itch.io

Love it. Simple and to the point, and definitely something you'd want to play on an old Nokia, and it seems totally possible! Good job!

Loved the atmosphere and look, especially the monster designs! Managing between the clue and map was a bit of a hassle, and the instructions at the beginning went by too fast.

A note aside from reviewing the game itself: My antivirus kept blocking the file and I had to make a security exception for it, which tends to happen with self-built exes since anything unknown is deemed suspicious by many antivirus programs. Since you're working with Game Maker, I recommend going through the few extra steps to make jam games browser-playable. Given how good this game looks, I bet this would have gotten a lot more comments and ratings that way.

Loved the idea of turning the resolution around, made for quite a different feel while still sticking to the "rules". Didn't realize you could wrap around the edges at first, haha! Also, very good-looking start and ending screens!

I think the game could have been more suspenseful if you had to collect all (or a certain number) of the eggs, cause often it was a bit too tempting to just run for the exit and ignore the score.

Killer atmosphere, reminds me of Return of the Obra Dinn. The only things that kinda took me out of the mood where the slightly too 3d-looking balls and the bats sneaking up on me to insta kill. (I think this might have even worked better as a pure adventure without any combat.) Anyway, nice feat within the constraints!

Was in love with this concept from your WIP screenshots in the Discord, but the implementation beats all expectations. Every level introduces a new clever gimmick, and the character's adorable facial expressions do their share to sell the action.

Only negative thing I noticed, the movement of the head(?) was quite jittery on my PC, not as smooth as seen on the GIFs.

Definitely one of my favorites from this jam, though!

Cute little game. The controls are a bit unresponsive, and it could use some more ideas to make it stand out, like special obstacles, missions or things like that.

I like how you included elements of your culture and even your language (even though I can't read it, ha ha!) Would love to see more games from Ethiopia in the future!

Thanks for the feedback! These are some good pointers for improvements, I'll try them out and maybe update when the voting ends. Thanks!

The looks and visual effects in this are beautiful! The core idea is quite interesting. Making a mistake high up can be pretty frustrating, wish there was some kind of rewind option (maybe it could cost time?) I also think it could introduce some additional elements to make gameplay more varied. Otherwise, pretty relaxing and atmospheric experience though!

Music, texts and the main character are very cute, even though the rest of the graphics are a bit spartanic. I dunno if it's a bug, but every time I die I got stuck forever on a black screen and could only quit the game with Alt+F4 and start all over again which kind of killed the motivation.

Oh wow, this game is really fun. Quite a lot of mechanics to learn all at once at first, but once that hurdle is conquered, it's just chock full of interesting ideas. Especially liked controlling the enemies and moving gadgets like trampolins around. Only thing that kept me from playing further was the first boss - too hard with the very limited hearts IMHO.

Wow, harder than it first looked! Was quite fun, though I can't help but imagine what it would be like with gamepad (analog stick) controls, haha!

The real history public unrest setting leaves me kinda emotionally uneasy (although I can definitely say that it made me feel something), but the mini-games are interesting takes on dealing with the different scenarios. Looks and sounds good, too~

Thanks for your kind comments.

About the time, it's actually meant to be this way - the time is just for bonus points at the end of the level.

Love the minimalistic art style, especially the little "U" goblins! The wizards with their tiny rats are cool too. Was fun to get to lead your little army through the maze and let them fight out your battles for you. I keep dying in the second maze though... :D

Really cohesive aesthetics and atmosphere! It was fun to steer the ship and how it behaved around platforms. Would appreciate an "easy gravity" mode though, as the strong pull toward the bottom made things feel kinda oppressive and made things harder than I would have preferred.

Thanks for the feedback! I actually managed to squeeze in a little fix before the deadline that should hopefully make the door issue less annoying. (Would probably have to rethink how doors work entirely to fix it completely, though.)

You are Mr. Brown's trusty sheepdog, tasked with rounding up the sheep and locking them into the corral. But beware of shifty snakes and the dastardly hawk, who are all too eager to capture your flock! :( Only the rancher Mr. Brown can get rid of them with his boomerang, but he keeps falling asleep on the job, leaving it up to you to wake him up and guide him towards the attackers.

This game is loosely based on an idea that was first told in 1983 but never made as a game. Well, until now. It's a long story...

https://derboo.itch.io/round-up

Hmm sounds like you somehow downloaded the browser version? Please try downloading Ninja Massacre 1.0.1a.zip, this should give you a zip with an exe and some other files inside. Extract that folder and you should be able to run it?

That juicy pixel art is so my jam! Kinda has a similar problem as my entry with the keyboard controls in that you basically need three hands, but aside from that very fun. And you win me over with kittens any day. I died or ran out of batteries multiple times just watching the little darlings!

Yeah, I can feel that. I'm currently experimenting with putting bat movement on IJKL and placing the actions around these two blocks which I think works a bit better. Might update that after voting is over.  Thanks for the feedback!

Yeah I couldn't quite figure out a good button mapping in time... have you played with keyboard or controller?

Wow how did you make it look so good in so little time? Throwing the torch is quite an interesting mechanic, wish I had thought of something clever like that! Can feel a little bit punishing if the torch lands somewhere I don't want it to be and I have no way of regaining orientation, but otherwise top notch!

Hmm, I could have sworn I've written a review for this game a few days back... maybe I forgot to press save. First of all, I love the semi-minimalist art style. The stop-and-go mechanics come more natural than they sound on paper, and the bullet splash and death animations feel very satisfying. The endless arena approach has its limits, though, and after a while I've fallen into a routine of just circling around backwards with a all enemies following  around in a bunch, so more varied levels and enemy behaviors would definitely make me seek out a hypothetical post-jam update!

Cool idea to have you switch between moving and seeing the stage! I agree with the previous reviews in that I think it would have been nice to have a clearer sense of progression. And (aside from just having more levels in general), moving parts in the levels (and moving enemies?) could also make things more interesting, cause at least as far as I got it's a little bit too easy to just memorize the layout and play blindly the entire time. Otherwise, nice beginning of something interesting, and since you already posted some status updates in the comments, I'm curious to see what else you come up with!

Wow, you came up with a lot of interesting alternative ways to interact with the pinball ball & table.  For my taste, the physics could be a bit slower and floatier so there's some leasure to adapt to the changing mechanics, and with some of the items its also easy to lose really fast.

A strangely relaxing approach to a shooter, an impression the music only adds to. :) It seems that enemies get always pushed to the left, even though you're hitting them in the opposite direction, which can be a bit frustrating and makes it hard to strategically clear your way so you can charge your bar. I like that you're encouraged not to overuse the laser (even though that part could be a bit more pronounced).

Great concept and great aesthetics. Unfortunately, the difficulty ramps up too quickly for me so I couldn't see much of it.

What makes this game is the really natural feel to the controls! It's almost like going back to those physical marble maze toys of old!  Also love the aesthetics and the various bomb/weapon pickups. Could do with a little less screen shake though, that was kinda disorienting.

Reviewing the fixed version, as it's clearly the same game with only the game-breaking bug fixed.  I had a lot of fun with the concept, and the enemy pirates getting exhausted from lack of booze reserves was a cute and clever metaphor to solve the problem of defeating enemies without attacking in any way.  I had a few gripes with the balancing - at first the complexity of enemy patterns grows slowly and smoothly, but then you get a really tough and hard to predict one, which I assume is meant to be a mini boss, and then you're back to a few that only attack one direction and middling-difficulty ones. I also felt losing towards the end of the longer stages was a bit frustrating and all too likely due to the very limited health. Maybe strategically placed refill mugs could go a long way in making them more bearable. Anyway, cool game!

This one was quite fun. I especially liked how enemies could pick up the powerups, too, and how it makes a lot of unique challenges with a small set of consistent mechanics.  I feel like the archers could use a little tweaking, cause getting around them got frustrating sometimes, but aside from that it's a really cool entry. :)

Hmm, the sound effects almost make this feel like a rhythm game, and it got me thinking like maybe it should be one? As it stands, I found the timing for the deflecting really difficult as the deflector time window is really short, but if it was all designed to fit a rhythm, then I'd have something to go by to match the timing. Anyway, just one weird idea I got while playing the game...

I like this concept a lot, and the way the levels keep adding new things to consider (like using blocks that are kinda understood as just part of the scenery at first, or dealing with the skeletons in later levels) was challenging but never overwhelming. I the only weak spot I found was that some levels where you have to do a lot of building when you've already figured out the solution can feel a bit like busywork, but overall it's a pretty great game.

Wow, what a unique and fascinating experience! This didn't even have to be a shooter - just walking around the environment in this weird perspective is interesting enough on its own.

I like the idea, but I feel like it didn't quite get to unfold its potential since you just can run away from most enemies and don't need to distract them with the familiar at all. The idea with having to keep the familiar away from the witches is nice, but it seems like sometimes you're safe even when they're visible as long as you're out of sight, and sometimes not? Also found the perspective misleading sometimes, maybe a lit more top-down angle could make things more easy to parse.

Yeah I agree with the previous comments that this is a bit too nauseating to engage for very long, but the ieda and visual design are cool and the teased improvements look promising. Curious to see the next version after the jam!

Wow, this is really great. The mechanics trick intuitions, but without being irritating or frustrating (in part thanks to the condensed stages). The puzzles are designed very cleverly and with plenty of epiphany moments (so far at least, I'm currently stuck at level 12), and the overall look and feel is much more polished than one would assume from a 48 hour project. One of my favorites in this jam so far!

Neat semi-minimalistic visuals! I think the concept could offer many interesting moments when combined with level design with various traps and obstacles. With the zombies alone things got monotonous rather quickly. Maybe also build in some twists with how the shooting behaves in different situations? But game jam time limitations, I know. :) Anyway, nice beginnings!

Hmm, might be an issue with my system, but after a few jumps I run into situations where I can only aim between certain angles, usually straight against a wall. The concept seemed intriguing, but this issue always makes the game unplayable for me within just a few jumps.