It seems so silly (and super cute!) at first, but then there's actually quite some depth in how it works, and it feels so great to play as well. Scoring a point against the tougher guys is quite satisfying. Very well done!!!
I was a little skeptical when I saw this on itch.io's YouTube but playing it myself, you really got this thing of "conscious movement" down, probably the best possible emulation of that gameplay mechanic in a 2D game!
This is great for a jam game but I think there's even more potential here. I imagine the game boy environment lends itself well for other aspects of DS. Not the cinematic stuff and extensive lore, and definitely not the online aspect either, but the rest of it: Travelling from A to B. Hiking, all by yourself through varying environments, all with their own mood. Stopping for little highlights on the way, no matter if it's a hot spring that replenishes your stamina or just something interesting to look at. Delivering cargo and feeling the satisfaction of taking it from one point to the other, potentially even with little story tidbits around it to make it all more real. And of course, clocking it all in in Private Rooms.
I'm saying the game boy would work for this because imagining myself playing a game like this on a game boy on a rainy autumn day feels really cozy and melancholic. I think that it would make for a great experience.
So if you ever feel even slightly compelled to come back to this, remove the Death-Stranding-label from it and flesh it out to make it your own thing, even more than it already is? Godspeed, you got my blessings and I'd totally be here for it!
Depending on your handheld, you only need to download the cart/PNG and put it on your device, or browse Splore if that's an option - the game should appear three!
Also, of course you're more than welcome to donate here on itch.Io :^) I'd appreciate it! But the game itself is free!
I'm really happy to hear that you played the game pretty much exactly how I ideally envisioned it and enjoyed all the stuff around it as well! That really brightens my day. (Also, in all of my ~20 years of learning and speaking this language, I have not once heard the word "zaftig" and I'm glad it happened in this context and if nothing else, that made it worth the effort lol)
Hey, thanks for playing and all that feedback!! I really appreciate it. If you're interested, here's my responses:
1) Yepp, it is quite lenient all things considered (and in fact, every room is designed to be solvable even if you walk in with 0 keys) but I wanted it to be more "relaxed", so that even players who aren't as much into backtracking would have a chance of finding the artifact even on their first run. I did get the feedback that the game was kinda easy though... maybe I'll do a Hard-Mode-version haha
2) Correct! That's their purpose. I added them at some point realizing that backtracking 4 screens just to not get your keys snatched might be tedious and I hoped that these locks at first seem like pointless decoration until players have an "aha!"-moment, realizing what they can use them for. I'd liked to get more feedback about whether that worked out...
3) Agreed. I'd personally have preferred to have a movement similar to Zelda 1 but somehow didn't get it to work properly. The code now is very basic as I'm an enthusiast at coding at best lol. Maybe I'll figure it out and update it, the movement does kinda break the flow when you wanna breeze through the puzzles.
Again, thank you for taking the time to get into this tiny game as much as you did, This means a lot to me!
Thank you for trying both the game and the manual out! Unfortunately, those last three locks are just plain old locks, but you were pretty close to the artifact...!
Thanks for taking the time to reply; when I sent that comment, I started getting worried that you might take it the wrong way. But I'm glad you didn't! And I see your motivations now, it all sounds very good and like you know what you're doing. That's great, so I wish you best of luck for the future!!
It's very well done! I can't even begin to imagine how you managed to get so much work, detail and charme done with such a small team, budget and timeframe. That's really impressive!
However, I think it's somewhat unfortunate that you copied so many essential beats from Little Nightmares. LN is already a popular, unique and great game. So if you take this much inspiration from it, you had best made sure that you EXCEED the original or put a unique twist to it. Of course, that's gonna be difficult, since LN had a much bigger team and budget, but if you don't surpass LN, it will always breath down this project's neck and even though Obusite is a great game, the presence of LN makes it a "great game, but LN did it somewhat better." And I think your hard work deserves more recognition than that! So I'm excited to see more project in the future from you guys!
Thank you for taking time out of your day (and DEFINITELY not out of your worktime or anything!) to get into this whole thing and document it. The way you described it (and I will have to try that out myself more later as well), it almost comes off as a strange gameplay-emergence-thing, so I'll do some thinking on whether I want to "fix" this or turn it into an actual feature for the next version or for a bigger "remake" of the game, if I get around to that.
In any case, thanks for all this and your encouraging words! It means a lot!
Woah!! How could I take this negatively?! This is the exact kinda feedback I was hoping for! :D You explained what you appreciated about the game (thank you!!) but then also took time out of your day to document a significant flaw in the game in detail and how to potentially fix it. I really, really appreciate that.
That said, you’re right — it is a game breaking flaw. I seem to remember implementing that function (hen moving right after spawning) at some point during development so that the hen wouldn't be hidden under the other hen and players immediately understand that it just hatched. I think I implemented that function, called it a day and then forgot to check whether this actually causes problems. And after testing the game a hundred times myself, I just didn’t see the "safe" hens. Just goes to show that playtesting AND documentation are fundamental even with smaller projects...
That said, the way you described your method for the 3 hens is so impressive that it almost feels like a pro strategy rather than a flaw/bug. :D I will fix this, of course. But just out of curiosity: Do you remember what your high score was?
Again, thank you so much for this comment and writing all of this up! You made my day.
I said there are no buts to this, yet here you are with a but that just further proves you do not understand the situation.
"Kill your darlings" is good advice, but to a limited extent and not the way you're using it.
"Outside influence" can indeed be a helpful way to improve a project, but it is a delicate and PLANNED concept, and you are obviously just trying to stroke your own ego here with subjective and shallow feedback.
You were never "polite," you were being self-righteous. You were not "harsh" either, you were being narcissistic. I already explained why your "approach" does not come off the way you apparently think it does, and now you're outright insulting the developer, too.
Finally, to reiterate: You obviously do not understand game development, you obviously have not worked in game development. You are a consumer who has played games before and thinks this is enough qualification to know better than the devs. It is not.
You are not in the position you see yourself in.
Take this with you for the future. Do not pester game developers any more.
I know you think you were being encouraging and generous, and that you maybe had to "break some eggs to make omelettes," but you need to understand that the ego and hubris is with you. You project your subjective opinion onto this game as an infallible truth while obviously not understanding the intent of TASQ. Your suggestions imply that you do not even consider the concept of how Programancer's own music is very likely to have integrity in the context of the project. And I'm guessing you have never taken on a project as TASQ, or any game development project . What all of this means is that you see yourself in a position you are absolutely NOT in. You speak to a developer (who owes you bugger all) in a way that not even project leads I've met would do.
If you wrote this comment with no malicious intent, then I hope this backlash, as uncomfortable as it is, at least inspires you to do a reality check. In the future, please refrain from this kind of unsolicited input. Just because you can reach out to a developer doesn't mean you should.
