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A jam submission

Diver DownView game page

Down in the darkest depths of the ocean, the light might not be the salvation you seek.
Submitted by Marchosias6, Yovador, alvina-dr (@alvina_dr_), 0ur0boss (@enzo_duret), MerlinConnected — 13 days, 3 hours before the deadline
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Diver Down's itch.io page

Results

CriteriaRankScore*Raw Score
Graphics#34.3334.333
Audio#113.8333.833
Overall#183.7923.792
Fun#273.5003.500
Gameplay/Design#343.5003.500

Ranked from 6 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.

What would you like feedback on?
We would like the feedback to focus on Game Readability and the Puzzles.

What did you update?
We update the Graphical 3D environments, the lighting, and the player movement system.

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Comments

Submitted(+1)

This game is a great one!

I have to agree with Ravernt about the switch control.

I would also add that the platform where we should end the level you have any effect to catch the player’s eye and trigger the idea that it’s the goal of the level. (Maybe a pulse light?)

The UI design is pretty basic but it works.

And I would like to suggest adding some time of effect like bubbles getting out of the player in order to liven up a little the gameplay.

Overall this game has a great potential. Congratulations! Keep working!

DeveloperSubmitted

Hey there

Thanks for all the cool ideas, I really want to add bubbles above the player too aha, never really got the time... Same thing goes for the platform, I'll try to add those things when I can, it's a really good remark
The UI design will hopefully get a redesign one day hehe
The switch control is fixed in the new version, should be better if you want to give it a try !

Submitted

This game is a great one!

I have to agree with Ravernt about the switch control.

I would also add that the platform where we should end the level you have any effect to catch the player’s eye and trigger the idea that it’s the goal of the level. (Maybe a pulse light?)

The UI design is pretty basic but it works.

And I would like to suggest adding some time of effect like bubbles getting out of the player in order to liven up a little the gameplay.

Overall this game has a great potential. Congratulations! Keep working!

Submitted(+1)

Cool game, it's very atmospheric and has a lot of potential.

I just have 2 suggestions: 

- make the hitbox more accurate, sometimes the box didn't pass trough some areas with really enough space visible; 

- when the box is stopped by something while you're still holding it, the character will continue to move, which sometimes lead him directly to the light. So if the character stopped with the box or the game gave some advice when this happens, the unfair error chance will reduce.

DeveloperSubmitted

Hello, thanks for your feedback !

- We'll try to make the space where you can't go with a box more evident, maybe by adding some other props and making them smaller.
- The player movement system is being reworked at the time by another member of the team so hopefully the player sliding without the box will be fixed too. It's a real problem so thanks for telling us :)

Submitted(+2)

Mechanics are great but controls are a bit janky. For example, if you stand too close to door switch you can't interact with it. I wasted a lot of time because of that. Other than that, I think game has a lot of potential.

DeveloperSubmitted(+1)

Hi, thanks for you comment :)

Just fixed the door bug, thanks for telling us, it was there for a long time and annoying to me too ah
Also added call to action so you'll now know immediatly if you can interact with the switch or not, should be easier for everyone like that !

Submitted(+1)

I took some notes upfront - general feedback:

  •  Mention optional WASD also in game page section "-- Controls"
  • Version playable in browser would be really appriciated
  • Installation via Itch App works :-) (this is more than often not the case for download-only games)
  • The game UI  is (only) in french language? Can't find the option to change to English.

The  graphics and lighting look beautiful and atmospheric! Really well done! I played the game on a gamer PC (game rendered perfectly fine without any  framerate drops), so can't tell how well it performs on non-gamer PCs.

My suggestions for improvements:

  • English language! I guess, with "Game/UI/Font Readability" you mean something different, but boy. This is of so little importance, when you limit the UI to an exotic language.
  • I got stuck within the 3rd room. And I think the reason: Too little information. Just step inside  the shoes of a new player. There is too little information in this room, and on top, misleading visual hints. What do I mean:
    • The gaps all look more than big enough for the cube to be pushed through - but turns out, this is not possible. There is a golden rule, that says: "If it is not possible, let it be very obvious." - That means: make the gaps very narrow,  where no cube should pass. Do not let them look like "yeaaaah, almost... but no! or... maybe?!" - this is leading only to frustration.
    • There is absolutely no hint for  the door mechanics. I just don't get it. I can't interact with them, they give me no feedback, why I can't  do it or what else I have to do.
    • The inevitable consequence: Rage-quit


Hope that  "new player is frustrated"  outside point of  view helps to improve the game - it looks promising, but nothing more than that.

Submitted(+1)

With the best intends and wishes for your games future development I recommend watching the following video:

DeveloperSubmitted

Okayyy, first of all thanks for taking the time to make this feedback, it helps us a lot :)

I recently published a new version :
- everything's now written in english (game was originally made for a french jam) of course allowing the player to choose between several languages would be the best option but I don't have the time for that right now so english it is !
- call to action that indicates when the player can interact with something. Hope it will help to understand that you can't interact with the doors directly, only with the switch connected to them.

After reading your comment I think that it was unclear that some boxes can only move on one axis (indicated by the algaes growing on them), we'll try to make that much more evident in the future. It's not really a hitbox problem in your screen, more of a : box don't go horizontally, only vertically, etc... Though we also do have hitbox problem aha, it's a work in progress

About the web version. I tried in the past making a version playable in browser but it was super laggy. For now I prefer not to publish anything that could deter people from playing the game so we're relying on downloadable versions.

Anyway. Again this helps us a looot so thanks for your time 🙏And thanks for the video, we'll look into that !

Submitted (1 edit) (+1)

Hello. Your game was great because of its exciting graphic and atmosphere. 

Only problem is working with controllers is hard.

( Rated )

DeveloperSubmitted

Hi, thanks for your comment :)
Could you detail what was hard with the controller ? 

Submitted(+1)

I mean I use English keyboard. So it was hard for me to figure out how to play. 

Also FPS was cool for me as I used a gaming computer but adding a graphic settings section may help the players to get better FPS.

DeveloperSubmitted

Alright, I thought you meant gamepad by controllers x) 

But yeah the ZQSD problem is a work in progess

And for the FPS problem I'll look into it, allowing the user to change de graphic quality is indeed a good solution ! Thanks for your feedback :)

Submitted(+1)

Great art and unique idea using lights for the puzzle.

In terms of Game Readability I had a lot of issues with the controls, ZQSD was hard to use for me but i luckily found out that you could use arrow keys so that was ok. I had a similar issue with the interact 'space' key I didn't know it was a key until I randomly pressed it since MENU -> Controls didn't have the space bar I didn't even consider it and thought the only keys were: Escape, ZQSD, A/E and R.

An easy solution for this is just add text during the first level of the controls.

I also had another issue where if I was too close to something I couldn't interact with it.

DeveloperSubmitted(+1)

Hi, thanks a lot for your comment !

The ZQSD problem comes from the difference between french and english keyboard, it didn't really crossed our mind that it would be played by people that don't have AZERTY keyboard. I'll come up with an update that translates all the text soon AND try to allow remapping. In the mean time, the game is playable with a controller if you want to give it another try.

Thanks for reporting the "too close" bug, we're going to try to fix it cause it's a real bother.

And about game readability I plan on adding call to action when you're close to something that you can interact with.

Again thanks a lot for your feedback :)

Submitted(+1)

Graphics work is awesome, altho the game is quite demanding, fps was a bit lacking on my machine.
The controls are a bit weird, with the qwsd layout, would make a bit more sense to have camera rotation on q/e, but that's my opinion.
Puzzles are nice, once you figure out the controls, took me quite a bit of time to do that. After that, everything is pretty straightforward, the rules are very much readable from environment.

DeveloperSubmitted (1 edit)

Thanks for your feedback :)

We're french and use AZERTY and didn't really thought the game would be tested by non-azerty users aha. On our keyboard, the camera rotation would be exactly where you're asking it to be. In the meantime you can still play with a gamepad if you want ^^

I'll try to make an update with the texts translated and a control remap so that people can choose how they want to move. 

About the FPS I'm really sorry, I'll try to look into it, I haven't done any optimisation about the HDRP part yet so I think there's something to do with that !

Thanks again :)

Submitted(+1)

Very fun, though it took me a while to figure out what to do. I recommend adding settings for lower graphics, as it  did not run very well on my computer.

DeveloperSubmitted

Thanks for your comment, trying to figure out how to improve the onboarding :)

The fps problem is a work in progess, thanks for pointing it out !