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Thank you to everyone that played and voted! I'm really blown away by the feedback. I've only been making games for about 8 months, and I hadn't really completed anything original to this point. I spent almost all my time learning little systems, like movement, inventory, upgrades, etc. While I do have some art and animation experience as a hobbyist, I've always been a little reserved about showing people my work. Not that I think anyone will come back and read this, but again THANK YOU. I was merely hoping to get top 500..

This is very encouraging, but also humbling. I played 60ish games and so many were SO GOOD. 

Keep making cool shit!

Thank you so much for giving my game a try! I thought since you enjoyed the Q ability so much, I'd mention that post jam I continued to work on the game. I actually found it fun to work on, and fun to play myself. I have added some more upgrades to the pool, 2 of which enhance the Q ability! I will have a new demo available in the near future(work and life dependent). 

I totally wanted to try and do more with the light and I probably still will. I will totally admit, I am not too good with shaders and lighting and stuff yet, as I've only been learning for about a year. Thank you for playing the game and the feedback!

I have rated everyone that has replied to this thread so far,  is anyone else looking for last minute rating and feedback?

This game was really good. The movement, acceleration and deceleration all felt good.  Sound effects were good. If there was BG music it was too quiet (or my kids were too loud). Simple shapes, art and colors allow for good readability.  Same can be said for the explosions. Upgrade system felt nice, could be simplified for the "average gamer", the example of this is the health of the ship being called integrity. That term did not directly make me think of my ships health when i seen the upgrade. 

Great game. I enjoyed it.

I have the next 2 days off work to continue the Rate for Rate!

This was really good! All aspects were well done. 

Thank you, for not only playing the game, but playing a full round and trying to break it! I honestly love that, I have 1 friend and my 11yr old Son that try to break every build of every project i make. That's truly invaluable, and your feedback was great. The Radius upgrade is certainly a little broken if stacked too high. I think my current build has some of that worked out.

The explosion was actually added to the game  about 4 days before the jam ended, because the game just felt like it was missing something to give it more juice? and fun. IDK
Spent almost every spare minute of the last 3 days tuning the game around the explosion and people actually taking the explosion early in their run. 
Post Jam i have added 6 new upgrades in all 3 tiers, a new enemy type that completely changes the dynamics of the game when its active, and a pause menu tracker that tracks your current upgrade bonus' . 

What a cool, and unique game. Id like to know if you all continue development.  This could definitely be something !!

Overall a really great game. Sound, art, visuals all really well done. Player control was smooth. I personally would have liked it to be a bit harder, basic enemies were little to no threat at all.  The boss fight was REALLY good.  Can you give some of that juice into the basic  enemies?  All that said, this is one of the best games i got to play and rate so far this Jam, i really liked everything about it!!

Ill check yours out as well!

Voting Ends in 2days and 6hrs at the time of making this post. I'd love to get another last minute Rate for Rate thread going as I was hoping to get more feedback/ratings than i currently have on my game. The game i created for this jam is an Endless Roguelike/Survivorlike Tower-defense game with an upgrade system and a high score. I actually had so much fun making the game, I started to sleep less so i could invest even more hours than intended on the game. I'm really happy with the outcome, and the limited amount of feedback i have received has been good. I'd love for some additional feedback on my game from people more experienced than myself. 
Here is the Submission page for Wave Warden:

https://itch.io/jam/game-off-2025/rate/4085078

Give it a try and leave a comment so i know to go try and rate your game, if i haven't already.

1/3/2026 EDIT: I Have the next 2 days off work to Rate for Rate!

One of the few puzzle games I enjoyed trying this jam. Instructions were clear and easy to understand. The art was simple and readable, and CRT look was awesome and nostalgic. Overall a good game i can see you building upon and having a good puzzle game!

Thank you so much for trying my game out! I had a lot of fun making this project. So much so that I continued working on it the first 3 weeks of December. (Then the Holidays and kids home from school made everything impossible this last week) 

So far I have added 6 new upgrade cards in 3 tiers, and a new enemy type. Id like to add some between round progression to help players push their high score up.

I will play all the games on this list so far. Here is my submission: https://itch.io/jam/game-off-2025/rate/408507

https://itch.io/jam/game-off-2025/rate/4085078

I appreciate you playing and rating my game! I definitely agree it feels a little too fast to level up early in the game. That particular part of the game ties into the overall balancing, which admittedly was the hardest part of the game. It was a constant push and pull, if the player levels up slower, the upgrades needed to be stronger to keep up with the enemies. Then the multiplicative nature of the upgrades snowballed higher with higher values and made the game too easy...etc
I'm getting PTSD just thinking about all the time i spent trying to balance the game haha
Again thank you for playing and the feedback! 

This was a super cool game. I really enjoyed playing it. Simple, challenging! Well done.

Thanks you for trying my game! I had A LOT of fun making this game, actually so much fun I would often forget to properly sleep for my 9-5.  Its been very encouraging to get such good feedback from people online. I'm glad you had fun, and I do plan to do some updates over the coming months, there's just more things I'd like to try, to push myself.

I love how intuitive and easy to figure out this game was even not being able to read the instructions or anything. It was fun, easy to understand and i like the minimalistic style of the game.

HTML Web Version is working!

I fixed the HTML export. There was some translation bugs i had to hunt down and find.

https://8-bit-nick.itch.io/wave-warden I would love for any and everyone to try my game and give me feedback about it. I spent so much time and had so much fun making it, I want to continue working on it and make it even more fun!

Thanks alot for not only playing my game, but taking the time to comment with feedback! The game is unintentionally lasting a little too long. But atleast its fun haha. I was really having quite the time balancing the pace and difficulty of the game. The earlier iterations had you basically unable to continue around 5mins, but it just felt hard, and not fun. I'm definitely planning on doing some updates to the scaling after the voting period ends and update it a few times with some new cards and possibly effects.

This was a really well made game. Sounds were good, game play was simple yet engaging. The colors and graphics were good as well.

Thanks alot for trying my game out. Im glad you found it fun. I plan on adding more to the game and maybe eventually even doing a full release at a low cost!

I meant no offense. I just wanted you to know there may be an issue with the upload. I tried 2 times and no controls.

Good game! I enjoyed playing it!

Thank you so much for trying my game!  And thank you for giving it a full try!  Getting the scaling to be fun, challenging, and engaging is quite the challenge. I had WAY more fun making this than i thought i would. I actually want to continue development and possibly make it a fully fleshed out game.

I am 99.9% sure Game Maker broke my game when it was exported as HTML. I spent 5 hours trying to fix it today with no luck.

I actually played your game as the very first game somehow. And it was very cool, I honestly loved your art style, and the entire combination of mechanics! It also sounds very good!

https://8-bit-nick.itch.io/wave-warden

Im pretty sure Game Maker just broke something when i HTML exported and i spent the last 5hours trying to figure it out. Im over it haha

I used GameMaker. the engine has its own language GML.

Thank you! Im gonna try and track that down. I feel like most people wont download to rate games :(

Thank you for playing! As well as the feedback.
Wondering what intensity you quit at? 0-200 is kind of the base game (13mins) with a smaller ramp. Then after the first 200% each extra 100% you survive adds ALOT of stats.  I did have the game alot harder and you lost by default early in the game. Had like 3 or 4 friends playtesting that love survivor-likes and said i should scale the game to last 10-20mins.  I will apply all feedback for possible future updates!

When i played just now, none of the movement or controls worked. Also when the enemies stacked up on me and attacked I seemed to not be taking damage.

This is only my 2nd project every loading to Itch.io. My first was very simple and easy to HTML embed. I have exported this current project and re uploaded it 4 times and it still will not load on the Embed.  Ive tried changing aspect ratios and making it load in full screen. Nothing seems to work. Any help?

Aim your light, defend your boats. Survive the tides.  How Long can you Survive? Play Wave Warden now and drop a screen shot of your highscore!!  https://8-bit-nick.itch.io/wave-warden  This was my first game jam and I ended up spending 135hrs on this project. I did all the art and coding, my cousin helped with some sounds and music. I originally thought I'd allocate 30-50hrs on the project and get a tiny little demo. My 9-5 slows down this time of year due to the weather and I ended up spending basically every free moment away from work/wife/kids on this project. Ive never had more fun and felt more connected to a project. Hope yall have as much fun playing Wave Warden as i had making it.

POST THOSE HIGHSCORES IN THE GAME COMMENTS!!!

And of course please leave any feedback/bugs you may have!

I should also state, i have a full-time 9-5 as well as a family. I am located in the US (for timezone reference). I do my best to put aside a minimum of 10-20hrs a week for my passion/hobby. Mostly in the evenings after work, and early mornings before work.