Skip to main content

Indie game storeFree gamesFun gamesHorror games
Game developmentAssetsComics
SalesBundles
Jobs
TagsGame Engines
A jam submission

Shinobi SwarmView game page

A bullet heaven survivors-like with ninjas!
Submitted by Francisco Cidade — 23 days, 15 hours before the deadline
Add to collection

Play game

Shinobi Swarm's itch.io page

Leave a comment

Log in with itch.io to leave a comment.

Comments

Submitted

Nice little game. Got some good vibes and looks and it makes me think of when I played God of Thunder back in the days.

Runs well and i like the shop and upgrades - gives you some retention to keep playing.

Personally i get tired quickly of games like that, but i do think it's my problem and not yours.

Animations are cool and overall i think it's good work. I haven't played alot of those games, so i don't have a reference and it's hard for me to compare against others.

Submitted (1 edit)

I would rate this game 3.5/5 and i played through stage 1 to 4. I think for positives it's visually very nice with good animations and music. However I think gameplay could be tweaked to be a bit more fun and varied.

Enemies for example are way too similar and just follow you, same with the bosses as well. Not every enemy has to be super unique but just give some enemies/bosses their own special attacks like shooting projectiles or charging at the player. That way theres some variation to how you move on the field rather than just looping around a big horde of enemies for the entire round. Ik vampire survivor games aren't supposed to be too complex but I think this could help with gameplay alot.

Also I dont know why the enemies just cant attack you when a boss spawns in. whether its intentional or not, it makes the boss really easy to fight. 

I also got stuck in the first map here and couldnt get out:

And then i actually beat the stage by just staying in this place (why i think enemies not harming you after the boss is a really strange choice).

So overall the game is pretty good just work on varying the gameplay (maybe add some more upgrades as well) and this should be a pretty fun game. Cause i did think the game was a bit easy since i got up to stage 4 with no upgrades only using the base ninja.

Also please check out my game if you have the time thanks.

Submitted

Played a round. the shuriken and co pushing enmeies towards! the player character is annoying. maybe you can set the direction to always away? 

i also think you should slow down the movement speed in the beginning. way too fast and in combination with the push direction quite hard

Submitted

I thought your art style and sound direction were dead on for the retro-GBC look. I have never played a bullet hell or survivor-like so I was very confused about what to do lol I liked that it was multi-player, and I thought the two options for characters were charming. 

My only feedback I can offer is an optional tutorial for dinosaurs like me who haven't played these types of games before. The writing was also quite difficult to read. 

You have a great start here! The game is cute, the multiplayer is a lovely addition and you clearly know what you're doing. <3 

Submitted

This is a really good start. I would love to see and expanded roster of playable characters (perhaps unlockable via achievements). Additionally, I think the UI needs some refining. 

I really enjoyed my time playing this game, and will most likely to revisit it every so often after this jam.

Submitted

I wish I'd had a game like this when I was a kid; I probably would have sunk countless hours into it. Regarding my experience playing it: Sometimes enemies get stuck when they're too close to trees. There are some assassins... I guess it was a dungeon (though I couldn't enter any buildings) that appears cut off. And perhaps it would be good to balance the difficulty a bit more to make it more challenging, because by the time I reach level 3, just upgrading the shuriken, I practically don't even have to move.

Submitted(+1)

Hi! Just finished playing the web version, here are some thoughts: 

  1. The game creates a very cozy feeling, which I like. Music, enemy and character design, animations. All that gives me a lot of chill vibes similar to, let's say, Stardew Valley. Which is an interesting choice considering the game genre, so curious about where you plan to take it. 
  2. Character controls and attacks feel smooth and behave as anticipated. 
  3. The base loop of running around the map, killing monsters, gaining exp to level up and upgrade, and gaining gold to upgrade between runs - all that works, as it is a genre standard. 
  4. Enemy visual design is very neat. I like the visual variety of animations and locations. Locations easily convey the intended biome. Even though it is just a recoloring of the background. 
  5. Game difficulty is on the lower side, I suspect, with the intention of being more cozy than chaotic, but that creates situations where there is not much to do. All the enemies are dead, or I can stun lock them + the bosses, and the maps themselves do not have anything to explore. 

My main complaint is that, at the moment, while there are quite a number of different locations, enemies, and bosses, they all feel the same. All locations are just infinite fields of nothing, all enemies and bosses just run at you with various speeds and HP. This makes it feel very repetitive, as the game neither introduces new scenarios nor forces me to adapt.  So instead of an emergent system where various combinations of enemies require me to learn how to deal with them, I can just keep circling. 

And my second main concern would be the variety of perks. Currently, there are several; however, I did not find any that will synergize with each other or create various builds. And that makes the game even more repetitive from 1 run to the next, as I just keep peaking the same upgrades and getting the same results. 

Random thoughts: 

  • Add rarity to perks. 
  • Change music when the boss arrives to intensify the perception.  
  • Lacks tools for movement apart from running. Having some abilities like dash or roll can add interesting variations to gameplay. Assuming there is sufficient demand from the game's side, it necessitates using those. 
  • Sometimes colliding and being damaged by enemies, while not expecting it. Particularly when moving diagonally 


Other than that, I enjoyed the overall experience, and I see potential in exploring the direction of combining this genre with the cozy vibes. So thank you for the demo and hope to see the game evolve :) 

Developer

Thank you so much for the detailed feedback!

I completely hear you on the variety. Right now, the characters and enemies are a bit simplified because it’s easier for me to balance the core game without too many places to change. But adding unique behaviors, perk rarities, and actual build synergies is exactly where the game is headed next.

Your “random thoughts” are gold! Loved your ideas, i’ll definetly write them down.

Thank you again for playing and taking the time to write such a good message!

Submitted (7 edits) (+1)

I think that this is a good start to a Vampire Survivor clone.


What I liked: 

- The music

- The effects

- The graphics. It is better than Vampire Survivors.


What I don't like: 

- It is slow and easy. I sometimes need to go out and find enemies which gets boring sometimes.

- Little enemy variety. Most enemies are blue, the same size, and move at similar speeds.


Problems with the game:

- The ninja and the samurai feel like the same character because the upgrades make them have the same weapons and make them move at the same speed. 

- The fun part of Vampire-survivor like clones is that it is an addicting fast compressed RPG like experience with lots of fun effects. Right now, this game has a slow pace and few enemies are on screen. I think this game can be a fun addicting experience if there were more enemy variety, the spawn system put more enemies on the screen, and if the characters were very different even with upgrades.

Developer (1 edit) (+1)

Thank you so much for the feedback!

It’s funny because some players feel the game is too hard, while others say it’s too easy. I’m definitely inclined to agree with the ‘too easy’, but maybe that’s just because I’ve played it way too much lately haha!

I’ll be working on the difficulty balance, as well as adding more variety to enemies and weapons. Currently, characters only differ by their starting weapon, but that’s going to change. I kept it simple for now to make it easier to tune the core difficulty without having to tweak too many variables at once.

Thanks again for taking the time to share your thoughts!

Submitted(+1)

Hello!

GOOD:
Music
Font
Godot ❤️

NEED POLISH:
UI
Mob spawn system

WOULD ADD:
Key binding
In place events

It is a great experience overall.

_______________________

* What was the most frustrating moment in what you experienced?
To run as fast as I can to the corner infinitely and no mobs spawning at all.

* What was your favorite moment?
Max sickle was pretty sick.

* Was there anything you wanted to do, but the game didn’t let you?
Run indefinitely all the way to any extreme point (it let, but it spawned no mobs).

* If you had a magic wand where you could change any part of the game, regardless of cost or complexity, what would you add/change/remove?
In place events, maybe some shrines (diablo style), chests, quests to do in each map.

* What would you say you were doing in the game?
Running after mobs.

* How would you describe the game to friends and family?
A nice and friendly ninja survival game.

Developer(+1)

Thank you for your feedback!

Your suggestions about events, chests, and other features are great! I’ll definitely add them to the backlog. Other players have also mentioned the spawn system, so I’m prioritizing a fix for the next update. Thanks for pointing it out!

Regarding the UI, could you clarify which specific parts you feel need improvement? Thanks a lot!

Submitted

That is awesome to hear!

About the UI, my feeling is that should be a bit more polished in general. What I do is take a look at some similar genre UIs and adapt them to my game.

Here are some sites I use to navigate through different UIs to make some benchmark:

https://www.gameuidatabase.com/index.php?set=0&plat=2&tag=89,43,65,12&r=4
https://interfaceingame.com/games/