Judge feedback

Judge feedback is anonymous and shown in a random order.

• Peak aesthetic. Everything just comes together so perfectly with this. I wish I could I WISH I could put perfect scores on every category, but I can't simply because it's not fair. The gameplay is simple and not particularly innovative, so that's where I'm taking away points. But it's so finessed that I still rank it highly. The art reminds me very much of when I just dug myself deeper and deeper under the mines in Mineral Town. That's a strong GBA aesthetic if I ever saw it. The tiles are clearly marked and identifiable even when rushing the game, that's very good. Although I can see how it may not be enough distinction for some players, to me it works wonderfully. The speed at which your power drains I feel is fast enough to make drilling a stone feel like a true risk or reward choice. There were times where the powerup filled up the meter too much that I stop worrying about the risk of drilling the stones but this is just the first level so the difficulty is kept low. I love this. I want more levels.
• You Know The Drill reminds me of a mid-90s shareware PC title in all the best ways thanks to a charming pixel art style with some wonderful animations alongside an addictive high-score gameplay loop which requires you to think on your feet as your pogo drill’s power quickly depletes. While there may not be much content to critique the amount of attention to detail in every square is fantastic. I especially love the detail of the completed floor turning transparent as the player falls through and the particles that fly off the drill. I also need to give credit to the music as the main stage theme really gets me energized to dig! While I cannot really think of any major issues with the game as it stands I do feel as if it is unfinished and missing some small things that could make the game even more fun such as treasure to collect and actually implementing the score system. Alongside this future stages could give the player more tile varieties which would make the game a little less repetitive. As this is a single stage I don’t think missing these elements takes away from the experience but they would likely be needed in an expanded game. Congratulations on creating such a fun and well themed game for this Jam!