Smaller levels would definitely put more strain on your level generation, but, as an upside, it's most likely easier to calculate if a level is solvable. Your maps are 50x35 tiles I think. You can compare them to the ones of my entry, where each map is only 16x16 tiles, and I'm very happy with how those turned out.
daid
Creator of
Recent community posts
I like the looks. Am I correct in that there are just 2 rooms or am I missing something obvious?
Not sure if I'm a fan of the mechanics. While energy turn based gameplay can be fun, it's now mixed with a limited visibility, which causes you to lose energy to just observe the environment.
I also had a weird issue where [space] would sometimes end my turn and sometimes not, not sure what was up with that...
Congratz on tackling procedural generation! It can be a tough nut to crack. I did get an unwinnable situation on the 4th level I think.
As criticism, I would make the levels smaller/tighter. That would in turn make the graphics stand out more and would create more focused puzzles. Some different enemy types would also spice things up. But, overall, a dungeon crawler puzzler with static enemies can definitely work as a game.
Love the art. Like the gameplay. Level design could definitely use more variety. Also, you might want to add that you can move in the direction where there is "void", so you need to be a bit more careful with what you press or you die. You can now sort of brute force it by just mashing buttons.
I also ran into the bug where you phase trough a wall, I think it happens if you have some "slowdown" glitch where the framerate drops due to reasons outside of your control. No idea if that helps in understanding why it happens.
I totally expected someone to go this way with the two button diversifier, just cycling between normal controls and selecting those. However... it doesn't play very well.
But, I do applaud you for trying! If we never take risks we never discover hidden gems, and only get carbon copies of existing games.
It started off a bit slow, but I'm very glad I stuck with it, the later levels are really fun, and add some twist mechanics! Puzzle games are never easy to make in a jam, and this is a well done entry, levels add enough twists to not get boring. Art is simple but works well. Controls feel right, never felt like the game made my lose instead of my own bad movement.
Pretty simple but well done. I think if you would have added some way the two characters interact with each other it would leave for more interesting level design. For example, if they could stand on top of each other. As now you just have two decoupled players that don't really interact.
Actual camera view distance is a lot less then in your screenshot, maybe leading to the leaps of fait that Smuon reports?
Not a bad platformer actually, there are a few weird things, like I suddenly felt trough the floor somewhere. And there are a few issues like text disappearing before I can fully read it. I had the feeling there is more content then I could find, which is a bit of a shame. So I think you did well on the content side, and should focus a bit more on the core gameplay to iron that out better.
The teleport effect is pretty cool. The webview has a bit wrong size for me, so the top with the healthbar or the bottom with the textboxes aren't visible.
I like the visuals of the enemies in the last level, they look cool.
Could use some sound effects, even something extremely simple does a lot to a game.
Actual goal of the game wasn't too clear to me.
I think the water section is the worst, if I would redo anything I would cut that out, it's not interesting from a mechanical standpoint and slows you down a lot.
Adding running would change the jump mechanics too much, I had to balance walking speed vs jump distance. I didn't want that to be too high and become more like super-meatboy and celeste.
I like the concept, it could really use some sound and music though. https://sfxr.me/ goes a long way ;-)
The art is very nice. The technical implementation has some glitches, but you already know that :) overall well done, I was kinda sad when I reached the end, hoped for some more complicated puzzles.
About the web swing, is it the part where you need to swing,fall,swing? The web doesn't work below the fall line, which is something I've seen other people struggle with to grasph. Or is there something else? Other people reported the web power to be finicky, but I haven't been able to nail down exactly what the issue is.
Is is clear that you can only grab the "moss" bits right? Or maybe that is unclear?
I explained on the page description that how I tried to add the theme didn't work out, so scrapped that part, but still wanted to finish the game.
The difficulty does ramp up after a bit, that was intentional. I don't expect everyone to reach the end. As for diversifiers, also explained on the page, didn't use any (they where not required, just like the theme is semi-optional) but I did use my own diversifiers in the art. 13x13 pixels and only 4 color EGA palette.
Where did you get lost? It's hard to judge where people can get lost as a creator, as you have expert knowledge. So I'm trying to learn.
I've seen someone get lost on two bits, after getting the wizard hat and at the start of the water area. And I have ideas on how to fix both. But maybe there are more spots to get lost. I did want to have some sense of exploration, but not so much that people would feel completely lost.
Ok, this could be good fun, but I think it's a bit too hard. Some difficulty levels or bit less precision required might help, or I just suck at rhythm games :)
Also, that the music fully stops when you miss causes me to generally miss the next beat as well, maybe that could be less "harsh" and only cut out part of the track or lower the volume for a bit.
The timer adds a very interesting tactical twist, as you now sometimes can wait for the timer to end so you can complete the line above that and just occasional try not to complete certain lines. Timing well and planning adds an extra layer of strategy to a classic.
Job well done!
Graphics are a bit simple but work well. The grey "preview" could be a bit darker, when thinking fast, my mind was getting confused and thinking the real block is almost at the bottom and I need to act fast.
Interesting little puzzle game. I think it could work well as an mobile game with touch controls (only tried on desktop). I got stuck on level 11 with my limited brain power at the moment. But enjoyed the puzzles before that. A bit of "juice" would add a lot to this game I think, some small visual effects on painting and some "fireworks" on finishing a level.
I had the issue that I had to play the game on keyboard, but then switch to mouse to goto the next level. Which isn't great for usability.
Next to that the "next" button for some reason is "nex". And I had a crash on finishing level 10, where the game would no longer respond and there is some null pointer exception in the developer console.
Initially the parts off-screen where just black borders. But when I changed the main menu to look a bit in the right style, I changed the background color causing it to be the same and thus confusing. That's what I get for last minute changes without testing...
And yes, I love programming. I am slightly crazy with all my projects. Building my own game engine is great fun and complicated and I would never recommend doing it if you want to make games.
I just made my code public as well on github: https://github.com/daid/DinoJam