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Jester's Banquet's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Audio | #19 | 3.806 | 3.806 |
| Accessibility | #23 | 3.444 | 3.444 |
| Graphics | #25 | 4.139 | 4.139 |
| Controls | #44 | 3.528 | 3.528 |
| Overall | #46 | 3.492 | 3.492 |
| Fun | #77 | 3.111 | 3.111 |
| Originality | #79 | 3.389 | 3.389 |
| Theme | #105 | 3.028 | 3.028 |
Ranked from 36 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
Godot Version
4.4.1
Game Description
A friendly game of cards... to the death. Jester's Banquet is a point-and-click card game with a sinister horror twist
How does your game tie into the theme?
When the Jester appears, you must prepare a banquet of cards for it to consume - fail to do so, and it may consume you instead.
Source(s)
N/A
Discord Username(s)
mrflappithegreat
Participation Level (GWJ Only)
1
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Comments
Hey! Cool submission! I think that it was a little confusing at first, to be honest, but it's a nice game overall.
Loved the SFX and the heartbeat thing! GJ :D
A bit confusing at first, but an interesting game! It was a bad idea to play it before going to sleep; love the creepy vibes.
Was just shuffling through hands for a bit before I realized what I was doing, but very cool idea and execution.
I do not want to admit how long it took me to understand the rules LMAO. The atmosphere for this game was incredible though, the music was unsettling, the graphics were incredible and once I started actually using my brain, the gameplay was pretty enjoyable too. I did have a small bit of an issue where it felt like I was dragging the card over the pile and it didn't accept it the first few times but that could totally just be a me problem.
This genuinely has a lot of potential and I think is something you should consider looking into developing further, there's so many ways you could expand on this game but even without that expansion, this is a REALLY good submission, I think it might have broke into my top 10 games I've played so far this jam!
Great job :)
Thankyou so much :) Yes I'm very tempted to continue making this game - in my head I imagined I'd have a 3D model of a Joker who sits opposite you, but my lack of 3D skills and limited time mesnt this probably would have been impossible, but I could do so.
The main complaint from others has been that the rules were hard to understand as you said. Could work on that also.
Thankyou for the feedback!
You're welcome!! Honestly I completely feel you on that first point though, it would've been so sick to have them opposite of you but sometimes you have to cut the things you want to make sure you get the gameplay as refined as possible! But I'd love to see that in a future release, I think it would add to the tension a lot!
If you keep working on this and managed to refine the rules a bit more, I think this game would have a lot of potential to be a lot of fun, I would suggest taking some inspiration from buckshot roulette on ways to spice the game up a bit more, I think it would be sick to see!
Great job though, it was a really cool game to see :)
Solid atmosphere and thank you SO much for letting me disable jumpscares. I love spooky looking games but I can't actually play em out (Got stuck in SOMA of all things)
- Huge fan of card games in general. Think your card movement implementation is solid
- Very impressed you managed to squeeze in a leaderboard within the jam's duration(!) Might have to try getting higher up it, hmmm...
- I really like the ambiance and time pressure, I don't see these often in card games but loved similar horror vibes in Inscryption.
Wishlist/Random improvement ideas as tribute:
- I did really poorly on my first attempt but got a little better when I realised I just needed to play as quickly as possible. I wish there was a visual timer so it was a little less stressful when I need a specific card.
- I wish I felt more control over the card portion of the game. I feel a good run relies mostly on quick pattern recognition, quick menuing and good RNG than the usual skills digital card games involve and I personally love (Deckbuilding, probabilities, squeezing out the value from a hand by sequencing it right etc)
- I wish the card stacks opened more possibilities. The way it is setup currently only the top and bottom card of each stack matters. It could be interesting if you could dump cards in a stack despite not having the previous one it needs yet (eg : 4,5 add 7 now you only need 6) or ways to allow you to cheat wildcards in etc
I think the current prototype shows a lot of promise and could go far with a little more cardgame depth or resources mixed in like Shotgun Roulette.
Thankyou so much for this great feedback! Yes I try and always add a leaderboard if I can to my jam games - it really helps to add further motivation to play! I always use LootLocker for the online aspect because I'm familiar with it now.
I did consider implementing a timer for the Joker - however I feel that might have dampened the fear and panic element I was going for when you pick up the card, so I prompted to have a heartbeat that speeds up. From the sound of it this did stress you out, which for me counts as a win hehe.
To be honest I don't play too many card games, I've been playing Balatro recently which is obviously why I made this game haha... but I think youre right that the game needed some more depth and understanding more about card games and their complexities could have helped with this.
Thank you again!
Nice one! Took me a minute to figure out the controls but excellent vibes.
It took me awhile to understand the rules, but the game is pretty fun and scary after that, I liked it a lot!
This was a really fun one! The jester mechanic took me a bit to understand, but once I did, I really started enjoying the gameplay (I kept replaying until my score broke 100)! The graphics and audio work really nicely together to create the eerie atmosphere you went for.
Also, I VERY much appreciate the ability to disable jumpscares.
Great work!
Cool adding a contrasting tension with needing to place cards correctly and find the right card to appease the jester within the time limit. Sometimes it was hard to determine whether it wouldn't let me place a card because the order was wrong or I hadn't clicked exactly the right spot.
Nice atmosphere and solid gameplay. Maybe cards could effect the gameplay in someway or the player could have a chance to change color of cards so you dont need to rely on just luck of what cards you draw. Great work.
Really good job on adding juice to the cards making the game feel really nice!
A fun take on solitaire! Really enjoyed it and the twist was interesting
What if Balatro was a horror game? I think, I know the answer)
The music was unnerving...in a good way. took a minute to figure out the mechanics of the game... the joke was also unnerving. I am still a little rattled writing this review. The music and the pacing of the music, the art, it all set the mood...I saved myself a heartattack and went ahead and unchecked jump scares ;-)
I love art and atmosphere
The atmosphere is really eerie, and I had to turn off the jumpscares (thanks for including that option). I had some bad luck, but at least I made it onto the leaderboard :D
The sound and pacing when you pick the wrong card really made me nervous, which is perfect for a horror game.
It’s a very interesting combination and a really cool idea.
Really cool! I love solitaire like games and this gave me that good balatro vibes XD
Very fun idea! I loved the visuals and sound design, and the take on the theme was very unique. I would love to see a little more variety in gameplay aside from the joker, as up until that point it felt a little stale, but once it ramped up a bit the gameplay gets very fun! I would love to see how far you could go with the gameplay of this game.
as an avid card player i loved this one! placing the cards in a stack was a little harder than i thought but overall a very fun game!!
The idea for the game is great and i had a lot of fun playing but i did struggle at the beginning to understand the mechanics properly, for example at the beginning i didn't notice the bonus cards that you could flip. But apart from that the game was very fun!