itch.io

Glad you liked it.

Thanks for playing and the feedback! Even with a play through video.

There will be more of a dialogue between Jake and Jil and no longer the constant banter. Seeing the video you did level up and could have added some skill points you even start with 3 (it is mentioned in the first "Welcome" dialogue. Due to some scaling issue you need to be very precise when you hit the "+" button. You need to hit the center of + sign. That you can't open the inventory/stats window by clicking on the portraits is an oversight on my behalf. During testing I mostly played keyboard only (except the skill increase).

For combat. Yes you can dance and I want to extend the "AI" to make that more interessting/challening but could not do that in time. The combat needs more polish in general.

And yes you will get through some invisible teleporters but the last one tries to teleport you to an invalid tile  and fails. Looks like that I some how fat fingered the target position which points to a three digit x position but the levels are just 32x32 each. Next you would have been transported to a room with a small trapdoor puzzle (for the jam it was tuned to be very easy). I posted a link to a speedrun (shortest route) of a bug fixed version of this.

Thanks for the feedback and the VOD!

Hey thank you for playing and taking the time to provide the excellent feedback, I appreciate it.

The way Jil works will certainly change. I just used her for the themes "endless" and a twisted "solitude". After the jam ends I do not need to follow the themes anymore. Its going to be some real dialogue between Jake and Jil and its probably triggered on a tile or certain events. The issue here is that you can walk alot of tiles while the VO are played. VO's are slow compared how fast you can move so I need to place them far away so there is no overlap.

You mentioned the "endless" xp and this will also be changed. You will only get the XP the first time you move on a tile, its a quiet simple fix :)

Yes, I wanted to implement "Chutuul" as a vendor but could not finish it in time, there is a unfinished vendor window you can open pressing the undocumented "V" key. The plan was to remove the key bind and open up the vendor window automatically when you stand in front of him. If it where not for the teleporter bug you can actually go back to the town level. There are other teleporters distributed in the level that would take you near the entrance of the mine, then you only need to take a few steps and climp out of the mine. But I could not finish the item/equip system in time and that pretty much rendered the vendor useless.

Actually both of the npcs you see in the village are meant to be cosmic horror demons in disguise. They where placed there after all the villager have been brought to the mine, to lure more unsuspicious travelers (like you)  into the mine, so there master could feast on new souls.

And yes the combat system needs a lot more love, I was just happy that I could manage to get something working :) So yes, more feedback and tooltips (also for the skillsystem) need to be added but I ran out of time. 

Thanks for the kind words and for the feedback!

The games requests admin rights, sorry thats a no-go.

Loved the cutscene, well done! 

The visuals are great and I could see (and hear, because the gpu fans reved up quickly) that you made good use of Lumen.

Fast snappy movement, I like that, however the enemies and the combat did not really match up the rest.

A solid entry.

I liked the visuals and the sound. The movement was a bit on the slow side but aside from this I can really add anything new then what others already pointed out.

A solid entry.

If have beat the demo!

Looks nice but the footstep sound needs to be changed. Why did you use A/D for turning? I prefer Q/E for that. Its a solid foundation and that you called it a demo implies that there is more to come, I assume?

Thanks for sharing.

If one of the themes would have been "try and die" this would have been spot-on.

The problem is that you implemented two mechanics that work against each other. The player has to explore but is punished to do so. In this case the punishment is very hard and that makes the experience even worse, If the punishment would not be as hard, it would be much more enjoyable.

Interessting game for sure! The others pretty much have summed up what I wanted to say. Visuals are nice except that the combat screen looks completly differend. Movement is okay but the tile size seems rather small. The perspective seems to use a high FOV which is noticable when turning (looks really distorted).

Nitpicking aside, I had fun! Thanks for sharing.

Thank you for playing and the feedback, I really appreciate it.

You are right, Jils samples are randomly picked and played every 10s after the last one ended. I'll change it after the jam is over and I don not need  to follow the themes anymore. I am not sure how to implement it yet , but I like the idea of a bit of forth and back between the two. 

I am using some trigger based audio for Jake, the problem with Jil is that if you move fast there is a high change of getting overlaps between the trigger tiles. Sure I can just stop and overwrite the output but that would sound odd. So currently Jake does the all the hinting to important things and Jil does all the bantering so there is no interference between important hints and meaningless clutter (except Jil always talks over others).

Yeah the floating combat text is not my favorite either, lets just say it was very easy and fast to implement it this way and I wanted to highlight the "endless XP" aspect. It does not have to be this way. And no you don't have to grind XP to finish but you can do it if you like.

This certainly does need more polish, we all had to cut some corners.

Next time I will most likely cut down the visuals to have more headroom for the actual content, it is just so tempting...

Thanks for the feedback!

During the year you can sign as many of your executables as you can produce. Does not have to be a game, can be used for any kind of desktop application.

I got asked how the inaccessible content looks like, so here is a speed run in a fixed version.

This should not impact your rating, it would be unfair to others.

Hey thank you for playing and the feedback!

Yes, the in-game menue was one of the things I could not finish in time.

And the whole point of Jil is to be intoralable. Its a twist to the theme solitude. Jil is supposed to make you feal you where better of alone.

Its a risky approach for sure, but just text would be in no way be as effective as VO in this case. And no, none of what she says has any meaning and she does talk over others because that is what people like her do.

There is no compass because I wanted to have a (fullscreen) map that would also include your current orientation. I am not a fan of minimaps as you end up only looking at the minimap most of the time.

I am not sure what you mean with "withhold my rating" as I can only upload a new version when the rating period is over.

Thanks for your feedback, I appreciate it.

Some people asked for a video of the inaccessable content. Here is one and you may notice how I use some traps against the mobs :-)

Here is a speed run of a fixed version. Its the current build so it also contains some other fixes (Skillpoints buttons are larger) and some small changes (animation and speed changes of the mobs).

I wish I had more time for content...

Your games usually kick me back to found childhood memories when I played on my C64, trying to understand what the words on the screen could mean (not a native speaker).

This one is different, its more serious. 

That doesn't mean that I don't like it, perhaps I expected something else. I just wish dealing with bad memories would work like in your combat system.

And I had hope you would go for a sunny meadows crawler, because I did not, but thats fair, maybe next year.

Thanks for sharing.

I really liked the simplicity of this. That the download size is only 4MB is a rare sight nowadays.

My only complains are that you only support the cursor keys for movement input and the perspective is a bit off. I often thought that the items on the ground where one tile away but was not.

Overall a solid entry and a bonus point for the small download size.

Good job!

Hah! I was wondering if some one would actually try that! Using the "endless" XP to gain a level (or in this case two), I like it!

During testing I leveled from level 1 to 2 this way (so I needed a bit less then 1k steps) and I got borred doing so, but 3k steps? Wow, I did not expect some one to be this determained.

Thats a lot of tear on the key switches but I don't take any responsibility for that ;-)

Sorry you got stuck, its a bug and not your fault.

Glad you liked it and thank you for the feedback, I appreciate it.

Hey! Thank you for the kind feedback!

Have not looked at your entry yet (mostly looking at entries with few ratings atm) but I am very curious what you created this year. 

Oh and good luck with Jil :-)

Thanks for playing and your kind feedback.

I am glad you liked the movement, I think its an important part of the overall experience and therefore put some thoughts into it. Its not the first DC controller I have written so I do have some experience that went into it.

Actually you can lure the npc's into traps just not in the currently accessible content. 

Having an option for the floating combat text is a good idea, I was already thinking about an option to display healthbars for the NPC as some seem to prefer this.

There will be a fixed version after the jam, not sure when exactly, as I have some other contract work on the table right now. 

Wow, you really went above and beyond to dissect this. I feel flattered.

And you are right about most of the things, obviously.

I had bigger plans for the town but had to cut it back. Most of the things you rightfully pointed out are the consequence of the time restriction. I usually aim for higher standards, but if you have a fixed deadline, you can only adjust scope and quality.

Adding skill points really requires pinpoint precision, but the stats actually do work and have an impact on gameplay. The only exceptions are Luck and Charisma; they are not used in the jam version. Wisdom, for example, will give you passive HP/mana regain over time. It's currently calculated as 200s/Wisdom = +1HP & +1MP. So with 10 Wisdom, you will regain 1HP/1MP every 20s. It has the potential to be a powerful stat in higher levels. STR will increase AP and parry chance, AGI will increase dodge and crit chance, INT will increase SP and mana, and so on.

The "1 XP" is part of the "endless" theme. Endless XP, yeah! Not a very spectacular implementation of the theme, but not the worst either. And I take it that you 'enjoyed' Jil's part of the "endless" implementation. ;)

In case you are curious: The key went to the party inventory, which is a shared inventory for all members and also contains the potions/Gold and other stuff, but unlike the potions, there is no UI yet to display them. The current implementation for locked doors just checks if the key is present in the party inventory and unlocks automatically if so. Of course, each character has their own inventory on top of the shared one, its modeled like this: player party (shared inventory) contains 1..n characters with their personal inventories. 

Free look is something I usually do not use if I can play keyboard only. But yes, it is a low-hanging fruit that adds to the feature count, so why not?

The bug does block a lot of the more exciting content, and I was thinking of showing it in a video, but it does feel a bit unfair to others.

Just a warning: Jil objects to your assessment about her; she wants to pay you a visit and give you an 'earful'. I hope you are ready for it. ;)

P.S.: I am going to delete your double post if you don't mind.

Really nice entry and a lot to like about this one. Got a huge chunk of retro vibes from it too. 

Loved to just roam around and explore the library, the forrest and caves. Found a couple of cool items and the key.

Very fitting art style too.

My only complain is that the windows bar was covering the bottom of the screen, making it impossible to use the lower buttons but was okay after a restart. Probably a Unity thing.

Big thumbs up!

Thanks for playing and the feedback, I appreciate it.

Sorry that you got stuck, it's an unfortunate bug.

Currently I am putting together an "Classic Dungeon Crawler Kit" for Unity and the game is based on an early version of it. Among an integrated editor and controller there is also code for an item/stats/inventory system and the like. This helped cut down development time as I don't had to develop everything from scratch (and it is allowed by the rules).

Thanks for playing and the feedback.

I am glad you liked the movement, sorry the bug is blocking you from seeing the content you are interested in. Traps, spinners and puzzles. But you should have seen at least a secret door (the blue crystal), a spinner, an open trap door (to enter the mine), an Illusion wall and some teleporters.

And yes. the combat does need more work. The mob teleporting was an unfortunate last minute problem when I changed the MobAI to use Crossfade() instead of Play(). So its now crossfading from the idle animation to the walk animation with a long fade duration and that is not a good idea :D

Thanks for playing and the kind comment.

Yes, the village and the non walk able tiles. You are not the first to comment on that. At first I had some fences around the path but they looked very artificial and out of place and I did not want players to get lost in the village. I'll think about that. One of the NPCs should  have been an vendor but I could not implement him in time, sorry (pressing V brings up the non functional vendor interface) it should have openend when you are standing next to him.

About the illusion walls and switches. I wanted the first ones you encounter extra obvious so there is a awareness that something like this exists in the game, further occurrences are less obvious. Kind of a "Look there are illusion walls, you may want to look out for them."

You may be right about some not so obvious traps ;)

I'll will upload a fixed post jam version when the upload block is lifted (may be not on the same day tho).

Thanks for the feedback.

Yes, combat needs more feedback, you are right.

And Jill will get an update as well, after all I am the one who had to endure her the most :).

You are right, combat needs more feedback and polish.

And Jil endless complains will get tuned down for sure. 

I think I heard her much more often then everybody else :D 

This feels so much better! While I prefer A/ D for strafing, I can adapt to Q/E after a while. Maybe switch between the two as an optional feature? 

But strafing really improved the movement by quiet a lot. Also storing potions instead of applying them instanitly is a huge plus.

Good job, Im gonna play a post jam version for sure!

You could try an oblique view frustrum (in professional photography also known as lens shift) instead of the default symmetrical. 

A manipulation of the vanishing point creates an non uniform frustum and lets you see more of the ground without tilting the camera. I think you can create something like this in Godot, otherwise you just need access to the 4x4 camera matrix and change 2 values in it and pass it back to the camera. 

I think strafing would be useful in your game. I often ran into the situation where the mobs would come towards me on a differnt row. To intercept (and bump into them) I had to turn, move, turn back. At this point the mob would already be next to me. With strafing I could just switch the row without loosing sight. Since strafing is very easy to implement its a low hanging fruit, waiting to be picked.

Thats a nice flashlight effect and movement looks okay.

Could be a good foundation. 

Thats a nice flashlight effect and movement looks okay.

Could be a good foundation. 

Nice story telling + nice art + nice puzzles + bonus point for a low FOV (even if its too low)

There is a lot to like about this one. 

If I could make a wish: I would change the perspective a bit and soften the harsh stop between tiles.

Good job!

Clean crisp pixel art meets procedual dungeon generation == promising entry.

The lack of any audio is holding this one back and if I could make another wish, it would be support for strafing.

I do like the combat, yes its simplistic but this also means, it very easy to understand and fast, bump into things == problem solved.

Good job!

Thank you! I used a very early version of my "Classic dungeon crawler kit"  that also includes a level editor + stats system, movement, etc... This cut down development time quiet a lot and helped me to find the weak spots in the kit. An "eat your own dog food" style approach basically. Major take away, I need to add more validation...

The intro is fabulous!

The free look option kind of reminded me on the movement in Operencia (which I am not a fan off) but I noticed that you put options in the menu to make it less disorientating (good!). 

I like the mouse aim in general (like in the original Xenomorph by Pandora 1990) and I am also using mouse aim in another crawler project but instead of a fixed center aim just a regular moveable mouse cursor. I found this to be much better aligned to the needs of a DC and way less disorienting. You may want to try this too.

Nick picking aside, I liked what I saw and would not mind seeing a post jam version.

Good job!

Looks really nice and has potential.

Unfortunatly it is also borderline un-playable and I tried a couple of times.

• Fell of the ship multiple times at different locations. First is right at start position, move backward and you are gone. There are a couple of other places, I think the place where the small space ship is shown on the left too.
• The zombies/space mutants get stuck in a T-Pose and sink into the ground once you hit em.
• The debug markers and debug infos are funny to watch but not intended, I guess.
• The zone with the moving energy balls and the laser cannon feels very unfair or I miss something obvious.
• Also got stuck multiple times after getting "off-grid".

Just a tip, do not use the physic engine to perform movement and  movement collision detection. It comes with a heap of problems when used for a grid based crawler. It is way more reliable and faster to have a 2d arrary of "tiles" and use that instead. You can then just convert the 2d tile position into a 3d vector (multiplied by the tilesize) and you will never get "off grid", solving a lot of problems seen in your game.

Thank you for playing and your feedback.

I'll rethink the voice overs, that is for sure!

Thank you for playing and the feedback.

Yes, the UI scaling is a bit off, especially in the WebGL version. I just added a fullscreen button to ease the pain. It was on the TODO list but did not make it into the last build.

Actually I had plans for buildings that can be visited but they quickly went out of scope as other tasks seemed more important.

Jil endless talking was part of the themes  and since everybody hates it, I'll remove it post jam :-)

I put some time and thoughts into the movement as it is an important part in the overall experience, thank you for noticing.

Gonna check out your entry later.

Jil was a take on the themes "endless" in terms of her endless complaining and a twisted "solitude" in a way that you rather be alone then in her company. Looks like it succeeded in a weird way :) 

I did part of the assets (wall, floor, doors, ceilings, trapdoors, etc..) and other stuff is kitbashed assets I had laying around (town, props, ...)

Making the UI bigger (especially the "+" for the skillpoints) was on the todo list but did not make it in the final build, sorry about that.

Thanks for playing and the feedback (Jil's complaining will be removed post jam).