I really liked this games concept for its mechanics, there is a gem in there. I do have two main pieces of potential improvements however. First and the biggest one: The game felt a bit too easy!! Once you learn the mechanic, it is way too easy to avoid the fire, so adding more obstacles and distractions to encourage the player to trap themselves in ring of fires would create an more intense game play! The other thing is that the doors were maybe a bit disorienting, maybe try making them instant or a proper transition screen.
Viewing post in ARRsin jam comments
Thanks for the comments. This was fun as it was my first Jam and arguably my first game that made it to the build phase. Everything before this was only a tutorial or just messing around. I gave my teammate, who is my roommate, a 12 hour notice by saying to him while making dinner: "Hey, let's do a GameJam. Thor (PirateSoftware) is hosting one and it starts tomorrow. Not sure of what the theme is but let's do it." No questions asked, he just said "What am I doing?". And here we are.
I totally agree with a transition sequence for the doors. They did seem a bit jarring and was a last minute addition since it was originally pitched in my GDD and game synopsis. I worked out some of the bugs with it and managed to get it cobbled together. I do plan to continue with the idea, possibly completely rewrite it as it was dirty and felt forced. I want to change the perspective, maybe, and update the mechanics for sure. Obstacles would be fun to engineer and maybe quick timing puzzles or find a key type of thing to get to the next level. The fire was meant to be a hurdle but it was more of an after thought once the game was all polished. I've worked on a few things and have a better understanding of the particle system. The most important thing I want to do is figure out procedural level generation instead of having to develop mazes. That was my plan from day one, but couldn't get a working prototype of a maze together in 12 hours and scrapped it immediately. I'm happy with what we made, with the limited experience and knowledge we have. Especially with Unity.