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A jam submission

ApricityView game page

Survive the merciless passage of time, as Winter tries to take over.
Submitted by Demyr, chamber_below β€” 1 minute, 1 second before the deadline
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Apricity's itch.io page

Results

CriteriaRankScore*Raw Score
Overall#14.3434.343
Limitation#24.4294.429
Visuals#24.8104.810
Audio#34.2384.238
Gameplay#64.0484.048
Theme#184.1904.190

Ranked from 21 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.

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Comments

HostSubmitted(+1)

SHEEEEEESSSSHHH... the art goes hard πŸ₯΅there shud be laws against making art look this good

Developer(+1)

merci messire

Submitted(+1)

I'm so bad at this type of games so I couldn't play much lol

But regardless, it was really fun!

The art is definitely a highlight, is incredibly pretty, I really really loved it <3

Developer(+1)

Thank you for trying it out regardless!

Submitted(+1)

This could be a full release game.  The telegraphing could be improved, as it became very difficult to time attacks. Additionally, I wish it wasn't me with a broom vs super human person lol. Wonderful cutscenes that I saw often.  

Developer

Thank you so much! Yeah the telegraphing could be better on some attacks, I've made the delay for the scythe attack longer, not really sure how but I'll try to improve the projectiles too.

Yeah it is kind of unfair, but that's kind of the point lol, your time is up!

Submitted

it would just require playtesters... they usually help a lot. 

Submitted(+2)

Fun game! I really love the visual style and the cutscenes. A little more feedback when hitting the boss and scoring points might have been nice but otherwise the gameplay was pretty solid. Beautiful work!

Developer (1 edit) (+1)

Yeah I wanted to add an effect on the score to show the effect of hitting (like a balatro kind of thing where you see the numbers acting up) and a particle effect when hitting her, but for now it's just the shader and a small stunlock if you hit her enough.
I might add that in the coming days though!

Thank you!

Submitted(+2)

I'm sorry but the art is absolutely gorgeous. I really can't stress it enough, it is literally stunning, I'm obsessed.

Developer

No need to be sorry :D

Thank you for playing!

Submitted(+1)

awesome visual

but I think I broke the game? The boss won't move at all after ice shard move.


Submitted(+1)

the character sprite animation reminds me of momodora.

Really cool ^^

other thing that I notice, fallen leaves tween animation feels laggy.

and the cutscene text feels lees sharp compared to in gameplay text

Submitted(+1)

I'll keep the game running until I reached the max score and I'll let you know later lol XD

Developer(+1)

Hahaha in this version you reach the highest difficulty at... 4300 I think? so you're doing pretty well

There's gonna be a hard mode in the next version, if you're interested

Submitted

I let it keep running overnight and I reached 1M score XD

Developer

Oh which animation do you mean feels laggy? I didn't use tweens for that, the one dancing around are cpu particles, and if you mean the one when you take damage that's just an animation.

I see what you mean for the cutscene text though.

Submitted

The singular leaves that move in circular motion. is it a leaf particle?

I can try record if you want

Developer(+1)

Oh yeah those are just particles with a leaf drawing

Developer(+2)

yeah ! i had never done pixel art before, so games like momodora, hyper light drifter, heroes of mana, secrets of mana and DQH Rocket Slime were constant references. i'm sure if you look for it you can find the DNA of at least one of these 5 in every pixel i've drawn here.

the cutscene text isn't really laggy, it's just hard-baked into the cutscene itself and i made it go a lot slower than the in-game dialog text so it would match the rythm of the cutscene. not sure if it had the desired effect though.

either way, thank you for playing !

Developer(+1)

Ah yeah, someone else had this.
There was a bug where if you broke one before she activated it, it would break the game, and I mostly fixed that but there seems to be an edge-case I missed

Thanks for playing!

Submitted

ah I see

yeah I think I remember that I went close to the boss and attack right after the string is gone.

idk if that was the cause or not

Developer(+1)

Maybe I just need to check if it's destroyed earlier than I currently am, I'll check that right now!

Developer (1 edit) (+1)

Oooh I actually replicated it, it's not an edge case it's actually a different bug I introduced fixing the other one. I'm fixing it right now

Submitted(+2)

THIS GAME IS AWESOMEEE!!! I love the bullet hell genre so the game is really fun, the music is amazing, the visuals are outstanding. The cutscene is well made, everything is so cleannn!!! Wonderful Work!

Developer(+1)

Thank you very much for the kind words! I'm glad you like it.
Stay tuned for the updates after the jam if you're interested!

Submitted(+1)

CONGRATULATIONS ON THE FIRST PLACE! When I was playing this game on a discord call with friends I said "This game better place top 3 or Game Jam is rigged" LOL it's good to know I wasn't wrong!! Amazing game!!

Developer

Thank you so much you're too nice! There's a new updated version if you want to give it a try!

Submitted(+2)

That's the most action game I've played on the jam! I really like the usage of theme and the concept in general! Technically this is a very well perfomed game. It's not clear how to skip a cutscene, though, but I got it skipped once! Anyway great game, thank you for sharing it!

Developer(+1)

Thank you for playing the game!

You can skip by holding down a key or mouse button for about a second, it says so in the first cutscene but I didn't implement it properly in the one when you restart so you don't see the info. It still works though

Submitted (1 edit) (+2)

The art is so good! I really liked the cutscene but I wish there were an option to skip it so I don't have to watch it every time I restart - which was often because its pretty difficult. I feel like the attacks are a bitt difficult to predict or avoid. It would be nice if the player is able to block or destroy the ice weapons with the attacks. Anyways I really liked it! Great job :)

Developer

Thank you for trying the game! You can skip the cutscene by holding a few different keys or the mouse button! It says so on the cutscene when you launch, but I forgot to add it on the one when you restart, sorry.
You actually can! Attacks destroy projectiles, but you have to have good timing haha

Submitted

I see so i just suck at the game…😭 Maybe a step by step tutorial would be nice.

Developer(+1)

Yeah I'll have to think of something

But no you're right, some attacks are not really possible to dodge consistently, I'll try to make those fairer

Submitted(+2)

Wow! Stunning game! I did find it pretty hard but managed to get a highscore of 3220. Idk where that ranks but I say pretty good :) This game was SOOOOO good and so well done. The visuals were stunning, gameplay was great, fun little story. I will say, a few of the attacks could be better telegraphed, but I bet balancing a game like this is a never ending battle (much like the game itself). I'm sure y'all play tested it a million and one times. I think attack where she throws out the ice leaves mixed with the little ice leaf spawner combo was the one that always got me. All the other ones were very well telegraphed and it was fun to learn the patterns of each one. I also like that the arena/color shifts throughout the fight. I wonder if I had gotten further if it would have done it more. I will say, and maybe I just missed this somewhere, I didn't know I could shoot until I read the comments. This might have been said somewhere and I'm just blind though. It also might be cool if the player had their own ability that charged up and could be some cool attack but that's asking a lot of a game jam. I like that the whole thing repeats each time, it gives a nice sense of the passing of the seasons as winter comes back around, but I do wish the repeat cutscene was shorter because I want to get back into the action! And the music! So good. Super job on this one. Y'all should be very proud of what you were able to make. Excellent entry and I hope more people get to play it!

Developer (2 edits)

Thank you so much for the kind words! I'm glad you liked it so much

3220 is pretty high, though the max difficulty spike is at 4000! It's already quite hard at this point though haha

I think the projectile attack should perhaps just have a half second pause after the giggle to give you a chance to dodge properly.

No it's not really written anywhere that you can shoot except in the controls page in the main menu. I'll think about it, might need another way of giving this information.

The charging attack was actually something we thought of doing at first, but yeah it wasn't on our list of priorities.

You can skip the cutscenes! There's a "hold to skip" prompt on the cutscene that starts from the main menu if you hold anything. I think the text doesn't show on the next cycle cinematic though, but if you hold it will still skip.

Thanks again for playing, I hope you give it another try after the jam when I add the stuffthat didnt't make it in time before the deadline!

Submitted(+1)

Stunning visuals and execution on all levels. My only nitpicks here are that the controls felt a little sluggish (could be a "just me" kind of issue) and that it's got a high difficulty level. I found myself  wishing for game pad support on this one and a gentler difficulty ramp. Beautiful art and animation here. Thanks for making and sharing your game. I'd love to come back and revisit it if y'all decide to make further tweaks.

Developer (1 edit)

Thank you for playing! I'm definitely going to be updating it a little more once the jam is over, and controller support was one of the things I had in mind.

The difficulty curve was difficult to nail properly, especially as we became more familiar with the game, but I think I'm going to make it relatively easier to begin with and add an unlockable difficult mode for after you get the hang of it.

Submitted(+2)

This game is so good! Everything is stunning, I love the visuals and it's a real standout. Your thumbnail is spectacular, and it really does represent the rest of the game really well. And your character designs!!! Wow!

Developer

Thank you so much!

Submitted (3 edits) (+1)

The game was amazing the best  ive never seen the  animation are really really good, the shading style of the pixelart was really uniqe the first time ive seen it, the gameplay was also really good, the music was great! and the sfx were nice, the problems i had, that a lot of the attacks arent telegraphed good like the redslash attack that i didnt now when it happen / didnt have the time to react, or the 3 ice darts attack were i didnt have much time to react where they will lend, also for the ground ice attack i didnt have time to react, the biggest complain is that it feels like being thrown into a final boss to a game without anything before, so i feel like a short tutorial could help abit, also found a bug that she is just frozen in place and cant attack more. (when in the attacks she does a lot of ice shards in a patterns like the silkmother in silksong) the cutscene was so great i loved the transition from the main menu to the cutscene, also how the area changes after each attack i really love it and the sfx that she jump to a diff position was way to loud btw from the other SFX! still funny to me how we did the same concept but flipped XD, so i think this game is super good but can just be a little bit clearer! btw what tools u used to make the game?

Developer (2 edits)

Thank you so much! Yeah that's a fair point, we played the game a lot so we got used to the patterns and difficulty, but especially for the scythe attack it should definitely be more telegraphed.

Oh I corrected that bug, that's annoying. Must have missed an edge case. Thanks, I'll look into it!

Which sound effect did you mean was too loud? The one where she jumps on you and makes a snowflake pattern?

The game is made with Godot, my partner made the art with ClipStudio. I used LMMS for the music in the intro and soundthread and audacity for the sound effects. That's pretty much it!

Submitted (1 edit) (+1)

yes the snow flake pattern sfx was really loud, and gl on whatever you decided to do next :]

Developer

Thanks, I'll fix that!

Submitted(+1)

This is a really good game. Visuals are gorgeous and the gameplay is simple but catching. My only criticism is hitting the boss counter productive to getting a high score, I think it would be nice if  player would get a couple of points for hitting enemy. Otherwise its a really solid and beautiful game!

Developer (1 edit) (+1)

Thanks a lot for trying out our game!

You actually do get points for hitting the boss, 5 with a melee and 2 if you shoot, but it's not necessarily that noticeable and should perhaps be more points (it made more sense when the score naturally went up much slower, but it should probably be double that now). I do plan on adding an effect on the score so that you see that more clearly.

Also, you can attack projectiles to destroy them. Not sure how to make that more clear though.

Submitted

May be make a small visual effect spawn when you destroy a projectile or make projectiles deflect instead of destroying them. Also there is a bug where you can spam movement to attack faster.

Developer (1 edit)

Yeah there is a particle effect on destroy in there somewhere, but it doesn't work lol. It wasn't a priority but I'll definitely fix that after the jam

Thanks for the bug report, I'll check that out

Submitted(+2)

This is fantastic! The visuals in the menu and cut scene are really top notch!  I was disappointed  I got thrown into the action so soon because I wanted more! haha  well done! Would love to see this fleshed out into a proper game

Developer (1 edit) (+1)

Thank you so much!

Yeah we wanted to add some short dialogue lines at the start, middle and end of the fight, but there was so much to fine tune so I couldn't properly include it before the deadline.
I'm definitely going to be adding that and a few other tweaks and bugfixes before the end of the month though!

Developer (1 edit)

To the four people that downloaded the game before the last few minutes, there was a pretty consequential bug that happens because I forgot to remove a line of code, so you can redownload it if you want, I just noticed it but it's fixed now.