Great concept and great job! I was in the Secret Santa Jam as well, so it was a nice surprise (although the person to whom I made the game, never showed up, and I didn't receive my gift either). But I digress... I really like the idea of the game, I think it can be expanded upon and improved. Maybe adding time would be a great addition! Thanks and kudos!
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Stone Lake's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Visuals(Graphics) | #13 | 2.828 | 4.000 |
| User Interface (UI/UX) | #15 | 2.121 | 3.000 |
| Overall | #15 | 2.310 | 3.267 |
| Fun | #16 | 2.357 | 3.333 |
| Audio | #16 | 2.121 | 3.000 |
| Overall | #18 | 2.121 | 3.000 |
Ranked from 3 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
DevLog Link
https://digaly.itch.io/stone-lake/devlog/236538/012-improve-my-game-jam-14-update
Comments
Great concept and great job! I was in the Secret Santa Jam as well, so it was a nice surprise (although the person to whom I made the game, never showed up, and I didn't receive my gift either). But I digress... I really like the idea of the game, I think it can be expanded upon and improved. Maybe adding time would be a great addition! Thanks and kudos!
Submitted
NumerologyI enjoyed it, it's simple to pick up and play and the art style is nice. I'm pretty sure I made it through every level without dying, and there was a nice escalation with each one. The intro cutscene is cool, with the flythrough of the steps and the logos.
Out of curiosity how did you implement the shadow/light detection? I'm using a light-based visibility system in my game so it's always neat to see other people's takes on it.
Oh and I noticed that mouselook isn't stopped when opening the option menu, so I would suggest implementing that just as a QOL feature.
I hope the person who got this for secret Santa enjoyed it!
Submitted
SUB MORTISOut of curiosity how did you implement the shadow/light detection? I'm using a light-based visibility system in my game so it's always neat to see other people's takes on it.
The game takes advantage of the fact that a directional light only shines in one direction. Thus, you can raycast upwards from the player in the direction of the light source. If we hit the world, it means we're in the shadows.
To do this with point lights or spot lights would be more complicated I think, as the light isn't just coming from a single direction anymore.
Oh and I noticed that mouselook isn't stopped when opening the option menu, so I would suggest implementing that just as a QOL feature.
Yeah, never got around to it, it was so minor that I didn't bother at the time.
Ah ok, yeah with only one light source the raycast makes sense. I had tried before using a trigger to detect when the player is in range of lights, then calculate visibility by raycasting to the player and calculating how close the player is to the light versus the intensity of the light. Became too much of a pain so I just switched to using a render texture.
Yeah that's pretty much what I figured, since frankly I found no real reason to actually use the pause menu other than just to see if there was one.
Cool stuff.
Loved the intro to the game, and the overall movement and camera control feels really good
Some of the puzzles are super strong, and I think you do a great job easing players into particular mechanics without springing them on people unexpectedly
Some of the levels, however, I felt like I was trapped, and that every couple of seconds I was back at the spawn without really understanding what had hit me or what I had messed up on. I think maybe having some type of safe zone for the player to look and figure out their next move would be really helpful as opposed to feeling rushed right off the bat.
My game may also just have glitched but I think one of the early light switch levels repeated twice for me (level 3 maybe?). I'm not sure if I messed up with out realizing it but I had to redo what appeared to be the same puzzle consecutively. I did not encounter any other major glitches (not even sure this was one)
Very cool game, keep fleshing this out it has a lot of potential
Submitted
ConceptHey, thank you for the thorough feedback! I appreciate it.
"Some of the levels, however, I felt like I was trapped, and that every couple of seconds I was back at the spawn without really understanding what had hit me or what I had messed up on"
I thought about this, there's no proper game over screen and you indeed immediately jump back to the start. The losing mechanic isn't really something I worked out, the player just needed to not be able to blindly run through the drone sights.. There should indeed be a more proper indication of what happened and how, either through sound and/or visuals.
Maybe in the early light switch level you ran into the spikes near the end and it just restarted, I'm not sure. I doubt the level would repeat itself, I tested a full playthrough before release.
Thanks again for taking your time to leave such helpful feedback! It's greatly appreciated.
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