itch.io

Hi Dave! Thank you so much!! All of the backgrounds were painted in Procreate using a great brush pack I found from @Morgyuk. I also overlaid two different photographs (1. a crumpled piece of paper 2. watery paint drips) on the image and played with layer blending modes to achieve the final effect. 

Such an interesting take on this assignment! I think you were extremely successful in creating a story that emphasizes a very different  array of emotions. The color changing background is so effective in providing a visual mood indicator. Normally when you shoot in games it is to hurt and kill your target, I love how in this game you are simply trying to spread positivity and love. In terms of mechanics, I think they can probably be simplified. Maybe mapping the aim to mouse position instead of QE/arrows would feel more natural. I also got a bit lost in the first level trying to read all the text. Overall a really great experience!

I think you did a really great job executing pretty much everything you mentioned in your original concept pitch. The UI, art, and music blend well and you have managed to create some very memorable gameplay experiences (the scissors *dun dun dun*). I like the power-ups you added and think the sword swinging is nice. I personally struggled to make the shielding mechanic consistently work for me but that could also just be my lack of playthroughs. Maybe if the first level was a bit more forgiving that would allow player more time to familiarize themselves with the mechanics. Since you have to get into melee range to attack it's easy to bump into demons and hit an instant loose state. 

I just want to start my comment off with saying I ran into a really funny bug in the third round where three bananas were pinning me to the wall and I couldn't move. It was both confusing and awesome at the same time haha 

I think your game is so beautiful and the music choice is perfect for really topping off the whole experience. I agree with Yuen that allowing players to have a bit more control over the camera would feel better and more natural. I think in terms of gameplay you made a really fun experience! I was thinking it could be nice to have some little reward after each completed dish before immediately switching to the next level. Perhaps after players complete a dish you could put the actual recipe on the screen with a bit of text about it.  In terms of the assignment I think that the different emotions can be emphasized more. For example in one of them if you want to induce stress you create a scenario where people are coming over for dinner and you're in a very obvious time crunch or something. 

Everything from sound, art, UI design, and particle animations, and game mechanics are beautiful and well integrated in this game! Your stylistic choices such as adding motion blur really make this feel polished and well thought through. I think in terms of the assignment I would just focus a little more on how to really emphasize change in emotional states from level 1 to 2. 

I think that the environment you created really successfully  invokes a sense of fear and discomfort! Especially in the first level I was pretty horrified because I thought the creepy crawling demon was an actual spider on my screen. My favorite moments of this game were the small details like the two demons in the beginning of the round running across. I also liked being able to see the demons running through the forest breaks before they entered onto the main path. I think if you either introduce more actions or more enemy types, not only the difficulty curve but emotional curve would be more emphasized overall.  

Feedback I forgot to post from October 5th:

What were your favorite moments of the game?

The eyes!! I can't stop looking at the person's eyes in the bottom corner of the screen. The way they twitch and roll around in his head is so creepy in the best way possible. I also thought the third wave transition was so beautiful and shocking!!

Where do you see room for improvement?

I think that playing around with the sound effect on the pencil shooter could be interesting to try out. Since I was shooting at a constant rate I kind of felt like the audio I was creating was steamrolling over the haunting lofi background music. 
Another thing on audio design, this might be super cheesy and overdone, but I think that having a steady thumping heartbeat that increases as the waves go on could be pretty effective on emphasizing the increasing intensity (or something like that)

I had a little bit of a hard time keeping track of what I was doing cause I was just so focused on shooting the bubbles so I think that replacing the UI text scores with UI Slider progress trackers could be a good way for players to easily see what's going on.

When did you stop playing and why?

I didn't stop! I actually replayed multiple times just so I could keep staring at the person's eyes :)

Was there anything related to the interface or controls that was hard
to understand?

Controls were very easy to pick up! It might be easier for players to follow progress if it was tracked by a slider rather than text. 
Also on the instructions page it could be nice to have a visual key 

Do you have any other feedback that you would like the designer to hear?

One more thing I just thought of, are the bullets staying on the screen after they miss bubbles intentional? If not, either shortening lifespan or having them destroy on collision with the boundary colliders could solve this!
Other than that, SUCH BEAUTIFUL ART!! So cool seeing the progress from last week to now. Great job!

Feedback I forgot to post from October 5th:

What were your favorite moments of the game?

The camerawork!! I thought it was such a great touch to have the camera rumble as the animals charged at the lawnmower guy, it really intensified the action of that moment. I also thought it was so funny how the guy just started whacking away those massive animals with his mower at one point.

Where do you see room for improvement?

I would love to see you travel further down the funny/ridiculous route as the game progresses. After seeing the stage where you can whack the animals away It was really funny to imagine what the stage after that would be, just how crazy could it eventually get? 
Also, it was nice to see you add in a giraffe and could be really cool to see even more animals with different behaviors/paths. 

Oh and one last thing, I noticed that when mowing the grass, patterns began to develop. It could be interesting to explore unlocking achievements by mowing a specific pattern (like a heart: <3 for example) into the grass.

When did you stop playing and why?

I didn't!

Was there anything related to the interface or controls that was hard
to understand?

Nope! Controls are laid out super clearly. I really like how the keys are so easily defined right at the beginning of the stage.

The mixed media animations in this game are incredible! I think it was Jason who suggested that you push forward with this art technique and try to remove digital assets wherever you can. I agree! I also agree with possibly removing fighting. Because this is such a fun visual experience, making a more explorative parkour style gameplay could allow us to focus on the visuals even more.  I hope you guys keep working on it!

Everything visually and musically blend very nicely together in this game! I think you've made a really interesting game system here and would really like to see it put to use in different maps. As many mentioned in class, the first level takes a really long time to pick up. Especially for the lost one and angel there are many consecutive rounds where even though they have multiple action choices it only really makes sense for them to choose one of them. I think condensing the map and experimenting with the wall layouts could solve these issues nicely. Also a visual indicator of a trap blocking a square for the lost one and angel would be nice. Because of the trap animation I actually expected the other players to get snapped and have a little hurt animation when they stepped on it.  

As everyone agreed in class, this game is so fun! This theming is a really great approach to the asymmetrical multiplayer prompt. I think with some polishing this game has so much potential to become a successful fun party game. I would definitely add game boundaries so driving off the edge of the city is not a possibility or make a funny falling/lose animation. I would also figure out how to tweak the roles of the two children so that they are more entertaining for those players and more impactful on the parent driver players gameplay (like if the kids were able to directly influence the parents driving by grabbing at the wheel or something).

Comments:
- Such cute pixel art!
- The parachute scene was a really nice surprise and instantly made the whole game a lot more memorable
- I decided to hold down space the entire first two rounds and I completely got the doodle jump reference!

Suggestions:

- I would either give players a way to regain health or restart players at the levels they died at rather than the entire game

- I would tweak cinemachine numbers so that the camera is lower in the y axis because I couldn't see the platforms a lot of the time

You've received this comment a lot but the animations in this game are so fun to look at! Especially that crawling animation makes me smile. I like the amount of mechanics you've added in your game and agree that the only big thing that needs to be addressed next is a gradual way to introduce them. These puzzles are really fun to go through and would love to see what other level designs you could come up with! Oh and also I mentioned this in class but I think it could be fun if you experimented with replacing the background music with a more upbeat tune because the character and situation is already so fun and quirky. Overall really great job!

The art and mechanics in this game work together extremely well! I especially love the look and feel of the lightning dash. I really like how you created three simple mechanics that are easy to pick up but then forced players into difficult scenarios where the mechanics would be hard to master. I agree with the feedback you received in class that the difficulty is a bit steep at times but it's also kind of fun in that way. I like when people can come together and talk about their shared experience of not being able to pass a certain section until their fifth try. I like what Jason said about creating more condensed levels which very clearly incorporated all three mechanics. I really like the idea of giving players the chance to plan out their pathing and strategy before tackling the obstacles  much like you did in the L shaped spike level.

Your game truly feels like walking through a dream scenario! The color pallet is very soothing and the sound design compliments it well. I enjoy the block placing mechanic a lot because it really allows players to create their own paths and solve puzzles how they see fit. The main comment I thought of that was also mentioned in class was that the cool downs sometimes left me standing on a platform for what seemed like a while and interrupted my pacing. I like John's idea of removing the previous block when a new one is placed down and feel that it could really allow players to not only choose their pathing but their pacing as well. Lastly, when I first picked up the key I actually didn't notice the block appear around my mouse because the opacity of it was so low so having some indicator or instruction that I can now use my mouse for block placement would be very nice. All around really great experience!!

I think you guys managed to create a really great experience here! The art and game mechanics work together seamlessly to make this game feel very polished and well thought through. As I mentioned in class I really appreciate how you introduced actions to players and really like your idea about having a practice dummy in the first scene. I think you should play around with making it more obvious that the dummy is interactive or make a more obvious route to jump up to that platform. I also agree with what was said in class about scaling down the two attack UI so that they feel less like something players should click.  Seriously impressive overall! 

I just realized I may not have seen the third wave of emotion because I might've died too early...if that's the case then ignore the last part haha

Beautiful art in this game! I love the large scale of everything around the sprite and think that the choice to have the camera follow players really emphasizes it. I really like how unique your take was on this assignment. I viewed it as more of an experience (until you enter the go to war option of course). The only two points I would bring up are 1. If we could actually see the bird decay after we cover it in shrooms that would give a nice sense of completion to that portion. The next time you enter the room a new animal could even be waiting there or something. I fully covered the bird with shrooms but couldn't get the tail to cover so I eventually gave up and was left wishing I could've seen what would happen if I did manage to cover it. 2. The go to war stage had me a little confused as to what was happening without a backstory. It wasn't until I saw the death screen that I realized these bad fairy people must be trying to overtake the spot as meadow guardian. Perhaps if you could inject hints of this plot throughout the game then there wouldn't be any confusion when players go t war. Other than those points, seriously cool game! I really enjoyed playing it :)

I think this game is seriously so beautiful! I love the gentle color palette and soft halo glow around the main shooter. The way you styled everything from the enemies, bullets, sound effects, and health bar/font work very well together. As for the waves of emotions I think you very successfully brought me through two. The first wave was extremely relaxing and I was really enjoying the slow spawn rate of the enemy so I could just explore the map. The second wave of emotion was when the sound/light transition hit and I believe the screen said that the tower had come to life and now more enemies were flying at me. This immediately got my heart beating a little faster and the whole mood was shifted into one of excitement and determination. My only real critique right now is that I can't quite point out where the third wave of emotion was. Other than that this is awesome :)

Hello!! That's so strange it's not showing up for you :( It 's an html file and should play right in the browser. Do you see the "I don't know how long I've been walking..." text? If you click on the word "village" it should bring you to the next passage.  Let me know if this works because I would love your feedback!

So fun! Love your artwork :)

Thank you so much for the play through and feedback! I completely forgot about the fact that only macs have the option button.