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The Cave Diver's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Sound | #56 | 2.813 | 2.813 |
| Aesthetics | #120 | 2.688 | 2.688 |
| Overall | #121 | 2.531 | 2.531 |
| Gameplay | #147 | 2.375 | 2.375 |
| Theme | #164 | 2.250 | 2.250 |
Ranked from 16 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
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Comments
the game is nice art and texture are really good entry feels amazing so problum i faced you should lower the resolution i was not able to see the story mode and also a bug not a big deal that when we die in the bad thing the animation moves with A and D keys i suggest to make it symmetric
if you do not mind check out my game too
thank you
the game is great! movement feels nice, i liked the artstyle, and i think the gameplay is solid. tho, i think controlls are very unintuitive, there are just too many buttons. simplify it a bit, let the player use the jump button to swing a pickaxe mid-air, do not involve mouse buttons for respawning, let me use the R button if I can use spawnpoint still, it woud help the gameflow a ton!
Cool entry!
Gameplay wise, I think you have a foundation for a solid platformer, with lots of things you could do to expand on it! However, I think the execution could use some more work, as the controls feel a bit slippery and I often struggled to do things. I feel like the movement in general is too fast and the gravity is a bit too high, so things feel a bit too "twitch reaction" but the game doesn't fully give you the control to handle it. There is currently no indication for when you're in range for the pickaxe to work, so sometimes you just jump and press LShift and hope it'll work. Because of the level design, where sometimes rocks are placed in areas where you'll die if you fail the hook, this can feel a bit frustrating. Maybe you could add something like an animation for the character or a glowing outline for the rocks if you're in range, so that the player has better feedback. This, coupled with a slight rebalance of the speed, could make it so that the player in general feels more in control. I'm not sure if you're using Unity's Rigidbodies and AddForces for this, but I find those may feel a bit inconsistent for a platformer unless you tweak them just right with gravity values and stuff. Some people even implement their own gravity functions so that you hold a bit longer at the apex of your jump, and fall faster after that. This game by GameMaker's Toolkit is an amazing resource to learn more about platformer controls, if you'd like to know more about it. You could also maybe play around with the idea of having the pickaxe hold you in place until you jump, so that the player then has a way of controlling the second jump a bit more and you can get tighter controls and platforming challenges.
Thematically, I feel like the connection is made in the mechanics and gameplay, but not too much in the presentation. You could add some things to make this feel a bit more connected, like, for example, having a fire icon next to the heat bar, and a red border appearing on screen if you're close to overheating. You could also maybe play around with some lighting effects so that the cave appears darker and the lava is what emits light!
In terms of the aesthetics, I really liked the art you had for the story bit, and how the character pops out of the wall at the start. I think there's definitely a lot of care put into these parts! In general, I'd suggest working a bit more on the visual feedback side of things, so that the game feels more responsive. An example would be the aforementioned outline around rocks when you're in range, or the visual effects when you're overheating.
In terms of the sound, some parts could use a bit more sound effects. The start of the game where the player pops out of the wall is cute, but it feels a bit empty because there's no sound effect for when they're shaking and struggling to get out. The music and other sound effects feel good though!
I hope some of this feedback can be useful to you! It's all just my subjective opinion, but still. Keep up the good work!
Wow, I never thought I would receive so much feedback in one review, thank you so much for the time you invested in it, for trying the game and for all the valuable advice. A thousand thanks!
Cool platformer/ die and retry. However the inputs are a little weird.. We use the mouse basically only to restart and the pickaxe hook is on left shift??? Why not right click??? Or why not space to restart?? Because the current inputs force me to basically play one handed (because restart force you to keep the mouse). And having to spam left shift + ZQSD isn't a good position for the hand...
Thank you so much for the review and for trying the game! Not many people even talk about the negative sides, I really appreciated it. In fact, when I showed the game to my friends they also told me that the controls were a bit strange, but I didn't have time to change them haha
Of course, the point of a gamejam is to improve and learn some skills! Which can't be done if no one talk about the negative aspects. Another easy way to fix it is to binds multiple buttons on the same thing. For example pickaxe hook can still be on left shift but on right click aswell. So you don't have to deal with the struggle of custom inputs and the players have a wider range of choices!
Thanks so much for all the advice! Unfortunately many people don't understand that the goal of a jam is to improve and not to write "cool game also try mine"
Yep I hate review beggars x))) This thing shouldn't be allowed. Just play other people games if you can, leave a review which might help them (wherever possible) and if they have the time they might play your game, that's all x))
Neat game! The graphics and audio were amazing, and I enjoyed how the tutorial walked me through the mechanics.
Thank you so much!
I like the art and the tutorial.
Not many games in this jam have an actual tutorial, which is very important.
Very cool game!
Thank you so much for playing the game!
nice to see a platformer that has coyote time! i would rather use space to lshift for use pickaxe.
Thank you for the review!
Super fast paced, with satisfying pickaxe mechanic. Nice work!
Thanks for the review!
Wow nice game, swift movement and pickaxe mechanics are great :D
Thank you so much!