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A jam submission

A Way UpView game page

Dark & Challenging Platformer
Submitted by june (@squishthing), FlowConstruct, alfie (@alfiesound) — 1 hour, 49 minutes before the deadline
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A Way Up's itch.io page

Results

CriteriaRankScore*Raw Score
Sound#53.8893.889
Overall#93.7503.750
Theme#143.8153.815
Aesthetics#164.0374.037
Gameplay#343.2593.259

Ranked from 27 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.

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Comments

Submitted(+1)

Solid work. I liked the vibe you created.

Submitted (1 edit) (+2)

I felt a little frustrated during my first playthrough, especially because the spike hitboxes are very unforgiving and I don't like retrying again and again because a spike that shouldn't have hit me kills me anyway. I felt discouraged to try multiple paths since I knew I would fall into some hidden (restricted field of vision) traps and I would end up losing time. Once I knew the optimal path and the position of all the sneaky little stalactites, it felt a little bit better. I still went for the word record because I like competition :)

I got a time of 01:16.33.

Developer(+1)

Wow - sub 1:20!! Really nice job, thanks for playing and seeing WR through. I hear you about the spikes, in my own run i was getting pretty frustrated too lol 

Deleted post
Submitted (1 edit) (+2)

My god...my final time was 29:20, but i must have spent 45 minutes playing it. there's a lot to love here, the fact I felt compelled to beat it says a lot. Things I liked : the graphics looked really good and cohesive, and the sound design was while minimalistic, quite good, It almost felt like a horror game, I was always terrified of spike falling on my out of nowhere. the movement felt good some of the time, once I really understood it, the fast character speed potentially makes this an entertaining speed run.  I took the down route at the beginning with the skull sign, and saw another one at the end of the game, if it has multiple routes and challenges that's really cool. Things I didn't like : The spikes were very frustrating, the hitbox is giant in comparison to the visual, it made it really hard to see them especially when there was just 1, I died a ton of times to the spikes in way that I felt was unfair. The wall jumping felt often unresponsive, and having a limited number of them made it hard to judge if you could actually reach a location or not. I think the limited view could be increased, it made the game feel like it was more based on repeated deaths and memory than platforming at times, although this is also cool, felt good to finally memorize a route through.

Great job the game was cool :D

Developer

Thank you. And really appreciate the full feedback. One thing not sure if you managed to get to it. There is a secret. Unless you saw it in the live. The game does offer a few paths with different ways you could go. The different ways merge into the last level either way. Currently there is 2 . The spike allow you to use them to jump on them to get somewhere higher to create a skip. The timing needs to be really precise. But even then they disappear after 5 jumps . Will look into the hit boxes I have noticed in my test runs it is not as we wanted it to be so definitely getting an update as soon as the voting is over. And hang on. you got under 30 seconds???? Need to add a leaderboard cause that is a literal : WHAT? 

Submitted(+1)

Haha no my time was 29 minutes, as for the hit boxes, I dont mean the falling spikes, those are fine, i mean the ground spikes.

Developer(+2)

omgg thank you!! i do wish we had the time to fix spikes, i totally agree that some are too mean. but i’m happy to hear you played so long and had fun!! :D we wanted “routing” to be encouraged and there’s definitely better ways of doing it, cool to hear it’s something you experienced 

Submitted(+2)

Solid platformer with some real nice atmosphere. It was a little frustrating with how far dying sets you back, but all in all a good time.

Developer(+1)

Thanks!! Definitely considering a checkpoint system as a difficulty option.

Submitted(+3)

Everything is fantastic, I think the sound was phenomenal, the music for the second stage surprised me! God

Developer(+1)

This means so much - thank you!!! (ꈍᴗꈍ) 

Developer (1 edit)

Thank you very much :)) the music was a little rushed, I only had around 4 hours to work on it since I devoted the majority of my time to sound design, but still pretty happy with how it turned out!

Submitted(+2)

Art style is fantastic, really had a unique look to it.

Definitely enjoyed my playthrough but the way the character sticks to walls feels a little weird to me.

games feels and looks professional, very impressive!   

Submitted(+2)

Loved the game, and loved settings. the ambiance was so good. Congrats man :D

Submitted(+2)

Very nice to speedrun, very good graphics, nice gaameplay, simply i love it

Submitted(+2)

Really good work! The atmosphere was incredibly well-built and very consistent throughout. I especially loved the tile work and all the little details like the mushrooms and the grass. Well done!

Developer

Aw thank you!! Tile work is so fun, especially the decorations. i wish i had time to add more but yknow how it goes D: 

Submitted(+3)

I really like the darker tone to this game, the concept made me really interested! I don't know if this is normal, but when I got hit by an enemy, I think I got sent to the secret room right away at the beginning of the game haha! The sound design is amazing, and I like the environmental design.

Developer

Tysm :D and congrats on getting to the secret room! i hope you enjoyed the surprise 

Submitted(+3)

Really cool entry I like the mood the game sets especially the tile art and opening set up. Character controller feels responsive however I'm so used to unlimited wall jumps I was trying to navigate the level not as intended at times but that not your game just my conditioning. 

I can see lots of potential with this project and enjoyed my playthrough if there was one thing I would change it would be a little bit more global illumination. I can see where you was going and how it aid's with setting the mood but it was a little to dark for me as it stops me properly building a mental map between runs and causes me to squint a little bit to much.

Developer

What kind words , thank you :D 

And I agree with your note on the illumination. I’d like to eventually add “difficulty options” such as increasing the candle size

Developer(+1)

https://www.twitch.tv/sugarfalcon  has achieved 1:45:47
UPDATE FOR LEADERBOARD SOON/ COMMENT YOUR TIMES

Submitted(+3)

This game is very polished and interesting. The art and atmosphere are spot on. Well done!

Developer

Wow thank you!! We put a lot of work in (ꈍᴗꈍ) 

Submitted(+3)

This game is great. The graphics and sound design are really good, and the UI looks clean. I personally find the character feels a little sticky, but good job!

Developer

We’ll be blasting this game with the destickifier soon. Thanks!

Developer

Thanks so much, that means a lot. Really happy you enjoyed the game! I loved Cardinal btw.

Submitted(+3)

cool wow awesome game

Submitted(+3)

Genuinely a really cool game, the sound design is fantastic, I absolutely love the art style and it feels fast paced with some difficulty elements to it. Great work guys!

Developer

Thanks so much for your kind words regarding my sound design, it really means a lot! Glad you enjoyed it ♥️

Submitted(+3)

Amazing atmosphere, art, and music! I really liked the core mechanics and first section of the game. I was really in the zone getting through the first sequence at the start of each run. The physics felt really good, you get a good amount of speed from running and wall jumping quickly which was really satisfying!

It's quite difficult and felt kaizo-like at  times tho! My perseverance is a bit too low to beat it in its entirety. A few small bugs with the wall-sliding mechanic would trip me up occasionally whenever I got deep into the cave. I snapped this clip from my furthest run when my guy wall-grabbed onto a floor spike momentarily, but long enough to kill me. RIPPP ;(


But A+ on the graphics, animation, and overall design! Awesome work from the whole team! Loved the music too. I can't wait to see some real professional platformer players speed run this one!! I'm curious how the game ends

Developer

Kaizo was a big inspo, particularly in the “punish” moments of the levels. Thank you for saying all that! And the clip is super helpful, there is definitely some buggy geometry there. We’ll get that fixed :) 

Submitted(+3)

Very cool take on it! I think that it is very impressive you got such well flushed movement in such a short amount of time. Awesome job!!

Submitted(+3)

Love the way the game looks and the controls feel