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Correct! The top ones were called out on the Discord channel and there's currently a community vote to decide the winner.

Nope! This jam doesn't have ratings. Winner is chosen by the host.

Eyyy! Way to make it to round 10! That's my highest, too. One of my playtesters was a legend and somehow made it to round 15... 😭 He's better than me at my own game.

Thanks for the idea! I'll definitely consider that and other ways to encourage performance on repeat plays if I take this further. Also thanks for playing! I'm delighted you enjoyed.

I personally don't find it highly engaging yet. Don't be discouraged in any way by that, though. The potential is definitely there. I think finding the "metrics" that create fun for this game and then figuring out how to bump up those numbers through playtesting and iteration will take you far. Here's some metrics I feel could improve the experience.

• Time to Kill: I want things to die faster because it'll speed up the dopamine hits and thus keeps me hooked.
• Survival Difficulty: I feel like it's super hard to lose right now, which means that there's not a lot of tension. A lot of this is due to how much health I have. Lowering health would probably require lowering tracking on the enemy shots as well as it's fairly hard to dodge.
• Aim/dodge difficulty: Right now the game uses an auto-targeting system which removes skill expression in the form of my ability to aim. I think you can keep this if you're attached to it, you'll just want to make sure I've got room to express skill in other ways (like my ability to dodge attacks).
• Mechanic clarity: we already chatted about this one. Making sure I know how all the mechanics work ensures I have the highest chance of enjoying all your game's features.
• Mechanic and kill "feel": the better a feature feels to use, generally the more players will enjoy using it. More feedback on a kill generally makes killing something more rewarding, which makes players more likely to keep playing.
• Power up utility: run surveys with players to measure how useful they feel each power up is. Once you start getting 8+'s, you know the power up is solid.

There's definitely potential in the idea if you want to keep working on it. You've got this!

Yay! My ghost army dreams may someday come to fruition, then!

Thanks for playing and I'm glad you enjoyed! Definitely agree on the art style; visual art is not my strongpoint. My goal in this jam was to create a highly polished, entertaining gameplay loop that embodied the theme and had great feel. If I take this further, I'd collaborate with an artist friend to shore up my lack of skill on the visual side. 

Way to get it done and submitted! I hear you on the time constraints. I was also working down to the wire. It's so funny, in game jams I'm always like, "Wait, one more day, please!"

I hear you on that! I used Corgi (2D engine) in this jam, and not having to program physics, base movement, and AI building blocks makes a HUGE difference. Plus, MM Feel is legendary. 

That's so relatable it hurts. 😭

Oooo dang I love the idea of side goals, almost like the daily objectives in The Finals. Anything that gives another layer for the player to shoot for and mixes up their playstyle. There's only the one enemy for now, but I heartily agree that more would make for a better experience; I was desperately trying to get another one in before the jam close, but the execution was buggy and thus not up to my quality standards for the submission. Alas!

Curious about the wall jump mechanic animation starting while not in a wall. There's a few bugs in this build, but I hadn't seen that one yet. I'll try and fix it if I keep going on this project. Were you even close to a wall when the bug happened?

Thanks for playing and thanks for the kind words, Friend!

Oh man! I've been in your shoes many times when it comes to trying to handle as much of the project as possible and trying to deal with team fires. Way to stick through it and get it done anyways. 

Way to get that much built in 3 days!

Smart stuff! Thanks!

Heehee! Alas! Drop shadow for next time. :D

No, I did not figure out how how to activate the first time that I played. I understand how it works now that you told me, but I didn't get it on that first playthrough.

Thanks for the kind words! I appreciate you. Here's to keeping on learning and growing. 

You bet! Out of curiosity, where do you get your assets and animations? I'd love to try making a 3D game sometime, but I have next to zero visual art skill.

Ahhh! No, definitely didn't get that. I find it super useful to playtest with people when designing, and not telling them how the game works, to see if a mechanic reads clearly or not. Might help for you in future jams!

I couldn't figure out how to activate them.

Haha! I would've never thought to make that comparison, but I can definitely see it with the cat-and-mouse-style gameplay loop.

Way to get your first game under your belt! Keep it up.

Haha! I hear you on the two hours thing. The tutorial in my game isn't much better if at all. xD Cost of the jam.

Way to get that much done in two and a half days! That bouncing and rotation is really satisfying. Plus, the background dynamism is neat. I'd be curious to see how far you could take this with more time.

Ooo was this made with More Mountains Top Down engine? We're More Mountains buddies! Sleeping with the pencil was 10/10. I broke the game when I tried to leave through the front door on the second day; the game froze, just like my poor heart.

That was disturbing as all heck and oddly satisfying. I'll never look at my cats the same way again.

Laser sharks?!? Thanks for re-kindling my cookie addiction.

Clever puzzling! I would've appreciated some way to come immediately back to my body. I didn't feel like I had enough lives to win this, which was difficult for an early game experience. If you tune the difficulty earlier on, I think this would work even better. Thanks for the experience!

I second the comments about graphics. Your sense of style is well tuned. If you're this good in high school, I can't wait to see where you're at in ten years. Keep it up!

Great character designs, neat animations, way to use bounce to make everything feel alive. I would've liked some horizontal knockback (a la Hollow Knight) during combat to avoid accidental damage. The hit effects are pretty cool and I think you can still push it a bunch further to make everything feel crunchy and satisfying. The level metrics felt off; some areas were too tight and I kept hitting my head on the walls. For a game this complicated, I would've appreciated if you spread out the tutorial more. Introduce me to moving and jumping, then basic combat, then souls and cards rather than having me read everything up front; it's a lot for a new player to digest right out of the gate. Other people have already mentioned it, but the difficulty can be extremely punishing. That second area is BRUTAL if you don't have the nuke. That's one of the challenges of tuning for a randomized card draw system; you can't rely on the player having any particular card in a given situation. While I couldn't get past that second section, I'd love to see a version of this taken further.

I wish I'd practiced game dev this much at your age. Definitely keep pushing yourself, it's paying off.

Naww kitty! I found the first platforming section too difficult with the jump up onto those thin beams. I wonder if this game would work better if you eased players into the difficulty.

Nice use of the trail renderer with the movement, gave moving some feel. I also liked hearing the soundtrack switch as I switched between Heaven and Hell. I wonder if the level design could benefit from more verticality to mix up the moving left and right for long periods.

What a great story hook: fill in for the Grim Reaper's vacation. I was not sure what to do in this game, but that concept is a fun idea.

Your game name and character sprite made me laugh. That bounce when you're running is super satisfying. I felt like the speed ramp was too slow and would've enjoyed jump animations to take the controller to the next level.

Your file name cracked me up, 10/10. This visual style is super neat. I couldn't for the life of me figure out what to do, but I'd love to play a horror game with this style. Keep it coming! 

I'd love to see this with squash and stretch, bloom, and screen shake. Nifty puzzle concept. Are you using a single raycast for ground detection? Some of those jumps required being on the far edge of the platforms but the jump wouldn't register. Using multiple raycasts or a hitbox could really help here.

Ooo, interesting idea! I really enjoyed the feeling of power progression. I think you could take this to the next level if each character had different attack patterns, and if there was some form of dodge ability so player skill was also a determinate (not just damage numbers). Neat stuff!

The sense of scale reminds me of Shadow of the Colossus. If you keep going with this, pursuing mixing that with shooter gameplay could definitely be an interesting mix. 

Love seeing team's collaborate! Go you guys! It was neat seeing the variety of abilities you went for. I found the enemy attacks to be a lot to dodge, bullet hell style. I think this would benefit a bunch from amping up the game juice for hits and kills. Keep it up, guys!

LOVE this art style; it has a lot of charm and character. Also a fun concept. I liked getting to know the characters and seeing the little bits how their lives were intertwined. I'd like to be able to fully reveal the text by pressing a button as I read much faster than the crawl.

Thanks for the experience!

Neat low poly graphics with shading. The aim was whacky, it kept flicking around and I'm not sure why. This is a neat start to a fighting game. Keep it up!