This game is really good. i like the assets and the intro its really good. i think this game fits the theme really well. it is a bit hard to play though i kept trying but i kept falling to my death. also i feel like the movement is a bit fast like sometimes there's no friction. otherwise great entry good job.
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The Gorge's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Fun | #66 | 3.656 | 3.656 |
| Overall | #133 | 3.418 | 3.418 |
| Innovation | #134 | 3.312 | 3.312 |
| Game Design | #153 | 3.409 | 3.409 |
| Graphics | #155 | 3.667 | 3.667 |
| Theme | #176 | 3.688 | 3.688 |
| Audio | #380 | 2.774 | 2.774 |
Ranked from 93 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
How does your game fit the theme?
The game is based around going down a mysterious pit, in a sense, diving deeper inside the earth.
Did you write all the code and made all the assets from scratch?
The graphical assets are made from scratch by me and my team, but some are not, like the sound effects.
Comments
It took me a bit to get the hang of this game but once I did, I enjoyed it! The swinging mechanic felt fun and I liked the sounds that accompanied grappling. I'm sure this is due to time constraints but the game could really use some music to add to the whole experience. Overall, a great take on the theme, nice pixel art, and fun gameplay mechanics. Good job!
Submitted
Reel AdventureThe grappling mechanic is cool as heck! I'd like to see it more developed.
Visually it's pretty amazing. Liked the art and it was especially cool that you guys managed to get an intro with images (although one of the last ones I didn't understand exactly what was depicted). The tutorial is pretty cool and the only minor problem I had with the graphics were the green/orange-ish spikes on the walls, they felt like they blended a bit too much with the background so I didn't figure it would kill me, until it did. Also, the jumping and spinning while double jumping are super charming, kudos on the animation.
On the sound department I think music is a must in this game. The frustration from dying time and again felt worsened by the sheer silence. I like the jumping sound effect but the dash one was quite uncanny, felt like Gigio was suffering somehow. The death sound is super cool though! And brutal.
I really enjoyed my time playing with the grappling hook, but Gigio's momentum is a tad too unforgiving. I actually gave up on the tutorial because I kept on falling while in the jumping parts. His falling speed felt a bit too fast, making missteps pretty certain death as it was near unreactable to me.
Also, regarding the checkpoints, I've reached a few of them but I'm not sure they are working because when I die I seem to return to the beginning of the map. Maybe some indicator of how deep you are could help?
Other than that, there were some really minor typos that you guys are probably aware, like the "Options (not aviable)".
All in all, I had a lot of fun trying to survive falling around. The grappling mechanic really is super neat and when you get to save your skin using it, avoiding spikes by an inch, it feels amazing! Congratulations guys!
Submitted
The Blue ScreenThanks a lot for the feedback, I'm glad you liked the grappling mechanics! The game will be surely polished a lot more in future updates, and we plan on fixing all the things you listed, and more! :D
As for the checkpoints not working, did you click on "Retry?" or "Reset Level"? Because if you did I don't blame you, many got confused and the menu will be reworked to be more intuitive (many, including my friends who playtested, said it looks like a title).
As for the sound effects, a theme and new reworked sound effects will be added in a future update! (we did the sounds last second, other than the death, rope, wind and walk sound effect, it's all me doing noises with my mouth and edited in audacity haha)
Stay tuned! ;D
Really fun core mechanic with the movement and grappling hook but the level design in the main game made it hard to freely move. Weirdly felt like the tutorial level had more freedom.
Submitted
Diver's LootGreat work! It's really fun to swing about with the grappling hook, plus I really like the art!
Submitted
Biscuit RescueThe gameplay loop is surprisingly addictive and very fun! Sprites look amazing, although the audio felt a bit lacking (bgm would be a good addition). Congratulations, you guys nailed it!
Submitted
Kitchen DiverVery Smooth gameplay, good controls and satisfying grappling hook action.
Submitted
Depth ExplorerIt's a great intro and very cool game-mechanics. Also like these little details like the little rotation on the double jump and it's a good fit for the theme. This game could be extremely fun, but for my taste it's a bit too hard.
There was actually just one real big problem: Not sure, it's somehow kind of embarassing a bit, lol, but really had it: I don't know how often i played the full tutorial from the beginning until the dash section, because this part was ways too hard for me.... (and now believe it or not) until i noticed, there is a "retry"(!) button. I always clicked the "Reset Level" button, because for some reason didn't identify the "retry" one as a button .... now as soon as have noticed, don't understand why i missed it, because it's soo big^^ Just as a feedback, because got actually really frustrated at the beginning of playing this intro section one million times. Maybe just remove the "reset level" button completely, because guess it has anyhow no real usage^^
But all in all i liked it and played now pretty, pretty long :-D
Submitted
Beneath the Dreaming SeaThe grappling hook feels very nice but something about the base physics of the player movement feels off, can't really point to to what.
I can see the potential of a platformer with these mechanics, not just going down.
The level design is kind of frustrating because there is not a lot of room for experimentation and having fun with the grappling hook, would've loved having some more space and thought put into the level design.
Good job!
Submitted
DivemensionsGood job! The grappling is very dynamic and well implemented.
However I feel the overall movement speed you reach and the level design goes a bit against it. I felt more frustrated than in control as whenever I tried to descend fast I always ended up dying in less than a second, so I found myself descending very slowly and carefully, without using none of the tools I had to go fast, because then it was game over. I also went slow because I didn’t want to miss the checkpoints! Maybe to have them as a horizontal line that crosses the full pit would have helped me to take more risks as well.
I think using the double jump as a momentum break would be interesting as then it would give a breather when going very fast and encourage you to take risks. I noticed the double jump is available at the beginning but when you reach some momentum it’s disabled, which is when I wanted it most. I only used the dash at the tutorial, because every time I used it descending it killed me against something or made me lose the platform I was aiming for. I never tried to pull my character with the rope because I didn’t find any reason for it.
Some of the spikes were very hard to notice, specially the yellow ones and the death felt weightless: would have been cool to stop the movement and adding a camera shake so it felt a bit better to die and retry.
Overall, I think the game goes a bit too fast and it’s too unforgiving to encourage you to use all the tools you have. Reminded me a bit of sonic, that you are going too fast and end up being hit because you just can’t see what’s comming next, but in sonic you can gather back your rings and continue whereas in here you just die. It becomes a bit into a memory game, trying to go through the same paths you know.
All that said, I kept trying to go down so it’s an engaging entry. Thanks for the game!
Submitted
Welcoming GaleThanks for playing and taking your time to review the game in-depth, every critique helps us a lot in making the game better! Yes, for now the descent is very much trial and error, but we plan on flashing out each mechanic in a future update. We'll probably rework the player controls and the dash (making them more like Celeste, where you have more control over where you are going), and polish the level generation a bit better, to make it possible to have the character fall for long distances!
Thanks for playing! The tutorial has a checkpoint at every explanation, so the player can try again and again with the mechanic without losing progress. Tho I must ask you when you died, did you press "Reset Level"(start from the first checkpoint) instead of "Retry?"(start from the last checkpoint)?
Many told us "Retry?" looks more like a title, so we plan on making the death menu more intuitive with future builds! :D
Very fun game to play, really enjoyed it. I love the art and the gameplay, the part where you got the newspaper when the players dies is funny as well. I found the level quite hard to do, since you can't see much of the lower levels.
Submitted
Echelons of LossWow! Really fun to play. Smooth well made mechanics. Good use of fall damage. Polished neat game. Music would be the cherry on top. Good job!
Can you try and rate my game ?
Submitted
Dream Diver
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