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A jam submission

Lens of Fear - Mini Jame Gam - Behind youView game page

Mini Jame Gam #33 - My first game after 3 weeks of learning
Submitted by PintSizedGames — 5 hours, 52 minutes before the deadline
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Lens of Fear - Mini Jame Gam - Behind you's itch.io page

Results

CriteriaRankScore*Raw Score
Special Object Implementation#73.9293.929
Theme Implementation#203.4293.429
Overall#402.4642.464
Gameplay#412.2862.286
Fun Factor#432.2862.286
Visuals#561.7141.714
Audio#621.1431.143

Ranked from 14 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.

How is your game related to the Theme and Special Object?
For "Behind You" there is a shadow chasing after you, forcing you to complete the level promptly.
Glasses: There are invisible platforms to help you navigate the level and invisible hazards that will cause you to die and restart. The glasses assist you in seeing both for a short amount of time

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Comments

Submitted(+1)

I think the theme was well implemented and I really like the idea for the Glasses. However, the game felt a bit hard to control and I really didn't like to hide spikes with the platforms. 

Developer

Thank you for your feedback. I need to learn how to better implement a control system and jumping, I've learnt that from this jam. I wanted to add a level of difficulty by making some hazards invisible. I did think about implementing a warning to warn the player of an upcoming invisible hazard but then I thought that would take away from the difficulty I was trying to present.

Submitted(+1)

I like the glasses implementation, but I think there could be a visual indicator to show if they are disappearing. The collision bugs I had while touching the wall or jumping on corners is a bit annoying. The jump feels a little floaty which makes the platforming a little harder to control. Overall, it's still a solid first game :)

Developer(+1)

Thank you for your feedback. The glasses UI alpha does fade by half once the glasses are used (maybe not clearly enough though, so I'll make not of that for future games). Yeah... next time I think my main focus will be to find annoying bugs like the collision one and overall try to make the game-play smooth, I think that was my biggest downfall here.

I'll have to look into the floaty jump, I'm not sure I learnt how to prevent it being floaty yet but its definitely something I'll try to improve on. Thank you!

Submitted (3 edits) (+1)

 The cons:

  • Visual art is unfortunatly repetitive and feel empty
  • Nos sfx or musics
  • Hard to understand wich input activate the glasses (i just learned what means RMB haha maybe everyone don't get abreviations next time be clear and just say on input "Right mouse click", make sure what you comunique is perceptible, comprehensive and unambiguous  so i'll suggest to avoid abrevations  on input descriptions )
  • Collision bugs reduce greatly the fun  factor that you tried to create with all the mecanics (colliding on a wall when jumping should not stick me on the wall and it happens all the time so it frustrating)
  • Character movement in general doesnt feel great beceaus of bugs and  jump feel too much floating, hard to easily come back on ground and move

The pros

  • Very good  implementation of the theme and the special object you respected them perfectly by implementing them in the gameplay and not visual ellement which you do not interact, and that's not everytime easy to create gameplay that fit game jam theme, nice job
  • Level design is not bad , the difficulty and intensity progression curves are good, the levels are not to much repetitive and there is some diverties in the level !
  • Mechanicc of glases with cooldown is a good idea to force use to memorize where are the plateforms, i feel like there is an intention behind you level and you gameplay and the intention is really impoortant

It's your first time so sure there a lot of things you have to improve , but still i wanna congratulate  you on what you have done for having only touched to game dev with Unity 3 weeks before the jam ! it's really hard to make games so don't be disapointed with what you made, be happy to see what you have been able to do today what you haven't been able to do in the past !

Here is some advices for you if you wanna continue game development :

  • You learn a lote in game jams, continue doing them even if you fail, you will learn so much and it forces you to understand how to plan yourself to deliver a game in a designed amount of time ! jesse schell in his book "the Art of game design" Sayed you need to create at least 10 games to start understanding how to make fun games
  • On your next games, prioritize what your players are doing the most and polish them and make the bugfree, afterwards if you have tim add mechanics ! in example you have different mechanics in your game but the character movment is frustrating with those bugs and as it is what you do all the gam, it is frustrating all the game
  • try to have "juicy" visuals with sfx, i means it doesnt have to look awesome or something but if it is simple and feel organic reactive like "squetch and strach" animation and with good use of organic particles it will change your game feel incredibly. Check for "juicness" in youtube and you'll get the things
  • learn game design an level design to learn how to create funny and interesting game experience, but don't focus too much in theory beceaus you understand it only by practicing, practicing, practicin ... Which means doing game jams :)
Developer(+1)

Wow thank you for taking the time to give a very concise feedback!

Next time I'm going to join a jam that's during the week as that's when I have the most free time to really focus on it, I nearly gave up on this jam because I felt so demotivated in what I made in the time I could spare but pushed myself to finish and publish something. I felt that my game idea was good but I wished I had given its deserved time. After publishing though, I realized this was good for me and made me want to do more jams, so I could learn even more and hopefully become better.

I wonder if the collision bugs was a result of turning it into a webgl, when I was play testing within unity and the windows version I didn't have those issues but this is the second comment of it now and I can understand how that collision bug can really take away from the game. Next time I'll definitely spend more time trying to find bugs that would disrupt the flow.

Thank you on the tip of giving clear instructions or controls. I didn't even think of that but it makes so much sense and I will be doing from now on.

Submitted (1 edit) (+1)

No problem i'm happy to help !

Also i saw that i missed words in my comment above i updated it so you have it complete now !

Submitted(+1)

I hope you can analyze my game like that too, bro. Very good analysis.

Submitted

I will then haha :)

Submitted(+1)

Getting stuck on the wall mid-air when holding A or D makes it hard to play. Good game though, but try to fix that and then it's a lot better :)

Developer

Oh, I didn't come across that while play testing. I'll keep that in mind for next time, I'll deliberately try to jump into things/ try to break the game to see if things aren't smooth. Probably on of the colliders were slightly misplaced. Thanks for the feedback!

Submitted(+1)

Well, the first thing. The graphics were kinda inconsistent. 

If you were going for pixel art, next time make all the pixels the same size. It just makes the game a lot more coherent. 

The glasses implementation was really good and the wall was decently menacing. Overall, I would say it's pretty good for your first game.

Developer

Yeah... it was my first time pixel art, I even bought asperite just for this jam and honestly didn't know what I was doing. I kept jumping from 16px's for small items and 32px's for the player for example. I did think maybe it would be best if I used the other assets within the tilemap folder but I wanted to give it a try myself. If you have any youtube videos or tutorials that you would recommend, that would be appreciated!
Thank you for your feedback!

Submitted (2 edits) (+1)

Here are some of my favourites: 

 Pixel Overload is a really good pixel art-based youtube channel https://www.youtube.com/@PixelOverloadChannel/videos

Reece Geofroy has some great pixel art tutorials. https://www.youtube.com/@ReeceGeofroy

Also this video my Goodgis is a must-watch for all new game devs.
 

Hope these were helpful. Good luck with your future projects! :D

Developer

Thank you! I'm going to save these and watch them later today

Submitted(+1)

I'm happy to help!

(+1)

Nice glasses implementation, the spikes at the end of the last level were cheeky

Developer

Thank you! Haha yeah, because I didnt have much time this weekend to fully work on the game, I wanted the player to learn a harsh but quick lesson of just trying to run through the level quickly without the use of the glasses.

Submitted(+1)

Good game! Here you really need to rush!

I think objects should stay visible for longer - it is quite hard to remember when there are a lot of them. 

Developer

Yeah... I did think that too but wasn't sure. As it was only 3 levels, I wanted it to be difficult and have the sense of panic or urgency with the shadow closing in but I think I made it too difficult with the glasses ability only lasting 3 seconds.
Thank you, for the kind words and great feedback!