itch.io

Thanks for checking it out! I really appreciate the feedback. I'll definitely take some time to fine tune the block and background color selection to prevent visual issues. The BPM fueling a song is on the to-do list. Hopefully I can figure it out.

And thanks for letting me know about mixolumia. It looks like it achieved some of the goals I have for this project.

Some thoughts and observations:

• Holding A keeps you in the falling animation even after you’ve landed. (It’s kind of cool because you can float around like Magneto in MVC2, but it’s probably not intended behavior)
• Jumping while moving into a wall kills vertical momentum. The first two humps you jump over in the tutorial can’t be jumped over if you’re hugging against them at the start of the jump. It’s probably something to do with the wall jump mechanic slowing speed while touching a wall? Not a big deal, but could limit design options in the future or lead to minor player frustrations.
• Here’s the biggest thing I’ve noticed: It would be very helpful if there was consistently some sort of indication of what the other world contains. For example, the first time you switch worlds in the tutorial there’s a low passageway, then the next area has a high passageway. But there’s no real way of knowing what’s going to happen until you do it, which seems to go against the theme of a game that focuses on going fast. It would make me feel really good as a player to be able to run through the level while being able to “predict” (through visual cues) what I’m supposed to do next. You have hollow red and blue shapes later in the level, but they aren’t used consistently throughout. For example, the blue ground to the right of the second checkpoint disappears, but doesn’t have hollow blue blocks in the red world. TLDR: Having a clear way to tell what objects are going to appear/disappear is necessary to empower players and prevent frustration. (Guacamelee is a great example to look at. They use sparkling shapes to show walls that will be present in the opposite world.)
• There’s no variable jumping/wall jumping height. The jump should be lower if I let go of the jump button mid-jump. Especially for wall jumps, this would make timing and spacing some of the landings much more fulfilling and would open possibilities for more difficult wall jumping sections that are still fair for the player.
• I sometimes get a second jump mid air while doing wall jump sections. Not sure why.
• After beating a level: One option is red and one is blue. I could tell which one is selected because the options don’t loop around, but visually I had no idea which one was selected. You could try dimming the color of the non-selected option maybe?
• The single-pixel black lines in the background of the tutorial jitter around when the camera slows to a stop. It might annoy some people.

Overall, I had fun playing around in it. I like the visuals of the levels. The red/blue dichotomy works really well. I think it has a lot of promise if you keep pushing forward with it! (I also have a game you could try if you have a minute, but no pressure.) Good luck!

Thanks a lot for the feedback! I agree starting with four and ramping up the number of blocks, as well as the complexity of the shapes, would be a good way to progress. It's on my list of things to implement if I continue development. I'll see if anyone else has that same idea for the controls. Maybe I could add different control types in the future.

Hey there. I gave your game a shot. Here are some thoughts:

• It would greatly benefit from having a cursor on screen. It was hard to tell were my shots were heading because the character is off center and the bullets go at an angle toward the center of the screen, which I wasn't expecting.
• I'm kind of confused as to why I'm a bottle. I'm really small, which makes it harder to tell where I am when there's a lot of enemies on screen.
• You might want to think about making the earlier enemies fade away after a while. Very quickly, the game started chugging because there were literally thousands of enemies on screen.
• A typical issue with games like this is the player will naturally move backwards and in a circle unless there is some force incentivizing them against doing so. Having some kind of forward attack would be beneficial because 1) It would incentivize them to move in a direction that isn't backwards 2) blasting through hundreds of enemies would be fun 3) it would provide a logical way for the player to get any presents that might be stuck in a horde of enemies.
• You might also consider adding logic to the enemies to prevent them from lumping together. Also, increasing the size of the playable area might be beneficial. Having more "zones" to move around to and from would add the possibility for more strategy.

Overall, I thought it was fun! I hope you get some insight out of what I said. I also have a game you could try if you have a minute. Have a good one!

https://ryankampmeier.itch.io/untitled-block-rotation-game-rotation4

I've made a simple prototype where you rotate a center block and combine it with surrounding pieces to make squares. Here's the summary:

• Rotate the middle piece with Q/W and press a direction to combine it with an outer piece. Each square you make increases your score.
• The higher your score, the faster the music gets and the faster the outer pieces move inward.
• The music is dynamic. New layers of percussion are rolled in as the beats per minute increases. Background effects also get more intense.
• It's game over if two pieces combine that don't make a square. (including outer pieces closing in on the middle piece)

I'm looking to see if it's any fun. Also, I'm hoping it's super intuitive where people would be able to figure it out on their own without too much info. Thanks for taking a shot! Any suggestions are appreciated :)