itch.io

I just discovered the, "pondering my orb" meme and figured this game was inspired by it, but it seems this game predates the meme's spread. Wild.

Really fun and nostalgic game. I think it could be cool if there could be a way to assign an adopted cat to a bed, so they go there when they sleep, and no other cat would use it. This would allow to personalize each adopted cat's sleeping space, for example to color-coordinate it with the cat.

Regarding item loss, I had an issue where I broke a pipe connector and lost the pipe connected to it. I think there was also an issue of some items getting trapped when placing tiles on them, although this was sort of expected. Also, and I'm not sure this is a bug or not, but items that fall into the ocean tend to disappear. ... I think this may be an issue in part because metal is somewhat rare. For the save file failure, I was holding down the fast-forward key for a while, pruned some branches off of a tree (the waterfruit, I think?) and then saved and exited. The game appeared to exit normally, but the log ends differently:

02:26:33 [DEBUG] (3) main::game: Next day ready
02:26:33 [INFO] Settings saved
02:26:34 [ERROR] Terminal must be dropped after all `Escape`s
02:26:34 [ERROR] thread '<unnamed>' panicked at 'called `Result::unwrap()` on an `Err` value: "SendError(..)"': main/src/game/mod.rs:334
02:26:34 [ERROR] thread '<unnamed>' panicked at 'called `Result::unwrap()` on an `Err` value: "SendError(..)"': main/src/update_loop.rs:157

Running it again, I get:

02:10:12 [DEBUG] (3) main::game: Next day ready
02:11:12 [INFO] Settings saved
02:11:12 [ERROR] Terminal must be dropped after all `Escape`s
02:11:12 [ERROR] thread '<unnamed>' panicked at 'called `Result::unwrap()` on an `Err` value: "SendError(..)"': main/src/game/mod.rs:434
02:11:12 [ERROR] thread '<unnamed>' panicked at 'called `Result::unwrap()` on an `Err` value: "SendError(..)"': main/src/update_loop.rs:129

This is pretty impressive. I expected lag, and indeed I did get lag once plants started growing, but it was an acceptable amount until I started pressing the fast-forward button. If I did this too much, the framerate was semi-permanently degraded until restart, pruning would be unresponsive, and saving would fail on exit.

Other noticeable issues: white font is sometimes hard to read, shadows are too intense in small recesses, resource management is frustrating, it is too easy to lose expensive items (in part due to bugs), and ladders do not work after restart.

Not as intuitive: It is hard to tell what moisture level the soil is, and it's not clear what amount of light the plants are receiving.

I am not sure how I feel about this game. On one hand, being able to precisely control the growth of plants like you're doing landscaping or clipping a bonsai tree is a wonderful, underused mechanic. On the other hand, I worry about the lag.

Also, I'm not sure if the gameification of resource management is the right fit, as it seems it could take away from the primary mechanic. I do appreciate more generally the building and "having something to do", and I like the aesthetic contrast of natural and urban. Maybe it just needs refinement? Not sure. I suspect that shouldn't be the highest priority, but also, the inventory management will only get worse as more plants are added.

Oof, that CPU requirement looks a bit too steep for me. I also have a 4-core i7 but it's maybe 30% slower. I might check back on this later. Hyperrogue was really fun.

Also, I wonder if the coins bounced more. Might be cool or really annoying.

Just saw your game on the itch.io channel. Congrats on being featured!

I haven't had the chance to play the demo yet. (to be fair, also Linux, lol)

But just looking at the footage on the feature video and your devlog, I have a few remarks...

First of all, the art is absolutely gorgeous! Also I can tell you've put a lot of effort into giving a lot of depth to the movement options available.

Having the weakest enemy in the game require two hits to kill is a bit bold from the perspective of a new player learning the ropes, but at the same time it depends on your target audience, and I see it introduces the combo feature which is cool.

Honestly the major gripe I could see myself having while playing this game is the aurascope build mode. It seems to take away from the flow. While watching the itch.io feature video, I noticed that the player started to jump in mid-air and then use the build mode to place tiles directly beneath them. Which made me think... why not just have that the default build mode? Have the aura cubes materialize directly beneath the player's feet, and save the mode switching for when precision is really needed. Maybe when crouch-sliding with the build key, you could materialize a bunch of cubes beneath you at once as you move.

It might even be possible to add a "flow" option to the bombs as well, with a parabolic trajectory. The trajectory could be displayed in the world. Perhaps the parabola varies in size periodically as you hold down a key. (also, I'm assuming you're trying to avoid using the mouse?)

Water quality? Wut? Oh wait, there's a new update! Sweet!

That's normal. Windows laptops by default have battery settings that reduce power usage while not plugged in (computer hardware consumes more electricity when it's working harder). Clicking on the battery icon near the clock will lead you to more settings you can explore.

Can confirm this is still a thing. Firefox 51.0.1 (64-bit) on Windows 7.

After some FPS testing, I've found that the water effects take up a lot of resources. I bet if those could be disabled, they would double your framerate. (Source: me playing Raft on my 8-year-old laptop, and seeing the framerate double after I build the walls)

Your GPU is decent considering its age, except for the fact that it doesn't have its own on-board memory.

One of the consequences is that your GPU needs free RAM in order to work. Assuming your GPU needs the full 512 MB and the game itself needs 100MB, and rounding up to be safe, you will need to check Task Manager and make sure you have 700 MB of free RAM. On your system, that probably means no other programs should be running.

Another consequence is that your GPU's speed is bottlenecked by how fast your computer can move memory from the RAM stick to your GPU. This can really kill performance, and unfortunately there's no way around it.

A workaround would be to:

1. Set graphics settings to the very minimum
2. Reduce the screen resolution of the game (It'll look like garbage, but it should bring the graphics requirements down to around Portal 2 levels)
3. Wait for the devs to implement a mouse sensitivity option (which really ought to be in the game anyway)

Sadly 3d Unity games tend to not be very well-optimized. There are far more performant ways to implement the mechanics present in this game. Oh well. Props to the devs for the game mechanics.