Thanks for the review EmperorZoldyck,
I see, but I don’t consider the rules broken. To clarify: The paper background is actually considered the “floor”. It’s the flat plane that the dots move over. The rules include an exception for the mouse and “one flat ground plane or floor.” which can have different shapes. It's indeed not grass, clouds, a map, or space background, but it is still a floor. I do feel like the reason is in fact: "for gameplay purposes" (and not aesthetics). I understand that the others did not decide to do anything with those exceptions, but I did. 😉
The scissor movement and cutting is based on every angle of the pentagon as well.
You start with being forced to cut like step 1, once you cut you get the horizontal one like step 2, ... We originally started with the horizontal one, but that was deemed a bit too hard.
In the overlay to your left it shows the boosts you picked up and says what they do:
* The rotating of the scissors is not available yet, I forgot to leave that text out. My bad!
I noticed during testing that many players (especially those used to action games) instinctively click right away, because they expect something bad will happen if they wait too long. A couple even thought the dots would grow larger or suddenly speed up increasing the difficulty. And since there’s paper and scissors involved, some imagined there might even be a rock that might chase them (rock–paper–scissors 😅). I understand why it get's confusing, especially since a lot of other jam entries you might've played prior to mine used those kinds of mechanics.
But this isn’t the case here. First and foremost, it’s a puzzle game, with action/arcade elements layered on top. You don’t have to rush at all. You can tactically wait till the dots are in the right position . You can reconsider the location of where you want to cut at and even cut off tiny snippets to get a more suited scissor rotation for the remaining floor.
Once you’re familiar with it, you can set your own challenge:
- Speedrun the game
- Use as little cuts as possible
- Use no boosts
- Go for the highest score
There are only three levels, so reaching the end is absolutely doable, even if you choose to take on one of the added difficulties.
Both Iraddev and I put a lot of thought into how the game plays; from functionality, to what would feel fun and fair, to how it could stand apart from other jam entries, how it would stand out from other games inspired by the Qix-style “disappearing floor” idea, etc. It took a lot of trial and error and this is the result. I do hope you get the hang of it. 😉
The best of luck to you as well! 🖐️❤️