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A jam submission

OrtusView game page

Explore a new alien world with your boat.
Submitted by OrtusGame, Secirus, jonathanpersson, Takeaway, DomoJ, InSilverClad, ElianMorgana, Jmingxiao — 20 days, 19 hours before the deadline
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Ortus's itch.io page

Results

CriteriaRankScore*Raw Score
Art Direction#44.0004.000
Overall#53.3333.333
Storytelling#53.0003.000
Audio#63.5003.500
Innovation / Experimentation#73.3333.333
Game Play / Game Feel#73.3333.333
Level Design#83.1673.167
Presentation (itch listing)#103.0003.000

Ranked from 6 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.

Judge feedback

Judge feedback is anonymous and shown in a random order.

  • Very nice atmospheric feel of this game. From the narrow caves that opens up to a big chamber with a tree to the breathing notices inside the helmet and the sound of a giant door opens in the distant . It all comes together like a fully thought out product. I didn't think you could have interesting or challenging puzzles with the push pull boat but you guys managed to do that as well. Very clever to use a numeral value to each plant, math is universal so its easy to understand. The itch presentation is condense and you can download the game quickly without scrolling down tons of information but you should have sold the feel of the game more than the mechanics. The big tree or a giant door opening is much more inviting than a gif of the boat. An atmospheric game like this needs a soundtrack that is just as gripping. BUT this is a tall order to give to a student project so well done. A bit of color variety in the cave to help navigation and makes it feel less "repetitive" in the scenery. Overall great job, you nailed the aesthetic feel of this game. The page on itch is condense and punchy but don't sell the game as well as it should. An animation of a giant cave door opening or the three in the big cave would have sold it better than a gif of the boat.
  • Absolutely beautiful art. Pretty cool that you have a cutscene too! Nice and mellow experience, scanning plants and exploring the environent. This game got an excellent atmosphere and a lot of potential
  • Striking visual design and really interesting narrative set-up. The game play is a bit confusing and could use a bit of onboarding/tutorial because it's really not straightforward what we're supposed to do.
  • Well done Ortus team! Sadly, I didn't get to play the entire game, but oh man did I love the parts that I did get to play. The atmosphere of the game is amazing. I could spend hours just boating around to explore this world! Speaking of boating, you have managed to really nail the controls on this one. It feels responsive, and remote controlling the boat works wonders for the puzzles! Collecting plants and analyzing them is great way to introduce the player to your system. However, I cannot say that I fully understood how to know what plants go where, especially when you have more than four. Maybe I missed some crucial part of that mechanic. When I played, I felt like I just chucked in the plants to see what worked. Is there a way you can make it more clear? Can the plants be marked by specific tags? Either way, it does work, and I bet once I understand it, it will make sense! The music is great, it is calm, but mysterious. It really adds to the experience along with the tiny sounds of the boat. I think you have a great game going! Keep it up!
  • It was all going so well, then when I got back into my boat off the DNA check island the boat wouldn't move.

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Comments

You nailed the alien planet vibe! The underwater effect for the algae is really cool, and the overall glowiness on the plants in a dark cave makes the player feel stranded in an unknown world.

I liked the remote boat control. It took me a while to figure out that you could only move it while seeing it, but once I got that, puzzles got a lot more interesting and fun to figure out.

The plant DNA sequences in the console felt a big meaningless, since there wasn't any punishment for getting it wrong, and you could essentially brute-force it. It's a cool concept nonetheless, and could very easily be expanded upon. I also got stuck in the terrain too often for comfort when walking around.

I think this game could make a very good use of camera panning when entering the puzzle-areas. It was confusing at times what needed to be done and how to do it, just because there wasn't any overarching view of the area, and I couldn't see a path to the places I needed to be.

Overall, this was an awesome experience! I spent a good half hour playing this, and I was left wanting for more. If you have plans to develop the game further, I'll be more than glad to playtest it and give some feedback!

Submitted

Very cool overall experience. I really enjoyed how the game teaches the mechanics through the level design, this was solved in some truly elegant ways! I personally lacked the sense of having a goal in the game - apart from just being curious and exploring, but that might be just due to me not being a big "exploration games" fan. 

Great work! 

// Florian

Developer

Hi Florian! Thank you for the nice feedback! That's definitely a good point, we could make the goals more clear. 

Thanks for playing our game!

-Team Ortus

Jam Judge

I got a plant. I analysed it. I went to the console. I got out of the boat. I ran a DNA check. The barrier disappeared. I got back in the boat. The boat was stuck and wouldn’t move in any direction.

Developer (1 edit)

Hi Richard! If you get stuck, you can use the "Respawn Button" in the Pause Menu. You can open the Pause Menu by pressing "P". Hope this helps! -Team Ortus

Jam Judge

Thanks, yes, I could probably have quite and restarted, too. How could I get stuck in the first place, though?

Developer

Seems like there's still some bugs to iron out, despite our playtesting efforts. :-( 

The feedback is much appreciated! We hope you can give Ortus another shot, if you didn't manage to play it further. In the meanwhile, we'll get right on fixin'.

-Team Ortus