 | 3.630 |
| Originality | #22 | 3.889 | 3.889 |
| Overall | #42 | 3.370 | 3.370 |
| Fun | #45 | 3.074 | 3.074 |
| Design | #47 | 3.037 | 3.037 |
| Graphics | #55 | 3.000 | 3.000 |
| Topic | #63 | 3.148 | 3.148 |
Ranked from 27 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
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Comments
Even as a native english speaker I had no idea what most of these words were, you definitely should have gone for more common words. I had fun playing but it did feel unfair at times. I would start the player off with two letters first rather than one. Also I didn't really understand your interpretation of the theme, it wasn't really in how long the word was since you didn't really have control over that (unless you failed guessing one word, in which case you're going to fail the level anyway).
I think you have simply misunderstood how the game works. The word is not set at the beginning of the round, it evolves as it is steered by player and computer - it's not just hangman. Surely you must have noticed that you could control this, since you get the first move. Thus, you actually have a lot of control over the length of the word, by thinking of how to finish it. I think more advanced play involves cutting off the computer, rather than just let it play - which is really the essence of most strategic play in all games. In terms of theme, well, I find this a bit ungenerous. Considering this was a very strictly officiated game jam, I'm not suring your judging all the hard work that went into this quite in the spirit of your own jam. Your thoughts?
When playing it, I was under the impression that the word was set from the beginning and that it was like hangman, maybe I just personally wasn't able to understand that from the introductory text. I do think that strategic games like this would benefit from some tutorial but of course that's easier said than done with the time limit.
Just because I didn't properly understand the game doesn't mean I didn't enjoy playing it, I had fun and I don't think it's a bad game at all. Also remember I may be the host but I am judging the games just like everyone else - my rating has no more effect than yours. I'm just trying to give constructive criticism, doesn't mean you need to take it or listen to it.
And yes, I also liked the hats.
Gave it another play to try and play it properly this time. I'm going to be honest, it wasn't overly clear from the introductory text how to play, at least I wouldn't have been able to know how to play if you hadn't told me. But I did have more fun playing it the way it was intended.
As a non native english speaker, I strugled a bit finding out the words haha It's a little hard to understand what to do. But thats a great idea! Well done!
I enjoyed this! It was a really creative take on the theme, and relatively well executed at that. Some of the words were really far out there, and the difficulty was... odd... (I got 15 on my first try and then negative points for awhile after that) but overall a very good time! I appreciated the hats.
Thanks man, difficulty can be...difficult.
This feels like it has so much potential. I enjoyed the concept of the game, but the issues that I had were
- The dictionary you chose was so bug that many of the words arent really real words that anyone would know
- You could win by adding an S on the end of a word, maybe take out any word that ends in S or make it a tie if the final word ends in S.
Thanks for the feedback. These are both interesting issues - to address them individually;
1. They are all real, actual words...English is a big language. However whether they are reasonable is a more difficult question and one not easily sorted by just reducing word length. Overall however the strategic player still has a lot of opportunity to cut off a word at source by thinking ahead.
2. This is what is known in games as zugswang and it can seem a bit cheap. However, there are lots of ways to extend a word by one letter other than 's', for instance by adding 'y', so this is difficult to judge without breaking inner consistency. personally I think that avoiding giving the computer a plural is just part of the game, like not playing a passive game in chess and allowing a pawn to reach the end of the board.
Fair points, I'll going to try playing this at home with other humans and see how it goes, I like the idea
I mean, don't get me wrong, your points are all really important and definitely part of tuning game feel, it's just hard to do without extensive testing, which is what its getting right now ;)
It starts really confusing, but a couple minutes in and I was enjoying more. I would never come up with something like Bookworm for a jam, really interesting.
I couldn't go very far because my English vocabulary is very short, but nice game.
All good, i see you're enjoying the other games, if you want to try a non language one, try smooth ops 2
Whew, this game was awesome! I played it for way longer than the other games I've checked out so far. The transitions were nice, the hats were better, and I was somehow able to win a few times! My high score was 10 though. You should probably add a two player mode after the jam ends.
Thanks, that's real nice and congrats on winning. 2-player would be excellent! Also a leaderboard for each level would be nice.
I am very glad you like the hats.
Nice game! It's definitely an interesting idea. I was a bit confused at first, but once I got the hang of it it was pretty fun!
The most important question is, what did you think of the hats?
10/10, would hat again.
The game sounds and looks great. The name is very clever! I could not understand how to play though. I would type letters that showed up hoping to get points. I said "No" during the first dialog prompt and it just ends the game, unexpected but funny. Could you update the description of the game with how to play? I would like to give it a try.
Just click yes! Have another go, sounds like you need to have a bit more of a try ;)
Haha, I did eventually click yes. The explanation given by Ralf did not help me understand what I should be doing to get points though.
I will have a word with Ralf and get him to rewrite his program.
I gave it another shot! So essentially we are both spelling a word. I need to choose the next letter in the word and get it bigger. It makes sense now!
Loved the sound and the look of the game and it´s a great game idea. So you can be proud of what you created in the last days
the concept is fun, once you understand it. But an issue is that it wasn't clearly explained at the beginning. I got 13 as my highest score, couldn't beat it tho. Overall it's a fun game! good job!
sorry it wasn't more clear
I liked the music and the idea :) The monologe at the start was a very fun intreduction to the game.
Nice job!
Great concept! and so difficult. I got negative points the first 3 times :D
its like getting over it for crossword enthusiasts.
I get it bro! Check mine if you have time so :D
I love it! the difficulty is just right in my opinion
everyone gets a slightly different game because of the words coming up. You have to think ahead a bit and see if you can close out a word early.
Very interesting concept, but difficult. Like others before me, I haven't advanced over level 4.
I'm not sure what the condition for advancing to the next level is. Maybe only if you have a perfect run? The sound fits neatly and is not tiring.
Thanks! There's one more level, just got to keep winning.
wow great game!! such a simple mechanic, but you really nailed it! Difficulty was really hard, given that I had no idea what 90% of the final words even were. Made it to level 4 after all :D
Wow, good for you, I'm not sure I've made it that far, which made debugging the end screen hard. But hey, even Zach Barff hasn't played all his most difficult levels. Really glad you liked it.
haha I can imagine... tbf, I did have many attempts and lots of levels were won by extending the 2nd to last word, by adding an "S", to get the plural form.
You know, a little bit of cheesing is a lovely thing yes?
Kinda disappointed it's not about doing space spells but dude the difficulty is just perfect for me, I'm a really shitty typer but idk why I'm hooked, really great design. The only distracting thing is the scaling for the effects looks weird and all those harsh gradients but from a design perspective it's really impressive. Great job
Haha, nice man. Give me a bit more detail on the scaling, I'll see if its something I can fix.
I honestly don't know what to call it, the blue dissolve texture kinda thing I think it's a bit low res idk I never tried to make anything like it so can't really help much, sorry
eyyyy you were in bonky jam I remember seeing ur game and being discouraged cuz I was also making an egg game and yours looked so much better, well guess who best you to the sausage this time haha
To use a sausage pun, you've battered me!
oooh don't egg me on, you won't like it when i'm.....egged
Difffffficult game, but good fun and I loved the music!
Thanks very much! How far did you get?
The game crashed on my first playthrough but still a very great game with cool AI :D
Thanks very much, I've been trying to track down this mysterious bug, what a fucker. Peace.
Game crashed every time I tried to play when completing a word (WIRYI, TROY) :(
Oh dear, I'll look into it!
I'm getting pretty smooth playthroughs atm, not sure you'll want to, but perhaps have one more go?
Looks like it works now. Dunno what was the problem. The game froze (music continued) and got out of memory error after a while.
Thanks for having another go. It's a bugger because there will be edge cases because its referencing a massive dictionary and I'm going to need some time to really thoroughly debug it. Sounds like a stack overflow, hmmm.
What did you think btw?