That's so cool of you, thanks for sharing this! Great video, too. :)

VIBE = BAD

What began as a fun, weird entry for GameOff 2018 nearly a year ago is now a finished high-score game that challenges your reflexes, decision making, and platforming skills! 

Blank Bit is a glitchy, twitchy deck-building platformer where you play as a powerless little BIT caught up in a dying computer that wants you erased. By harnessing the power of CMND BLOCKS, you can collect precious BYTES, erase malicious GREYWARE, and avoid the FORMATTING long enough to discover what lies at the end of the SYSTEM. 

I think anyone who gives Blank Bit a chance will find a lot of fun and replayability in this tricky high-score platformer. Even better: You can grab the latest version (v1.3.0) for half price all weekend :)

https://pfail.itch.io/blank-bit

Awesome video! Thanks for posting it and sharing. Better luck grabbing a top score next time :)

Yeah, it's pretty incredible tbh. Thanks for the comment :)

Niiiiice... Thanks for playing and sharing! 

Ha! Glad you figured it out eventually. Great video :)

BLANK BIT is a glitchy vertical platformer that demands snappy reflexes and moment-to-moment decision making. 

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You play as a harmless little BIT that has gone BLANK. The DISKS you call home are dying, ravaged by GREYWARE until the SYSTEM was forced to reset in order to survive. You must plunder all three disks of the system and gather as many BYTES as you can, always one step ahead of the FORMATTING. Collect data, erase malicious Greyware, and avoid deadly glitches by harnessing the power of CMND BLOCKS and quickly adapting your SEQUENCE to overcome every challenge.

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How many bytes can you collect? Will you discover what awaits at the end of the system?

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Play for free: https://pfail.itch.io/blank-bit

Just a heads up that this doesn't work on Mac

Nicely done! The look of this is super elegant and cool, and it was genuinely fun to unlock the different animations. Between the camera movement and the all-white ball, I had some trouble losing track of what was happening sometimes, but thankfully there was no restarting or penalty from what I could tell. All in all, you made me actually enjoy a digital pinball machine for maybe the first time ever. Thanks for that! 

Appreciate the detailed feedback!

I know what you mean about the UP button taking some getting used to, and tbh, I think the ideal solution is just to make each key mappable. Oh, and the RNG is definitely still something I need to finesse overall, though you can definitely traverse any level layout as long as you have a single JUMP or BOOST. Glad you enjoyed, though :)

Well, this is easily my favorite entry of the jam, and a game I truly hope more people get a chance to play and rate before the voting is over. I've given it 5 stars all around. :)

Setting aside the excellent visual design/aesthetic and the great use of audio and sound cues to instill a beautifully lonesome atmosphere, this feels so incredibly personal and yet inspiring to experience. The puzzle-ish nature of finding the collectibles and figuring out what to do with them is the perfect framework for unravelling the story here, and the more you discover in the woods, the less you feel lost and disoriented. You're making connections through music and writing, and those connections help guide you and give you a sense of where you are and where you should go. It's such a good idea, and so well made!

Personally, finding the boomboxes and discovering what else was on the mixtape became my favorite part of exploring. I got so happy when (SPOILER!)Sleater-Kinney and Portishead started playing! And it was truly rewarding to dance along with the music and watch the lanterns float. Just so freaking good :) I'll be recommending this to friends for sure.

Thank you, Mark! You're right that once you know the basics the game throws you straight into the deep end. Sink or swim haha... 

I agree that there's a version of this game that could introduce certain concepts more gradually, without the immediate threat of death. I'm not sure I'll go that direction, but I do think I'll need to expand the tutorial to allow players to at least try out the abilities. That would probable help minimize the discouragement of dying repeatedly ;)

Perfect! I'll start a new thread after I get a chance to play today :)

Ah, yep, that makes total sense. It should be more obvious when those spinning gears remove a CMND from your sequence. Glad you shared that! 

The gem colors don't matter, no. You'll get the same points no matter what. But now I'm thinking it could be interesting to make that color cycle actually matter. I'll have to look into that. Thanks again!

I think a more in-depth tutorial would be really helpful. This seems like it could be a fun, relaxing puzzle game once I fully understand it. :)

Ah, that's great to know! Appreciate the update, and looking forward to that new build :)

Getting Over It reimagined as a 2D platformer? At least that's how I felt every time I had to start over or got shot back to the beginning. Haha... Definitely a fun idea that I can tell a lot of thought went into. And also frustrating as hell! :)

I have to say, if this is your first finished game, you've got some pretty strong design and dev skills! Everything worked perfectly and the goal of the game was clear, controls easy to pick up. So good work on pulling off that much already!

As someone who also worked on an "endless"-type game for this jam, I know the main design pillars of these games is rewarding mastery and encouraging replayability. One of the ways to do that is through high difficulty, and that's a tough design goal to nail down. While playing your game, I quickly decided that I wouldn't bother trying to collect coins or anything else, because it was nearly impossible already to not touch the walls and die instantly. My strategy wasn't "See how high I can score," but rather "See if I can live more than 10 seconds".

I'm not sure if that was your goal, but it was discouraging to have a single hit restart the level every time. I'd suggest giving players a little more room to make mistakes, especially in the very beginning, or even turn the walls into something other than instant death. Seeing that this is a prototype, I wish you the best if you choose to finish it. You've got a great starting point!

Like Jay said, this idea is strong and I can see it's potential. With some iteration and polish this game could really work well!

A fun little game once you get the hang of it! Definitely an original idea from what I can tell :)

Loved the music choices for this. Very nice mood.

Looks good, but it's hard to tell what I'm supposed to be doing.

Glad you're gonna find time to update it! Looking forward to that. I'm very much interested in making a project with the same aesthetic of this (been watching loads of videos about classic JRPGs lately), so I was thrilled to see someone nailing it. Gives me hope I can pull it off in the future. :)

My first controller I tired to use was a Logitech Gamepad F310, which is pretty ancient at this point. It usually works fine, but thankfully I've got the PS4 I can steal from in the other room.

Thanks for playing, Jay, and this is killer feedback. When you say some of the objects were hard to tell the effects of, can you remember which ones those are? I'm definitely going to do a final update for this in the future, and feedback like that is extremely useful.

Thanks again!

Ah, I see. I definitely moved over them and tried to "trigger" them in some way, but nothing happened. Will actually try to stop on top of them next time. :)

Maybe I'm missing something, but I couldn't figure out where to go or what to do. There were no enemies that I could see, and I wasn't sure if there was an objective or something I had to complete. I wound up flying around and shooting my ammo into empty space until it said "WARNING: LEAVING SECTOR" and pushed me back onto the map. Is this maybe an old build I'm playing?

Thank you! Downloaded and fired it up, but it wasn't compatible with my gamepad. I grabbed my PS4 controller and hooked that up, but for some reason it turned off all of the game's sound? Haha... Oh, and the camera was constantly rotating, and it seemed like my buttons weren't properly aligned with the prompts you have on screen.

Sorry to drop all that on you, it looks like you've put a ton of great work into this game. I love the whole look and style of it, so I hope the controller issues can get sorted out. :)

Glad to get a chance to play your latest build, and congrats on the progress so far. It's evident that you've put a lot into this game, and that it's going to be a pretty massive undertaking.

As someone who is absolutely obsessed with roguelikes (primarily in the traditional sense, though I love some roguelite fare as well), I can tell this project will have a lot of depth to it in the future. (Pun intended!) The character creation was surprisingly robust, and it seems like it'll grow even more. I also loved seeing the new loot drops I would get from enemies, especially once I realize I could equip different light sources along with armor and weapons. I'd love to see some fun game mechanics with what different lights can do, as I think there's a lot of interesting ideas there. I'd recommend checking out the game BELOW for a great example of light-based mechanics in roguelikes.

Your game in particular seems to be hugely about combat and exploration, which is great for a dungeon crawler. I have to say, though, I think there's room for improvement on the combat aspect. A game like Unexplored comes to mind, in terms of a similar approach to combat that is greatly satisfying.

I know it's still early days in development, but there's a lot to enjoy here. Looking forward to what comes next. :)

As someone who has made a retro FPS of my own, I loved seeing this updated spin on those old-school games. Everything looked awesome and was fun to explore. Loved the weapon and enemy variety. Really good level design, too. Good luck on finishing the project! :)

I can tell that a lot of thought and hard work went into getting this started, and congrats on accomplishing as much as you have with it. As someone who largely works solo, I know exactly the kinds of hours that go into doing everything yourself.

Best of luck seeing this through to completion!

Wow, well, I think I can say with total confidence that this is the most complete and actually "finished" game that I've played for this jam so far.

The idea of taking Breakout/Pong style mechanics and making it a battle game is very clever in and of itself. But the whole power-up and progression system you've added (and the polish you've undoubtedly put into everything) really makes it shine. This is not my kind of game, and even I got hooked after a couple rounds. If you were able to make this a multiplayer game, I think it could do even better.

If I had any feedback, it's a couple minor things. Mostly I found the mouse sensitivity to be too much, and the speed that the bombs would bounce seemed crazy high, at least at first. If it could fit into your dev schedule, I could see a big benefit making those settings available to players. Even just a selection like "Normal / Fast / Ultra-Fast" for the bomb speed would be great. Lastly, I think a variety of music could go a long way. Whether it's something the player changes themselves, or something that changes as you progress, I personally could see that adding to the experience.

In any case, congratulations! You've made a fantastic and fun game.

Glad you're interested in feedback, and I'm super happy to share some. This will probably differ from person to person, but for me, I like the idea of completing tasks within a level, if only because it allows for more world-building. But I could see a sort of "challenge mode" working as well, even if it wouldn't be interesting for me specifically. The idea of having to get somewhere while overcoming obstacles seems like the strongest direction this game could take. Hope that's helpful!

This game actually reminds me a lot of my own entry, mostly in the way that you control your character by using certain "cards" in a specific order to move them towards a destination.

I really like the turn-based/board game approach you take, though, as it allows for more complex actions and card choices. I'll admit that I found the controls and card management system a bit too complicated at first, but it makes sense once you get used to it. Nicely done!

Simple and well made! I bet this could be real fun with a friend, especially for kids. Great stuff :)

How does one download this game?

I like the core idea of this game, as it's quite simple and straightforward, but I think it could use some more balancing for difficulty. Also, it would be great if I had a goal other than "don't die", which seems inevitable whether I stay in one place and watch the Fatigue meter rapidly climb or for some reason I "trip" over something I can't even see and die.

Don't get me wrong, I love difficult games and survival games, but they only work when it actually seems possible that you can survive. You did a great job with the audio and visuals, so I'd love to enjoy that stuff in a game that's not just a death trap. :)

Thanks for the great feedback! Excited to see how everyone fares this year :)

Looks like a ton of thought and time went into making this, great work. Glad to see someone making a fully 3D puzzle game in Unity, and not to mention one that runs extremely well. Five stars all around!

Very good artwork!