itch.io

Do you know how good a games color pallet has to be for me to mention it first in a glowing review? Very, is the answer. I love how curated and well realized the arts and environments all look and sound. Such a great sense of ambiance and tone that the team absolutely nailed. 
The story can be a bit over-written and very smarmy but I found myself invested in the fate of the main character by the end and satisfied with the ending I got, which in my experience means someone did something very right. 

Terrific job, I hope everyone is very proud of their work. 

OOPS you made the presentation too good, very unfortunate mistake. The character art, UI interfaces, lovely detail in the backgrounds, all the hard work that absolutely paid off in dividends onscreen, its all so gorgeous its infuriating. Incredibly unbecoming. 

The core gameplay loop is a novel idea, with the context behind it being very fun. The voice acting is a nice touch for the dialogue but I feel as if the writing can be very slow paced, especially during the introduction being especially overly wordy to get through. 

Still, great job all around. Very appealing, very fun, gorgeous visuals, seething with envy. THATS how I know you did a good job. 

WOW really liked this one. 
Visuals were great, loved all the small but important details with how the characters moved and were animated, it went a long way to give the world a lot of life and energy. 
The characters and the environment felt well realized and appealing, with the writing doing a good job of drawing someone in  to the melodrama between the characters and their situation and really made me feel form them. Equal parts empathetic and endearing. Kudos. 

If I were to give constructive criticism I would say tonally it can be a bit askew sometimes. The cute appealing art style and modern dialogue sensibilities contrast with the dark subject matter and eerie music in ways that can be hard to tell if it is intentional or discordant. And the "good" ending epilogue, while very satisfying, did seem a bit rushed and more resolution or a more pronounced climax wouldn't have gone amiss. 
Really terrific job though. So engrossed with it I played through it multiple times just to see all the outcomes and make sure I found all interactions with the world. Great job! 

I'm a game artist/animator who also specializes in writing. Have done a LOT of collaborative game jams in the past and trying to branch out into different genres and subgenres within the medium.  Jack of (most) trades looking to collaborate with someone familiar with visual novel structuring and programming within the existing engines. 
Check out my page for some examples of past work or my online portfolio. 

If you make the objectively smart decision of wanting to collaborate with me, write me here on on my discord at @radiovillain.

Absolutely love the art style here, love how simultaneously thoughtful yet purposefully janky it all looks. Big sucker for "squigglevision" and 3D art styles that mimic 2D and you nailed it here. 

Tonally and gameplay wise its also very fun too, striking the exact correct balance between monotonous conveyor belt work and a core engaging gameplay loop. Really loved it, great job. 

Loved the vibes and the look of the main mechanic. Navigation can be a bit rigid sometimes but I think it works well when contextualized as how a bat moves around their environment.

Massive fan of the hand drawn style. 

Am wondering how exactly you managed to achieve it by compiling all the hand drawn assets in Unity so seamlessly? Would love to learn how for future reference. 

Obscene amount of style. Somehow you found a pallete that is simultaneously garish and obnoxious while also being appealing and not too obtrusive, not sure how you did that but keep doing it for all your future projects cause it looks great here. 

I personally love the controls, like the art style its just the right balance of appealing yet awkward, which makes it all the more satisfying when you manage to master them. Very satisfying and very fun. 

Also music and sound design slap salaciously hard. Perfect match for the tone and vibes of the game. 

Fun visuals and managed to balance simultaneously a calm but exciting tone.

I'm a sucker for isometric platformers which is why its so important to have that shadow underneath the player showing where they would land when in the sky, and a fairly glaring omission when its not there. This is remedied with the countdown giving the player enough time to get to safety, but the drop-shadow is still a very important quality of life feature to have. 

Its a testament to its quality that despite the omission it is still a very  enjoyable game. All of the basics are very solid its just the subtleties that could use a pass through, a statement that can always be said about almost every piece of art. 

As enjoyable as it is addictive which is very. 

Loved how each level modified the game and how I thought about the level while simultaneously having a fast and exciting pace, something very difficult for a puzzle game to have. Good job on that. 

Love the concept of a roguelike where you have to choose which determent you can live with. Inspired idea. 

This game is like what if East Saint Louis was slightly more hospitable to human life. I dig. 
Love the tone and presentation but what ties everything together is the writing and the story. Very fun energy that permeates through it all. Some minor technical errors don't detract from what this game does right which is a lot. Will say though, with a game who's main mechanic is about clicking on dialogue options, I do wish that the clicking on the dialogue options was somewhat more reliable. 

The best game on Newgrounds in 2010 which is the highest possible praise I can give a piece of art. Loved the impromptu improvisational feel each level and each reload gave me, truly made me feel like a professional inept alligator hunter. 

The art style and physics contribute a lot to the games tone and vibe, feeling exactly as charming and irreverent as it should. 

Full disclosure, I don't know if the Alligator AI or the physics are completely understandable, comprehensive, or at all fully functional. That is a compliment by the way, some of my favorite moments were when I thought to myself "Alligators aren't supposed to fly like that". 

Loved the game, great work, I'll get that alligator yet someday. 

Excellent lesson on how a simple idea  well executed is better than a ambitious idea executed only okay. 

Very engaging and genuinely exciting. I wish some of the presentation had a bit more juice as a game this simple really lives and dies on those style passes, but despite that it was still really fun and I found myself playing it for longer than I expected. 

Taking a break from constantly replaying the level to write this comment. 

Really fantastic job. Absolutely adore the presentation and the platforming mechanics, exactly as tight as they should be. We love a good slide mechanic but I wish there were more opportunities to use it and capitalize on the otherwise excellent momentum mechanics. You have a strong grasp on appealing visual language and information conveyance to the player that is inspiring, I'd appreciate the art design more if I wasn't so enthused to go as fast as I can through the level. 

Very addictive, I can see myself coming back daily just for a single go to see if the mechanics can give me a slight edge. 

Okay enough writing have to go back and beat my high score

again. 

Love the tone and the gameplay. Can be genuinely challenging which can be appreciated.
Love the small animation and design details on all the little characters, really ties everything together into an endearing package. 
If I were to give anything constructive I would say I wish the sound design was as good as the rest of the presentation, as it can come off as a bit too chirpy and grating especially with a lot goin on in the scenes. 

Really liked it though, absolutely nailed the tone and core gameplay loop which far and away are the most important parts to nail. Kudos! 

Really loved this one. Genuinely fun and a really engaging simple premise that made what appears to be a relatively basic looking game as engaging as it is simple. 

If I would make one change it would be to omit the written warning about what is going to happen to the player. It would make it much more interesting if the player had to intuit the game mechanics on the fly in a high stress environment as opposed to having it literally spelled out for them. 

Good job though. Liked it a lot. 

Genuinely spellbinding game you have made here. Exact perfect amount of polish on everything from the character designs to the art to the music (upsettingly excellent soundtrack btw), all of it has the exact right amount of love put into it and vision put behind it. 

Found myself engrossed by the heartfelt melancholic story, and while I have yet to get all the endings (only have gotten 4,5, and 6) the ones I have seen so far are wonderous and pitch perfect. 

A small detail that I positively adore is starting the piece off with a point of view account from the main character that leads into choosing the characters' names and genders. Such a simple addition that instantaneously forms a connection between the person playing the game and BOTH of the characters they will be following throughout. And the fun jovial dialogue and overall moody but happy tone helps with the engendering too. 

MOREOVER: The game is a perfect example of the two most powerful tropes to engage someone to a new fantasy setting. 

• Step 1: Do something weird to the moon 
• Step 2: See step 1

Genuinely terrific job. Loved every second of the game, absolute winner this one is. 

It should be noted just how much life and personality you are able to give to the characters and world WITHOUT animation, which already  is a lot. 

I hope you and your team is as confident in the quality of your full game as I currently am, which also is a lot. 

Happens to only the best of us! I know exactly how anxious you must be to fix it and I am excited to see it happen! 

Fantastic heavy atmosphere that hangs over your head like the Sword of Damocles or another moody metaphor. Everything is purposely poignant and intricately designed that encourages critical thinking and engaging with the world and story. 

Wonderous artwork all throughout as well, prefect for the tone you are aiming for.  Great job on it all, such a clear and concise vision executed excellently. 

Far and away the best part about the game is the atmosphere. Immaculate tone setter for the adventure, and every element of the presentation from the music to the UI engages you. 

When tackling such a well worn genre as you've chosen, its important to understand how to successfully execute on the subtlety's of the genre, which is a very long very kind way of saying you should have the option to continually shoot if the shoot button is held down, ESPECIALLY with enemies and obstacles that take more than one shot to destroy. Similarly I would say the most glaring determent to player retention is a lack of noticeable progress. The environments changing mid level is gorgeous but it seems to happen at random as just another thing that happens. Something simple like a countdown timer showing how long the player has to survive for or a progress bar would go a very long way for player engagement. 

The core game and how it is presented is absolutely solid and you should be proud of the work you've done, but small details are oftentimes just as important as the big picture. 

Excellent tone and direction as a whole. I think more could have been done to play/toy with the audiences expectations, there was so much tension and buildup and dread and it kind of fizzled out by the end with not much of a conclusion. With meta works like this it can be easy to rely on self awareness as a crutch for a truly gripping plot or any kind of shock value, but as these kinds of stories have become more and more common, its important for them to really try to play with what they expect from a prospective audience. 
All the same however, It's clear you did a lot with what you've been given and wanted to get out of the story. The presentation similarly is all top notch and I was very compelled all throughout. Good Job. 

So good its actually kind of obnoxious. Every single one of the 720 hours you spent working on the jam is on full display.  The characters are as fun to interact with as they are stunning to look at, which is very. 

Kind of difficult to come up with constructive criticism not gonna lie. I feel like the battles can drag sometimes but since the core gameplay loop is all about building up to them it seems appropriate, even if they can feel a bit tedious at times. I will say for a piece that is positively exploding with life and energy I do wish there could have been a bit more Juice put into some of the presentations. Mostly the character designs and text bubbles which feel much more static than they should, especially with such vibrant characters on display. Even a gentle float or squash and stretch animation would go a LONG way. 

Other than that though its quite difficult to come up with anything I would change or add. Its a clear and concise vison executed almost perfectly. Great job, you and your team should feel proud. 

Very cute game. The character designs and overall duologue make the world and stakes very easy to enjoy. Love the contrast between the player's in game character model and the lovingly crafted designs of everyone else in the world, makes the entire experience very endearing I feel. 
Not sure If I'm missing something but opening the mindscape seems to do nothing except make a loading bar appear with nothing to trigger, making a very critical part of your core gameplay loop largely guesswork. Otherwise aside from that (what I assume to be) glitch its still a very simple sweet game. Kudos. 

Offensively good visuals and presentation, and their wonderous moody dreamlike quality extend to the theme and gameplay as well. Simultaneously entranced and on edge playing through it and exploring the environment. Few games (let alone freshman efforts) can have such a strong tone that engages the player, let alone managing to balance TWO simultaneously. Kudos. 

The art is beautiful, but at times it can feel overwhelming, especially with a core gameplay loop revolving around searching for small details in such a vast area. The overwhelming and overpowering art design does make the game more challenging, but in doing so simultaneously risks it becoming annoying and aggravating which thankfully your game (mostly) does not! It works okay when it comes to searching the environment, it works less than okay when trying to read and decipher a very thin wispy font. 

Truly A+ tone and world design, dreamlike in the best way possible. 

Love the psychedelic dreamlike tone of the game and the world explored. Its clear you put a lot of effort into the character designs and the story. Everything seems very deep and busy but in a (mostly) good way! I feel like you wrote a lot of really interesting lore we are only see a small part of, but even that small part can be overwhelming with a lot introduced very quickly. 

Loved the character designs and all the art for them, but if I had a genie in a bottle I'd wish for some more dynamic poses with them, not just on the battle screen but with the normal conversations as well. 

Still, good job with what you've made, it's clear its a passion project filled with so much passion its positively infectious! Keep it up! 

Loved the presentation to bits! Gorgeous color palette and very cozy aesthetic. You really do feel connected to the house by the end of it. Really do like it a lot. I wish there were more cute minigames similar to the cooking one (Which is still engaging and expertly presented) about tidying up the environment to really connect the player with the world around them and the feel what Rutile is going through. 
Still though, gorgeous job! Could stare at the art for hours no matter how messy the home is!

I've been wanting to start working with the RPG Maker game engines for a while, and I see this jam to be the perfect opportunity to start and meet people smarter than myself about the topic! 

I am an accomplished game designer and game artist with tertiary experience with game writing and production. I've studied  game design while I was in college and have participated in a variety of collaborative  game jams projects. I am familiar and comfortable working on a collaborative remote project and have a fast turnaround time on game ready deliverables. 

Skills include but are not limited to...

• 3D Art/animation
• 2D Art/animation

  
  

  • Pixel art 
  • Spine based animation
  • tile sheet creation
• Game Design
• Game Production
• remembering to routinely drink water

For further reference feel free to check over my online portfolio or look over my itch.io page.

To contact me directly, feel free to message me here or add me on discord. 
Discord ID:  radiovillain

I genuinely mean it when I say this is in my top two games named "Blackout" submitted for the 2024 Spooky 2D game jam. 

Love the little guy and the little noises he makes. 

Barely any videogames have me sit staring daggers at the screen while I shout "LET ME LOVE YOU!" at the characters....

Quality job. 

Simple and inspired design. Feels like a classic that has stood the test of time while simultaneously having a modern coat of polish. Kudos.

You know its a good game when your failures make you feel genuine shame and a desire to try again and again and again...

you also know its a good game when the graphics are pretty.