itch.io

Thanks a lot for taking the time to play it, and for recording it!

Seeing how other people play your games is extremely valuable, I could see a lot of things that need to be improved (for example, I can see that I didn't communicate well enough how to use the flares).

I see that you found the turn back move :D. I didn't note it in the controls list because it's a bit rough, I'm not too happy on how it transitions at the moment.

Again, thanks a lot!

Hi! I joined the jam a couple of days ago, and all the discord links I have found are expired.

If I understand correctly, I need to be in the discord channel to have access to the main character model. If so, would it be possible to send me a new valid link?

Wonderful! Thanks for the encouragement, I'm trying to get a couple of systems going at the moment, let's see if it works out :D.

Hi there! That discord link is also expired :D.

Is it too late to join? I'm not sure if I will have the time to work in the game, but I would like to try.

Thanks for the offer, but I don't really have much spare time at the moment. I'm trying to build a portfolio myself, and between that, a full-time job and a newborn baby, my hands are full.

I like the concept of this game, so I will keep an eye on it. Every few updates (not each update) I will give it a try and send you feedback if I find anything, but I really can't be involved with dev builds as well.

Cheers man, and keep it up!

Thanks a lot for taking the time to play, and for the feedback.

I kind of hate my own voice, but I think that's a common thing :D. Recording it was fun.

About YouTube, I think I should make a dedicated channel for dev stuff. In that channel I mostly upload videos of me playing a game called "Blood Bowl", all in Spanish :D, I will try to do a bit more dev in English from now on.

Thanks!

Nicely done!

I'm sorry I didn't get in time to give it a rating, but I had fun with it :D.

I noticed that the water changes material midway at times, not sure why that is. It makes all of the water brighter at once, then after a bit darker, and so on. It's a bit distracting until you realize what's going on.

Some music, and especially, some sound effects, like footsteps, landing, and a jump chime (ala Mario) would give it a lot of "life".

Cheers, and congrats for the release!

The ambience was very good, as well as the timing to open new areas. My screen size is 3840 x 2160 (typical aspect ration 4k).

I copied a slightly edited version of it. Cheers man!

Wow, this game is big. I had some issues with the save feature, but it's probably on my end. This is the kind of game I'd like to play over a few sessions.

Some thoughts:

• Cool splash art at the beginning
• I wasn't able to figure out how to send people on expeditions, and also I couldn't get enough seeds to progress my base (I needed 10 to be able to build a garden).
• For a new player, it's a bit confusing to figure out what each area does. Perhaps it could be useful to leave the name of each area permanently one, and show the details when the player hovers over it.

I think you have a good prototype for a very interesting game here. Keep at it!

The audio system in my project is done in a very manual way at the moment :D.

I will make a proper dialogue manager and update the project with it soon, I'm waiting for the rating period to be over before I submit any update.

I'll let you know when I have it implemented, so you can have a look if you are interested (I'll keep updating the source code as well).

This is spectacular, great job with the lights and the ghost, it looks superb!

Some random thoughts:

• The UE4 logo is not a circle, but an oval for me. You may have it anchored to the whole screen, but in this case I think it may work better if you anchor it to the center instead.
• Awesome work with the menus!
• At one point I was going up some stairs and I fell off the map. May be adding a blocking volume could prevent it (in any case, it was me who was going in a wrong direction).
• Navigation is a bit tricky, I was getting lost at times (I have to say, I know too well that navigation is hard to implement :D).

Good job with this one, I think you have something that you could expand upon if you feel like it :D.

Nice concept! Hehehe, I have fun dishing it out on Travis, for some reason I was bumping into him a lot :D.

I like your menus a lot, as well as the music. One little thing though, hitting [Esc] brings you back to the main menu with no further notice, I was expecting some kind of pause menu.

The office is really cool, and the environment never gets in the way.

Very good job!

I had some good fun with this one! I think it's the only horde based shooter I've seen.

Some random thoughts:

• From the main menu, in the controls list, C is listed for both 'Switch view' and 'Equip pistol'. 'Equip pistol' is correctly listed as Q in the controls list of the pause menu.
• Nice effects in the widget titles!
• I like the minimap, it's very informative.
• Great storytelling with the orbs!
• After the target trials, I wasn't sure how to advance, In the end I figured out that I had to interact with the information wall by looking at the minimap, but it could help to have some kind of indication, or have the wall trigger automatically.
• In the horde fight, it may be helpful to indicate how many hordes there are in total (for example, Horde 3/ 5, or something like that). It's perfectly fine as it is, I found myself wondering about my progress in the middle of it.

I liked the navigation of the maze, which could have been a nightmare, but was made very pleasurable by the great mini-map, and by wanting to find more of the orbs to get extra story tidbits.

When it comes to shooting, it worked well, but I wonder if you could benefit from some Bungie-like stickiness. For example, just as an idea, how I would approach it:

• You could have a line trace going from the the point from where you are shooting (I guess the camera, but could be the gun) into a decent distance like 1000 or something like that.
• If the hit actor has a tag "shootable" then you can reduce the yaw and pitch speed (I think it's those two) to make the mouse move slower.
• If there is no "shootable" actor hit, then you restore the original yaw and pitch speed.

I had fun with this one, both in the exploration and the shooting aspect. Great job, and keep at it! :D

Thank you very much for taking the time to check the playthrough, and for all your interesting comments!

I saw your video, and I really appreciate all your tips and comments. I think I will be adding some lights on the platforms, as you suggested, and I may try something like the Far Cry lines you said, to help navigation :D. I should try ALS V2 as well, I haven't played with it yet.

I also like the idea of somehow closing the access to the platforms once electricity is restored. I don't want to collapse the platforms, but I could add some intense electricity in that hole in the wall, now that electricity is restored :D.

At the beginning, I did try to stop the physics of dead bodies after a few seconds, and turn it at least static, but I was getting some weird results at times, so I decided to let it as is for the game jam. I think I will have another go at it for a future update, as it would help with performance, as you say.

By the way, they are not audible in the video, but I do have footsteps :D. I got 8 different sounds that play at random, spawning at the position of the relevant foot.

Again, thank you very much for your video and all your feedback!

Thanks a lot for taking the time to play it, and for the comments!

Thank you very much for letting me know about the print string! I thought I had set it up for shipping, but if you could see that string then something was clearly off. The good news is that I will be able to easily squeeze a bit better performance when correctly set to shipping :D. That string in particular is a test for a fake achievement that you get when you die 7 times, but I didn't have time to implement it in time.

About the platform section, I had a couple of slanted platforms with the idea of having the player die once or twice, but I have been receiving feedback that people have been dying a lot. It definitely was harder than I intended. I have learned that it's hard to gauge difficulty when you know the optimal route, and which platforms are not good. Sorry for the frustration!

I will be updating the game after the rating period is over. In the first update I will have much improved performance in the main menu, and also a mission message that clearly states what to do, and is also accessible with TAB. I realize the current system is far from ideal, as the messages were ambiguous and would sometimes be overwritten by other non-informative ones.

In future updates I will also add highlighting of interactable objects and a reworked platforming section.

Thanks a lot for your time and feedback, and sorry for the frustrating parts!

This has an open world feel to it, it's a nice concept that can be expanded upon.

Some random thoughts:

• In the main menu, the options are slightly hard to read. Perhaps a semi-transparent box would help to make them stand out.
• The upper comment probably is related to the scaling. I play in a 4k screen, and all text looks minuscule here.
• I like that you start in the control screen, instead of the main menu one :D.
• The animations of the cats are nice, as well as the transformation.
• Hehehe, 5 lives? What happened to the 6th and 7th ones? :D
• It would be helpful to have a pause menu with the option to re-read the story and go back to the main menu.
• I really like how the different people in the world are going about their day, moving and seemingly doing things.
• I'm not sure if it's my system, but I didn't hear any sound or music at all.
• After getting the target soul, clicking on "main menu" or "quit" doesn't do anything.

Nice job! Keep at it!

I'm really sorry to hear that. I would have liked to do some optimizations, as I use a lot of lights and post-process effects combined with lumen, but I didn't quite get there (as you could see). After the jam rating period is over I will update the game to improve some aspects, including as much optimization as I can (I'm thinking about having Lumen as an option).

I apologize for handing you a frustrating experience, thank you very much for taking the time to try it!

Great job! The levels look quite polished, I would say, with satisfying sword slashing (even if some sound effects when hitting an enemy would push it a bit further even). I really liked the credits level, with the 'hidden' Easter egg of your own name just in the back of the player.

I have to say, though, I was starting to get a bit sick with the movement. I only got the Quest 2 yesterday, so most likely I'm still too sensitive to VR, but I can see why the introductory apps opt for teleporting instead of movement. But, I totally understand that teleporting wouldn't work here. Hehehe, I don't have a solution, I don't even know if it's an actual problem :D, just wanted to let you know.

In any case, it's a great experience. I hope you keep doing VR things!

I loved the jumping in this game, it feels good, as well as the crawling. I also appreciate that you can rotate with the joystick.

My unique problem (which is completely a 'me' thing) is that I don't have too much space around me, so I didn't finish it due to fear of hitting the wall (got close a couple of times :D). Also, I just got the quest 2 yesterday, so I may not be particularly adept at it yet.

I think you have something in your hands, that you could easily expand in many ways. I hope you keep at it :D!

Hehehe, nice concept!

I'm in the same boat as another commenter, I just got a Quest 2 yesterday and this app "gently pushed me" towards setting it for development :D.

In my case, I do have a reduced space for computer things, so I would have appreciated the option to move to one of three positions: original position, in front of printer, in front of where you stamp the paper.

One thing I noticed is that dropping the stamps results in the stamps going through the floor, and not respawning, so you cannot use that stamp anymore.

Fun idea!

Hahaha, dying to a car when I was walking around was a good jump scare :D.

Your sounds are very well done. The footsteps, the claxon of the car, everything works well and with the right relative volume. Same for the music when you die, the font, etc.

If any, I would have liked the base movement to be a bit faster, but I understand very well that it would impact the overall design of the areas :D.

Nicely done, very good job!

Good job!

Some random thoughts:

• You nailed the shooting and the zoom.
• The entry level, where you see the controls and can adjust them, is brilliant.
• Very small thing, I didn't realize the play area was isolated from the menu one, I thought it was connected and died once going backwards. Perhaps having them at the same level could make it more obvious?

One more thing about the assets, I saw that the source code is 7.5 GBs. I haven't looked at it yet, but I suspect you added the used assets directly to the project. For example, a Paragon character by itself is around 1.5 GBs. However, you are not using most of that content.

If I may, I would recommend you to have a separate project just to triage the assets, and build some blueprints and test maps with the things you need there. Then, you can migrate just that test map and/or blueprints, and Unreal will be smart enough to only copy the files that are actually in use. For example, I have two Paragon characters in my project, but combined they "only" take 700 MBs instead of 3GBs.

Anyway, the game itself was very nicely done, and lots of fun!

Thank you very much for taking the time to play it, and for the feedback!

I have some ideas about how to increase performance during gameplay, I'll try to optimize it a bit once the rating period is over. I also had a giant issue in the main menu that has halving performance there, that's already fixed in my local project.

About the platforming section, I'm sorry, it caused frustration to a lot of people. I wasn't sure if it was hard or easy, I intended to be an area where players would die once or twice, but no more than that. I know now that it's kind of hard for the developer to gauge difficulty, as I know the best path, but it's something I will try to get better at. 

Again, sorry for the frustration, and thank you very much for your kind words!

Thank you very much for taking the time to play it, and for the comment!

I have a giant issue in the main menu level that is almost halving performance there. I have it fixed in local, I will be updating the game once the rating period of the jam is over, and hopefully I'll find ways to improve performance during gameplay as well :D.

Thank you for your kind words!

Nicely done!

Some random thoughts:

• The controls feel very much in line with one of the best spaceship games I've ever played, "Freelancer". It's an oldie, and weirdly enough doesn't seem to on steam or gog, but worth a look for extra inspiration :D.
• I had a weird issue in which the space stations would disappear if I went a bit far from them to try to make a U-turn and come back. I kept looking for them, but I couldn't see them, not sure if I was just being dumb though.
• I wasn't very sure what exactly I had to shoot at. May be having a small sound effect that triggers when you hit something that can be damaged may help?

This is a fun game, nicely done!

Thanks a lot for taking the time to review it, and for the comments!

Hehehe, believe it or not, I haven't played Portal 2 yet... Knowing this, I'll have to play it (finally!).

Thank you very much!

I hadn't played chess in a long while, that was fun.

Some random thoughts:

• I like your choice of music for this game, it goes very well with it.
• The chess assets look good!
• Did you do the AI by hand? it's not a particularly strong chess AI, compared to professional chess games, but if you have done it by hand it's actually quite impressive!
• Perhaps some kind of animation only for the AI pieces could be helpful to track their movement. I wouldn't use it for the player pieces though, instant movement feels better for those (for me at least).

Very good job, even more so considering your time constraints!

Thanks for taking the time to play it, and thanks for the comment!

Sorry to hear that. I tried to make it so players would die once or twice in the platforming section, but I didn't want it to be more than that. The thing is that it became really difficult for me to gauge how hard or easy it was becoming, as I knew it way too well. The last thing I want to do is to get people frustrated, so I apologize.

Thanks for the feedback!

"Oh yeah!" Hehehe, this is a very fun game, very well made, with a great idea for mechanics, and very well done sound (I see you know your sound processing well :D). Possibly the best sounding game I have experienced this jam.

If any, I would recommend you to add a full screen option for the web player (I couldn't find it in this one).

Very good job!

Thanks for taking the time to play it, and thanks for the feedback!

I totally understand your point. I do have a decent microphone, but I'm quite the noob when it comes to audio processing. I intend to add some enhancements to this game, so I will try to improve the audio quality. Actionable feedback is the best feedback :D. Thank you very much for pointing it out!

I had the weirdest situation with this game, as it would only start in 640x480 resolution :D. Fortunately, I could download the source code and play the game from the editor.

Some random thoughs:

• Nice interaction system! It works really well.
• I like the mystery shrouding the house. Who deserves saving, who doesn't, it keeps you engaged.
• At one point I entered a room and was instantly killed by the demon. I'm not sure, but I think he may have got stuck in the door, because I had not seen him for a while.
• The music goes very well with the general tone of the game.

All in all, really good job with this game!

This looks really neat.

Some thoughts:

• I absolutely adore the parallax effect of the stars. Is it 4 layers in total? It feels great.
• The camera delay is also perfect for this game.
• You already mention that the damage to the ship system is in open state. Because of that you can just get the ship on top of the asteroid, destroy it, and collect all the materials without effort :D.
• I understand what you want to achieve with the controls, but perhaps having the movement mapped to the input direction while adding some inertia to the ship would be more intuitive (if I remember correctly, space rangers 2 did it that way, but it's a long time, may be not :D).
• The asteroids spawn with very neat spacing with each other, nicely done.

Good job so far! Keep at it!

Thanks for taking the time to watch the video! The game is in the demanding side, no doubt about it. The main menu is the worst offender, as I had some elements I forgot to delete, but it won't go from 3 to 30 :D. Hopefully I can do something about performance in the future.

Thank you very much for the comment!

Thanks! Yeah, Unreal Engine 5 makes nice assets shine :D. The platforming mini-section was intended to cause a couple of deaths, but the game as a general is a bit too unclear about where to go next, I'll be fixing that in the future.

Thanks for taking the time to play, and for the comments!

I love how good the feedback to the player is. You interact with the required objects, one of your chains disappears with a nice effect. And the controls are very well explained, including the interaction prompt, that's very nice to see.

The music is a really good fit. Perhaps the sound effects could be a bit louder, as they are hard to hear with the music.

Platforming feels really good, the jumps are well measured. The only thing I would say is that me, personally, as a random player, I expected to be able to jump from under a platform without colliding with it (Mario style, I guess :D). But that would definitely impact level design, so it's not something to change lightly.

Very good job!

Alright, after trying it again, I realized that my old save had actually saved my resources, but not the things I had built. I had built improvements for wood and metal, among others, but they weren't there. Gathering those would give me 10 materials and take 3 seconds, consistent with the room not being built.

After deleting the Hope folder as you told me, I played a few turns and the same thing happened again. I built stairs, then left, and on playing again the stairs were not there (but my resources were).

I will try again in the next update. And, if I'm the only one having the issue, don't worry too much, it may be something on my end.

Thanks for taking the time to play it, and for the comment!

I can say that I had some fun recording the lines :D. Setting them up in the level was too much of a manual process, so now I'm working on a "dialogue manager" of sorts to make it easier and avoid voice overlaps.

Thanks for playing it!

Thanks for all the tips! In the end I don't have time to check it tonight, but I'll try deleting the folder and playing it again tomorrow morning. Cheers man!

You are totally right, by default I should set the resolution at the player's actual resolution. That's a very good point, thank you very much, and, again, sorry for all the inconveniences so far!