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Shapeshift's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Accessibility | #21 | 3.440 | 3.440 |
| Audio | #53 | 3.320 | 3.320 |
| Controls | #76 | 3.200 | 3.200 |
| Overall | #87 | 3.091 | 3.091 |
| Theme | #90 | 3.200 | 3.200 |
| Graphics | #108 | 3.040 | 3.040 |
| Fun | #113 | 2.800 | 2.800 |
| Originality | #146 | 2.640 | 2.640 |
Ranked from 25 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
Godot Version
4.4.1
Wildcards Used
"Show, Don't Tell", "Simple Shapes"
Game Description
You are a lone shape, tasked with collecting upgrades to survive as you will get more enemies over time. Upgrades like to shift over time into something entirely different, so you can't always rely on them.
How does your game tie into the theme?
The game is very chaotic, with lots of projectiles and upgrades on screen that are difficult to understand, but the player can over time learn when the upgrades will switch and what they will become.
Source(s)
N/A
Discord Username(s)
addictdev, kiloadd
Participation Level (GWJ Only)
1
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Comments
Pretty good arcade game! I never figured out how to dash. Good job! keep making games!
Looks good, plays well, but I needed some instructions. Also nice sounds
I think you really nailed the simple visual look and I also enjoyed the audio! The game itself was fun and chaotic but maybe a bit too much chaotic - it was really hard to understand the powerups system.
The music change to indicate being close to death was a good touch. Fulfilling the "show don't tell" wildcard made it difficult to understand what the different upgrades meant. Overall a fun experience though!
This is amazing my main feedback though is just that there aren't really any hints at what the powerups do so I don't feel like I'm getting any stronger throughout the game.
I get that the mechanics are unexplained on purpose, but... well, yeah, they're still unexplained. Not that this'd be the first jam game to trip over its own feet trying to fulfill a wildcard, mind you. I did get the feeling my stats were going up, but its not like I had time to try and figure out which incremental improvement is related to which abstract shape while flying in circles. I think if you wanted to expand on the intentionally mysterious mechanics thing, the trick would be to not throw all of them at the player at once?
The music shifting was a pretty good idea, a lot of these kinds of games I tend to struggle keeping track of my health.
A small note: being able to fly behind the powerup bar (and die down there) while barely being able to see through it wasn't great.
Notes aside, it's a decently fun shmup. Good job, especially since this seems to be your first jam?
Thanks for the feedback and yeah this was my first jam. Being able to go behind the UI was a big issue for me the that I just wasn't sure how to solve other than turning the opacity down a bit which is what we did in the end. Thinking about it now, it may have been a better idea to just center the camera on the player and create a bigger play area. As for the upgrades system, the original concept was to introduce them at a much slower rate, but given how we didn't have a lot of time to spend on this project, and with most people only spending a couple minutes playing, it seemed like a better idea to simply make it more chaotic and give out all the upgrades quickly. Hopefully I am able to revisit this game in the future and look into creating intuitive upgrades with more unique modifiers and possibly particle effects that actually tell the player what the upgrade is doing.
I loved the audio change right before dying. The music in general was great. But I couldn't figure out which shapes were upgrades (apart from the green plus) and which ones enemies.
interesting idea! Took some time to figure out the gameplay! But sweet
Nice audio change when you're low on health. This is a nice addition to the feel of a game. I wish I had thought of it for my own game. Good job!
Nice solid entry, the survivor-like genre fits in well with the theme! I really liked the audio too! I found myself simply kiting all the enemies round in circles for the whole game, and I'd love to see different sprites for each upgrade type, but other than that, cool game!
Cool game, a great interpretation of the theme and wildcards! I just wasn't able to use the power-ups, though.
All of the power-ups apart from the dash is passive (increased speed, health, rate of fire, etc.), so I'm assuming they just aren't intuitive enough which is completely understandable and it seems like most of the feedback I've gotten so far is about the same issue. Hopefully I'll figure out a better system for the future.
Simple Game but the upgrades add a lot of depth. The upgrades werent so easy to understand for me though!
Fun survivors-like game, I didn't understand the upgrades for awhile but overall I enjoyed this entry.
Fun game and good job including multiple wildcards. It took me a while to get the hang of it, but I guess that is to be expected for the "game with no tutorial".
The Simple Shapes wildcard really made a big difference in the design for this game, which was certainly unexpected for me. I definitely understand how it's confusing especially with the current upgrades system, so hopefully I'll be able to look into a more intuitive system in the future.
Cool game but i didnt really understand how the upgrades worked. It felt like i just got a dash and nothing more
Even after implementing all the upgrades myself, I still don't really know what they each do, and I think the idea was that this is somewhat intended, since generally knowing the upgrades doesn't make a huge impact on how you play the game. Since a lot of people are giving feedback like this, I may look into ways to create a more memorable system so the player can really understand the upgrades.
Great concept and execution for the themes. Had a great time bouncing around and evading the shapes. Would love to see more power-ups or something as you progress through the level.
With more time to work on the game, figuring out ways to improve the end-game like this would've been the biggest priority. In our original planning we wanted to add one-time consumable items as well that the player get to make it more interactive, something like the cherry from Pac-Man might've been cool.