itch.io

In much of social media the idea of upvotes and downvotes (mostly downvotes on social medias platforms) have been very tossed around as a negative addition of late as , and at least the way I see it: justifiably so. But, that's not my main point so I'll move on to the other stuff.

The issue is that without actually having a loose understanding of why somebody agrees or disagrees with something, it quickly becomes impossible to know exactly why an opinion is 'bad' or 'good'. It is a lot more productive for people to give a very brief explanation of why they think its a great idea or a horrible idea, because the people judging a comment might actually be the troll (or similarly ill intended in their judgement of what may actually be a fair, thoughtful and caring critique), and there is no way to know that.

Plus, the best discussion is founded on disagreements-- but only disagreements which people openly share. Without knowledge of why people might disagree the original poster can't defend themselves and just feels shame or even sadness for putting care into an idea, while the people voting might have done so just because they did not like the fact that somebody thought the game they liked could be improved on.

What we ideally want is for people to feel comfortable sharing their ideas, and know that after they do they are going to be given opportunities to show off that idea instead of being shunned silently. Everybody wants to be heard, and by helping show them a better viewpoint or listening to their controversial but maybe actually well thought out viewpoint, everybody is made better by discussion rather than silent voting.

Additionally, as a side note of things I've seen, voting is hard to moderate as you don't know what individual you are meant to be reporting. I have seen some unfortunate voting where people asking if support for other languages would be added, and did so in a very polite tone, and got downvoted far more than any other comment.

I know, I know, crazy idea right here.

However, I don't think its addition has any practical use on itch.io.

On things like Q&A websites, they are useful to gauge which response is best, and is visited by people who are inclined to share real knowledge and thus vote very legitimately while doing so. Note, voting is perceived as a near objective quality of somethings correctness on these websites, which is why it is used.

However, useful itch.io comments are all game feedback and criticism, while the site is mostly visited by people who are inclined to play the game rather than build on to it. Game development has no "correct answers", so allowing people to vote on things they might not like for personal reasons and having them feel like objectively bad ideas is hurtful to the idea sharing space. What we need is constructive progress, not destructive progress.

People already have the ability to reply to comments and give their own feedback on why their response may be good or bad, which; is far more productive, allows the developer to know more about the issue, and also gives commenters trying to give constructive feedback a chance to elaborate on their point. Replying to comments with a description of your feedback is the ultimate filter to people who don't actually care about the game, as they won't bother to put themselves out there if they themselves have to be prone to criticism as well.

Overall, upvotes and downvotes make feedback discussions feel more like a court wherein you're trying to appease a faceless group of people who don't have to say anything besides agreeing or disagreeing completely with you. This is detrimental, as feedback on things you love should feel more like a room full of enthusiastic people sharing their ideas equally instead of anonymous judgement where you are punished for putting yourself out there and making yourself prone to criticism.

Of course! Always happy to help. Have fun with the game, I've been loving it a lot.

You have to perform the "sv.hash" command at the satellite's computer itself that you're trying to get the hash from.

E.g., drive to Charlie, type "sv.hash" into its computer, record that as Charlie's hash code.

They actually do have grays! Only as a joke though, but they technically are there.

And to the point, yes, every piece of media I listed has their own take on aliens which are each very creatively made. Having unique aliens is awesome! Only using grays gets stale, especially seeing how there is no horror to them like there may have been in the past. However, when making a unique/creative/awesome alien design for media, it is paramount to make that design reinforce everything you've already presented to the viewer.

For example, the Alien franchise has their aliens as freaky "perfected lifeforms" which can survive almost anything, making them the ideal for the deep space survival horror of the series.

Again, The Thing has an alien which can infect anything and hold their appearance almost perfectly, which makes it ideal for an isolated mystery horror with a modestly sized cast.

As another example, Project Hail Mary has aliens which have an INSANE level of scientific detail, complete with entirely different atmosphere structures of their home planets, unique technological progress based on their minds ability, way different body chemistry, cultural habits which include things like sleep and eating routines, how their biology functions while they sleep, the ties between cultural development and evolutionary requirements, differences in the ability to eat foods, different ways of sensing the world around them based on how they evolved, the list goes on for way too long!

But the list goes on for a reason, the book is mainly focused on the science part of science fiction, and does it very well. The insane details are there because thats what the reader came to read, anything else wouldn't add to the core experience-- it would just be a sideline to the stuff they actual came for instead.

The point is, if you look at the general themes presented in each of these media, it is 1:1 to the rest of the content given.

And thats the problem that I have with arirals, they may fit into other media well where their presence would reinforce its themes, but they don't reinforce anything in this game.

Quick preface, I've spent many days solely playing this game. By and large, its extremely good, I just think the things below really counter-act some of the best design principles, which is odd because the initial development seems to have been so successful in creating and enforcing those principles.

Now, on to it. The whole game up until things like the kerfurs and arirals appear has an amazingly unsettling atmosphere which lends itself quite a lot to its source material; Signal Simulator, Source games (and their history of being very freaky while you're alone in their levels), and a lot of other very well respected science fiction.

That chunk of the game has its beautiful, suspenseful and unknowing feel, which is all supported by your old worn out technology. That is what you know the game as: an authentic- and by far an upgrade to- signal simulator successor that has a lot of respect for what its based off of.

And then you get into things like kerfus, which takes the 'old & industrially made' feel of everything you've worked with up until that point and kind of ignores it in place of 'new & cosmetically made' with a face panel dedicated to showing a cat, incredibly powerful AI, strong batteries, remote server status checking, an on-board flashlight/camera/remote controls, the ability to fix servers, etc.

Up until that point you were relying on mixed information, unreliable single-purpose machinery that you had to repair regularly, and everything being made to serve its purpose and nothing more beyond that. No pretty cosmetic interfaces, sleekness or personification built into the machinery- if you wanted even room decor you'd have to pay a premium. The base game before kerfus really makes you feel like both a scientist and a technician because of this purposeful and working feel, which is a great thing! You feel professional, smart, and makes roleplaying easy-- you don't have to try to feel like a skilled worker, you just feel like one!

That's the main reason I don't like their addition very much. They break the design rules of the game-- they move faster than you, can fix things that before only you could fix or delay breaking, know where everything is automatically, know what servers are broken from anywhere. You suddenly aren't the scientist and technician anymore, what you could do before as a routine part of the game loop can now be done better by a 500 point purchase. Furthermore they also break art direction: they're very colorful, they have cosmetic additions which are not important for their primary function-- which detracts from the scientific feel of the game even more. More psychologically, it disrespects the form of roleplay (the best way to describe it) that the game had spent so much time to coax the player into being comfortable with (further explanation: you suspend your disbelief and really believe like you are the person you are playing as. You believe the rules of your job and the world you live in, and then the rules change and the belief that you gave feels disrespected). Its counteractive to a great game, which feels sad to witness and be subject to.

Now, on to the arirals. I admit, grey aliens (the main things used in the source material) are pretty lame-o and uninspired. Even through the complete boringness of grey aliens, their addition to the game does have merit as a callback, and feels nice to interact with.

However, arirals are kind of a step back into uninspiration further. They are humanoid (like grey aliens), but also have red human-like hair and fish-like ears, whiskers and large human-like eyes. They don't feel alien, they feel like a cartoon character, and much of their art depicts them as meant to be attractive. Compared to well respected media like The Thing, the Alien franchise, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Project Hail Mary, District 9, hell even ET, the arirals really depart from ideas of 'good aliens'. Ignoring the lack of horror, they aren't foreign enough to our understanding to be considered 'alien'. This is too much of a departure from what atmosphere the game had created up until this point-- added as a little joke here and there like maxwells, stickers, etc. fits the humor part of the game okay-- but as the first aliens encountered across the game, its really displacing and harms the mood that the game worked so hard to create in the first place. It doesn't feel like two entirely different and scientifically progressed races having a first encounter with eachother, it feels like TV show characters based only on Earth animals and entirely familiar with the human race popping out of otherwise very cool designed spaceships and quite literally pranking you and somehow eating human meals.

Things like the Rozitals and their artifacts are pretty cool as an example of something in the game done right, they illicit feelings of leftover machines from a bygone race which DOES fit the sci-fi theming quite well. Additionally, the freaky paranormal phenomenon and shadow creatures are also spooky done well, and really share the feel of Close Encounters of the Third Kind where something unnatural is happening but you have no idea why its happening or who/what could be causing it, especially when its motivations aren't hostile but entirely unknown and complex.

Just hope anything here can be used to help with focusing the games direction (or inspiring deep thought!). Also, if you haven't already, Project Hail Mary is a fantastic read and has one of the best takes on aliens I've seen yet. May be good inspiration for the making of the game if a developer sees this!

Incredible game, a working near perfection of the genre with a lot of loving detail and callbacks to Source games. The art direction is also incredible, but has some notable confusing drops in quality like with the kerfur, who does not match any art or tech theming present in the game or its source material at all and detracts from any immersion. With some extra work and tuning, this game has the ability to make massive amounts of money (if the devs so wish it to).

Neat game for the time it was made in. If you had more time or are interested in working on it further, the game suffered from a lack of suspense. The stuff below is only if you are interested in hearing feedback for any possible future post game jam updates.

tl;dr
gotta let the player know that there's a big angler fish early, and use every aspect of the games mechanics to reinforce that the player is in danger.

An example of suspense used in Iron Lung is the lack of a constant view of the outside world, paired with occasional snapshots of something horrible following you around and the audio of it nearby. That, as well as the degradation of the ships hull builds up to the final jumpscare as you know you are in danger, but you can't know when that danger is going to act on you due to the restriction of information.

Your game struggles mostly because the player always knows their relevant surroundings (there's nothing that is implied to be hidden outside of view), and there isn't any threat which seems life threatening that the player knows of through their equipment. Their radar only shows ore veins, so the player can't be scared by any abnormalities as there are never any. The game has coordinates, but they aren't relevant because the player can pilot through the specific tunnels and reach the end through 'following the path' rather than distracting them from piloting with a layer of uncertainty in movement. The game has ore mining, but there is no unique process involved other than grabbing it.

All that is to say, the player is entirely focused on piloting the ship through tunnels, pressing the grab button and twice (quite rarely) having to use tools to fix barely threatening problems. There aren't any stressful activities the player has to perform, or anything on their equipment to show that there is an instantly life ending threat just outside their submarine.

As somebody once said, there's no suspense if a bomb was to just go off under a table when two people are talking, but if you let the viewer/player know that there is a bomb under the table early, then suspense is created as they keep talking near that bomb.

AKA (also the TLDR at the start) gotta let the player know that there's a big angler fish early, and use every aspect of the games mechanics to reinforce that the player is in danger.

Absolutely amazing! In your video, you said we should hit you up if we have a good starter campaign idea. How should I/we go about that?

A bit too slow to move around for my liking, and had no real objective, but if it was expanded upon I could see myself loving it a lot.

It's a simple idea with some... interesting execution that I managed to have a lot more fun with than I expected. The difficult controls made something simple seem stressful as I remote controlled my vehicle through difficult console commands to simply turn and fire. It felt like I was exploring somewhere unknown in some sort of rover.

The best fit for Unconventional Means so far

Doesn't quite teach the player to be ready for the final level in time, didn't really make me that anxious during play, but had a cool concept and employed features that supported that core idea well.

The premise was decent, but the levels were uninspired and didn't bring anything new/interesting to the table or any original takes on a ruleset like this. It's pretty much always press a few buttons in order and maybe there's a sneaky way to skip one.

A very funny point and click murder mystery. I wish the game was less linear in its puzzles, I know it is meant to replicate classic games but more options and allowance to come up with your own theories and pursue your own paths never hurts in murder mystery games. I also got stuck on the rose-bud part and there was no apparent way through. Also, it could do with some voice acting to tie it all together, give the characters that extra bit of pizzazz and all.

The skill required for resource management contrasted by randomization can make the game kinda meh. I wish the game either lessened out on the intensive levels of resource management and took it more into having fun just building ships or took out some of the randomization, because it takes skill to get anywhere, but it takes even more luck.

The double jump feels quite a lot better now, thank you! This game feels so beautiful, I wish you well on its further development. Might I suggest active playtesting, gauging player response as they go and the likes.

The whole key to the trunk thing made no sense and left me quite lost. An indicator to connect a golden key to a golden lock maybe would make more sense, and the ending felt a bit... dull? It was all a big buildup to an okay climax. The game, despite having the crappy graphics aesthetic (which I do love) runs a bit poor.

This game is so close to being good. The game place takes on floating islands, where if you fall off you get your progress set back a rather decent bit, and yet you give the character close to 0 air control. If you were to give the character higher air control, and the ability for a double jump to completely reset velocity if it's going the opposite direction, the platforming would feel as smooth as the combat. The double jump thing is mostly because if you kick enemies, a wall, or even jump off a slant you can get thrown in a random direction for no apparent reason, and it's irritating to deal with that when you could have the ability to do a guaranteed recovery.

Hello! I love your content and was wondering if I could use the spell list in Sepulchre for my own inspired Stealth TTRPG system named Tenebris. I have no intent of making money off of it, just sharing it with my friends (and possibly as a free PDF, uncertain). Thank you!

Amazing game! Knife can be a bit buggy when retrieving it, but otherwise spectacular all around!

Sounds like you're just getting very unlucky, and on a side note chances are monsters and traps aided in your starvation based death by lowering your health.

I agree with watabou in this situation, the game is set in a dungeon, something meant to kill you, and if it wasn't harsh whatsoever it doesn't feel very dungeon-y. Anyways, yes, there is strategy involved with the hunger system as you have to manage what you want to take on to the next level of the dungeon, such as you could take that charm card or glaive, but instead it might be a better choice to stack up on food lying about in case there is a lack of it ahead.