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Echoes Of War's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Overall | #4 | 3.667 | 3.667 |
| Musics / Sounds | #4 | 3.833 | 3.833 |
| Graphisms | #8 | 3.889 | 3.889 |
| Gameplay | #8 | 3.333 | 3.333 |
| Theme / Rules | #10 | 3.778 | 3.778 |
Ranked from 18 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
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Comments
Cool game. Well structured. I really liked the idea of the game and the progression of the music. The only one pity in my opinion is that sometimes you have one or two of the cats stuck amid the graves and you can't really do much about it.
No cats may have been injured in the making of this game, but some definitely were in my play-though >.< ! Silly game, but very fun. Only feedback I have is the end game RNG is brutal and the only way to get a perfect score is to have perfect luck. There is some strategy in moving your cats strategically get them together in an open space, but whether or not you can keep them alive depends on if the gravestones invade your open space or not. AKA you get to a point in the game where RNG is the driving factor that you cannot compensate for with strategy. This definitely isn't a game killer because I still had a lot of fun playing, and everything else was very well done but that perfect score kept taunting me! Great work!
In normal mode, you actually have a small amount of error allowed as you can miss one pumpkin smash and still get them all (on difficult each tombstone must smash a pumpkin). Also at the very end there are 4 open spots on the board for 3 cats. I take your point though (and others have commented as well), randomness does have a high impact on the final outcome in the last round regarding if all cats survive.
In hindsight, I wish I would have made the following changes:
It's kind of an interesting balance question because not getting perfect doesn't mean 'lose'. Really the 'lose' condition is when all cats die. And getting a perfect score in one or two tries is not very satisfying either (except this is where 'easy' mode does shine; you can get that perfect in one or two tries and then move up to normal mode). As well, 'losing' a 'perfect' due to randomness does have a certain unsatisfying sting.
I originally planned to add in-game commentary/narration on the 'randomness' of who lives and dies in war and have some kind of commentary/narration each time a cat died to echo the same. In the end, it didn't feel right to make the comparison or highlight the randomness of death or war. In no way did I want the game to come across disrespectful.
At any rate, you (and others) are correct and I should moderate the gameplay for the purpose of the Game Jam submission with an easier chance for success/perfect.
Thank you for playing and taking your time to provide feedback!
RNG can be hard sometimes. The dissatisfaction is tied in with knowing even if you did better as a player it wouldn't matter because RNG has cheated you. I liked that you had planned to use it as a narrative point, it would be a powerful reflection of reality where you can do nothing wrong and still lose. That narrative would also temper the expectation of the player since they are going at it from an experience rather than a game of skill
Personally my belief (and mind you this is a challenge to implement sometimes) is to structure RNG so that it can make a challenge more difficult to complete, but never absolutely impossible. That gives the player a feel of agency and the sense that by getting better they can improve. The golden rule I try to follow is to try to never leave the player feeling like they have been cheated by the game
I played quite a few rounds of your game and I felt the difficulty was well balanced, I only completely lost all my cats a few times, but having played it for a bit I realized I hit a wall in terms of being able to get better at my strategy because RNG would ultimately decide if it was possible to get a perfect game or not, and most of the time it would not.
All that being said I did rate your game very highly because everything else was basically perfect. It is a really fun game with a silly theme as you scramble to save the cats. It felt decently balanced and I had a lot of fun. Dont take the RNG feedback too critically because you really made an awesome game!
Solid All Around Well Made.
but it does feel a bit too hard, game jams games tend to be better when they are fairly easy.
(p.s. Why did you have to make them cats, i didn't want to see them die so brutally)
very good game. was the game your idea? had a lot of fun, was the best game i played here in this jam!
Nice work :P
I enjoyed it a lot, good work!
Pretty cool concept!
Seems very original and I enjoyed this one. Everything is very smooth and works well, too. It feels a little too fast at first, but I understand that's due to the 1-minute limit.
Wow once I got a feel for the gameplay really kicked ass not sure what improvement feedback to offer for the most part was a solid little puzzler.
Pretty interesting game. I do wonder about the strategy part, seems pretty much mostly luck. Cool audio and graphics.
Thank you for playing. I've added the following to the 'Echoes of War' game page.
'Strategy' hint - be proactive about moving the game pieces around from the very start. Actively arrange pumpkins to clear room for cats so they have more move options. You are trying to maintain the total number of 'open spots' on the board and ensure open spots are near cats. Any gravestone that does not smash a pumpkin (or cat) will reduce your open spots. Prevent open spots from getting trapped behind gravestones; if spots are about to become inaccessible, keep shifting pumpkins to fill those spots as well as the spots where gravestones will drop. While you can't avoid the luck element, you can maximize your chances through gameplay choices and execution.
The randomness makes the game really hard but also very enjoyable. Poor cats though
I wasn't ever able to save all the cats and squish all the pumpkins. Not sure if I just got unlucky or if I missed some big brain strat, BUT this submission looks and sounds great and is a compelling one minute game. My favorite in this jam so far~ 😸🎃