Play game
In Fighting Shape: entering the program's itch.io pageResults
Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
enjoyment | #4 | 2.828 | 4.000 |
sound design | #5 | 2.121 | 3.000 |
music | #5 | 2.121 | 3.000 |
graphics | #7 | 1.414 | 2.000 |
Ranked from 1 rating. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
is the game finished?
only the first chapter is available at the moment as a demo.
game description
a beat them up style game
Leave a comment
Log in with itch.io to leave a comment.
Comments
I played through twice, a few levels 3+ times, and largely enjoyed my time with it. I did experience a few minor bugs (and 1 crash to desktop), but nothing that really bothered me for a project of this scope.
Let me know if you have any questions, need clarification, or want me to test anything specific!
Positives
- The Pause menu is easily one of the coolest I've ever seen!
- I love that new elements are added in every level.
- Would definitely pummel a jet with punches and kicks again. I thought that was a fun boss battle, and I'm usually not a fan of boss battles.
- Enemy variety is very solid.
- I dig the look of the characters and animations.
- The combat is simple, but fun and rewarding.
Controls
Suggestion: Make it clearer which platforms allow the player to drop from them (S key). I'm not sure how to tell the difference.
Suggestion: Allow players to use the keyboard for dialogue selection (Phone call). Having to switch to a mouse on a game that otherwise uses the keyboard feel tedious.
Personal: The character feels too floaty for my tastes. On something like this I'd prefer more precise control.
U/X elements
Suggestion: Include a warning or yes/no prompt on the "Click to start timer" and "Back" buttons noting that it will restart the level.
Suggestion: Make it clear what level the player is on. Maybe on the pause menu add "ACT #-#" to the monitor.
Personal: I'm not a fan of the look of the environment. Even with the gradients it's too flat. I suspect it makes sense within the lore, but I would like something more appealing and dynamic to look at.
Note: I don't think it's always clear when I'm taking damage and/or when I have i-frames.
Suggestion: make the amount of player HP more easily recognizable. I never did quite get the hang of how to tell how much health I had at a glance. Also some sort of screen effect
Tutorial: Weapon Pickup Level
BUG?: You can bend bullets by shooting in one direction and then quickly turning to face the other. Maybe this is intentional, but it annoyed me when I was trying to shoot and move.
Suggestion: I think the prompt for "Space to pick up weapons" disappears a little too quickly. I missed it the first time and it took me a bit to figure out how to pick up weapons. I think it would work well staying up with the other button descriptions.
Act 1-1
Personal: I think it's odd that you can be knocked into the spikes without taking additional damage, and that you can walk around inside the spikes without taking damage.
BUG: I was knocked into the spikes, I couldn't move for a few seconds, the game respawned me on what appeared to be the Weapon Pickup Level, then crashed to desktop.
BUG: When the dialogue "Did my..." starts the screen moves and cuts off the remaining dialogue (my resolution is 2560x1440 in case that helps).
Act 1-2
BUG?: I had 2 hp left and got hit by one of the blue arm melee attacks, I was knocked back, but standing, couldn't move for a second, and then died.
Suggestion: Make it very clear what layer different level elements are on. There are spots that projectiles break apart on, but I can't why. You and NPCs can get on the platform under the stairs but can't go through the stairs.
Note: Standing at the end of the conveyor belt (towards the spikes) is pretty powerful. Sword enemies can't get past melee enemies, gun enemies can't get up the stairs, so you can kind of hang out there and launch projectiles to your hearts content. The sword enemies being the only actual threat.
Act 1-3
BUG?: I stopped to heal at the end. Since the screen was zoomed in I didn't see an incoming bullet, it hit me, and knocked me back in the direction that the bullet came from. I tried it again to see if I could replicate it, but this time the bullet disappeared at the door.
Act 1-5
Note: First jet encounter. I'm confused about how the fighter jet was beat, did it just take the one shot from the rocket enemy? I pickup up the rocket launcher and shot towards the jet, but before my rocket even hit it, it flew away. I suspect this is intentional, but it felt weird to me.
Thank you so much for playing my game and leaving a detailed review!, ironically your game is the only one I didn't get to today...
expect the review to be done in like 12 hours maybe :P.
anyway I am glad you enjoyed the game! feel free to follow me on itch to get notified about future updates, I might follow your project too it looks interesting.
last thing I have a hard time getting inspiration for improving the graphics of the game if you have any references or ideas please let ne know.
I've been thinking about the level graphics of your game and the only thing I could come up with is something along the lines of Tron, but that's largely because I'm assuming the character is stuck in some sort of simulation or something along those lines and I think it would match the enemies relatively well.