Post by AI Sin in Berry jam comments

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Pretty fun, but also very frustrating. Perspective is very much so messed up in this game, so it can be hard to judge jumps and such. It was to the point where I glitched past the last gate instead of doing it properly.

Would have been nice to add a flag to that final gate because moving the boxes to the same spots over and over was a bit annoying.

Controls are a bit frustrating to deal with because you have what feels like two separate control systems. This is partially my fault, but might be nice to have say prompts on controls appear if you are still for x seconds.

You can jump to win on the first 'boss' fight, bypassing the rest of the fight.

The big beetle felt a bit luck based with the boss sometimes just spamming non-fireballs or spamming fireballs without the button, or would do the remove button twice. Also the swipes were not even in speed so sometimes it would move super slowly, sometimes it would move at normal speed, sometimes it would move at fast speed, and one time it was basically instant.

Please skip repeat dialogues on death.

Slug fight was very annoying and difficult and sometimes felt completely unfair. You have to drag the fire/ice into the slug and sometimes they just clip through the slug. This is on top of having to deal with the slug if it attacks you during, which can end up trapping you. The slug's attacking you also felt somewhat forced if you only participated minimally. One time, I jumped and the slug still hit me because it moved so fast.

One of the blocks near the peak seems glitched and a bit off in terms of layering. This also causes your web to fly off into the 0,0 coordinates (top left of the map) without hooking, which obviously causes you to fall if you were trying to make the jump at the same time.

Your web stops charging if it is in a block instead of allowing you to point blank web jump.

It looked like you were supposed to backtrack for a few flies. I wasn't able to because I glitched past the gate, but I do wonder if there was a second ending for getting all the flies.

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ProjectESPider3 years ago

Thank you for the feedback! Sorry about the perspective, it's somewhat out of my control since it's built around RPG Maker's art and pre-set perspective, but I'm very confident with it's consistency. 😅 Could you go into more detail about the last gate glitch? I know you can jump over it with the grapple ability, but if there's a glitch that's occurring, I'd like to know. Anyway, here are my responses to the other points made:

Ahhh, that's fair. I'll add that if I update the game! ^^

Ummm, I'm a little confused by what you mean with "two separate control systems"? The controls don't change and there's only one way to do each thing (except for the fact there's controller support). The prompt idea is cool... but I didn't even think of it since, well, most games don't need this? Could you go into more detail about why you think this game would need that specifically?

This was intentional. Originally the boss would keep going until you left, but play-testers got confused, so I made it so it ends after a bit. You can finish the boss either way. 😁

This was intentional. Like most bosses, the moves are selected randomly, but there is a system that prevents the same move from being used too many times. So even if you don't get the move you wanted, the chance the next move will be the one you want will increase. I'm a little confused about whether this is a bad thing, since most games' boss battles are a little random when it comes to move selection? As for the swipe, there are only two speeds. The boss indicates it's going to do the faster one by slamming its other foot (and shaking the screen) beforehand. So you gotta pay attention and look for that sign to know if it'll be the faster one or slower one. 😅

I agree >.< As I mentioned in a previous comment, I wanted to shorten them after you see them the first time, but just ran out of time in the game jam. Even so, they're only a couple seconds long, so I figured it would be fine. (And there's only, like, 2 dialog scenes in the whole game anyway)

I agree. Probably the biggest mistake I made with this game was making the final boss a bit too difficult. Unlike the other bosses, it has a health bar, so you control how fast it gets defeated, but if you aren't patient, you'll end up making more mistakes. In the future, I hope to add the ability to let the player get hit twice before dying and lower the max HP of the boss.

Ooof, sorry about this! I'll see if I can replicate the problem and fix after the game jam!

This was intentional. Otherwise, you could just keep climbing the wall forever. 😅 Gotta give it a little space so the momentum of the web actually "pulls" the player up!

You can actually get every fly the first time you enter the room they're in. Some flies may be easier if you backtrack with new abilities, but that's never actually required for any of them. 🤗 Since you can get over the gate using the box and the dash anyway, I should've probably added the ability to go back with the gate their, but like I said, you don't need to backtrack for any of the flies, so I didn't think of that. >.<

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AI Sin3 years ago (2 edits)

It is the grapple jump. Once you do that though and go to the next screen, you can't ever go back.

You have both mouse and keyboard controls would be nice to be able to know what the alternative controls might be. And it is a bit confusing when you have the grapple and tethers both on the mouse. Would have been better if the the tether was on the shift key or something for more natural movement. Was jump on space? I forget. Point is, if I take a break and then come back, I might not remember the controls. Combine that with controls that don't necessarily feel natural (I feel like grapple and tether should have been swapped), the player might have a harder time. Giving the player some remap options, like say for me, space to jump, wasd controls, shift to tether, and left click to grapple would feel the most natural because of where my hand rests on the keyboard. This can get especially confusing when I need to jump, grapple, and tether at the same time.

It definitely felt like there was more than just two speeds. It felt like four speeds to me. Might have been a glitch or maybe my senses were just being a bit weird, but I feel like at least once the swipe was super fast. But with RNG, you can get annoying combinations like string on the upper left corner, button on the lower right.

There might not be many, but for a tough fight where you might have to repeat the fight...

The problem isn't a matter of patience. The slug moves faster than you from what I can tell and it can hit you while you are jumping out of the way in some cases. Combined with seeing fireballs and iceballs flying through the boss and it feels unfair.

Still would have been nice if you could keep charging it at least.

There were two flies that I couldn't seem to get right away. The water fly (I don't think you have jump at that point) and the fly on the cliff (due to perspectives, it made it harder to tell where I was even supposed to jump from if it was possible). These two flies really felt like you needed grapple to reach because with the perspectives one, it felt like I kept hitting a wall. The water one just looked like it was intended for later.

That also brings up another possible issue. I wonder if any of the fly traps allowed you to accidentally grapple jump and lock yourself in.

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ProjectESPider3 years ago

Ahhh, we'll it's an unintended exploit, and there's no reason to backtrack anyway. >.<

Yeah, I would've loved to add control remapping or more accessibility options... but I mean this was a game-jam game after all. Only have so much time. 😅 There's no point in the game where you're required to use all abilities at the same time, so I didn't think of it, but yeah.

Idk either. Guess I'll wait and see if someone else encounters something like that? As for the placements of the button/web-device, their relative placements are not random! The third-phase is purposely spread out to make it a little difficult. Once again, intentional to make the boss interesting. 😅

Yes, like I said, I agree. It's difficult. There's a whole system that tells you where the boss will dash however. You need to dodge before they start moving.

Yeahhh, sorry about the cliff one. The game recommends controller so you have more precise movement. And it is color-coded so you know the height to jump from.

Every fly trap is only two blocks high, so you would be able to escape all of the ones you enter. Even if you couldn't, the pause menu has a "Restart Level" button, so you can always restart from your last checkpoint even if you did manage to get yourself stuck somehow.

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AI Sin3 years ago

Color coding would definitely be a problem for me... accessibility issue there.

I feels like the button placement was random since I don't think I got the same pattern each time. Unless dying doesn't reset the pattern and it just continues.

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