Indie game storeFree gamesFun gamesHorror games
Game developmentAssetsComics
SalesBundles
Jobs
Tags
(1 edit)

Nice job!

I really liked how you game a little bit of time to get used to the movement before collecting the robot, since it lets the player understand your game more without giving them too much to think about right out of the gate. It can also make getting the robot feel a bit more meaningful than if you started with him. Reminds me of how Portal has a few levels before you even get the portal gun.

The level design in this game is actually really good. I liked all of the challenges that the various diamonds gave the player. They were all unique and required a bit of thinking to get their solutions, which is great for a platformer to have more thinking on the solutions vs more precision. Once the player knows how to do the solution it shouldn't be hard for the player to achieve it, and I think many of the diamonds succeed in this. Although, I do think a bit of it is taken away when the robot tells the player how to get the diamond by jumping off of them while falling, since it would feel great to figure that out. (And the player could also backtrack after they get the double jump if they can't figure it out.)

I feel like I was supposed to backtrack to get some more diamonds, since I ended up with 6/8 my first playthrough. I tried doing another run, but when I went to the spot I was likely supposed to back track (double jumping over the door controlled by the switch), I found that the loading zone for the next room was too large so I wasn't able to do so. If the other two diamonds were not back there, then I have no idea where they were.

The movement mechanics of the player being separated from them creates a really unique dynamic. You never really always have the power to double jump, especially if you are using the robot to hold down some button. I think there is a lot of room here to explore different movement types using the robot. Maybe even allow for switching out which processing the robot is capable of doing, limiting the player in what options they want to use for a level.

There are a lot of small things that this game could improve on, mostly things that you can learn over time by making games or reading about all the hidden features platformers give to the player to make it more responsive. For example the players hitbox I assume is nearly the size of the entire sprite, when many gives actually make the players hitbox much smaller than they think. This is prominent when you try to drop down and there are spikes on the wall right below you, you will hit the spikes even though you really shouldn't. The player shouldn't have to account for what the sprite looks like to dodge certain things. There are also a whole sort of features to make a character feel more responsive, (This website has great examples) but I didn't feel like this game was in need of any of them, so maybe you did implement these.

Another thing (that I have also struggled with figuring out) is buttons. When you leave a button in this game it will always un-press, even if the robot is also on top of it.  Which can make it a bit tedious to get the robot to hold a button down in small spaces, since you cannot be on it when they also get on it. A simple fix for this is: When a body leaves the button, have the button check for any other bodies within its range before it actually un-presses. If it still has overlapping bodies, it stays pressed.

This game is very good! I think this shows a lot of promise to your ability to design a game, since most of the flaws are things you usually pick up along the way while making many games.

Nice work!

Thanks you for playing and for such an in-depth reply. For the last 2 diamonds you do have to backtrack but I realized its impossible because of a gate that blocks you. The hitbox is something I realized would be an issue, I tried fixing it but it still wasn't perfect in the end. The buttons was also another major issue, it was very finnicky to get right because there would be 2 body's that can interact with it and obviously it wasn't perfect in the end. Thank you again for such an in-depth review.