Glad found it memorable! My aim for all of my music is to try to make it as memorable as possible over everything else, and I'm glad it succeeded in your eyes. I think having multiple instruments playing the main melody also adds to a grander sound, grander sound = larger than life theme. Thanks for listening!
Denny'sGuy
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As a guitarist myself, I appreciate this piece and its qualities. I'm trying to imagine a scenario where this would fit as a villain theme, but it's quite difficult to imagine. There are some notes that have a dissonance quality (I think the use of chromaticisms is what I'm thinking of) to it that I think has a more "mysterious sound", but I would say nothing sinister. I think this would fit well in a silent mono-chromatic short film.
I enjoyed the "waltz" feel on top of the dissonance (wow what an original comment). But yeah, I get the sense of a haunted house where I see ghosts or demons dancing. The change at about 13-14 seconds in is very apparent, but I think it could have been more prominent and could have evoked a stronger sense of emotion (dread, maybe tragedy), but effectively, I think it gets us where you intend us to be.
The somberness of the piece and calmness also gives me a sense of floating in space. This theme makes think of movies like interstellar. The tempo increase throughout the piece paired with the clock ticking sound emitted a subtle tensity that felt ominous and gave me an overarching sense of dread, it really made the calmness of the piece quite a red herring. I think there's a lot to this piece that is extremely effective, but might not be recognized immediately. Definitely a sign of creativity, in my opinion. It would be nice to see this piece get a proper ending! Great job overall!
Glad you enjoyed it. Yes, the tritone can be considered a bV (or diminished 5th), but my reasoning for calling it a sharp 4 is that when modding the scale (minor), you sharp the 4 while the 5 still remains in the scale. Also, It's easier for me to read it as [I, II, bIII, #IV, V, bVI, bVII] than [I, ii, bIII, bV, V, bVI, bVII] as we have a distinguished number for each interval (rather than displaying 2 Vs we read the intervals in succession as IV, V).
This can definitely fit a more "retro" game aesthetic. The percussion in particular reminds me of something like Runescape which is probably one of my favorite OSTs of all time. I love the combination of acoustic and synth instruments. Sine wave synths are always ear candy to me. The melodies are pretty decent and memorable. The change in tempo really adds a dynamic element to the song which I think is appropriately related to seasonal change. good job!
You definitely put much more thought into this album than what I thought this is worthy of, so that really demonstrates your passion for the craft. Thank you for your thoughts. It's cool to see some of my music through a bit of an analytical theory lens from another person - it feels like I'm being exposed, but in the best way possible. I'm glad you enjoyed my work and that does motivate me to want to continue composing for this "world". I initially had about 13 tracks in mind, but my brain only seemed to allow me to get 6 out this time around, I'm glad I didn't force myself and went with songs that I felt satisfied with rather than a bunch of songs that were kind of "meh". I would probably also add parts and alter some of the existing songs.
My goal is, in fact, to tell a story, as someone who studied screenplay writing in college, acquiring those skills actually help me compose music - pacing, grasping the audience attention, hook, structure, intention etc. To me, melody is key for a lot of music when it comes to grasping the audience's attention - I think that's usually the part of music where we can connect to the most. Your album, in my opinion had some ear catching melodies and I can tell your knowledge in theory oozes through your work as well.
The ps1 era is exactly what I was going for, I think using my roland sc-88 vst really sells that.. it also does have some really classic instruments that I can't help to use.
Feel free to leave criticism back as well. I'm always open to improving my work in whatever way possible. I think this work could have used a bit more leitmotif, to which, I could not quite find a hole for one. Perhaps, if I revisit this, I will be able to put more time into that aspect. Anyway glad you liked it and thanks for listening!
definitely paints a vivid sentimental feeling. I like the use of using synths amongst the orchestra and the electric guitar during Daemon was a nice surprise. The beginning of Daemon vaguely reminds me of pac-man world 2 while the orchestra melody seems reminiscent of what I'd hear out of a marvel film - both what I'd consider good things.
Thanks, that was one of first attempts at doing anything digital like that really... All created in aseprite of all programs xD.
Now that I think about it, there are no face vibes there. These character designs were literally off the cuff, so I suppose, subconsciously I took some inspiration from that film.
Glad you enjoyed the music as well!
This is probably one of my favorite entries so far. I can say I was immersed into the world as it felt like a believable place. Also, I'm not only a sucker for 2D/3D hybrid graphics, but low poly 3D is becoming one of my favorite aesthetics.
Game play wise, it was fun and I appreciate how you incorporated some platforming elements which was essential to take pictures of certain things. Personally, though, I didn't find enough incentive for taking pictures (I did anyways since that's what the game wanted me to do). I think there's room to expand on that feature - maybe there's a score and/or currency system, maybe you need to take certain pictures to progress to the next area.
Atmosphere wise, the game was pretty relaxing and the music was perfect for the environment.
Great work overall!
[spoilers]
I loved how you introduced the big foot mystery as you scale up the mountain, and how it ends up tying into the plot - it was pretty wholesome.
Yeah, I could have done a better job explaining the health bar at the top. In lore explanation, you are the amygdala trying to regulate a human's (who is on the verge of emotional break down) emotions. So that bar represents "mental health" - If you let that bar deplete to zero, you lose a life. The bottom right was supposed to be enemy health, but I was not able to get it working properly in the given time.
Thanks for play and glad you enjoyed it!
Wow this was really good. To see cuts cenes and pretty well detailed pixel art has been a treat so far.
Enemies had some variety, animations were good, art style consistent, sound design was excellent. The visual and auditory feedback was very satisfying.
I can tell this a more experienced dev - for a one man team, they accomplished a lot. However, I ran into a game breaking bug - when I died during my run, the player death animation executed, but nothing happened after that and I was simply stuck with no way to continue or restart the game.
The game is alright to play, I would imagine there to be more variety in the future for how you go about beating the game (also more levels, of course). I never really felt like I had to strategize on how to get to the goal. Building things was pretty sequential and linear. Conceptually, I like where this is going though and can see potential (I understand this is a prototype).
Couple issues with the UI:
- I had to really read to understand the resources needed for each thing that I needed to build or for expeditions. Structuring descriptions in a way that will make things effortless for the user, will help improve the UI immensely.
one example I thought of:
[Structure]
Description:
Research Cost: 25
Mages needed: 5
Time: 30 seconds
- counter for expeditions and facility share the same spot on the UI. I definitely think the timers need to have their own specific location - for not only better visual feedback, but to distinguish when multiple processes are going on at once [preferably, I would rather look at a progress bar than a counter - but this works]. The timers sit on top of each other at the moment and bounce between each other to show the numbers counting down which, I guess works, but visually is an eye sore.
- because the game is dependent on actions being described by the UI, it will be important to make sure the UI is as optimized, user friendly, and as visually pleasing as possible. Keep up the work!
Graphically, the most impressive game I've come across so far. The game is simple yet serviceable. I think the theme and limitation are implemented well. To see (hear) voice acting as well, was a great touch.
Art style was cute and I absolutely love the mix of 2D and 3D assets. I like how you have to carefully pick your route - not all routes leading to the side where the customer resides will lead to the customer - so there is a bit of memorization/puzzle aspect. Animations, yet simple, are smooth and work in conjunction with the overall paper-mario-esque aesthetic.
Overall, I didn't encounter many bugs at all - so I can tell that the programming side of things was handled pretty well.
Great work! (bonus points for using an accordion in the instrument arrangement for the music).
Aesthetic and style was consistent so the nightmare-ish theme you were going for sold me. The shooting mechanics can be better implemented.
- I think utilizing the mouse to aim would definitely be a quality of life improvement rather than a handicap - especially once more elements like other enemies appear during the run. Having to physically stop moving and turn around to shoot the boss while trying to dodge enemies hurt the flow for me - my issue with the bosses in games like metal slug that have this format, although, there is typically less elements to deal with on screen (think of metal slug 3's first boss).
- having quicker accessibility to shooting towards any part of the screen would definitely be a good thing, imo
- With how far I got, I saw no point on shooting downwards - maybe there are specific ground enemies that appear later that you have to shoot.
- jump animation is a little wonky , but I'm not going to rate quality of animation with how little time we had to complete our entry - it works - that is all that matters right now. Animations are overall serviceable for what you were trying to accomplish.
-I like the implementation of an upgrade system. It's cool to see game jam games incorporate them with how little time there is to complete anything.
overall, a cool little run and gun keep it up!
Graphics were great, music was good, game play has the difficulty of a shmup.
Aesthetically, I like what is here, the crt filter was a nice touch. The visual ques when you get hit was nice, fairly extravagant and I like how the animations were animated to the beat of the song. The pixel art was of higher quality than other entries I've seen so far (which makes sense, as this is the first quartet that I've encountered).
The variation of the bullet patterns is nice, and I like how there are essentially phases for the types.
I didn't get that far, but I got far enough to see the phase shift once.
Overall, good work!