itch.io

I think you did a great job with the progression. It felt satisfying to get more and more as the loops got bigger. The crazy animals was a nice addition, too!

Even though the power at the end was satisfying, it also made the game a little bit trivial :D I kept searching for an end ... I'm not sure if you added a "max" animal level or not. Anyway, it was a lot of fun and very polished.

I finally get the hang of it :D Moving the lasso while you are pulling it back is key. I was able to grab chests on the edge more easily.

I had a laugh when the lasso collided with obstacles and bounced all over the place. And the exploding barrels were funny to.

Like others have said, there are a few bugs, but these are forgivable. I notice the lasso power meter still has an interactable slider -- maybe turn that part off ;)

Really satisfying game loop. I felt like a beast at the end, firing a barrage of gigantic bullets. Like many others have said, choosing downgrades made a really interesting balance.

I think you should experiment with the movement some more. I expected more float, being in space. As is, I think the controls might actually be too easy :D 

The visuals were very satisfying, too! Great choices  :D Thanks for the game.

As someone who played a lot of roller coaster tycoon growing up, I am impressed! There is a lot of functionality in this for a game jam. I also like the mix of building a coaster and collecting orbs, which was a fun constraint. I don't think I noticed any other secondary prizes related to speed or G-Force, but that could be cool. Maybe like, extra stars.

The control was a little finicky sometimes, and it would add extra nodes as I dragged forward. I'm not sure if that was by design or not. :)

Great job!

I had originally wanted to add a lot more narration content, trust me. Did you find the different narrations with the switch? :D

The cards really do add a lot of variety, and I get to choose the variety (risk and reward). That's pretty cool! Thanks for also including a tutorial.

Loved the hand-drawn effect of the art, and the background really tied it all together. I also liked how you integrated the idea of powerups with the novelty of a floating weapon. An eraser may have been more technically correct, but the pen and ink really felt satisfying to use.

I learned that I am terrible at drawing circles with a mouse XD

Loved the hand-drawn effect of the art, and the background really tied it all together. I also liked how you integrated the idea of powerups with the novelty of a floating weapon. An eraser may have been more technically correct, but the pen and ink really felt satisfying to use.

I learned that I am terrible at drawing circles with a mouse XD

That was fun to see the story unfold. I saw the "let it go" button, but thought, "no let's see this through, at least once". Figuring out the right order of things was satisfying, and it wasn't too hard, since you gave good constraints :)

I liked the vintage aesthetic. I wonder if it would be fun to have the player wind back the clock each time, like with the mouse.

Very creative concept! I really like the chromatic aesthetic to the loop.  It is definitely a challenge to get the hang of, to get a feel for the "weight" of the ball and the strength of the throws, but I think the balance of encouraging stacking as many gathers as possible was smart. Also, it was clever to destroy the boxes if I draw a loop around them :>

One thing you might change is: clicking anywhere, not even on the ball, loses a life :(

Also, for some reason, the first load played at an extremely low framerate for me. I had to reload the page, and then it played normally :o

I understand :) the home and office areas were very nice.

Thank you so much for playing through the whole thing! I don't know how many people actually did :)

You're right, the narrations take "3 paths" but all eventually merge. The gameplay itself is what I consider to have 3 endings.

😆 You have my apology

This is a pretty satisfying loop! Once you figure out the right flow for swapping those silly barn animals and such, I got my time down pretty low.  About 8 seconds was my personal best that I was satisfied with. No way I'm getting down to 03:78 XD

Oops! Maybe I need to add a motion sickness warning 😵‍💫

No worries, it actually fit the theme of your game well :D

If I was only just ahead of the ball, I could sometimes get back quickly. But after a point, or if the terrain was unlucky, then "sorry pal!"

It's surprising how simple but satisfying this is. I really did feel the struggle of Sisophys. The random generation made my torment feel entirely intentional, not just situational. The "inspirational quotes" were especially demoralizing, as if my pain was somehow virtuous. And when I noticed more decimal places on my progress, I really felt like the system was rigged against me >:) 

One thing I do wish is that it is easier to get back behind the rock. It never felt like I could outrun it, so the "grace period" felt unnecessary. 

Nice take on a bullet hell game. I think the wrapping ability was nice, especially because it was a circle. The enemies had nice variety in their abilities, but I agree with other commenters that the player character could be more distinct or visible.

I was able to avoid the three starter enemies pretty easily by circling them, since they weren't any quicker than I was. The big enemy also looping was a good surprise, and it also had a lot of bullets, which was more of a challenge.

Nice job, and I'm glad you focused on simple graphics. I would have stuck to one aesthetic, or I couldn't really tell what the player character was supposed to be. The background was space, but what was I? :D

I think they said, "press Ctrl to slide. It can also be good for a little speed boost." But it turned out to be Shift, for whatever reason. That's my guess!

Noo I zoomed right by Mercury 😆 what a neat Easter egg for skilled players.

Really impressive art! The puzzle design is simple but challenging . I was getting discouraged about the rooms killing me until I figured out the connection with the "emergency controls". Very clever! It was enjoyable, great job team!

We had a similar mechanic :D You were smart to include a cursor in the center of the screen ;)

I really love the hand-drawn art aesthetic. It makes for a very peaceful architecture. It almost feels like a Zen garden.

The hit box of the posts was a little hard to intuit, but it was still fun to try to make all 4. The direction changes were also a little surprising. I used a circle for mine, rather than a square :)

What a truly charming game. I really hope you are featured! The art and sounds were all so cute. And the gameplay was really clever. It was pretty challenging, but very rewarding when I figured out the "right" sequence to the puzzle. Great job!!

I think you did a great job of slowing teaching the mechanics and increasing the difficulty. I appreciate the work that it takes!

Oof, should be public now. 

I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong. The game starts, the alarm is ringing, and I'm pressing all the keys and clicking, but there's no movement :(

Okay, I realized I can't properly read. I promise I looked at the "How to Play" screen several times, but I did not notice "Z to wake up" until the 5th time. In my opinion, it doesn't make sense to have a single-use control. Just use movement to wake up :D

Anyway, fun idea. The "obstacles" in the house felt very interesting. The platform section was not as interesting. You could add more obstacles that you would expect on the street, like a dog or a puddle or an old person walking :D

Thank you for playing! As the developer, I always have way more time practicing the controls. Hopefully I can improve them :D I hope it was enjoyable even just for the "normal" path. 

I had a similar concept in my game :D "talking to the developer". How fun!

I really enjoyed the narrative. My reaction to the first iterations was, "ah okay". And I felt sadness when you expressed not feeling a direction for the game. Then with the new graphics and controls, it felt so positive. You captured the journey well.

Thanks for a really fun experience.

I had the same reaction at first, but luckily I had discovered the "extra" control that I don't think was explicitly mentioned. For me, it was the "Shift" key.

Great idea! I really liked the backdrop of space. It was really peaceful when floating between planets. Collecting rings on the planets was a fun secondary objective, and each planet felt a little different based on the speed and sense of "gravity". The surface textures were pretty cool. Maybe you can add even more personality to the other planets, like different music or ambient sounds, so they each feel like a new stage.

^ Me, when I flew past Earth and next into the Sun ...

I had fun playing! The only other note is: no love for Mars or Venus? :o

I uploaded the full render here: [[SPOILERS]]

I left the flowchart image low quality for now to avoid spoilers 🤔 but maybe there is no harm.

Thank you for playing! I would love to polish the controls, after the ratings. Keep trying to hit the lever ;) 

I like that it builds on itself, and it gets really interesting later on. Here are some other opinions:

• I didn't find it useful to have a "continue/quit" button on every end screen. I think it would work well to seamlessly load the next "level", which would make it more like an endless runner. If I want to quit, I'll probably lose soon enough anyway :D
• The movement could be tuned a little more. I think if you decelerate faster, it would feel less "floaty" and give better precision.

Haha what a lovely game. I can tell you put a lot of thought into this. The tutorial went from 0 to 60 real fast. "This is how you farm, and btw your cows will explode, oh and BTW EXPLODING WASPS!"

I personally prefer a tutorial that allows me to experiment with each piece of advice/mechanic, otherwise I feel a little overwhelmed and start forgetting pieces. Also, my barn got attacked by a wasp while I was still reading the tutorial (I'm a slow reader) :P

You managed to fit a lot of satisfying game loops in here, and the level of polish is actually higher than you gave credit! In my opinion, any jam game that adds a pause menu is ahead of the curve! Loved the music choice. 

Did this game take any inspiration from Fallout?

I enjoyed the story established in the introduction. I appreciated that you highlighted important words in the tutorial, too! It's a small thing, but it helps emphasize key mechanics. I think you did a great job making a game feel like an adaptation of a tabletop, and the combat quickly became intuitive.

I love how you combined sprites together to make the bigger characters! That made them feel much more complex than the original 16x16 would allow. The "auto-advance" button fit right in with the "tabletop" vibe, although it may have been helpful to show what objective the character was moving toward. The coloration of the tilemap definitely made it feel alien (not human), but if you had more time, I think the overworld could have used more visual interest to match the epic story you craft!

Great job overall! I lost Prince Caspian toward the end, and I immediately wanted to restart and try again using new tactics. 

Wow, I could play this forever. The environment is so well-crafted for just 48 hours! You made good use of ambient effects to fill it out. And the sound effects added a lot of life to the little guys!

I love the idea of being incredibly vulnerable as the player, and relying on a horde of "serfs" to carry out combat. It really adds a unique challenge. Awesome job! I also thought that having the keys require a certain number of serfs to carry them was really smart. 

Edit: Watched your devlog. I remember really enjoying the music as I played through, but I didn't fully appreciate the progression that the sound designer put in. That's cool!

I guess I had No Man's Sky on the brain haha

That's awesome! Can't wait to check out the update.

Thank you for playing! I will definitely look into some post-processing effects for next time!

Thank you for the nice comment!

I definitely can improve the clarity of the objective. It is essentially timer based, so adding a timer would have helped! Not to mention I broke the balance before submission, making it impossible to survive the archers xD

Thank you! I had been waiting for someone to question how big those houses were :p The little'uns are known for their large families ;)

I had the same worry about how intuitive the "rage" mechanic was, and I actually had the same thought as you! I was also worried about making it too complicated, as it was really just an analogy for "health" as you inferred. I'm glad you brought it up. It's valuable to know what players are thinking.

Thank you for playing, and thank you for the nice feedback!