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Ecora's Echo Chamber's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Originality | #13 | 3.850 | 3.850 |
| Overall | #26 | 2.962 | 2.962 |
| Theme | #28 | 3.050 | 3.050 |
| Enjoyment | #29 | 2.550 | 2.550 |
| Gameplay/Design | #31 | 2.400 | 2.400 |
Ranked from 20 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
How does your entry fit the theme?
The entry fits the theme as an echo chamber: environment where a person only encounters information or opinions that reflect and reinforce their own.
What would you like feedback on?
Art, level design, sounds, text and dialogue, ui interface, bugs, etc.
What assets did you use (if any)?
I used mostly my own, the music is credited on the description of the game.
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Comments
oh, I think you are using gamemaker, I might be wrong, if you find a way to fix the fullscreen issue let me know.
Yeah, I'm using Gamemaker, it's my favorite engine, what fullscreen issue are you talking about?
This game that I made https://angelkof15.itch.io/space-colors-beta doesn't scale properly when you go full screen on itch.io, only fits like 40% of the screen the rest are black bars, and I really would like to fix that. I notice your game has a similar issue, there are small black bars when you go full screen.
Oh I see what you mean, I can't access the game you linked though. Anyway, I haven't tested that out but... Did you use the fullscreen button from itch.io? Maybe try that one with the window_set_fullscreen(true) code. If it doesn't work then maybe window_set_size(width, height).
Sorry my game was not public, but it is now. I already did the fullscreen button from itch.io method. I tried the other ones
I think the timer is more of an annoyance than anything else, this looks more like the type of game where you take your time, read, and reason. When time was up, I had just started kicking the balls into the circle. And the controls need some polish, like I believe the balls should not stick to your character, and the kick hitbox should be a bit bigger or at least the character legs should be bigger.
Also, I think this game would be good as an educational game because you can practice your association skills and vocabulary skills and it's actually fun. It was very original, I'll give you that too.
Thank you for playing! That approach for an educational game is really interesting, I like it!
This game left me quite confused for a while, I'm still not 100% sure what I was supposed to do... I really liked your original interpretation of the theme :)
Basically there are two types of balls (colors don't matter, only the text on the bubble), the ones that go inside of the circle have to reinforce the overall idea of the npcs, when you do that you gain points, if they reach a certain amount you complete the level (if time runs out you lose), also you lose points if you have ideas inside of the circle against the NPCs opinions (so for example if you have 1 of each type you don't gain nor lose any points).
Thank you for playing! I'll make a better job explaining this in game next time.
That makes so much sense now hahaha, thanks
Took me a while to figure out the game idea, the speech bubbles too a lot of space making it difficult to navigate sometimes, and sometimes balls got stuck in the corner edge. It is a very unique game idea, I really enjoyed kicking the balls around and overall sound effects are good. Great job!
Thank you for playing! Yeah... I didn't account for the corners, I'll also make the bubble take less space.
It took a minute to figure out what was going on, and I lost my first run because of that. On the second run, I had a much better idea of what I was doing, so it was starting to become enjoyable to me. I do like this idea of herding something into an area to gain points! I found the tornado to be more annoying than engaging, but I understand why it has to exist. I think making the player a little bit faster would have made it less annoying to chase down the balls it would kick away? I'm not sure though.
I didn't read any of the text the NPCs in the levels would say, since I felt like I was always on a really tight timer to keep as many reinforcing ideas in the zone as possible. It never felt like there was any downtime to take a moment to read what they were saying.
Gotcha, thank you for your review! I'll definitely add some breathing time to read dialogues, and probably a way to counter the tornadoes to make it more engaging.
Don't want to be harsh, but I had quite a few problems with this.
I don't know, overall pretty poor experience :(
Nah don't worry, you aren't harsh, if it's hard to understand then I did a bad job explaining,
1- The game is about the media meaning of echo chambers, the game is about an imp who can create this echo chambers, the objective is basically to push balls away or inside the circle depending of is they are discerning or reinforcing ideas (the npcs have opinions, the balls have to reinforce those ideas, if they don't, then you kick them away from the circle).
2- The tornado only pushes the balls at random, you win by gaining points (it's the text on the top left on the screen), the thing is, if you have disserning ideas in the circle you lose points, so if you have all the balls inside, you don't lose nor gain any points (you should have 0 disserning ideas inside), and then wait for the score to fill.
Thank you for your feedback! I'll work to make the game more understandable.
For some reason I really liked just kicking the balls around, and I don't know if it was an intended feature but I also like how you can kind of "dribble" the balls, like they will get stuck your your character sometimes and you can easily change their direction. One thing to note though is that if a ball reaches the top of the screen the player is unable to reach it. Since you don't technically need all of them to pass the levels it works out fine, but the edge of the screen is something to keep in mind when developing future games.
Thank you for playing! I'm glad you liked the football mechanic, yeah, i noticed that issue, to solve that i increased the range of the kick when facing up during development, it should bounce from above but i guess that can fail, i'll try to fix that.
The game only display a black screen after I click start (browser, MacOS, Chrome)...? Was looking forward to this one! :(
I'm sad to hear that! It would be hard for me to fix that since i don't own macOS, i can export the game for that platform but i wouldn't be able to test if it works myself, i can think of some things that could cause the issue, at least i'll try to fix that after the jam if you are still interested in playing the game.
I would! Good luck! ^_^
I got it to work on my work computer! :D I think the idea is good, but maybe the timescope was too small to make this amazing. Took me some time to figure out what to do, andwhen I found out I ended up rage quitting because of the god damn tornados! XD Good start and a fun little game! :D
I'm happy to know you got to play my game! Yeah, i barely made it in time and couldn't test it properly, i should probably add a cooldown to the tornados and a way to counter them, if you hated them then you would absolutely despise the angel of the third level (i guess it was a good thing that level was skipped by mistake), thank you for playing, i'll work on making a better job at explaining things :D.
Yes, I'm having the same issue on Firefox, MacOS. Not sure why that would happen since html5 should be the same on all systems.
Really really like the take on the theme, i would never have thought of that, awesome game
Thank you! :D
This is such a fantastic take on the theme... Full points for the unique interpretation!
I'm not sure if the levels are connected up right or if I somehow ended up skipping one?
On the whole, I enjoyed the music, concept and originality. The visuals and gameplay themselves could do with some polish, but I'm sure that given time you could make it shine :))
Do feel free to check out our game and share your thoughts.
Thanks! Yeah, the third and last level was sadly skipped by mistake, yeah, I'll check everyone's game so expect a review from me!
The art is what it is and the overall game could help from more polish but oh my god this is such an awesome and original concept !
I first thought that we were only supposed to put the red balls in the red circles but have been happily mistaken. The speech bubble on top of the character does make it hard to read when we're on the top screen and there is a little too much texts on the characters inside the circle but apart from that I loved it ! Great job !
Thanks! I'm glad you liked my game, I'll be fixing those issues, maybe making the balls of the same color at the tutorial would help.
Personally, I found this game to be quite decent. While it may be simple, I really appreciate the unique and fun take on the jam theme. One aspect that deserves my biggest praise is the world that has been laid out, along with its originality. I particularly enjoyed the fact that you play as the villain in this game. However, I did feel that the pacing was a bit off. I wish there was some dialogue or text in between levels to provide more context and enhance the overall experience. Nevertheless, I still love the game's design, and the art style has a charming appeal to it. It's visually pleasing!
The music is another aspect that stands out for me. The bopping tunes help add to my delightful chaos during my gameplay and make it even more enjoyable!
My biggest issue lies with the gameplay itself. While it is interesting, I didn't find it engaging enough. I believe introducing more challenges or obstacles could enhance the overall experience. For example, incorporating circle characters that reflect different emotions (such as happiness) could require the player to introduce other emotions (like anger) to maintain a balance while still causing mischief in the town.
Overall, while I do have some critical points, I must say that this game is solid, and it definitely shows potential. I encourage you to continue working on it and further improve its gameplay. Great job so far! :D
Thank you for playing! I'm glad you enjoyed the world, I'll definitely add more context to the story to make it more enjoyable.
Yeah, I have a bunch of ideas to make the game more challenging, like having to play at two towns at the same time or having circles for specific ideas, I'll be working on make it more engaging for the post jam version.
Very unique and fun take on the jam theme!
I enjoy the unique world that is laid out here with all the interesting and varying characters, but at the same time I feel that it lacks a coherent pacing, perhaps some sort of story text between levels to set the stage for the level you're entering would help.
As for the gameplay, the concept is interesting but there are some pretty large flaws in execution. I managed to get through the game by just kicking the idea balls in and then kicking them back out if they were dissenting ideas. As for the cut 3rd level, the angel would help the problem somewhat but ultimately the expected gameplay method could still by bypassed by just memorizing which balls are reinforcing and which are dissenting. In the game's current state there's just no real reason to figuring out which balls are which the correct way. I personally don't have many good solutions for how to fix this other than to add more dissenting idea balls so that it's harder to guess the reinforcing ones.
With this, the text boxes flashing on screen as you run past are distracting more than anything, I'd recommend making it so that you have to press a button to talk to the nearby NPCs.
The sound design is fun, the upbeat music combined with the simple sort of kickball sound just make this game feel far more joyful and upbeat.
Don't fret over my critiques however, they're mostly nitpicks aside from the gameplay ones, I still had a lot of fun playing it and enjoyed the character design and overall sort of feeling to the game! Keep up the great work, I'm excited to see what you make going forward!
Thank you! Yeah, I should make something for between the levels so the player understands where they are and what they are doing.
I didn't want to make the game too much complex because of the short amount of time I wouldn't be able to test everything, but I wasn't able to add the more puzzle elements such as having to play at 2 towns at the same time (you would know if an idea is reinforcing but not if it's actually reinforcing that town it's in), and other more circles for specific ideas.
Yeah, the text boxes are a mess, I have to fix that asap. Thank you again for your feedback, I'll be working on the post jam version of this game.
Playtesting after submiting the entry i realised the third level was skipped, the second level goes directly to the game over screen... So frustrating, this one was supposed to be the real challenge, with an angel that teleported dissenting ideas inside the circle and reinforcing ideas outside.