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As a massive fan of Link’s Awakening, I had a lovely time with this. The overall design felt really polished and I loved the puzzles (I’ve always been a huge fan of ice block puzzles ^_^). The overall idea of weaving in and out of three dungeons at once was quite interesting as well. As I’ve seen others mention, the unskippable cutscenes were a bit much, esp. for the final boss, and holes were a bit too easy to fall into, but otherwise it felt nice to play! I was expecting a twist of some kind at the end due to the rival bird’s warnings, and thought there might be a bit more to the story of the bird guiding you as well, but it was still an enjoyable tale! Loved the trading quest too! Overall, I think it’s super impressive this is your first game! Thanks for making it and all the best to you and the rest of the team involved going forward!

I downloaded the new version and gave it another go and made it to the end just fine! Had a lot of fun! However, during the final judging session, my piece floated up into the sky and disappeared offscreen...I guess it was so good it ascended to the heavens lmao I consider this to be the perfect ending. Thank-you for fixing the bug and thank-you again to the whole team for making such a cool game!

No worries, bugs happen, and it's still a standout for me either way! (I also did watch Kyle's stream so I got the full story!) I did give it another go just now and unfortunately the bug now happened on the first challenge and then again on the second challenge on a subsequent attempt. I go to set a base and it drops down and then from there can no longer set one. Just thought I'd give some more info. that might be useful if you do plan on continuing to update it!

Update 9/1/24: Just a small update to add a "special thanks" note to the title screen and game description.

Thank-you so much, glad you enjoyed! I'm really glad the sense of mystery and tension came across so well!

lol no worries! It didn't really affect things too detrimentally and I was able to recover pretty quickly from it!

This is just a really nice, chill game! I love the large sprites for the mascots and the environments were all very well-realized. Great DSD absence too haha I did run into a bug in the sewer platforming section where it felt like an invisible force was pushing my character backward, but it seemed to possibly be corrected by pressing up on the d-pad (or perhaps it just went away on its own). Overall had a really nice time though!

I really love this. Such an inventive and charming adventure. I loved being able to freely explore and meet all the quirky characters and figure out how to puzzle through everything. The overall design just worked so nicely and it was fun to remember which character wanted which item and so on. There's a nice variety as well between the puzzles, the minigames, and the platforming sections. I love how you combined elements from the prompt with a lot of original characters and ideas as well. Just a really nice time with some really lovely Game Boy vibes!

I cannot overstate how much I appreciate the charm of this game. Everything from the art to the writing to the sound design made me smile so much. It’s funny but also tells a genuinely endearing little story. The writing is seriously just so good. I love the unique animal characters mixed with the familiar mascots as well. The woodworking mechanics are a bit finicky but still a very impressive and fun concept, and I love how much creativity is encouraged. Unfortunately though I ran into a bug on the final challenge where the game suddenly wouldn’t let me set a base, so I had to quit. I definitely want to go back and give it another shot sometime though!

Incredible vibe and atmosphere and very impressive art design. I love the concept of hopping through different surreal dimensions and the environments do a really nice job guiding the player. The rift 'o' matic mechanic is also simple but satisfying and well-implemented. I also love the sense of mystery throughout, though I did find the irreverent tone of the ending to be a bit jarring and clash with the otherwise somber and contemplative vibe. Overall though this really drew me in seeing Kyle play it on stream and I had a really nice time playing it myself as well!

Really cute game! Giving each mascot an evolved form is such a nice idea and all the character and enemy designs are really clever (the Pitmaster being a particular highlight). I would have liked a quick tutorial as the battle system was a bit overwhelmingly chaotic at first (though it was also partly due to the prompts not matching my controller), but I had more fun with it the further I went. I loved the secret boss fight and ending and the way the game just abruptly closes is great haha

Thank-you so much and I'm glad you enjoyed it! Writing can definitely be daunting especially when it’s just not flowing. I jumped into Twine shortly after the jam planning stream and before I knew it I was having so much fun making this. I think a combination of the inventive prompt and playing around with a new format I’d never used before really helped invigorate me after being in a bit of a writing slump lately. I’m glad the fun I had writing and putting this together seems to have come across so well!

Those are incredibly encouraging words, thank-you :) I'm happy it drew you in so much!

This really goes above and beyond. It's a charming 3D platformer on its own (though a bit buggy; I had to restart the first level because a fry container wasn't spawning, which happened after checking the creepy "glitch tree" a few times), but the second part really elevates it and is expertly implemented. Just a fantastic idea all around with both funny and genuinely unsettling moments.

Really love this! I love the diorama-like environments and visiting the smoke box at different time periods is such a great idea (and anything that brings Chrono Trigger to mind will always get some points from me). All the depictions of the mascots were also super cute and it was a really sweet ending! It also felt really satisfying using knowledge from one era to solve a puzzle in another. Just a lovely time and I really liked the music too!

Thank-you!

Thank-you so much! I'm glad you enjoyed it!

I was a little worried about the gore at the start because excessive gore isn't really my thing, but I ended up having a great time by the end! I really felt like the ending I got was fair and earned (the "Jake" ending), and I was laughing so much at the depiction of the Pitmaster and the dinosaur lol Really good stuff with a lot of expressive art and fun depictions of the characters.  

Thank-you, that really means a lot! And thank-you for following!

I'm glad you enjoyed it! Translating each mascot into a strange cryptid-like creature was definitely one of the funnest parts for me. And yeah, figuring out what Glerry would be was a particular highlight, so I'm glad that came across!

I'm so glad to hear that, thank-you!

Thank-you for the kind words and thanks again for checking the game out on stream! Readability was definitely a big priority so that really is so nice to hear! I had some fun figuring out the different paths though I definitely could have gone further and that’s something I’d prioritize if I did something like this again!

Thank-you, I'm really glad the tension came across and was effective!

Thank-you!

Had a lot of fun with this! I loved the arcade game and the "upgrade" was such a delightful surprise! I did get tripped up at a few parts, namely the animal puzzle (I guessed but figured out the reasoning after) and the circuit board puzzle which I still admittedly don't quite get. I also got stuck finding the bathroom because I assumed all the doors were locked after trying a few. Overall though I was impressed by how much variety there is and the finale was a big highlight!

omg I completely forgot about Kyle's detective hang-up haha And thank-you, glad you enjoyed!

This is wonderful, Alix! I think my favorites are the midday and dusk dragons; such a beautiful use of colors! But so many lovely designs throughout. Love all the cute fluffy ones too! These brought to mind the enchantment of seeing legendary pokemon as a kid, and dragon types were always my fave!

Pretty much everything I could have asked for in a follow-up to the first. I love how it explores a lot of "missing pieces" from the first game and dove much more deeply into a lot of complex themes. Every character is treated with such a high degree of empathy and nuance. I also love how humanized the parents are and that whole aspect is such a brilliant portrayal of how complicated those relationships can be (Diya’s one with her mom hit close to home for me in several ways). Min’s character development is amazing and her positive relationship with Diya makes me melt into a puddle of happy tears (as did the ending, which felt like a beautiful culmination of everything both games stand for). It’s so incredibly difficult to balance being so real and so raucously hilarious but both games pull it off amazingly. Akarsha’s texts never failed to absolutely destroy me lmao Thank-you so much again for making both games! They're both all-timers and I’ll def. be recommending them as much as I can going forward!

I loved every second of this, thank-you so much for making it! It’s so immensely heartwarming, real, and absolutely hilarious. The scene in the café at the end will forever fill my heart with joy. <3 I actually just finished the also amazing sequel and will post more thoughts there!

Really unique little game! Really love the sound design and vibes! And the art and animation is great, sort of a Kirby’s Dream Land 3 vibe! Took a minute to get the hang of it, but was a nice game to just chill out to and vibe with! <3

This is so cute! Love the animation on the dragon, and the silly tongue sound effect made me smile so much lol Really fun music too!

I made an account just to comment and give this a five star rating. Loved this, Kyle. Seriously clever is all sorts of delightful little ways. It was fun thinking about the different paths I could have taken to the final genomster, and I especially enjoyed seeing all the fun ways that keeping Danielle around affected the adventure. I also love how, similar to Box Peek, this is like a "behind the scenes" story...like we're seeing how the creatures in a different game are created.

Very impressive sprite art as well, and of course great humor. I loved Onessa and Danielle's interplay, and stuff like the shotgun on the wall (I was pleased that continuing to examine it was rewarded with the "Not this time" at the very end lol). 

I do wish we got more from Ezekial at the end (as he was gathering some of the ingredients we didn't get, I thought maybe we'd see his genomster as well and how it compared to ours...then again I know there's tons of outcomes I didn't see...), but all-around I genuinely had a great time! It's really inspiring to see you creating these projects...looking forward to whatever you do next!

EDIT: I finally watched the group stream playthrough which I missed before...the Mama run was so good haha! My playthrough was pretty similar to Jones and I also got Street Night...except I even messed up the sloth puzzle because I was thinking Zelda block puzzle rules. The Revolting Punish Bolt and Ulba Dunta moving slowly due to low stats...so great lol