This is Papers Please mixed with I'm on Observation Duty if it was made on gameboy, with a decidedly pickle theme and I'm all here for it. I love the sound effects and the screen shake, it makes it feel so much like a gameboy game. When my results started popping up and there was that rumble and screen shake, I was like *chefs kiss* gameboy vibes. My only issue was I was a little bit uncertain what was a pickle and what wasn't, like I don't entirely see a problem with a pickle as big as a jar so you have to like dig it out with a spoon, but also I'm pretty sure that's one that should be rejected.
My first impression was "this would be way more fun without grid-locked movement" and then I read the thing saying it was roguelite and then it made a ton more sense how the gameplay worked haha. Nice vibe, nice world, overall nice work!
I really like how there's two things happening at once: collect trash with the rotating thingy, then shoot the asteroids with the little space ship. It's challenging and fun to try and keep track of everything that's happening. It took me a minute to try and figure out what the rotating thingy was for, but once I did, I was in business.
Love the music, I was bopping to the title theme for a fat minute. I really like the cozy vibe of the first room, the (also bopping) music and the wholesome letters. I do however think that it's a bit disjoint, and I think it might have been beneficial to lean into one idea or the other (comfy room vs space shooter).
Overall nice work, looking forward to seeing your team pop up in future jams :)
EDIT: Oh! and the sfx on the menu buttons were a lovely gameboyey touch :)
Very nice game! Kind of slow and methodical tetris, which I like :) Also like those physical block puzzles where you have like a 5x12 tile grid or whatever and have to place all of the tetris shaped tiles perfectly in the rectangle. The one thing I might have appreciated is being able to hold the arrow key down to move a tile a long distance.
I agree, moving up and down was a bit janky sometimes. I spent a ton of time tweaking the movement and trying to get it right, and I feel like I got as close as I could in the time that we had, but there were some key things about it that I would change.
I agree, maybe attaching the tutorial icons to the screen and letting them fade out would be better, as opposed to having them move away as you drive. Thanks for the feedback!
I liked how the tomato splits apart each time it's cut, it made me want to keep the tomato whole for as long as I could.
It seems like when your mouse leaves the hitbox of the objects, you lose control. Keeping track of when an object is being held, and keeping it that way even if the mouse leaves the hitbox, would make it much nicer to control.
I like the idea of using the grunts in the world to destroy the hero -- interesting reversal of roles. It's also interesting how the playable characters (the snails) are a bit disposable, meaning if one dies you take control of another.
I second what others have said about being a bit confusing to figure out how to play, but overall nice ideas!
