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A jam submission

SomniloquyView game page

A theater director battles Broadway divas and picky producers.
Submitted by HuntingSwan2 — 2 hours, 59 minutes before the deadline
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Somniloquy's itch.io page

Results

CriteriaRankScore*Raw Score
People's Choice#463.5713.571

Ranked from 14 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.

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Comments

Submitted (1 edit) (+1)

Played it just in time! A really peculiar game that stands out from the other ones in the contest!

The theme and story is really interesting, even if I missed something at the start because I'm bad with names, and the game starts introducing 4 different characters in a row.
I find the graphic style and atmosphere really unique: character design is weird in a positive way! It's like the style of some parodistic drawings, but made with really distinguishable character personality!

The duality of the day and night battle is also interesting: the day ones are more of a reasoning type, while the night ones are the Undertale ones!
I really liked the day ones: they're the best way to try comprehend the character's mentality.
The night ones were also interesting, with a more modern take on Undertale BS, even if they seem lot more basic, and a little longer with fewer variance of enemy attack patterns which made the battles a little longer of what they needed to be.
I understand there might be a mechanic to deal more than 3 damages to enemies, but it never happened in the entire game, and I don't think it was explained how I should use the different skills.
The attack patterns are all unique, even if maybe more were needed. I particularly liked the one with the cigarettes. XD

A really "uniquye" entry, I would surely love to see more of this game!

I played in stream in English just to give you direct feedback. In the case you wanted to see the vod:

Submitted

Charming game that left me wanting a little more towards the end, but understood the developer was pushed for time. Good attention to detail during each curated scene which I always appreciate, and I feel like this was something a bit different from other titles I'd played in this jam. 

The differences from other games I'd tried came across through the battle system, which is more akin to the Undertale style. I wasn't too great at it, and sometimes it was just a bit too quick for me, but I did have fun - and that's the main thing :) 

I think you've done an excellent job with character building and that's definitely to be celebrated in such a short project like this. I'll admit the expectation was already there for me, as I've tried other works from the dev -- character development is definitely one of their strong points.

The show must go on!

Submitted(+1)

I streamed with the dev present, so here are my notes for the record:

  • +Cute concept, nothing too complex but engaging.
  • +The writing worked well for me and had fun moments.
  • +The presentation is okay, nothing great or bad, but that in itself is praise considering the graphics are a bit of a mishmash of sources and styles.
  • +The combat system was a bit on the unfair side (especially with hitboxes) but it was a refreshing change from the usual. I did enjoy guessing what attitude the enemy was having, tho a few I had to kind of guess at random.
  • +The windowskin being script paper was a very cute touch.
  • +The music was cool!
  • -Some moves are clearly wacked out, to mind come the lady's attacks being a bit too harsh for being the first encounter, especially the cigarettes'. The second fight had two, the "pines" attack's hitboxes were a mess, and the consecutive blue and orange lines attack was UNREASONABLY quick and I barely had time to process what was happening. 
  • -The ending was fairly abrupt, but nothing I can really complain about considering this was a 1 week quick development.
  • -The lack of any saving system really screwed me over when I accidentally quit the game via misclick :T

For what it was announced to me as (a silly little thing with low effort in a week) was a lot more enjoyable than I expected! I could see this being longer with more polish no problem if that's ever the direction you want to go in.

Developer

Thanks Indrah, I loved your playthrough!

Betty Vulpine, the bitchy broadway diva was so fun to write, I don't know what says about me looool.

(1 edit)

Somniloquy is a jazzy repartee-based battle system game where you do Undertale dodging, and combine it with some conversational persuasion systems. Depending on whether you succeed or fail these encounters, you get different endings! It's a great concept...

...and it's backed up by effervescent, crispy writing that just dances on the page. It's clear that HuntingSwan knows exactly how to play those notes, just dance on those story-beat keys, for me, will you? Will you really, now - will you, darling?

The hilarious caricatured battlers shoot out pine trees and pickles at your "heart-like object" (we're thinking Undertale here again), as HuntingSwan utilises a SumRandomDude plugin to great aplomb! These plugins are there to be used, and it still takes some great talent to integrate it with a project that has weight.

One of the reasons why I feel Somniloquy has weight, is that it's also rooted in the serious - notions of the inequality of balance in Hollywood, the necessity of being assertive, aggressive, passive and passive-aggressive in turn to tip the scale of power your way, and the bleak reality that women were trampled all over in this industry, and didn't seem to get their fair recompense.

I didn't manage to get a "good" ending, so I suppose my experience curved towards the "pessimistic" in this case. However, being the type to play a game once and embrace its ending, I enjoyed it as a cautionary tale. I can imagine that if you get the "good ending" it might be a little different? Only Heaven knows!

All in all, this is a fun, comedic romp of tête-à-tête tit-for-tatting, petty persuasion, and the struggle for power in a game where everything's fake, even the points. If this is any indication of other HuntingSwan games, then I must have more!

(Here's a video of me playing on stream:)

Developer(+1)

Benny what a fun review! Thanks for playing and commenting, much appreciated.

LARGESSE. ;)

Submitted(+2)

VIRILE!

(+1)

😆😆 INGENUE!!!

Submitted (1 edit) (+1)

I was very intrigued by this entry because it used the theme in a very original way. The battle system is based on the one used in undertale and I think it was a really good choice as it gave more characterization to the cast. The fact that these battles occur during sleep also makes us understand how the protagonist is tormented by his past. Maybe I would have reduced the HP of the enemies a little and I would have added a quick tutorial on how to understand which is the most appropriate attack to do (in a nutshell use interact before acting)!

I read that in your idea there was going to be another boss fight and in my opinion it would have been perfect to have it as a conclusion! I don't know if you intended to expand this game in future or if you wanted to create a stand-alone game for this jam, in any case you did a good job, keep it up!

Developer (1 edit)

Thanks for the feedback Thund! :)

Submitted(+1)

I liked this game! It really shows how hard you worked on it, congratulations! The take of the theme is original, and this can be a genre in itself because it’s so weird and I like it.

The problems I have found is if I skip all the dialogue and I choose always the first option I can manage a good result, also if you lose in a combat you need to redo the game, I didn’t check if I can save on my house or in an another place. The combat is quite long even if fun and I see many times the same two or three skills for character, I would have preferred at least twice the skills. But for the rest, I really liked the game and how detailed it is , I think we hardly will see one game like this in the future, and that is a good thing because it means is really original.

Developer(+1)

I appreciate all the notes and thank you for rating my game Michael! :D

(+1)

So I got this for judging and am posting my thoughts here:

-Interesting idea for the game, play as someone trying to make a hit of an old show.

-Like the idea of trying to appease the diva and the execs and having to make the right choices.

-Not sure what the point of the battles were. I lost both and still got the ending where the show was a success. Do they factor into the ending at all? 


Suggestions for improvement:

Honestly I'd like to see more to this game. We only cover 2 days in game then get an ending. Maybe more events as the show is being rehearsed and such that you have to deal with? Also would like an option to save in game, just in case. Or if there is a save option I never found it, hitting the key for menu does nothing.

Developer

Hi bgillisp! Thanks for your comments :)

The conversation sections and the battles are both supposed to contribute to the final ending outcome (I programmed 4). So I could imagine if you did well in the conversations but still lost the battles you could get the 'good' ending. However, to be frank,  I think I may have also  made an error with the variable adjusting so one ending overwhelms the others.

Originally I wanted one more day/night cycle, with you confronting a particularly harsh theater critic as the final boss. But I ran out of time :D

Good luck judging! xxxx

Submitted(+1)

Congratulations on getting it over the line! Look forward to trying it out.

Submitted(+1)

Great variety of original attacks implemented into a familiar mechanic -- the pickles are my absolute favorite!

Submitted(+1)

Congrats on finishing, dude!!