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A jam submission

The Cursed CavernsView game page

Dive into the Cursed Caverns to fight back against an unknowable evil...
Submitted by JD Nation (@JDNationGameDev) — 3 hours, 1 minute before the deadline
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The Cursed Caverns's itch.io page

Results

CriteriaRankScore*Raw Score
Overall fun and playability#553.0953.095

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

Theme incorporation
I tried to put them all in, but it's mostly Ancient Ruins, as the main setting is an Old Dungeon, with some light Cosmic Horror elements in the main nefarious influence. There are character themes of isolation, and cosmetic elements of Eternity and Infinity.

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Comments

Submitted(+1)

I like the skeleton enemy art style a lot. And I must say I loved the optional very quick ending in the beginning.

I have to admit though that I was struggling while playing the game. Which was a pity, it seems interesting and the level designs thought through.

The controls both that they didn’t have any WASD mappings as far as I could see and the hold shift to strafe. It made it very hard navigating and with a lot of holes… well awkward at times.

The attack/defense reaction bar also was superfast. I wish there had been a setting to make it easier and/or given the player something when selecting the fail option.

I was also really confused about the multiple keys for one lock. I think the idea is fine, or even good, but I think I would have liked as many locks on the door as keys needed and some feedback of how many I had opened thus far. I was about to give up on the first door even though it said I needed multiple keys. I expected it to react in some way and not refuse my first key all together because it was too few.

The spacing out of instructions was very nice, but also a bit problematic that you had one shot of reading them and then they were gone. Now I wouldn’t have to go through them each time I entered the tile, so it would require some smart system.

The save system was one of these where it was so odd that it said Load when opening it that on my first run I didn’t dare use it. So being able to re-read that instruction would have been critical. Or preferably one key for saves and one for loads.

My first attempt crashed. I were at the fire traps and I didn’t feel like I should have been caught by them, but the game indicated that I were and then there popped up an error window and I had to restart.

On the second try I managed to save but when I got about as far as I had previously gotten I ended up in a fight were I didn’t feel like I got to select attack/defense option but ended up inside who to apply the non-action to. And whichever I selected nothing happened. And the game seemed to have locked me there with no recourse to continue. Something had seemed a bit off with not being able to equip keys before in the inventory so I’m guessing whatever was corrupting the game-state was sort of spreading.

Playthrough (as far as I got): https://youtu.be/rwrahdtRASY

Developer

Thanks for playing and posting gameplay.  Always very helpful.

Sorry it was all a bit awkward.  Lots of great points.

I've never seen that menu glitch before.  It looks like you tried to access the map while you were in the inventory, so maybe that's what did it.  Could be the logic that deals with opening and closing menu flow didn't account for that.

Submitted (1 edit) (+1)

This is fantastic!  I managed to make it through to the end, but I had to watch CaptainCoder's recording to find a couple spots ^_^.  When I got the hammer, the game trained me that the map would have icons for breakable walls, (and I saw no visible difference in-world upon first inspection), so I never even thought to look for them later :(.

At some point I noticed that if I died it auto reloaded and I had max HP, so I started doing that instead of using healing potions, and I ended the game with exactly the 4 I needed... without abusing that bug, it would have been really frustrating, as I likely would have been at 0 potions at that point :(.

Controls on gamepad played pretty great (despite the odd shift+arrows to strafe ^_^), and it felt nice and snappy and I love the visuals.

Submitted

This is yet another game that has some cool stuff and interesting mechanics, but I just can't beat it. I guess my reflexes are getting worse and the combat minigame can be pretty unforgiving.

I should mention I was also confused at first with it because I thought Red meant no damage and Yellow meant damage. I guess in my mind I was thinking about it in the same way as a health bar, so my bad.

The movement was nice and snappy, instant movement made the repeated tapping easier to deal with.

The visuals are good, the gargoyle statues remind me of the Jibbly painting from Homestar Runner. You can take the latter statement as a complement or insult depending on your opinion of the old web series.

I liked the level layouts, with the vertical elements and fire traps. Made the world feel very interconnected which was cool.

I did notice a number of typos, though I think this one was the most confusing:


I think it's meant to say "Maps must be collected...", but these things happen during a jam and I've definitely done worse. Just something you that should be looked over for a post-jam update if you plan to make one.

I also found the unlocking controls to be a bit clunky. I think it would be better to interact or move forward into a locked door and have it detect if you have the right keys, rather than having to go into a menu to equip a key and then interact with the lock.

I would recommend placing more health potions around the level, I think I only found 3 in the entirety of my failed playthrough. I'm not sure how far I got exactly but I reached the top of some central tower, got a fancy fire cloak, and unlocked one of the blue key locks.

I'm sad I didn't get to finish this, but I enjoyed what I played. Good work!

Submitted(+1)

A very nice game! The art and music were great, and the gameplay was really enjoyable! I only managed to get one of the endings unfortunately because I overused potions a bit and only had 3 left by the end, but I did watch Captain Coder's playthrough afterwards to see the other ending. Overall a great job!

Developer(+1)

Thanks.  I'm glad people got to see the alternate endings this time around.  I've put secret stuff in other jams and it often goes unnoticed.  I guess it makes sense.; when you got so many other games to sample, you don't wanna linger too long on one game.

Submitted(+1)

Hey, nice to see another gamemaker game! I wasn't able to finish it, the difficulty was a bit punishing (the timing on those flamethrower tiles got me) but I got a nice look at it I think. No damage for the yellow bar in combat seems pretty harsh, and in general the pointer on the bar feels like it moves just a bit too fast.

I wonder if you use emulators often, as the control scheme reminds me a lot of the good old days. I don't encounter ZX for keybinding often, and a WASD alternative would have been welcome, but it didn't take me that long to fall back into the old bicycle seat, or however that saying goes, haha.

I am wondering what is the game design choice between having to use keys on doors, but just walking into a wall switch to trigger it. My suggestion would be to automatically open a door when walking into it while in possession of the necessary keys.

The presentation is well put together, and the movement itself feels good! I feel like you've got the bones of something solid here, it just needs some polish.

Developer (1 edit)

Thanks for playing.
Glad you liked the look and feel even if it was a bit on the tricky side.

I do think that was a bad call with the keys in retrosepct.

I wanted the use of items to be universal, andthe process of equiping and using them to be something ingrained from early on.  Also, there were some plans for Keys to be limited, so you'd have to pick which doors you used them on, and the long process was kind of a safe-guard making the player think more about it.  And so they wouldn't be used accidentally.

Like in this section, you eventually find the blue key, and that can be used on one of two doors.  Depening on which you use it on, you can get an additional piece of armour and another weapon early, wich can help with exploration.  (Though since I never made more than two enemies, it ended up being a bit pointless.)

But yeah, I probably would just asign Keys to Up if I were to do it over.  Especially since it meant players often went into fights with no weapon equipped because of it.

On the controls, I used to play quite a lot of freeware games that used that layout, so that's why I favour it.  Though yeah, I think next time I'll include some alt options like you guys did.

Submitted(+1)

The graphics for the dungeon looks great. Controls are snappy and instant. 

Having several keys needed to unlock one door I think is a bit strange design decision, better to just use one or have them picked up as shards etc.

Key bindings was a bit awkward to get used to. Had to read the page several times and still got it wrong somehow.

Developer

The keys do seem to cause trouble.  Originally they were meant to be "Key Coins", but I changed them to Yellow Keys when I wanted to add another colour.

I'm definitely gonna have some control options next year.  I've had a bit of trouble myself; it messes with me when some games have QE for turning and AD for strafing, but then some have it the other way round.

Submitted(+1)

The combat system was interesting. I am not much of a sight reader, but I think it was balanced enough that I could go for a critical hit.

The map was also helpful. I was not good at fire zones, but the map helped me to notice the moves. It was a very well made game.

Developer (1 edit)

Good to know.  Initially I wasn't gonna show the fire area until you get to the end, but I didn't want people to get stuck and frustrated so early on.  I had a feeling it would be tricky.

Submitted(+1)

Such a great entry. Very challenging but great looking graphics.

Developer

Thankyou!

Submitted(+1)

A fabulous entry! I thought the combat was challenging but not unfair; I wish I had better reflexes :P

I really enjoyed this one. With just a little more polish it would be a 5/5. Great work!

You can watch my playthrough here: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/2109694847?t=00h52m51s

Developer

Thanks again for playing!
Seeing someone stream your game is always the most awesome part of doing a jam.

Submitted(+1)

Remember... flame traps cause code errors.

This was a neat entry.

The key controls were a little much to get used to, but we worked it out.

Do put the controls on the game page.

Good game.

Developer

Glad I got to see the fire glitch doing your stream.
It was actually a Quick-Load issue.  I really shouldn't have rushed that.

Submitted(+1)

I have to admit that this game kicked my ass really really hard and I couldn't get too far into it. What I did manage to see I really liked though. Movement was good, classic key collecting, some platforming elements with traps, inventory management, the works. Combat was too punishing for my taste, it was very easy to completely miss turn over turn if you're terrible at the minigame (which I was) and the fact that mobs seem to respawn also made it harder for me.

I will try again after I've done more ratings in a few days as I'd like to see where the game goes. The map and exploration really drew me in but I need to git gud first.

Developer

lol, Thanks for playing.
Sorry it was a bit rough.  The stats could have been a bit more forgiving.

Submitted(+1)

Great enemy sprites there, and the movement was very snappy and oldschoo. While the text can be scrolled quicker with X it is still a bit cumbersome. I think I had a couple of bugs, when using the save slots, as door would stop working and items doubled in the inventory. But keep on working on this! 

Developer

Thanks for playing. 🙂
Yeah I definitely rushed some of the save systems towards the end.
I think it automatically loads the Check Point for Slot 0 without wiping the inventory clean or something like that.

Submitted(+1)

Fun, playful style!  But I wish the text could just appear all at once with a "next" button,  because it takes very long to write everything out like that.  

Developer (1 edit) (+1)

Thanks!
Sorry about the text.  I did mean to implement the 'next' skip but forgot.
You could speed it up so it was almost instant with X or Shift though.

Submitted(+1)

Oh I appreciate that!  I will give it another try.  I hear you able not being able to implement everything though :)

Submitted(+1)

I'll switch to other games for now because I spent an entire afternoon on it and I want to play other games. I think I'm almost there, I've got the 3 flame parts, the hammer and the feather grieves, still wondering what I should do to get the good ending (in fact if there's no alternative ending then that you can tell me), whether it's linked to the skeleton, the corpse or something else.

The game is great, the control, perspective and movement are perfect, the dungeon is very good, I love the cartonny style of the skeletons and flames and the combat system is fun enough, I specially like how different equipment changes the bar.

Developer

Thanks man!
There is indeed a Good Ending.
I could give you a hint if you like.

Submitted(+1)

Got it, the true evil is slain!

I'm glad we had three weeks since it took me that long to finally try the right thing. 

Thanksfully I got all these strong weapons so that I could kill the boss using only my bare hands.

I'm a bit lazy to doublecheck but I think plenty of secrets are actually optional secrets rather than things you mandatorily need to pass by if you want to reach the true ending which is great and the exact reason why I think what you have to do to get the true ending is pretty good, and if I'm wrong about that then it's no big deal anyway.

The game is truly great.

Submitted(+1)

Nice entry. I had a bit of difficulty to get used to the controls/ui. And this turn effect, I love it!

Submitted

I will skip this since its reusing 50% of old stuff, a bit too much in my opinion