Play game
Midnight in the Mines of Mercury's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Story | #26 | 3.859 | 3.859 |
| Horror | #123 | 3.219 | 3.219 |
| Enjoyment (Best Game) | #163 | 3.344 | 3.344 |
| Aesthetics | #169 | 3.844 | 3.844 |
| Creativity | #177 | 3.500 | 3.500 |
| Sound Design | #200 | 3.234 | 3.234 |
Ranked from 64 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
What game engine did you make this project in?
Unity
Leave a comment
Log in with itch.io to leave a comment.
Comments
Nice art and story, sadly I could not get past the first zombie, Left click did not seems to work :(
Left click is just regular click. Are you using a mouse or a trackpad?
I'm on Windows 10 with a regular mouse.
Not sure why it wouldn't be responding. I haven't heard a report of this before. 🤔
You did pick up the knife, right?
I did not picked-up the knife... Maybe I don't eat steak enough, ahah! I'll replay it more! :) thanks for the help!
Ooooh there you go! 🍴🍄
Loved the limited color palette. Pixel art was superb. Story was interesting and held my attention all the way through. Combat was satisfactory and achieved its purpose. Not too hard or too easy. Loved the setting and religious vibes.
Thank you so much for checking it out & sharing your feedback! Glad you enjoyed. :)
I got pushed against the wall and got stuck there. It was game over before I knew it!
Ooops. Sometimes the zombies push you into the collision. It seems infrequent and I didn't figure out exactly what causes it.
Thanks for trying it out!
Pretty cool midnight man
Thanks very much!!
Fantastic game! I love the old school style art and the gameplay. The dialogue is also very well-written, maybe too well-written because I felt like a lot of the language flew over my head haha.
Thanks so much for trying it out, I'm so happy you enjoyed it.
And since some of your slang went over my head, I suppose we're now even. 😉
Touché haha, looking forward to trying more of your works <3
Wow, this is really well design game!
You made really good story, I was really interested to pass the whole game!
I like mechanic of flashlight and dialogue, art is pretty nice!
What I would improve is fight mechanic, I got problems that enemy was rushing me and blocking me to death. I found out that I must run back and attack to survive :D
Good job and congratulations on your submission!
Thank you so much. I'm really glad you enjoyed it!
This is a really well made project. I liked the scavenging around to get the supplies. The zombies are very fast and can sometimes lock you into a corner if you are not careful, but with looking around for medkits(and their alternatives) it's very much possible to get through the game without dying. Opposed to what I read from the comments I found the knife combat very easy once I understood the rhythm of stepping backwards and slashing, only times I was caught by it was when I ran out of room, which felt very fitting for the scenario. Because of this the gun felt a bit redundant outside of the priest room where you get it as you get overwhelmed there very easily.
Only issue I'd raise is that collisions of some of the elements(especially doors) are very big compared to the sprites making it easy to get stuck on invisible barriers when walking around or in the middle of combat.
One other thought I had when playing, which is more of a suggestion is that the camera feels very zoomed in so the gameplay feels claustrophobic especially when looking downwards where a lot of space is taken up by the inventory. However I’m not sure how hard it would be to zoom it out a bit, given the pixel art style can be sensitive to resolution change.
With the red eyes, wine and mentions of dukes and duchess I fully expected to be a vampire protagonist, I was genuinely surprised to learn I wasn't via the mirror.
All in all a very well made and cool game, I hope it gets a proper ending in some update.
Thanks for playing, and for all this great feedback!
I had originally planned at least 5 different weapons, with tons of levels to use them in... but realistically, level design took much, much longer than I had planned for, and even the grenades are implemented only as an afterthought.
The diversity of responses I've received to the combat (too easy, too hard, etc.) show that different players have different tastes. I'll implement varying difficulty levels after the rating period is over.
Zooming out is achievable with little difficulty, but then I don't get to show off the art in the same way. I figured, since the environment is so dark, it wouldn't matter too much. But I can experiment with this.
This has a great story and gets quite intense when a zombie has you cornered - I want to know more about the world of this game! :)
Thanks so much for checking it out, and I'm glad you enjoyed it!
If you're curious about this world, several of my other jam games (e.g. The Derelict Orpheus, The Gnawing Hunger, Dagger's Last Testament) also take place in this world of spacefaring feudalism.
I just finished this game and loved it thoughout! I enjoyed interacting with everything, sometimes it felt like I was getting too much goodies for a horror survival game. I think reducing the loot amount a little could help the experience.
Concerning the combat: I felt like sometimes it was unreliable to know how much hit an enemy needs to take before dying. With the knife I think it was mainly 3 hits but sometimes it felt like 4. With the gun it took 2 hits sometimes 3.
I also felt like the knife range was very forgiving, maybe if you tried reducing it a little bit then players would have to be careful with the timing as to not get hit in return, which would feel more like handling a knife because you have to get up close. The gun then is a nice change to that as it is by nature forgiving with its range. I would also increase the gun damage to make it feel more distinct. Apart from that I have no notes!
The world feels rich and complex even if it has the "evil" nobility thing going on. The music was superb, i felt dreadful throughout and when it changed I got really creeped out. The sprites look gorgeous and the facility is thoughtfully crafted. Overall it gives me a Dune vibe somehow, I think because of the nobility and space religiousness. But it stays unique and has its own cold, dreadful vibe. Love it and keep it up!
Thanks for trying it, and for all this detailed feedback!
You are absolutely right about the knife hits, and good job being the first person to bring this up. In fact the zombies have 5 hp, but most hits seem to hit twice. I'd like to get to the root of that issue, but I didn't prioritize it because I thought a little bit of unpredictability "worked" in the context of the game.
Good thoughts about the use of knife vs gun. A lot of people seemed to feel that knife combat was too hard as is... Tweaking the difficulty is always hard without playtesters; after the ratings period I'll add difficulty levels.
I have been developing this setting for a while now. If you're curious, The Derelict Orpheus, The Gnawing Hunger, and Dagger's Last Testament all take place in this world. The first of these games was made in 2021. Then I read Dune last year, and I was, uh oh... 😂
Yes playtesting and gathering data is definetely a good idea, before tweaking something based off one comment! About the unpredictability, I see that it works for the dreadful setting and could see a scenario where you keep it like this without it being a bad thing. If you find the issue and fix it you could still keep that unreliability by choice. What you could even do is: keep the unreliability for the knife but have it changed for the gun. So that the gun gives players more control over the situation. Then when players find more ammo they will cheer and thank the gods of sol and luna, because the gun gives them a sense of security, while the knife remains the "sloppy" alternative. Then limit the ammo drops even more and you'll have desperate players biting their nails with stress haha.
Good suggestions!
Fun game! I do love me a bit of horror with a sci-fi twist. I was killed by a toilet zombie :D
Happened to me several times as I was playtesting!!
Thanks so much for playing. :)
Love the style of the game! The controls are nice and smooth, and the colors and the UI design is neat! The art is consistent and crisp, and the idea is unique. The gameplay itself is challenging and pretty fun! I will say, the attack is a little hard to aim, and the "zombies" are sometimes too fast.
I do wish the exposition was a little better, as I was confused about the setting and wasn't sure what was going on before the power turned off. Also, the text boxes felt a little sudden at times, and broke up the pacing a little.
Overall, great work! A lot of potential to open up this world!
Thanks for playing, and all this feedback. I appreciate the comment about the UI--I worked really hard on that!
I'm not sure what the alternative to text boxes is (other than voiceovers). I guess it would be using them more sparingly.
If you're curious, I have a few other games set in this world, mostly narrative. The Derelict Orpheus, The Gnawing Hunger, Dagger's Last Testament all explore the politics of these dukes and duchesses.
I like games like this. It looks simple and pleasant, everything works as it should. Well done! It's a good project.
Thanks for playing and sharing your thoughts! Appreciate it.
This game makes good use of the different mechanics. It felt pretty balanced, which is rare for a game jam game. My biggest issue is the combat, specifically the fact that the play stop moving when they attack. Since there isn’t knockback on the zombies, it makes everything kinda clunky. Regardless, I still had fun, and also found the story to be interesting. Great work!
Thanks for playing and commenting! In fact there should be knockback for the zombies, but it may not quite be working as well as intended. It was a challenge to be working on these melee combat mechanics, I think I learned a lot here.
this was a good zombie game I would have loved to see more variety of weapons but I know game jams are hard I also really liked the music one thing I would suggest is have the dodge cover less distance and the ability to actually like go through the enemies when dodging but overall I liked the style the writing and the sound effects good job
Thanks for all that feedback! I did have more weapons planned, but... I rand out of time. :)
Impressive for a Game Jam, especially because you did everything ! Great atmosphere and sound design/music. I had a good time :)
Thanks so much for checking it out!
The style and atmosphere are awesome! Very good game.
Thanks for checking it out and sharing your thoughts! Appreciate it.
The storytelling feels professional! The combat is kinda hard for me, I died several times halfway and used every health kit instantly when I found them haha. Feeling the combat will be much smoother if the player can attack without stopping to move, or increase the knockback to the foes.
Thanks for checking it out, and for your kind words. I will be adding difficulty settings in the post-jam build, so players who mostly want the story don't have to sweat too much, but players who want a true nightmare can have their heart's desire. 😈
This is the first game I've ever played all the way through!
It's really well made. :D
Thanks so much! Glad you enjoyed.
Cool idea and execution, and game is kinda hard ;)
Thank you! Yeah, jam games often turn out too difficult because they usually don't have playtesters (other than the developer). One thing I just didn't have time for was difficulty levels, but I'll add that after the rating period.
I very like space themed games ! good job !!
Thanks for checking it out and leaving feedback! :)