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GhostDungeon's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Artwork | #3648 | 3.094 | 3.364 |
| Creativity | #4936 | 3.010 | 3.273 |
| Audio | #5670 | 2.341 | 2.545 |
| Enjoyment | #6540 | 2.258 | 2.455 |
| Narrative | #6544 | 1.840 | 2.000 |
Ranked from 11 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
How does your game fit the theme?
You repeatily play the same map but with help from the past
(Optional) Please credit all assets you've used
The sound effects where made with bfxr, the font is from dafont and the rest was all made by hand during the jam.
(Optional) What would you like to be called if GMTK features your game?
Friedemann & Leander
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Comments
I really liked the art, that fact that you made it all during the jam is truly impressive! I was playing it in full-screen and couldn't make it out what was going on, only to find that the game is meant to be played in a windowed screen (dumb me XD). The character customizations were a nice little touch and the gameplay was satisfactory, too bad the ghosts shot me before I can make it far in the game. I think the player profiles could be saved so we don't have to create new players every time we die, also some background music would be nice :D . I see that you are continuing the game further, good luck with that and again, great job on your game!
It’s a really good idea, but dying in one shot makes the game very difficult, between having the skeletons that can snipe you out of nowhere and your previous ghosts sniping you while they try to shoot said skeletons, it feels like it needs a bit of balancing… i honestly got the furthest when i just did a full reset, and didn’t have to worry about my past-selves killing me…
that said, it’s really cool to have a proper roguelike in a jam (at least it seems procedurally generated?) and it seemed like i was softlocked a few times, but spawning skeletons that drop chests that can have the key you need is a very clever way to get around that.
i think this game could be really great with a bit more balancing, and i think it’s overall a good game, like many other jam games, it just feels like it needs another day or two.
Thank you. This was really one of the first games I made for a game jam where the game idea really has potential that is already showing in the jam version. And I really want to continue this after the jam. As you said balancing is the main thing to work out. Currently difficulty and skill don‘t really match up. I will be working this out over on GitHub though and there will be a postjam version. If you would like to check that out I would be interested in hearing your feedback again.
An interesting idea, but on account of the friendly-fire and ghosts not aggroing enemies (and so often not actually killing them as the enemy was positioned different during that ghost’s life) every attempt would tend to become harder than the last.
In general this feels bad, though given the theming of your game it seems to be the point, and I do think the idea’s worth exploring. But maybe there should be some incentive to the player for continuing on despite all the ghosts they’ve spawned, as opposed to just hard restarting. Maybe with each prior life, additional loot from that ill-fated adventurer was dropped in the dungeon that could help the player, or there could be a roguelite upgrades system like in Rogue Legacy. And if you don’t mind my proffering further ideas there could be a way (whether it be an upgrade or something else) to “exorcize” particularly troublesome ghosts so that you’re not always stuck just waiting for them to despawn.
I must say that the random enemy spawns I in particular didn’t like, as these are enemies that your ghosts definitely aren’t helping you with, and on later attempts you’ll have ghosts firing seemingly at random on account of these spawns. Also, these spawns could happen rather close to the player, which would feel troublesome.
I did like the character customization screen, even if it didn’t have too many options. (But hey, time constraints.) A randomize button for this screen would be nice, as otherwise players who just want to quickly start their next go are gonna end up always playing a nameless naked dude.
Sorry for a lot of criticisms. Despite them, it’s clear to me that good work went into this game. The art’s quite nice with a fitting style, and the top-down shooter gameplay played pretty well, though was definitely too difficult. (Having more than one HP would help a lot.)
Good work overall!
Thank! you! This is really great and honest feedback, I really appreciate that :)
My responses are kind of from bottom to top: I would have really loved for the enemy spawning to be the same in each round for the game jam version (it is already fixed in the github version) but there was a problem with the seeding in the jam version, so yes it’s really annoying. The randomize button for character customization is a great idea and on our todo list from now on. The few customization options were just because of the time constraints, yes. I think I will stick with the single HP, because I fear there could be players doing a whole running without ever seeing (or being) a single ghost. The ghosts though are something I thought about a lot after finishing this game jam. There is a ghostkill upgrade, but it only accounts for the current run and the ghosts are back in the next one. Making it absolute would come with other issues like killing a really important ghost accidentally or ghosts with the upgrade killing future important ghosts. I will have to think about it a bit more, but I really think some kind of exorcise functionality would be useful. Incentives to keep playing are also something we hadn’t quite worked out for the jam. This was another case of starting on a half fleshed out game idea and realizing a bunch of problems while implementing it. Ghosts not aggroing enemies is kind of annoying but I also find it quite interesting, because you as the player (knowing you will be a ghost) have to be aware of that and for example shoot at places where there had been an enemy but it walked away because it got aggroed, but in the next run when it wouldn’t get aggroed you (as a ghost now) would only be able to hit it where it spawned. It’s kind of mind-bending and also delays the gameplay somewhat which is not ideal, but as a game jam concept I found it really interesting. If you want to play a improved version of the game there will be updates on itch after the jam and also maybe a new release in between on github
Nice Idea. It is easy to get soft-blocked with some starting areas because if your clone gets a key before you and then dies, the key is lost, so I think a shared inventory might be better for this game.
Thank you for the feedback. Softlocking is always hard to figure out, especially with the time constraints of a game jam. We “solved” it by just having enemies spawn every 20-30s that have a chance to spawn chests. But I know this is a really inefficient way of solving it…
Hey, our games use the same concept! I found it quite challenging to get your 'past lives' to perfectly repeat your actions. Nice work!
Interesting, I will try it out
Very cute graphics!
I would have liked to play it, but the mac version didn't seem to work with my macbook. (Then again, it's a 2015 model so the problem may be on my end.)
Great game idea
Thank you
Cool idea, hard to figure out though.
Thank you. What exactly do you mean by hard to figure out? Is it hard to figure out what’s happening or hard to complete?