itch.io

There are a lot of really great features implemented in this game. The stealth mechanic with the fires works well. The crafting works feels like it gives you gradual enough upgrades to not feel too overpowered. It's a little lacking in polish but that's to be expected considering the amount of content you managed to cram into 2 weeks. 

My biggest issue was the general lack of contrast. There are ways to make a game feel dark without making it impossible to play without your curtains closed and brightness maxed out.  Edit: this was fixed.

Overall though, it was very enjoyable and although it was quite challenging for me, it still felt fair.

Everything works well which is a great achievement for your first game jam. It also looks really nice but it took me an embarrassingly long time to realise that the black bit of wall was actually the door. 

Really great game! I was relieved to find out that it took you 5 hours because I couldn't comprehend how so much could be made in 3 hours.

I love that the final level has a bit of a plot twist with you having to break the portals instead of fix them. Dialogue was great and the visuals and audio were both very fitting. My only complaint is that the hitboxes could have been a little more forgiving. Overall though it's an insanely impressive game to be made in 5 hours.

The mechanics are really cool and original but getting a highscore seems to be purely based on luck which is a bit annoying. Everything worked well though which is a good achievement for a 3 hour jam

It would have been nice if the enemies had a set path instead of random movement. At the moment it can take quite a while to wait for a path to become unblocked. Everything works really nicely though

I like the idea of finding pieces of the map and it's nice that the timer stops when you reach the end

You've included a lot of really cool bits of polish like the transition from the menu to the game and the mini map. I'm also always impressed when a game made in such a short time has sound effects. It would have been nice for there to be more of an objective, even if it was just a win screen when you reach 100% exploration. It feels a bit more like a character controller demo than an actual game. 

Very fun game! At the start I really struggled to survive more than 10 seconds but once I'd been playing for a while then it actually got pretty easy which I think is the sign of a fair but challenging game. I think you had a perfect balance of simplicity and interest, with the planting mechanic giving you a goal other than running away.
The only thing I found a bit odd was that the enemies move faster than you which makes it seem impossible to escape them at times. If the enemies moved at the same speed as the player I think it would feel a bit more fair.
Overall though, great job!

You've managed to get a lot done during this jam and the overall presentation is excellent. Unfortunately I found the platforming controller to be very slippy and I spent a long time getting not very far. The level design requires a lot of precise jumps but the controller doesn't feel like it gives you enough control to make them.
I wish I could have gotten further because the start had me excited to play more. You also had a lot of options in your menus which are often overlooked in jams so good job for that too.

Very polished game! The art is amazing and the music and sfx fit the game very well. Good interpretation of the theme and unlike anything I've played before. I would have liked to have keybinds for the abilities (maybe just the number keys) so as to not need the mouse but I appreciate that you made it mobile friendly. The UI is very well designed and I like how obvious it is when the enemies are about to attack, although it would have been nice if there was some indication on the UI of how many enemies were left in a level.

I found the gameplay to be a little bit repetitive. The enemies only spawn from one of 2 locations and the player has very limited options for what they can do after attacking (either breathe in or move). This leads to the player not really having any counterplay options and instead just hoping that there's enough time between enemies to prepare their next attack.  For example, I got into a situation where there was a melee enemy right next to me but also a bow enemy far away on the other side so I had no option but to take damage. This isn't too much of a problem because the game is easy enough that taking some damage doesn't really matter but it does leave the player feeling a little powerless.

The tutorial at the start of the game was really well done and I enjoyed having a little bit of a narrative element. I found the font quite difficult to read so that might be worth changing if you develop the game further for general accessibility.  It would have been nice if the ending had some kind of dialogue or cut scene too as it felt quite abrupt but I would assume that didn't happen due to time constraints.

Overall a really excellent game and I could definitely see it being made into a very successful mobile game. All of the polish is there already, I just think that the combat could use some small tweaks to make it feel more fair and exciting. Great job!

that's a really good idea that I hadn't thought about. I'll be sure to implement that if I continue developing the game.

Thanks for the idea and for your kind words 😊

The controls are really fun and I love the art style and the tutorial was very effective at teaching the player what to do. It took me a long time to complete the first level and I thought maybe it was just a high score game but once I got used to the movement I didn't struggle too much.

I made it to the first boss fight which honestly was a bit confusing. I didn't really know what the balls on the sticks were but I lost all my health quite quickly. When I died during the boss fight though then nothing happened. I just floated around unable to control anything. I'm not sure if it's because I still had oxygen left because I'm sure when I died before then there was a death screen.

I really like how at the end of each level you get a guaranteed upgrade as well as the opportunity to buy stuff from the shop. That was a really great design choice and it allows the player to always feel like they're progressing while still rewarding the player for doing extra well. 

A couple of things didn't feel completely fair. The first one is when you get an upgrade box and it changes your thruster.  I would have liked if you were able to choose which thruster you used because otherwise it seems better to just not pick up the box in case you get the leaky thruster.

The only other thing that felt a little disappointing was the combo system. I got a combo of 20 and I was really excited to see what the reward would be but I think it was the same reward as if you get a really small combo.

Overall though the game was really fun and I think there's definitely potential for this to be developed into something bigger post jam. I would pay money to play an adventure exploration game with this character controller.

Loved this game! Movement and combat both felt natural and easy to understand. The art was great and the music added a lot to the game, especially how the music was used as the timer for how long you had left in the zen mode. All of the enemies were really well designed and it felt quite fair. I think the UI was quite busy and it took me a long time to realise what all of the different health bars were and I still don't know what the green and red dots under the breath bar are.

I made it to the second big boss (the black ghost thing) but when I died there the restart wave button didn't work (I think there might have been another UI element blocking the button) so that's as far as I got. I wish I could have made it to the end to see what happened but I enjoyed the experience nonetheless. 

I think the dramatic pace change when you take a deep breath is funny every time it happens and it's really well done. Overall an excellent game and I had a lot of fun playing, congrats!

I definitely agree about the controls needing improvement. I intended to add a rebinding menu but ran out of time.

I wanted the player to have to stand still while breathing because then it adds a level of challenge to when you're able to breathe. I think if the player could control their breath mid air then the game would become far too easy.

As for the spikes, I intentionally made the hitbox on them quite generous because I think it's better for the player to think "that probably should have killed me 👀" than "that shouldn't have killed me 😡".

Thanks for leaving such a thoughtful review. I appreciate it

My favourite part of this game was the combat system. Flying around and using the bow was very fun and it felt very natural to control. The art was also stunning and very nicely done although I did find that the visual effects (specifically the chromatic aberration ) were a little bit overwhelming and distracted from the gameplay a bit too much. The music was really nice too and overall the game felt like a very original experience.

It took me a while to realise that I could roll with the arrow keys as that wasn't mentioned in the tutorial. After I figured that out though it was very fun trying to control the character. It felt quite difficult to control and chaotic but in a way that made it funny, not frustrating so good job with that!

I think the breathing in sound effect was quite confusing because it was much shorter than the time it takes to fully charge the breathing mechanism. This meant that I kept releasing the button before I should have.

Overall though, really good interpretation of the theme, excellent art and music and fun to play.

In that case, I think it would have been good to make it so that you have to use an ascending zipline to leave the area that you get the paperclip from. That way the player is taught how to use it without needing a tutorial. 

I didn't compete in this jam so I can't give you a rating but I just wanted to leave a comment and say that I loved the feel of this game. Up until the point of unlocking the attack everything went really smoothly and I didn't come across any problems but after unlocking the attack I walked around for quite a while trying to figure out what it had unlocked exploration wise and couldn't find anything. I'm assuming there was a breakable wall somewhere that I didn't see. I did however notice that you can go up the zip wires by spamming jump which I think is probably unintended. I used this exploit to see how far I could get and eventually I died to a bat in the underground bit and when I respawned it wouldn't let me move at all so I had to stop playing.

I would love to see this game finished and polished. I would 100% pay money to play a finished version of this game and it inspired me to try and make some more progress on my game dev endeavours. Thanks for the experience

Very well made and polished game. Levels could have been longer but considering it was made in a week I think you did a good job.

Very cool game. The level design is excellent and I always knew where to go and how to get there. I think that the character controller could have benefited from being a bit floatier because once your fear goes up it is almost impossible to control. I feel like there were maybe a few too many mechanics as well that weren't necessary (turning off the torch and eating food to reduce fear) although I do think that all of the mechanics were introduced to the player very well. Overall, the graphics and audio were great and I had fun playing your game. Great job!

thanks face, appreciate the support.

The opening sequence was really nicely done. Great art and the voice acting was appreciated. I liked the maze idea but the controls could have been a bit more refined. I think it could have done with a little more direction at least at the start. Maybe each of the characters could be faced with an obstacle that requires them to use their skill right at the start of their maze section. Overall, the music and art were really the highlights of this game for me.  I also had a good chuckle when I died and it sa

The art and visuals looked very polished and professional especially for a game jam. The concept was really good and I think it was well executed but there wasn't enough feedback from any of the attacks so I never actually knew if I had hit anyone. The stun and knockback abilities also has great visuals but it was confusing trying to actually use them because I don't think they did enough. I really enjoyed the elevator music when the floors were moving.

Really good idea and the majority of the puzzle design was very good. I'm really impressed by how many levels you managed to make in such a short time. Good job!

I found it quite difficult to understand what was happening but the art was really nice and I like the attention to detail of the guns shooting in time with the music. 

Great looking game and it's really fun at the start but then once you have a good gun setup then it feels like ages before the boss shows up. It would be nice if the gameplay was a bit more varied between these stages. Maybe modules could have a life span so they destroy themselves after 20 seconds and then you always have to keep building your ship.

I really like how the game looks. It plays more like a demo than an actual game because the objectives are never really made clear but it was enjoyable overall. Aside from a couple of bugs I think what is shown is very polished and it's very intuitive.

Very cool concept and a surprising amount of enemies that all seem well thought out and cleanly executed. At some point though, I got a little bored of running in circles. I think it could have been better to have some form of obstacle that requires you to not just run in circles but I'm not exactly sure what that could be. Also it would be nice to have in indication of how many rounds there are so that there's more motivation to get to the end. I made it to round 17. Also it's very pretty. Good job!

Hey there is actually an adaptive soundtrack that I made all the music for but it seems to not load for some people (some kind of issue with fmod and webgl I guess). I wish I'd realised before the jam finished and then I would have just uploaded a downloadable version instead but I didn't catch it in time. Thanks for playing though.

I really liked this idea and think it's very original but it ended up being a little too passive and easy. I placed 3 turrets on the first few waves and they comfortably kept me at the right health for a very long time. When I eventually needed more towers I had a ridiculous amount of money which didn't feel very balanced. Then the win screen popped up very abruptly which caught me off guard. I think you could have done couple of pretty simple things to make the game feel a little better. First I would put a wave count somewhere so that the player knows it's not just an endless game and then the end wouldn't be so surprising. I would also either give the player much less money or just get rid of the money entirely as I don't think it contributed to the gameplay. Finally I think some simple animations when the turrets fire could have gone a long way to make the game a little more juicy. Overall, the game seems really well made and although I found it too easy, I think you made something really impressive and I love how different your take on the theme was.

I honestly wasn't quite sure what was happening most of the time but it was still tons of fun. It just felt really good to play. Controls are perfect but the enemy path finding could have used some calibration to stop the boss getting stuck behind a wall. Overall really really fun and I enjoyed it a lot.

Yeh if you wait a bit longer at the white screen then an end screen shows up. It shows up a lot faster in unity but in the build it was painfully slow and I didn't realise in time to fix it. I think I just put something in my update function that should have been in fixed update.

Fun concept and nice execution but personally I wish it weren't so long. It could have been a really thought provoking story game if you focused a little more on the dialogue, but instead it ended up being a repetitive clicker. I still really enjoyed the idea and it was very refreshing to see something so different. The visuals are great and and everything is super super polished. Good job!

Great game! Really well thought out concept and a joy to play. The areas with the falling eggs felt a little too punishing as almost every jump was completely blind and it felt like you just had to hope there was going to be a platform underneath you. The controls were great though and this is one of my favourite games from the jam that I've played so far.

Good idea but I think the level design could have used a bit of work. I pretty much fell to the finish line straight away by accident which was a bit confusing. The controls are good and well done for making your own music and putting this all together in 3 days :)

I really like the idea and think it's fun to play. I like that you let the player choose how many lives they get and on a whole the game feels really balanced. My only problem was the controls. I would have liked if there was an auto fire if you hold down the mouse so you don't have to keep spam clicking. Also moving with arrow keys would be nice and shooting with space. Overall though you've done a great job and I had fun playing!

I might be biased because your idea was pretty similar to mine but I think this was a really good take on the theme. Really clever puzzle game with well designed levels and lots of them. I'm amazed how much you got done in the time. Great job!

I LOVE the broken mario music. Honestly you get extra marks just for that. As for the actual game, it seems cool but it's just a bit too difficult for me and I can't make it very far without dying. Everything is well explained though and I like all of the ideas. Good job!

I'm not sure this really does anything to fit the theme beside the game over message giving a nod to it. Besides that though, the game is fun, feels very balanced to me and seems well made. I really like the fast shooting when you press space and click. That was a super cool and well implemented mechanic. The diagonal movement was faster than the horizontal movement which bothered me a little bit. If you normalize the movement vector then that should fix that problem. Good job, hope you enjoyed the jam!