Pretty cool little game! I played with keyboard and mouse, and know that's not the intended way but I don't have a controller. I think the sword range could be shown a little better, as it's hard to tell how far it will reach. The sword swing has a lot of startup frames and cancels itself when spammed. That's cool for forcing a more methodical approach, but having it cancel into itself feels sort of clunky. I think the idea has lots of potential and would love to play it once the keyboard+mouse input is fixed!
Play game
They Pile Up's itch.io pageResults
Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
Creativity + Theme | #23 | 3.715 | 4.083 |
Visuals | #30 | 3.563 | 3.917 |
Music + SFX | #33 | 2.957 | 3.250 |
Fun Factor | #35 | 2.805 | 3.083 |
Gameplay | #40 | 2.502 | 2.750 |
Ranked from 12 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
Comments
I really like your take on the theme: persistent corpses. It turns the vampire-survivors/twin-stick shooter kiting and dodging power fantasy into a much more grim affair, matching your music and art.
I was a little bothered that the pixel art is stretched to a variety of resolutions in-game. A lot of the animations and textures looked fantastic, but seeing them side-by-side at different zoom levels distracts from the overall aesthetic.
The attack felt a tiny bit underpowered - with an animation that doesn't correspond to the actual attack area, it's really tough to deal damage without also getting hit. Death feels inevitable if you stand and fight - which may have been what you were going for!
Music has a nice calm Castlevania vibe to it, which fits the atmosphere you've created in the game. The melee attack reach seems too shallow to be as fun as it could be, so consider changing that and seeing how it feels. Very interesting to have twin-stick controls for a game that isn't a space shooter, props for that! The horde overpowered me pretty quickly, but I think I could go further with a bigger sword!
Thank you for the feedback. I actually did change the range of the sword midway development which is why the range is way longer than the sprite animation would suggest. I probably should increase it further though. My original plan would have included other weapons too, some with longer range etc but due to time restraints we decided to scratch that.
This is really nice! With corpses blocking paths, every action felt meaningful and like it could be the end. Awesome job!
I love the idea of having to be mindful of where you kill enemies, this is an interesting take on the theme! I did have some trouble playing it, since it felt like the hitbox of my attacks was a bit small and inconsistent so it was difficult to actually hit enemies. That being said, very creative mechanics, and I loved the art as well!
Thank you for the kind words. May I ask what kind of controller you were using? I was told by another person as well who used an Xbox controller that they had issues with the attack. I wonder if its due to the analogue nature of the trigger that is causing issues. I myself only have a controller with no analogue triggers, so I couldn't replicate that issue.
Leave a comment
Log in with itch.io to leave a comment.