itch.io

Just as a warning to others, I uploaded this submission's exe to VirusTotal and it was detected as a Trojan by multiple antivirus vendors (23/72). It's been reported to itch.io so they can review it.

VirusTotal Summary

Cute game! I managed to discover all the cats. It seems the checkerboard one took the longest to show up. It seems like I had to spawn at least one of each other cat type for it to show up (I'm not sure if that's what triggered it, but I tried that and it seemed to have worked). The car cat was probably my favorite one both stat and design wise. I do like the art and the variety of cat and enemy types that were made. A potted plant being among the animal enemies I thought was funny.

I do wonder if the arena is a bit too long. When I'd move the camera back and forth, there would be long stretches of little or nothing going on. A lot of the action seems to gravitate towards the left and right sides of the arena.

After playing the game for a bit, I noticed all the sounds eventually stopped playing. I experienced a similar bug with another game in this jam as well, so I'm not sure if it's something on my end or it's just a coincidence. I'm curious if anyone else experienced this or it's just me.

Anyway, cute game! Nice job!

Thanks for the feedback and for trying out the game! Based on this comment and the other one, it does seem like I made the game too difficult and definitely should have included a tutorial or instructions of some kind to help alleviate that.

If it helps, the souls spawn in whatever your current position is about every second (or about a little over a second), so I'd probably need to adjust that spawn rate if it's giving players trouble.  If you get a bad enemy layout that seems impossible, and you die after collecting the lid, you can click "Restart from Beginning" and it'll reset the level and the enemies. 

The intended strategy was that the player would need to time their jumps and plan their movements to spawn the ghosts in the ideal positions. In hindsight, I probably should've included some kind of visual indicator to show when a soul would spawn.

Again, thanks for trying out the game and sorry it was frustrating. Your feedback will be helpful if I decide to revisit this project in the future.

Thanks for the kind words! Too bad you couldn't get past the first level, but the people I had playtest also struggled so you're not alone, lol. I had adjusted some hitboxes but that might not have been enough. Regarding the tutorial suggestion, what part of the game initially confused you? I'll keep it mind if I choose to expand on this game.

Nice, atmospheric game, though I did struggle a bit. My strategy was just rushing and lighting the nodes while being completely swarmed by enemies, lol. It might help by increasing the  starting amount of light energy if you wanted it to be more manageable, but that's up to you, of course.

The ambience and the footsteps add to the atmosphere. I like that there is music when the enemies are near to emphasize the danger. I did seem to encounter a bug where all audio cut out once I entered the second sector.

I managed to get to the third sector of the game, but I eventually found myself wandering around, unable to find the last nodes to light and kind of lost interest after that. If you decide to expand on this, it might help to make some parts of the environment look distinct from one another. Other than that, nice job on the game! 

Pretty easy little maze game you got here. I managed to get through all the levels!

I noticed there didn't seem to be much of a reason to drop the plasma, so maybe that could be made to be more useful. A few times I placed them to help orientate myself and mark where I had been, but I wasn't sure if that was the intended use. I do wish there was more to do in the mazes other than wandering around until you find keys and switches, like maybe puzzles to solve or things in the dark you have to watch out for. Other than that, nice job!

The art and premise are fun. I never could quite get used to the controls, though. I did think it was funny that your character burns up if you move too fast. I did notice a bug that the game over screen pops up again when I try to replay the game after dying.

Nice idea for a game, though its really difficult to react in time to the oncoming obstacles., particularly the rockets. I would suggest having the player able to move faster or having them positioned on the left side of the screen.

Nice, simple game. It kind of fun watching the atom bounce around and hoping that it hits the bulb., lol. There's also a good amount of mechanics including the magnets and moving walls. Nice job!

Good thing you got you got your game uploaded! 

The game itself is fun for a bit, though, maybe a bit repetitive. Maybe more types of hazards or maybe even power-ups or something could help add some much needed variety. Also, I managed to walk on one of those rising green poles and stayed on it as it carried me upward, making it impossible for any of the cannonballs to hit me, lol. I also feel like the game over screen should show the player the time you managed to last, since the goal seems to be to survive as long as possible. 

Overall, nice job!

Nice take on a curling game. I like how you can use choose from different objects each with different physics and uses. The bomb especially can really mix things up. At some point, the AI threw a bomb and scattered my pieces, sending my score from the double digits down to just one point, lmao. I also like that the arenas had different properties. I feel like this could make for a good 2-player game. Nice job!

Interesting game, though it's pretty difficult and the controls take some getting used to. I feel like the coins should respawn when you die, as I found it more useful to just reset the game after being sent back to the beginning so I can increase my shield easier.

Neat idea requiring the player to have a certain number of boxes to destroy the platforms. I also like the twist of this mechanic being used against you, too, such as the part where if you had 9 or more boxes, you end up destroying some platforms you needed to progress.

I did struggle at the beginning part before you grab the third box. I couldn't reach the platform until I realized you can walk off ledges and jump in mid-air.

Nice job!

I really like the art style and the music. The visuals give me a children's storybook vibe. 

It took me a minute to figure out what was going on before I realized the giraffe determined how fast the rhino moved. I like that the penguin added a jump mechanic. Seems like you could easily expand this with more animals having their own abilities like that. A short, but cute game.  Nice job!

Nice game. I managed to survive 6 waves. When I first played, it seems I got soft-locked when I got stuck between two angels with no ammo and had to reset the game, lol.

It looks like you forgot to upload your game. I don't see a game or any downloads on your game's page.

Cute, little game. Is it possible to actually beat it or do you just the pop the bubbles for fun? Your 100 day challenge thing sounds interesting.

Really cool, yet very difficult! Including the Mooncat controls was a nice twist.

Really cool! I like the different upgrades and the shrinking timer per round. Would be cool to see this idea expanded on with more levels and upgrades. I managed to get to round 9. 

Best: 0:13:.26

Total: 2:40.54

Really cool concept of using screen wrapping in a puzzle game. I also liked the art and the music.

The levels and puzzles are well-designed and definitely made me have to think them through at times. There were a few times some jumps felt like they had to be too precise for a game like this, but other than that, nice job!

I like the  "dying to progress" idea. I feel like you could do a lot with that if you choose to expand on this. A fun, short game. 

I'm not sure what the intended solution to the third level was. I ended up falling to the bottom floor and mashing space against the rightmost wall to "wall jump" up and get the last pill. I wasn't sure if that was one of the intentional "loop holes" that you mentioned or if there was another solution.

Nice job on your first jam submission!

Nice little puzzle-platformer! It gets hard pretty quick. I managed to get to the cloud world. I wish there was a level select.

I'm sorry you had a rough time with the controls.  I can see how those sections would be frustrating. Thank you for trying the game out, anyway!

Nice game and I liked the creepy music. 

The first zombie took a lot of hits and I wasn't able to kill it. I ended up running out of ammo, and I wasn't sure how to reload, so I just jumped over the rest of the enemies pretty easily and beat the game that way. I would suggest tweaking the shooting mechanics and give the player a reason to have to fight the zombies.

Nice job on the submission!

Fantastic art style and I love the music choices! Building up speed is a lot of fun. I wish there was more to do in terms of platforming such as dealing with enemies or interacting with different mechanics. Though, the tornado transformation thing was neat.

Overall, this is a decent prototype with a lot of style and promise. Nice job!

Good concept for a game. It's like a physics-based version of Bomberman. I like the art, especially the power-ups.. I like the risk-reward of risking your life to push the bombs towards other players, though, I wish there was a way to hit them to force them around a little faster. Jumping seems useless as far as I can tell. Maybe you could make use of the jump by having a way to jump over explosions with good timing or maybe adding some verticality to the levels..

I could see this being expanded into a fun party game. Nice job!

Nice platformer. The player controls well and the levels are designed well. I just wish there were more levels. I get the impression that you probably made this from one of the GDTV courses, but we all have to start somewhere. You start simply following tutorials and then you learn more from there and soon enough, you'll find yourself relying on tutorials much less often. 

Overall, this is far from being a terrible game. Nice job!

Nice job on making all the assets yourself and for publishing your first game! I love a good 2D platformer. The game is simple, but controls well and I really like the pixel art. Hopefully, one day you could expand on this with more levels and mechanics. Good job on your submission!

Great idea for a game! Interesting combination of a typing game and a 2D platformer. I've never really seen that before. Only complaint is the strange slope physics. Other than that, cool idea and nice job!

Interesting take on the theme. I found myself replaying a few times to see more of the NPCs' dialogue. Though, I did notice some of the NPCs said variations of the same thing. For example, one would say "Looks like I'm lost" and another would say "I'm lost." There were also plenty of variations of "This looks like a good place to X" and "Can't wait for the universe to end" type of dialogue, which made a lot of the characters feel too similar to one another. 

With that said, the idea of talking to different people and hearing their thoughts knowing the world is about to end is an interesting concept. Add more variety in characters and dialogue and this would be even better. Nice job!

Wooo! I won! Nice, short game. I like that you have to try to avoid hitting the wizards, so you can't just shoot blindly. If I were to suggest anything, I would say you consider having the enemies flash and some particle effects play when you hit them to make shooting them more fun.  Overall, nice job!

Nice little platformer with some cute pixel art. I like the idea of a platformer/stealth hybrid. Too bad you didn't have time to make more levels. Congratulations on your first game jam submission!

Nice game. I think the artwork is really well done and I like the music choices. I like that the foreground elements were made transparent as to not obscure the player character too much. I liked using the mouse wheel to quickly cycle through different weapons on the fly.

I did find the combat too slow and sluggish due to the high cooldown of your different abilities. Having an ability or two with shorter cooldown would definitely help make the combat more fluid. I was also unclear of what the little pill-like things I was collecting were doing until an upgrade screen popped up.

Also, I encountered a bug when I dashed against a wall on the right side of the map and got stuck until all the enemies killed me, lol.

Nice job on this submission!

Here's mine. It's a 3D platformer.

https://dylan-bee.itch.io/phantom-of-the-stars

Really cool game, though, it's quite difficult! I couldn't get past the third rail, but I loved the physics-based movement, and getting the brief bursts of speed through well-timed dashes was quite satisfying. Would love to see this one expanded on with a tweaked difficulty curve. Nice job on this one!

Nice little top-down shooter. I like the sprites and the music choice. It wasn't clear what the pickups were supposed to do. Killing enemies was fun for a bit, but it did get repetitive after a bit.

With that said, nice job on the game!

Decent little racer. I especially love the low poly aesthetic and the colors! I think the racing mechanics could be refined a bit as it was pretty easy to stay on the road and make turns. It seems too easy almost like I was being guided by the game. 

EDIT: Playing it again, it looks like you can't even drive off the road. Also, I would suggest including the timer during the race, so players can better keep track of their time if they want to climb the leaderboard at the end.

Anyway, though, nice job!

Hi, thanks for trying out my game! Sorry you're having issues.  Your suggestions are very helpful. I hope I can provide some clarity if you decide to try the game again.

Most of the important helper spheres are right near the starting point of the game. Basically, they'll tell you that a ghost appears at night and chases you and kills you with one touch, but if you collect the sun tokens scattered around, you'll get more sunlight and prevent the ghost from appearing. The amount of sunlight is indicated in the top left of the screen with the number by the sun icon. If it reaches below 10, the sun goes down and the ghost shows up.

If you have at least five crystals, you can fight back against the ghost when he finally does appear. The #/8 number in the top left corner next to the blue diamond shape shows you how many you've collected so far. Collecting all eight crystals is optional and they can be collected in any order.

Yes, the flame you can touch and your player will immediately pick it up. However, a timer will appear, indicating how much time you have before the flame blows out and returns to its original position. If you are able to carry the flame to a candle on time, a crystal will spawn directly above the candle.

The areas where the yellow bubbles are rising up, there are flowers on the ground in those areas. Walking across those will help you move faster for a short time. Some of these are needed for one of the flame/candle puzzles.

The timing of the switching platforms can be tricky. In some areas, it's best to time a jump towards a block right before it appears. The really tall area with the switching platforms is probably the hardest crystal to get, in my opinion.

Here's a hint, one of the crystals is hidden in one of the more dense collection of trees. Also, there's no crystal by the little neighborhood of houses. That area is pretty much there for stocking up on sun tokens.

Thanks again for playing and I appreciate the helpful feedback!

Thanks for trying the game! I definitely should've included a shadow for the player character. I remember thinking about that early on when I was developing the game, but I completely forgot about it as I was focused on finishing other things before the deadline. The game does have controller support if that helps you!

Nice little puzzle-platformer! I like the premise and the art is good. Using light switches to make monsters and hazards disappear is a cool idea. The eerie music choice is great. 

I wish the game was longer! I definitely think this idea could be expanded on with more mechanics and puzzles. Nice job!