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I'm glad you liked it!

I think that if it wasn't a jam game, but a proper full game, then I would make the character go from one static level to another static level, so there wouldn't be a problem with camera jiggling around and so clicking would be easier. I will keep it in mind for any future project I might make.

Thank you for playing and your review! I'm glad you generally like it.

I think majority of the problems with Necro Druid come from the fact that I don't actually play nor really like logical/puzzle games. I'm a 2D platformer/metroidvania enjoyer, and so I naturally gravitated into making the majority of the game into a precision platformer rather than a puzzle platformer, splitting the game content into two different philosophies of gameplay.

While I understand your frustration, I can't agree with you regarding controls. Aside from occasional bugs with collisions and accidental super-jump exploit*, controls work as intended. Contrary to you, I find it easily controllable to navigate player during and after jumping, so I guess YMMV.

Similarly, Bouncy Plant (aside from the super-jump exploit*) works as intended. I think that your varying experiences with its force might (in some situations) come from using the jump button at the moment of impact with Bouncy Plant or from jumping from one BP directly into another BP. The fact that it bounces the player away depending on the place of touch allowed me to structure the levels the way I wanted. Changing that would fundamentally change the level design and made the Bouncy Plant extremely boring.

Regarding the color scheme, I'll remember that for the future. However, I don't really see how one could confuse the background area with the interactable area as I feel they are already distinct enough. None of my (3) play-testers has shared such insight with me.

Once again, thanks for playing and your input!

* super-jump happens when you press the jump button in a quick succession of landing on a Bouncy Plant, making your force of jump much stronger than it should be

I've played your game 4 times, getting the highest score of 19000 if I remember right.

I prefer games that are more "play once and win" rather than "play any amount of times for high score", so I might be biased. Also, English is not my first language and I am very critical as a person, so what I've written might appear as more aggresive than I intended. Take note of this when reading the text below. I'll first focus on what you asked for and then proceed to the other things that came to my mind.

Enjoyability: It's good enough to play for a bit. If I were back in school as a child on an IT lesson, I'd most likely be more satisfied with your game.

Controls: Controls are fine and intuitive enough.
The only thing that comes to my mind in terms of improvement is that currently if you push toward the desk and try to change direction without stopping to push, you'll either be stuck in place or move very slowly. I suppose the player input for pushing forward could be ignored when he's close enough to a desk, so that the dino is able to easily slide in the other direction.

Player purpose: I've sacrificed my first playthrough to understand what I'm supposed to do, but that's normal for this kind of a short game. Adding images at the game's page so that the player can look at the playing area's screenshot before starting the game might have alleviated that 'problem' a bit, but I don't know if it's worth the trouble for you.

AI: AI gets stuck on desks. Considering your game is made in Unity, I think this might be helpful for you. Also, it could be cool if enemies spawned with different pathfinding types - for example, one could follow behind a player, and others come straight to him.

Enemies: At the moment, enemies just block your path and can be 'defeated' with clicking left mouse button at the nearest desk and right mouse button afterwards. I think that you could add more enemy types that require a specific type of food or more mouse clicks, OR just make enemies deal damage to you/result in an instant game over if you ignore them for too long. Right now they just feel kinda like an afterthought.

Sound: I think music in the start screen should be at least 2 times longer before looping, or the looping moment should be made less noticable. At the moment it's very jarring. Also, I think there should a sound effect whenever an enemy spawns and when you feed them food. Aside from that, sound design is fine.

Good job overall.

I entered the room in which the shooting mechanic is explained, but forgot about it around ten seconds later. I am not accustomed to using ctrl in 2D games, so later I didn't bother to double-check if anything was bound to it.

I've played through your game two times.

The first time, I forgot about the fact I can shoot enemies, because I don't really use ctrl in any game, so I got through the entire game as a pacifist by avoding enemies (and clipping through them on invincibility frames).

When I re-read your post and saw 'shooting enemies', I replayed the game. Honestly, not having the ability to fight back made the game more challenging and fun for me, although that's just my opinion.

Regarding the mini boss: on my second try (so when I didn't clip through the mini-boss), the fight with it was indeed quite fun and the best part of the game. Although, in the last phase of the fight (when it starts shooting a large projectile downwards and smaller on the sides), I've just stood in place between the hitbox of the large projectile and the area where smaller ones can spawn. Nothing has hit me during the last phase when I stood there, so I just shot upwards until I destroyed the mini-boss.

Regarding the story: there's only one dialogue I could find - the one at the end of the game. It was understandable, if that's what you're asking about. If you want an opinion of its quality, then I can't give it, because there was not enough story-content to rate it in any meaningful way.

Other: I think it'd be better if the player stuck to walls automatically instead of having to hold X, or at least if "hold x" was replaced with "toggle by pressing X". Trying to navigate the controls was harder than I feel it should be, and I think that manually holding wall-climb was the main reason of it.
I haven't noticed any bugs.

Good job overall.

Game Title/URL: https://hadezerx.itch.io/necrodruid

Pitch/Information: 2D puzzle-platformer in which you get through the levels by healing plants as a druid. However, due to your necromantic corruption you can only heal one plant at the same time and the others will wither away.

I'd like feedback on: Nothing in particular, unless you especially liked/disliked something. I guess the most important question is: "is it fun?"

Really nice and original!

Thank you!

Thanks!

Necro Druid | Devlog #6

I have finished the project.

All four planned levels have been created, all the features I wanted to make has been made.

There's not really much more to say.

Link to the game

Link to post-mortem thread

Necro Druid is a puzzle-platformer game in which you play as the titular undead druid. You can use the magic of left mouse click to revive dead plants, which will pave a way through the levels for you. However, due to your necromantic corruption, your healing powers are severely weakened and so you can only heal one plant at the same time.

Over the course of this jam, I managed to create four levels (+intro) containing two enemy types (+spikes) and two plant types. All the graphics, animations and scripts have been made by myself. The only "outsourced" element is the sound design, which I got from freesound.org.

Here's a link to the game's page. I hope you'll have fun.

If you are interested in the development process of the game, check out my devlog.

Necro Druid | Devlog #5

Hey, it's me again. A lot of progress was made.

Current progress (last 4 days):
I have created a new plant type - Bouncy Plant. It bounces Necro Druid away when he lands on it.
I also implemented Laser Eye in the game. It tries to reach the player's position with Unity's 2D raycast, and if it hits the druid it starts charging up its laser beam.

I have created a fully functional main menu, in which the player can change settings (resolution, fullscreen mode and sound/music volume), quit game and load any checkpoint previously reached. All of these things are saved in XML files in AppData.

I started to get the project's page on itch.io ready to publish. I will finish it tomorrow and launch it when the game is ready.

I have made two proper levels after the intro one. I think that current game content is around ~5 minutes long.

Here's a video showing off Bouncy Plant and Laser Eye in a throw-away scene.

Further plans:
Today, I will create level 3 and an in-game pause menu, so the player can return to main menu.
Tomorrow, I will create level 4 and add sounds to the game.

Necro Druid | Devlog #4

Current progress:
I have created the first proper introduction level, which you can see in the video below. I have made the first build of the game, containing said level, and sent it to my two friends in order to check if their computers don't explode. From now on, I will not publish more videos, because I don't want to spoil the further content of the game.

Further plans:
I will make three or four more levels, introducing one new plant type and the laser eye I've shown in the first post. The playtime of the full game will be probably around ~10 minutes. In the final day, I will polish the game - add menu, so the player can select levels and properly exit the game without using ALT+F4, and maybe also add some particle effects of dirt flying away where the druid steps.

Next devlogs:
I will make the next devlog (#5) whenever I make the next plant type and implement the laser eye in the game. Devlog #6 will be the last one, and I will write it when the game is ready and uploaded to itch. I plan to take part in GMTK Game Jam, so I'll submit Necro Druid around a day before deadline, whatever the progress in that moment might be.

Not really, I haven't thought about it for more than a minute.

My idea is that you, as a player, witness the fragment of Necro Druid's journey from one unspecified place to another unspecified place. The game begins when he stumbles into a cave, and will end with him finding his way out of the forest.

Necro Druid | Devlog #3

Current progress:
I have postponed making the first level to tomorrow, because I was busy doing other things in real life. Instead, I focused on doing small things that I will need later and generally adjusting what I already had.

I have implemented Spikeroaches in the game, so they are ready to be added to the levels whenever I need them.
With the first enemy in game, I have added the death of Necro Druid whenever he touches an enemy and death particles at such an event. Also, the screen fades away to blackness at death, and returns to normal at level restart.

I have modified the script for Expanding Plant, so now it can grow not only upwards but also sideways and downwards, depending on the location of the seed.
Due to problems with colliders and triggers, I decided to make the druid able to jump in the air if he fell (but not voluntarily jumped) from a plant. I don't know yet if this gimmick will be needed for completing any level, but I'll leave it be regardless.

I have also done some little technical stuff that I would need to set up later anyway, such as making level controller for going to other levels; adjusting the camera and player movement, etc.

Here's a video of the updated sample level. Not much changed.

Further plans:
I plan to make a sprite for spikes later today, so that it's ready for tomorrow. Aside from that, see Devlog #2.

Update 9th July 2022  22:00 CEST
I've made spikes sprite and a background dead tree sprite.

Necro Druid | Devlog #2

Current progress:
I have made a cave+ground tileset in Aseprite. Further additions such as trees and sky will be created towards the end of the game dev process, so the mechanics and level design are ready beforehand.

Using those tiles and other things I made so far, I created a sample level, which you can see in the video below. I haven't made a way to exit a level yet.

Here's the tileset I made. You can take it and freely use it if you want. Each part of the tileset is 32x32 pixels.

Future plans:
Tomorrow I plan to make the first proper level, introducing player to basic movement, Expanding Plants and Spikeroaches. If I will still have energy, I will create a second one still using those mechanics but more difficult. If I manage to do that, I will make a way to go from one level to another. Also, I'll try to tweak player's movement a little.

I'm HadeZerX, a random guy from Poland. This is the first game jam I take part in, but I have made one small game before - Expanding Snake.

I've been working on this project for three or four days already, but only now I have noticed the option to create a devlog here. I'm working alone, doing every graphical asset and coding everything by myself.

Genre: 2D Platformer
Engine: Unity
Art: Aseprite
Concept:
You play as skeleton-druid-necromancer, who has an ability to heal plants (by clicking on them with the mouse). However, due to being a necromancer and not a true druid, you can only heal one plant at a time. If you heal a second plant, the first one will wither away and return to its default state.

Using this ability (and jumping, and walking), you will have to get through the levels to the other side of a dead forest/caves.

Progress (first 3/4 days):
I have created the graphics for the first plant - Expanding Plant, and the titular Necro Druid, both fully animated. I have also finished the mechanics for the Expanding Plant - as the name suggests, it expands. The movement of Necro Druid is also ready, but I suppose it might need a little tweaking later.

Here's a video of what I have made so far:

Additionally, I have made those two enemies that will be added to the game later. The eye will gradually open and shoot a laser at the player when it fully awakens. The spikeroach will mindlessly go left and right from wall to wall.

Further plans:
Tomorrow I plan to create a tileset for ground, background and roof for the game areas and learn how to use them. I will also probably make the first tutorial level.