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A jam submission

Color HecatombView game page

Puzzle Platformer
Submitted by alan93dev
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Color Hecatomb's itch.io page

Results

CriteriaRankScore*Raw Score
Concept#1612.1384.000
Presentation#1641.8713.500
Enjoyment#1721.6043.000
Overall#1741.7373.250
Use of the Limitation#1961.3362.500

Ranked from 2 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.

Team members
Alan T (just me)

Software used
Unreal Engine 4

Use of the limitation
The game is impossible to beat without the player dying as dying is an integral part of the mechanics required to beat the game. Would be interesting to see if anyone can complete the game with the minimal number of deaths. Themewise, one must sacrifice one ability in order to be able to use another.

Cookies eaten
I actually didn't snack during development itself though I did snack quite a bit in between. I think like 2 ice cream shakes and some pastries (sweetroll maybe)

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Comments

Submitted

Alright I finished it now with a death count of 11 (could have been 9 but I got impatient), following your update (and needed spoiler ;)) and I got some feedback:

  • You can completely bypass every AI waiting obstacle by standing directly behind the AI, their turn circle is too large and they will just walk around you. It felt like an exploit though I dont know if that it was an intended strategy. It obviously got more dangerous when there were multiple AI around.
  • Maybe the AI also need to be a bit more lenient about spotting you. Now its an infinite range instant-kill laser, while a slightly shorter range and/or an increasing detection meter would really take some edge off.
  • The sound for dying is really loud lol. I had to mute the game.
  • Although I never missed the jumping puzzle after I put the pieces in the right place, it feels unnecessary that if someone did miss the jumping puzzle, they'd have to go around and die again. A simple staircase back to the start feels better.
  • Your improvement to the AI waiting game at the lower level did work better, though the AI's at the higher part still waited around for a long time.

Cool concept though, and with more work this could definitely turn into an interesting puzzle!

Developer

Yes I noticed the AI blindspot too, though the thing is, it only really matters for only the third AI (the one next to the glass walls). For the first AI its simpler to just wait till it turns around (using it's blind spot there is pointless). For the second AI, it's easier to hide behind the grey cube than use it's blind spot. For the fourth, you only go there when you need it to kill you for it's color. The third AI obstacle however is affected by the blindspot which is why I updated it in the second version, now it shouldn't be possible to take advantage of it's large turn radius (unless you somehow pulled it off still in the updated game??). So you should only be able to use the intended method to get through there now. 

I personally prefer the difficulty of a single hit kill, it forces the player to be more careful and precise with his movements.

I feel you there in regards to sfx, I actually just played the sounds raw without even modulating them in any way lol. For one of the assets, the one that I really wanted to use couldn't be imported to ue4 due to improper format, it definitely fit better.

My idea there was to force the player to die in order to force a color change (for difficulty purposes). Though ya I do agree that once the blocks are lined up properly, there is little need to k.o yourself (though it's pretty inline with "failure is inevitable" tbh).

Glad you liked bottom AI improvements, you were completely right when you said waiting time for those was too long. For the ones on top however I purposefully left the waiting time to be quite a bit longer since player had to avoid two at a time. When I tested that are with shorter AI waiting times, I felt that it was too difficult to get through on a consistent basis ( I still could do it but felt I had to be too precise with my timing to get past them). Now that I think about it, the turn radius exploit would definitely make that area waaaaay too easy, gonna be fixing that for sure (I now see why you mentioned the turn circle exploit first). I tunnel visioned too much on the bottom AI.

But ya this is like the best feedback ever! I feel really lucky that you checked out my game to the extent that you did. I will definitely try to match this feedback quality when I get to your game. Thanks again!

Submitted

Apparently you can move the blue block with the red block (when you're red yourself) using your magnetic powers, but I also couldn't jump on the blue block to progress.
Running back and waiting for AI to turn for a minute each time to switch colors was also quite frustrating.

Developer (2 edits)

(spoiler) you need to jump off from the ledge in the beginning to the top of the blue block. 

I have just tested the game and found that if you get killed while you are grab mode ("telekinesis"), the block that you were grabbing becomes movable by other blocks until you grab that block again (which resets it's physics properly), will fix very soon. You basically found the only thing in the game I didn't intend for lol

Developer

Ok I fixed the block moving issue you described and I also agreed with what you said about waiting for AI and balanced that out a bit, so all should be good now!

Submitted

Interesting game, but I dont understand how to get up, I cannot jump high enough to get on top of blue block. How am I supposed to complete it? 

Developer (3 edits)

(spoilers) you need to jump off of the ledge in the beginning to the top of the blue block

Submitted

I got stuck there too

Developer

(spoilers) you need to jump off of the ledge in the beginning to the top of the blue block