itch.io

Can't wait to try it!

Thank you so much!

I tried DMing you, but in what can only be considered the ultimate irony, I can't DM without a Premium account.

Could you follow @coinbirdface (who just followed you) or maybe we could send our link some other way?

Hey organisers,

We had a technical hiccup at the last moment and were unable to complete the submission process by a margin of <1 minute. While we understand this should not have been the case, we are ready with our submission. Would you consider still accepting the entry?

Finally got around to playing this - just didn't get enough time within the jam. I was part of the team that made Dreamweaver. Since my teammates had already played and rated this, I spent my time playing games with lower ratings. But I always intended to play this once I had some time.

I'm writing this after having played 2m and 39s of the game. First of all, the level design is immediately great, but honestly I'm guessing you've already got all the feedback you need on the technical elements. So instead, all I'll say is that this is one of the few submissions I've played that really truly hits the mark on what it means to be a game (at least as per my definition). You've put real effort in cutscenes, dialogue, story, start screen, menu options etc - that's (to me) when a game really becomes a "game" and not just a mechanics showcase. It took just 2m and 39s to make it clear that you really wanted me, the player, to actually experience something. 

TL;DR - Meteora is a real game, not a jam submission. Honestly I don't even feel like rating or judging it. I feel like putting on some earphones and just diving into it.

I understand you guys have taken part in previous MVMs as well. I intend to take part once again in the next MVM, and if you guys plan to join as well, it would be great to see both our games lined up against each other once again. 

PSA

During the rating period, we received a lot of wonderful comments with encouragement and feedback from many of our fellow developers and jam participants. So firstly a big thanks to everyone who did share their thoughts on the game! Unfortunately we lost all the comments due to a technical glitch halfway through the rating period. 

For whoever is reading this - please do write in your comments and give us feedback on the game! We're always looking to capture player experiences and understand what we can do better.

Been wanting to play this for a few days - finally got around to doing it. I like your setting the most out of all the games in this jam. Like everyone else, I like your movement the most too!

I think two things could've been done:

1. Narrative - I know its a game jam and we don't bother much with stories in jams, but its such a core component of what makes a game a game, that imo it should be a part of any game. Something simple - some directive to get the player moving towards a goal. I personally feel like even in a game jam, some narrative is a non-negotiable. It could be something simple - "need food for my family", or "I must kill all dinosaurs" - but the fundamental function is to give the player some reason to explore. That's just my 2c.
2. Level design - the playing space was elegantly designed from a mechanical standpoint, but visually they ended up feeling unmemorable. Unmemorable doesn't mean unfun. It was fun for sure. Unmemorable means that there were no rooms that stuck out as locations for me to recognise and remember. Having one memorable room per region helps players memorise the map and increases immersion. Think of rooms like that giant room of platforms in the forgotten crossroads in hollow knight. It's difficult to forget that room, and every player knows what's to the left of it and what's to the right of it. So some ways to do that are using the shape of the room (horizontal, vertical), use repetition (many many flowers, or many many of those round spiky things), use symmetry (what's on the left side could be on the right side), use some architectural component (maybe a gigantic archway or something) - basically anything that makes the room stand out.

These are minor nitpicks in what was overall a super fun experience. Well done!

What negative can I even say about this? Great little game - excellent job on the input buffering in particular. I would've messed it up bigtime, but the character jumps exactly as I want it to.

Super cool idea and nice game overall! I agree with the points in the other comments - faced the same issues myself - so I'll add some other comments, which aren't gameplay related. 

I think it'd be nice if you added a soundtrack, SFX and a narrative to this. It doesn't have to be good - it could be any boilerplate background music + some free SFX off itch. And a simple narrative - you're an archaeologist stuck in some ancient temple and need to get out. Anything works, because it'll greatly increase immersion and the overall player experience.

Here on itch.io and the amateur indie scene we focus so much on mechanics that we forget what makes games games - the intersection of A/V, storytelling, and interaction. Without A/V and storytelling, games are toys for adults to fiddle with, not games. That's my 2c at least. That being said, I did really enjoy the puzzles and the mechanics. The core components of a great experience are here.

Great job and thanks for a fun 20 minutes. Kinda inspired me to try some puzzle platformers now haha.

Hey thanks so much for the feedback! Appreciate it and we've taken it into consideration. I'm sorry about the music issues. We do have a Windows download up now if you'd like to give it another go! We've also implemented a knockback on enemies.

Damn I was looking to try it too and came with the same question. I'll see if I can find a windows laptop.

Hey I played this earlier but forgot to rate and comment...understandably incomplete since this is for SMVM, but I'll highlight what I thought was really enjoyable - I think shooting is done well here. I like how it feels, I like the gravity and ping-pong effect on the projectile. It's the root mechanic of what could be a really fun game. I did feel that the player moved a little too fast for ease of control - that's only me, so check with others. Maybe the platforms are too small for the player to move comfortably.

My only advice as time goes on till SMVM is to make sure you keep things in scope, and don't skimp on a narrative to keep the player engaged. You don't need 10 more mechanics - a nice shooting mechanic is actually good enough. Instead, focus on a couple of other simple abilities, then work on other elements of gameplay.

All the best for SMVM!

Dude the VFX are awesome no doubt. Loved the enemy death FX, loved the bloom on the blades. I think this is the the only game that I've played so far that has such carefully crafted VFX. 

I think the single biggest thing you should do for your next project is add SFX. I know this isn't any concrete gameplay advice, but from an overall perspective, I think you should start to focus on SFX too. It's such a core part of the overall experience.

As for the gameplay, I personally didn't get very far so I can't comment much. I'm not a great gamer, so I got stuck very early on. I realised that I needed to wall jump up a tunnel, and I literally physically could not execute the moves required. I don't think it was hard (the other commenter clearly made it through) but its more of a skill issue. I tend to have a lot of trouble performing mechanical skills in games. So I ended my run there - sorry! 

Pretty decent! I couldn't finish tbh. I actually didn't know where to go after the first big stone golem thing. I ran past the falling rock, then into the small tunnel, but I couldn't jump across the gap (probably a skill issue). I tried and failed a few times so then ended my run there. Player character has a nice bouncy feel. Btw nice front layer tiling for the grass!

From what I did play, I do have a couple of suggestions:

1. Try and make your art consistent - so don't scale up a small sprite (like the trees in the back) - try to just draw a bigger tree. It doesn't take much more time but it'll make everything look consistent. 

2. You could add a simple starry background instead of a plain blue background. Makes the world more real. 

3. I would have personally liked to see a "beginning" - even a simple one. So before the game starts, one screen with just the introduction to the story. That bit is pretty important so that I have the initial motivation to play.

Otherwise like I said not a bad effort, and I wish you all the best!

Edit: also, awesome music.

Edit 2: how could I forget! I definitely disagree with the control scheme. Space I think should be the jump, cause gamers by now are so used to it, you're just fighting their natural instinct to press space. I suggest moving the knife throw to right mouse, that way your right hand is the attack thing and your left hand is movement.

You can download the itch.io app for mac, which lets you easily install mac builds.

Hey Dan, thanks so much for giving our game a chance! We apologise for the issues. We've fixed the issues on HTML now, and we've added an executable as well. Hope to see you giving it a run soon!

Game over! Excellent game, what an experience. Loved the upgrades, loved the puzzles and loved the story. Music and SFX were top-notch. VA too. My favourite part was when you first meet the boss - what a cinematic shot. 

Brilliant! Would've really liked it to be longer. Kudos to the entire team.

The maglev burst is difficult to coordinate inputs for (diagonally). If I delay either of my two directional button inputs by a little bit, the burst only goes in one direction. A few frames buffer (like coyote time, or jumping again just before you land) would be nice. Took me ~10 tries to jump up into the first bug room - kept falling down - and I'd say a similar number of tries to clear the bug room itself.

About 30 tries I think? For the last locked door, I kept pulling the bucket back down from above cause I thought I needed that to jump. Then I tried once by just regular jumping, which worked.

Hello - good to see another large team with a voice-acted game! 

If you guys don't mind, I'm going to post feedback quickly since there's not much time before the deadline. So it'll be a string of comments instead of one big comment. It's too last-minute to make changes, but if any of my feedback is worth taking into account even now, I'd be very happy.

The buttons I need to press are difficult to see - they're slim and they don't stick too far out of whatever wall they're on. 

Edit: The first boss is mega-hard! Dunno if its possible to slow the boss down by a few pixels. Ofc pls keep in mind this is just me.

Na it was before this. It's right in the beginning when you just walk right till the first wall.

I was on web (safari)

Nice entry! 

But I got locked in place in the first screen. I walked right and then went upto a green wall and got stuck there. Couldn't move. Let me know when this is fixed and I'd like to replay. I'll rate after that. If you want me to rate now, I'd be happy to do so as well.

Aside from that, I definitely think you could put the control scheme somewhere - either in game, or in your itch.io page. In the first story screen ("everything was well..."), I pressed every single button on the keyboard and unfortunately the last button I pressed was Enter, which removed the screen.

Cool stuff otherwise! I like the layout of the UI, it's pretty neat IMO.

Ok I clicked on the dialog box and could play the game.

Dude the mechanics are insane...I've never seen something like this in my life. I can't even visualise how you must have implemented this. Also with branching dialogue and story and everything...kudos man really well done. The music and art support the gameplay too.

It was really difficult to control personally. I got the grappling hook and then tried to get up to the laptop...that was insanely tough for me. Ultimately what I did was spammed mouse and jump together randomly upwards until somehow I made it to the top. I continued doing that for a while, until I got stuck here (see screenshot). Couldn't click any grapple point out, and couldn't go inside, so I had to end my run here. Maybe I missed something idk.

Aside from the controls, I can only say that  it was tough to keep track of where everything was. Obviously this is a challenge given the kind of physics you have, and I believe you could give the player some affordances here. For example (don't do this, just a suggestion to highlight the problem) make each circle/world a completely different colour or something.

Still, just the experience of trying this game was wild for me. I need to go drink some tea or something. Crazy stuff.

Just for us player's benefit, maybe you could upload a gameplay video or walkthrough later on?

Hey what's up? We seem to run into each other a lot haha. Thanks a lot for trying man, appreciate the feedback. 

We fixed the invis issue, so please do try the game out when you get time!

In that case, kudos on pushing something through. I agree with that philosophy - no matter what situation, you gotta press submit one way or another. 

Glad to hear that your next jam went better and all the best for your future work!

Hey the game bugged out as soon as I started, moved right, and the first dialogue box appeared. Let me know whenever fixed, and I'd love to replay this.

Hey, I didn't rate because I'm not the intended audience for this kind of game. If you would like me to rate nonetheless, please let me know and I'd be happy to do so. Please keep my feedback with that perspective in mind too.

I found this game super tough. Like insanely tough. I'm not much of a gamer in the first place, but even so, it was sooo hard. I just died like 50 times just to get the grapple - and then I was basically stuck because I could not physically execute the moves needed. Pretty much called it a day and ended my run there.

But with that being said, this is the first time I've played this kind of platformer (seen some on youtube) and I did really enjoy it. So that means you guys designed your rooms and challenges well. In each room I was given what I consider the two most important things in game design - the ability to make different decisions and a clear upfront challenge. Also the archaeologist doing a Zelda when they got an upgrade was nice haha.

If I were to suggest improvements, it may not align with your vision of the game, but it would be to give the player a ton of affordances - slow the wall sliding down (I know its super slow already), reduce my hitbox so that I can get away with close shaves and not bang my head on jumps etc. But I understand if that's not the direction a game like this is meant to go. 

Secondly - this is my personal opinion and I know nobody cares about this in game jams, but I'll put it out there nonetheless - I would really like to see the story implemented in the game itself. I personally consider storytelling a core component of what makes a game and basically a non-negotiable. So I don't align with the game jam values of "make a neat little game with unique mechanics and some polish." I like even the little games to be large and immersive.

I don't really need to go further than the first upgrade to get a sense of how much effort was put in and how well everything has been put together. I can visualise all the issues that I would've had if I had tried to develop this game. Great job to you guys.

Now that I've had a taste of this, I'll be playing other such platformers. I'd also like to give this another go when I have more time. 

The "walljump projectiles" is a super cool concept. Plus some of the other things - the theme, ability to forgive or kill sinners. I'd like to see a game made out of this. All the best team!

Great aesthetic - felt like ESSA. Nice UI. Good use of assets. 

I wasn't able to finish the game for two reasons:

1. I found the controls a little difficult to handle. The drone felt heavy and unresponsive, which had me redoing many jumps and puzzles just for a couple of missed pixels. If the drone was responsive, it would have made crossing each puzzle/platform section feel really rewarding (it already is: more on that below).

2. The magnetism effect (S key) often didn't work. As far as I could make out, I think it only works when the ball is just below the magnet? So I was never able to catch the magnet while falling. Either way, its very pixel-precise. 

With that being said, I'll be going for another round and trying to finish the game later.

On the other hand, I think the levels and platforming challenges were excellently designed. Loved each little section. I liked the pacing too. Finally, the magnetism ability felt super cool - it really was! I felt a rush of adrenaline when I first used it. I thought it was such a neat mechanic + considering the point about the levels, really well-implemented.

Good hustle overall.

Definitely gonna check out the stream - feedback on any game is useful to all of us devs. Thanks for doing this!

https://coinbirdface.itch.io/dreamweaver - Here's our entry, would love to see you check it out!

Ay pretty slick according to me. Made it through with 3 collisions.

I suggest you establish player goals at the beginning of the game, and then check whether they did what they were supposed to do at the end.

1. A simple "Reach the checkpoint!" may be super cliche, but goes a long way in giving the player something to want to do. 
2. Then put a checkpoint at the end. Once we reach, give us a win screen - suddenly its not a mechanic, but it's a complete game. The player overcame an obstacle and was rewarded with victory.

Totally cliche example, but highlights the fundamentals of a gaming experience.

Good hustle overall - all the best for future jams!

Ah sorry man I tried searching for something on my drive but I never put it on the internet anywhere and I must've switched 3 laptops since I made that game. 

Hey just tried it out - its still bugged (there were places where after reaching the wall, I didn't fall) and to be honest, even when it works, it doesn't feel too responsive.

With that being said, I did manage to move a bit and found it quite enjoyable to grapple around. 

I didn't manage to find the oni though - I kinda went everywhere I could but still couldn't see anyone (other that the first lady).

But I do get the general sense of the game - it'll def be a fun one to play through with some fixes. I suggest you keep at it!

Hey same as below, tried to play but got stuck in a wall a bunch of times. Def would love to play a re-upload. Let me know if you want me to point out the specific bugs (the guy below has done it already though).

Art and music are wild, but I couldn't get to play the game properly. As you guys already mentioned in your page, it was too fast. I also couldn't get into any "rhythm" - whatever I thought the rhythm would be was wrong.

One thing that I could suggest is having beats to press in the intro portion. The reason being that I actually kept restarting the game wondering why nothing was happening to the music. Only after I saw the other guys comment below me, I realised that there was some gameplay, so I waited until the beat hit.

With that being said, I can see there was a good amount of work that was put in this. Kudos!

All the best for future jams!

Cool little game! 

In the beginning I had a ton of difficulty figuring out what to do. I waited for a long time staring at order screens of 0000 because I thought from time to time orders would pop up. After several tries and minutes I realised that orders of 0000 have to be pushed in. If others also face this issue, then one solution could be to remove 0 from the random options entirely? If the game is about getting items onto a tray and pushing it, then logically speaking, a 0 order goes against your desired gameplay loop.

But that aside it was quite fun. As mentioned in the other comment, a timer feature or a couple of other small challenge inducers would add to the enjoyment.

All the best for future work!

Amazing! The game and level design is fantastic - loved the puzzles and challenges gameplay. I'm assuming this was made in RPG Maker.

The gameplay loop is "overcome challenge in room" - so a game like this should open with a tiny movement challenge to set the tone and player expectations. For the first few minutes, there was a lot of walking, talking and following. 

Since this was made in RPG Maker, I think you did the best you could, but some feedback here would be that a movement-based game where you do things like chase, time your jumps, aim and dodge - should have a robust movement system that feels nice to pilot (probably beyond the scope of RPG Maker). Some QoL things such as being able to turn around without moving a step in the new direction would've helped in the Chosen fight, or making the second guy's sickle throw not follow the player in midair.

On a narrative level, you may want to consider forcing the gang into the initial story. Despite the hint given by the restaurant person, players may skip talking to them in the restaurant, thus never actually knowing who the villains are before fighting them.

Finally the keyboard mapping was - to me at least - a little off. WASD + right hand buttons are more familiar to me. 

That aside - the development of the story along with the mechanics was great. Each puzzle/challenge felt nice to overcome. There was a sense of logic and design - as a player I knew instantly what I had to do, I engaged in trying to find a solution to my barrier, and I felt a sense of accomplishment upon completing it. Making the final fight a simple sickle throw was a great touch. I think you have a really good knack for making fun gameplay and would love to see you make more games. All the best!