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The Rumor Academy's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Artistic Style | #88 | 4.500 | 4.500 |
| Cleverness | #401 | 3.500 | 3.500 |
| Theme | #415 | 3.500 | 3.500 |
| Playability | #486 | 3.250 | 3.250 |
Ranked from 4 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
Judge feedback
Judge feedback is anonymous and shown in a random order.
- I can understand the time being the challenge for this game, but it never feels like there's enough of a window between the teacher's movements and the clock to actually pass notes quickly enough. I could just be bad at this, but it's really fun to play
- Ms. Melonbottom has a dump truck brother. Game is fun and looks great. I found Ms. Melonbottom to act similarly to an oscillating fan. A bit too predictable. Regardless, still enjoyed my stay. Keep making things:D
- Good entry! The teacher's detection mechanics are kinda finnicky sometimes (catching the wrong classmate, catching classmates with her back turned to them, etc.) Other than that the game is solid. The art is cool, the music and voiceover are nice and it's true, Thor does love ferrets more than people. Keep kicking ass!
Did you include your Game Design Document in your downloadable files?
YES
Tell us about your game!
Lighthearted arcade puzzle game where players are tasked with spreading a rumor note across the classroom. WASD for the controls and Tap spacebar to write the note. Don't get caught by the teacher!
Did you remember to include your Game Design Document?
Yes!
Is your game set to Public so we can see it?
yes
Extra Notes
Game Jams are awesome!
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Comments
It took me a little to really get what I had to do, but it's a really fun idea! I really enjoyed the rumors at the end, and I'd definitely play an expanded version with curated levels and more rumors!
I love how complete this game feels. It's bonkers that you got this completed in 2 weeks, with so little apparent bugs or missing links. Good stuff
Great presentation, fresh idea, plays well, and charming front-to-back. I've been particularly impressed by the level of polish on entries to this jam, and this one is no exception.
Top notch stuff! Great job everyone <3
Impeccable idea, very cute and well polished game.
Fantastic atmosphere and the menus are spot on <3
Lawnmower: 1 - Mike: 0, I heard! The characters and their animations are super smooth and polished, and it was fun working out the best strategy to avoid detection. Only took me a few plays to work out when and how the teacher would react, which was a really nice balance. All the menus fit the setting so well, can see that a lot of care and thought has gone into every aspect. Short and sweet! Great job, and have a wonderful jam 💚
I wanted to add some more rumors to the jam. I had more planned but got distracted near the end. They are all random each playthrough but there are only about 5 in there now. Thank you for playing!
I feel you, we had a similar thing with our events; had another one planned and built but didn't want to risk making bugs by adding it last minute - but that's the jam, hey!
I played like 20 rounds of this because I just had to know what went down between Mike and the Lawnmower
nice camerawork for the intro (besides going through some heads haha), and great theme interpretation! the gameplay itself is fun as well, but the vibes really make it into a great jam game as a whole!
Haha thanks. It was my first try at implementing cinemachine and originally I had some nice dolly track pans that carefully moved over the students heads but something kept breaking so I had to go for the easy way out and let it automatically transition from virtual camera to virtual camera, hence the heads getting passed through haha. Thank you for playing!
Great beginning of a game. Looks great and it took me a couple tries to finally pass a round :)
Thank you! We quickly realized we would not have enough time to add in the extra levels/teachers/ai patterns and powerups we had planned so we focused on polishing what we had to create a solid base to build a game on. There are a few things now in hindsight we would have liked to add to make the gaming experience a bit more clear where the passing would fail when too close to the teacher. Thank you for playing!
Are you guys going to expand on it after the game jam? I'll gladly give it a try, when you finish it :)
Probably not. Not because I don't think adding in those things would make it a much better game but probably because it won't ever be a fantastic game. Everyone learned a lot from the gamejam and I learned how to use some new tools in Unity which was the goal. As long as we cross our T's and dot our I's and reflect on what we could have done better and what would we need to add to improve, the next game jam or next game will benefit. I love game jams so I've joined a lot and plan to join even more. I think of a genuine HIT strikes from one of those it may be worth taking it further, this one... it might turn out to be a good game after everything is implemented but it probably won't be a hit. :)
I loved this entry. Short and sweet. Everything is so well polished. Great art, sleek camera transitions and great use of the surroundings for UI. Awesome work!
I would love to see how you could expand this game further to make it more challenging :D
Thank you for commenting on the camera! I wanted to try my hand at cinemachine for the first time and I got kind of carried away adding virtual cameras all over the scene haha. We had planned several different teachers which would each represent a different level and they would have many kinds of AI patrol patterns. Powerups to allow students to throw paper airplanes and distract the teacher or pass the note over several rows, sleeping students, having the principal barge into the classroom etc etc... Not enough time to add in all that stuff so we tried to polish what we had! Thank you for playing!
A great concept, perfect implementation of the jams theme! I like the music, and the art is really fun. And nice logo! well done overall.
Thank you so much for the kind words! Our 3D artist really knocked it out of the park with the characters! With more time we would have liked to improve the gameplay with powerups and other teachers with different AI patterns but that is the nature of gamejams! Thank you for playing!
Great idea and execution! It was the perfect balance of risk/reward and the overall polish was unlike anything I've seen before at other game jams. Well done!
Really appreciate the kind words! We quickly realized that we would not have enough time to implement all the stages/teachers/powerups we had planned so we focused on polishing what we had to at least make the gameplay look good, even if it wasn't the most fun in it's current iteration!
It took me a few times to get the hang of it but overall it's a nice little game. I like just how low stakesit all is.
Thank you for playing. I think adding in some easier to understand mechanics for where the teacher is looking and if you are in her trigger zone would have helped make a better gameplay experience. Not enough time to playtest during the jam unfortunately.
This was a really neat concept i really like the game good job!
Thank you so much for playing! Appreciate it!
Very cute game, looks very polished. The concept of the game, the art and the music blend together very well! I struggled a bit at first knowing who had the pencil because of the angle of the game. Maybe you could add a way to switch angles to better understand the perspective? Besides that, great job!!!
Yes you're absolutely right. I was struggling with the angles for a while when I now realize I probably should have modelled the classroom with taller walls to allow you to have a more overhead viewpoint! Thank you so much for playing!