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JELLYHEAD's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Adherence to the Theme | #99 | 4.552 | 4.552 |
| Overall | #220 | 4.086 | 4.086 |
| Design | #280 | 3.914 | 3.914 |
| Originality | #597 | 3.793 | 3.793 |
Ranked from 58 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
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Comments
This was excellent. Especially love the art style and sound. It took me forever to realize that the sliding enemies on level 2 only hurt you with your shield up, so that was a little frustrating. But then again I'm an idiot. 5 stars across the board.
thanks for playing the game, and thanks for your feedback! Out of all the puzzle mechanics I designed, the sliding enemies on the second level were the ones I was the most worried about players understanding. I'm glad you eventually figured it out. Thanks again!
Cool game! I really liked how you introduced the mechanics progressively, the learning/difficulty curve is great!
As others have said, the controls are wonky though, since, when you try to jump, the game has to wait to see if you're wanting to do a short press, a hold, or a double press.
I saw on another comment that you noticed this problem halfway through the jam, and hesitated to start over, but I'm glad you didn't because I think you still made some cool dexterity puzzles to go along with the one-button mechanics!
Oh! And I like how your jump doesn't get interrupted by the corner of platforms! The game lets you slide up to put you on top instead! I wonder if you took the idea from Mark's last video about Celeste, but anyway it's great that you took the time to implement it!
I imagine the game would have been quite a lot more frustrating if you didn't, since, after a failed jump on one of those steps, you would have to double tap to turn around, long hold to move away from the step in order to reach it at your jump's peak, double tap again to turn towards the platform, and then tap to jump.
It would have been a chore.
Anyway, thanks for making the game!
Thank you for the constructive feedback. Many have commented on the controls, but you are the first to comment on the fact that the game has to wait to see if you're wanting to do a tap, hold, or double press. "Waiting" is exactly the right word for it, and that's exactly how it's implemented in the game's code as well.
I'm also glad I didn't trash the idea. As I've said elsewhere, it was a nice exercise in level design under extreme restrictions. I have watched Mark's video about Celeste, but I wasn't considering it when designing this game. The way I was thinking of it was this: if you tapped the button and you were grounded when you started the tap, you intended to jump, so you should get to jump. The game shouldn't punish you for not jumping with that sort of precision, especially when there's a delay between pressing the button and actually jumping (due to the "waiting" I described above). I'm glad it's consistent with what he mentioned in the video, though.
Hey, I sent you this review on discord, but just wanted to post this here for others to see.
The first thing that caught my attention was the art. It looks just like a classic gameboy game. Also, the way the blob transforms into a heart at the end of each level? fucking adorable. I love the art a whole bunch.
Sound design is great too. it meshed well with the art. I love the little sound it makes whenever he's hit by the bullets.
gameplay is solid. only one input button worked for this game. the puzzle elements were fun. none were too hard that I couldn't figure them out after just a couple of attempts, so great job on the difficulty curve for that. the entire game was a tutorial for the game so whoever managed to do your level & puzzle design for that deserves a pat on the back and a cookie. all of it is extremely well done and balanced.
I don't have a whole lot to say but that's only because everything just meshed so well together and your game is so good that I'm just not sure what all to really say about it beyond, this is a goddamn good game. I was actually surprised by how much content it had, considering you had only 48 hours. it feels like it's own full, short, standalone game. you did amazing and you should be very proud, you did amazing.
Thanks again! I appreciate it!
Appreciated that one button affected multiple platforming elements at once. The sound cut-out after a few deaths, which was sad because I was enjoying it. Liked this game a lot!
Check out our submission, here.
Thanks for playing and thanks for the kind words! I have noticed some audio issues as well, but only with the HTML build of the game. Still working out some of the kinks with audio and the engine I used.
Oh wow, the level design is really well done ! I love how you teach all your mechanism and how they can interact with each other !
Really cool game !
Thought I had some problem with the audio that glitched after a while, but that's okay, this won't affect my rating ;)
Thanks for the kind words! I tried to make sure that everything was taught to players before they had to deal with more complex situations.
I definitely noticed some audio issues as well with the web build. I'm still learning about how to do proper HTML builds using the engine I worked with. Still, I appreciate that this didn't impact your rating.
Great use of one button to do all the actions a normal platformer does! The control is clever and smooth, but does take some time to get use to. Consistent graphics quality, and nice level design! Good job! :)
Thank you for playing. I'm glad you took the time to get used to the controls!
Good work, I like the idea and its realisation. Gameplay is smooth and enjoyable, sometimes hard, but I in a good way. I think, the game will be great for streamers.
Thanks a lot! Some streamer exposure would be great.
I really like the fact that I only have to use one button. Visuals and music are simple but fit well to the game. It was pleasant to play :)
Thanks for playing!
A really cool idea and well executed as well. I love all the ideas you had for what you can control with one button only. And especially the idea of giving the player a shield when doing nothing, therefor giving him time to think what to do next. Good job!
Thanks for playing. I appreciate you noticing the decision to shield when doing nothing. When I was thinking about making a game with only one button, I broke it down into four actions:
I wanted to make use of all four of these actions, so I'm glad that didn't go unnoticed!
You've already mentioned some of the flaws of having a single button with a precise platformer, but you did a good job on capitalizing on some solid level design to test the limits of one-button controls.
I was torn on how much to rate you for design, because the individual levels show some really good combinations of different obstacles, but there are some obvious design flaws in just using a single button. Considering how well you designed the levels in spite of the forced restrictions, I feel that this game needs to be mentioned by GMTK, due to the lessons this game can teach about design. I'm giving full points for design, theme, and original use of the restrictions.
All that said, this was a truly terrible game. I'm glad I'll never have to play it again. You're an amazing level designer to get me to finish something with controls this bad.
Thank you so much for playing and for the useful feedback. I especially appreciate your comments about the level design and the way I combined the different obstacles. Level design and puzzle elements are what I spent the most effort on this weekend, and it's nice to see that effort wasn't put to complete waste. Your comment summarizes exactly how I felt while designing it. In some ways, it is a truly terrible game, but it was an interesting experiment in designing under heavy restrictions.
Thanks again! Hopefully my game gets noticed by Mark :)
This is exactly how you get good at game design, by trying a bunch of small experiments, and learning what ideas are good, and what ideas are bad. I'm sure you'll remember the valuable lessons this game jam taught you about how to manage player controls, without accidentally spending several months learning those lessons while working on an important project. With the skills you're acquiring, I'd love to see what games you build in the future!
Really like the one button interface though moving short spaces can result in jumping which is a bit frustrating (but hey, what are you gonna do?) I love the graphics and the heart shape at the end of the level. Pretty difficult, as most game jam games tend to be. Overall good execution and enjoyable
Thanks for playing and thanks for the useful feedback. I agree that the awkward controls are probably this game's biggest drawbacks. There were so many times I wanted to just add a second button for controlling the character, but I had to stay true to the jam's theme!
Really liked the level design and gimmicks, thought you made great use of them in interesting ways. I think that the levels weren't really created to fully embrace the control scheme and some areas would have been better with multiple buttons. Even then I had a lot of fun with this and its definetly well produced and not too difficult.
Thanks for playing! I appreciate the feedback. I agree with you that some areas would have been better with multiple buttons. I don't think this is the most fun game I've ever made (or will ever make), but it was a useful exercise in level design under extreme constraints. Being able to use only one button is an awkward control scheme for a platformer like this one.
I think the controls hold the game back a bit as they make the game harder than it should be but over all very creative and interesting, I loved seeing what you could come up with.
I hear ya there. I feel like I designed myself into a corner with this one. I knew I wanted to do a sidescroller that uses only one button, but I didn't want to just make another endless runner game. I agree that the controls are a bit awkward. I spent the first day of the jam implementing the controls, and that was when I discovered how awkward it was to move around using only one button. I had to make a decision: either I trash the idea and start from scratch, or I had to find some way to make the awkward controls fun.
Obviously, I tried to go with the second option there. I tried to design the levels and the puzzle mechanics in such a way that mastering the awkward controls is what makes it fun to play. I'm not sure whether I succeeded or not, but this was a fun exercise in game design under heavy constraints either way. It's tough to design fun levels for a character that can't move as freely as Mario!
Thanks so much for the feedback and for playing the game. I appreciate it.
You know I also made a sidescroller that uses only one button and man you did such a better job. It's a pretty difficult thin to accomplish but you did it pretty well.
Clever single button control scheme, nice gameboyesque style.
My only complaint is it's a bit too hard too quick. Otherwise, very solid entry.
Thanks for playing! I appreciate the feedback.