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Shadows are Friends's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Playability | #205 | 4.667 | 4.667 |
| Cleverness | #269 | 4.333 | 4.333 |
| Artistic Style | #386 | 4.333 | 4.333 |
| Theme | #590 | 3.667 | 3.667 |
Ranked from 3 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.
- Hits the shadow theme very well, a little bit of the alchemy with mirrors. Would like more speed as it feels like crawling or a small jolt motion just to breathe a little bit of dodge in the game for a mechanic.
- Love the art style, the puzzles make you scratch your head, but not enough to be frustrating, not a lot to do with alchemy, but plenty to do with shadows. The music is pleasant and fitting, the character feels a little slow, especially for the longer areas, but it can be explained, as, you know, the lack of legs are a thing for the little guy. I can't wait to see where you take this in the future! Good work and keep it up!
- Would love to see more levels, of course! Beautiful game, love the shadow mechanic but the *mwah* moment was the time shift. That was unexpected and perfect! It would be cool, maybe down the line of the levels, to be able to time shift while moving. Also a little more enemy feedback, I think? Didn't know if you were aiming for eventual response to enemies or just avoiding. The flashing 'bulb' on the flower made me think there could be more to it.
Did you include your Game Design Document as a Google Drive link?
Yea
Seriously... did you include your Game Design Document?
Yea it is linked in the game description
Is your game set to Public so we can see it?
Yea
Tell us about your game!
Venture forth into a world of danger. Explore, unlock new abilities, and most importantly, stick to the shadows!
Shadows are Friends is a micro-RPG, 2D-platformer, puzzle game that is light on story. The crux of the game is about avoiding standing in sunlight for too long. The game gives the player the abilities to manipulate their environment in different ways to open up a path forward.
Extra Notes
This is my first game jam. I intended to add more levels/mechanics, but ran out of time (lesson learned!).
I appreciate any and all feedback!
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Comments
Nice Game, It's very relaxing and there is so much attention to small details. I like the art style, maybe things like the brick walls could use normal maps to have them feel less flat when in direct sunlight, but that is nitpicking at this point (it's more something to try for late polishing). I noticed the one tree in forest level 3 was cut off, but I guess you'd have fixed it if you had the time left. Besides those minor visual things, I didn't notice anything off. The sounds were great and the music fitting and relaxing. It was fun to play and the puzzles were good introductions to the mechanics. I am interested how difficult the puzzles would get in a final version of this game, as these were still very easy (as they should be for introduction puzzles). It's a very atmospheric game, and I like that.
All in all, it's well-made with interesting concepts, and I'd be interested to see where you'll take this game after the Game jam is over. If the next mechanics are as good and thought out as the ones you have right now, this will be an amazing game.
(I took so long writing this that I reached the end of the ambient bird sounds, perhaps put those ambient sounds on loop, just in case. Also, surrounding yourself with two boxes prevents you from jumping, it's nothing game breaking, but a minor inconvenience. The ladder in the final unfinished level lets you climb through the ground)
Had a lot of fun playing this and wish you a great future in game development
Thanks for trying it and for taking the time to write all of this feedback! Yeah, there was definitely some things I wanted to fix up, like the tree texture cut off and the boxes mechanics being a little bit broken, but I ran out of time. I like the normal map suggestion, that's a great idea!
nice game , i really liked the parallax and the whole look of the game nice puzzles
Thanks for trying it!
great game!
i noticed if you stood between two blocks and hit shift to move them you'd get a bit stuck, but i was able to wiggle my way out haha. either way, i loved the shadows/light mechanics along with the puzzles of each level - i could have kept going for hours!
It has a great atmosphere! I love the sounds and visuals!
Very nice! Very clever use of mechanics.
Thanks for playing!
cool game! I really liked the time change mechanic, I felt like it could lead to some really cool puzzles down the line! The character did feel a little slow to control but I didn't mind that. it was cool to see how polished you were able to get the game, with awesome looking sprites and the parallaxing background, made it very atmoshpheric
Thanks for trying it!
The whole atmosphere is charming and meditative, and the puzzle elements make a lot out of a little. Really pretty sprites. Tried to pet the wolf at the end, it went bad.
I'd play this for hours.
It's an nice entry, you had great idea with shadow manipulation. Also the sprite work is incredible.
It's a shame everything is slow, your character move at turtle pace, even the time change don't feel great because of this.
Excellent work nonetheless !
Thank you for the feedback! Yeah, my original intention was for the game to have a slow, contemplative feel to it as a contrast with faster action platformers, but I think it ended up not being as fun as I thought it could be, especially with the puzzle elements of the game being quite simple (doesn't really leave you thinking and contemplating for very long). Thank you so much for trying it!
Love the game. I appreciate the small spin on having shadows be your ally and light being the enemy. Love the pixel art as well, I know some of these sections probably took hours to make but the time was well spent. Shame the last level is not finished but it sometimes really do be like that.
Cool concept.
Missing the alchemy theme of the jam, but otherwise fun puzzle game.
The pixel art is very well done.
Thank you! I was originally intending to have animal transformations that the player could do as a sort of "alchemy" but never got it fully implemented (although you can turn into a cat on the last level). Thank you for the feedback!