No problem! And full disclosure, I am what you would probably consider to be the target demographic.. I have an appreciation for finance, investing, probability, etc.. So definitely hit right.. But, that said, and having worked on a few finance-centric game ideas myself, I think that it still is straightforward enough to understand even for a more general audience... yeah, overall, good job, and nice use of the theme (while managing to avoid cookies/biscuts lol)
Josh Welliver
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Wish I could rate, but didn't join this year. Yours is the first I've tried. The movement is hilarious... lots of fun! I did get stuck trying to go under the "0"-shaped pipe. Btw, I honestly initially clicked because of the bird, but I saw your comment below that it's not actually in the game. Either way, also hilarious cover image :D
No problem at all, I was trying to knock out some reviews quickly yesterday during some time I had set aside. I neglected to mention that your visuals are outstanding. The santa on the main menu is incredible and everything ties together very well.. Best presentation I've come across so far.
And AH! I had a feeling that snowman was meant to be thwacked. I couldn't quite get it though after a few passes, and was mostly focused on the house. Definitely was chasing that first shot's dopamine hit.. I was trying to figure out how to drop presents and was like "Space?" .. *Bloop* right in. And I halfway sat up out of my chair. lol.. Certainly not as easy after that, but had fun trying to get a feel for it. I'll have to revisit when I have more time.
And thanks, feel free to check mine out. It ended up being more of a WIP technical demo as I was trying to work with some friends who are new to game dev and jams, and I didn't commit as much time to it as I would've liked. As I was staying up past dawn with a few hours left and most features unfinished, I decided the "special delivery" component was going to be me delivering myself to bed, and submitted what I had. lol. So, have fun, but some imagination is required!
Fun, took me a bit to figure out if/how I could control the reindeer... would like them to be more responsive.
The second level had me confused as the house is right next to the level barrier on the right side, so it was tough to hit.
I do like the arc of the gifts though, and happened to get my first one in by pure luck!
Loved the UI and UI sounds. Felt really good.
The overall package/polish felt pretty nice.
As someone who didn't read "how to play" first (I know):
Took me a minute to realize the arrow wasn't indicating my target direction.. was confused about why I was being forced forward. Also, I aimed for all the green hula hoops just out of instinct.
Also, liked the bonus minigame of fitting santa down the chimney. :)
Well it took about 20 hours during our evenings, Wednesday to Saturday to put the whole thing together. I did all the coding and it was my first time back in Unity in a few years, so that didn't help. I'd say the main mechanics before tweaking and messing with art was around 5 hours.
Why do you ask?
Also, We put a few more hours into a patch that we're releasing tomorrow which really enhances the swinging gameplay (fully rotational player, rigidbody legs, some critical fixes that should actually make it playable on most machines).. if you enjoyed it (or didn't!) I hope you'll give that version a shot as it should've been that way initially.
Thanks for playing!
Seems like a fun concept. Had a few issues with bugs as others mentioned and it seemed like the Q key wasn't doing anything even though it's in the tutorial.
Pretty difficult with the controls and the event timing.
Also, got myself into unrecoverable debt after the second death.. first -20, then -7000, then -50000 shortly after.
Does seem like a pretty good gameloop though. Graphics and sound were good. And managed to keep me wanting to play long enough to get a better handle on the controls even after I was initially frustrated for struggling to get on the conveyor belt and pick anything up. And didn't take too long.
Lots of potential here.. Overall, with a patch, could definitely be really good! Surprisingly complete-feeling for just 7 days... really fantastic work!
https://itch.io/jam/brackeys-9/rate/1933413
Hey there! Thanks for sharing! Will be happy to check yours out today!
Great job!
Should've reviewed the controls before starting because I definitely accidentally murdered a bunny.
Nice, cute game. The bloom was pretty intense.. but everything still looked nice nonetheless.
The baby sheep I was leading to find their parent must've been really confused when I defeated an alligator and then instantly disappeared to become a gorilla. Hope they got reunited. :)
thank you for the feedback!
Speeding up the text was on the list that we didn't get around to. Lol
Our new update is way more fun. I'll link you a copy when we send it out.
Water is a second camera outputting to a render texture and then processed in a Shader.
I had no idea how to do it.. until I followed this tutorial:
Looking forward to checking out your game when I get home tonight. Thanks!
hey! Yes.. it's my first time back in Unity in around 5 years.
I realized the issue was tying the physics to the Update method rather than fixed update. We already have a much nicer feeling update ready to release once review period is over. Full character rotation, inheriting swing velocity.. the way it should've been from the beginning. Kicking myself for not catching the Update issue but we sure had fun making it while... Getting back into the swing of things... :D
As for shift, I considered not using it for that reason on Windows, but couldn't think of a better key and hoped it would encourage people to disable sticky keys as it should be by default!! :)
Appreciate the feedback and glad you liked the art, it was entirely hand drawn and I think it came out really well.
thanks for the feedback!
Regarding the slowness.. getting alot of reports about that.. think it's the excess lighting. :/
Runs well on our dev rig but I tested (after submitting) on a slower machine and got the same effect.
The arrows were very last minute and I did give them a 10% chance of passing through the vines but didn't have time to test.
Not sure about why you had trouble grabbing after collecting the amulet. I'll look into it.
Thanks for playing!
Rate Vines! by jwelliver for Brackeys Game Jam 2023.1 - itch.io
Rated & Looking forward to your feedback!
Rate Vines! by jwelliver for Brackeys Game Jam 2023.1 - itch.io
Checking yours out now. Thanks!
Bummer! It's likely poor performance :/ I built it on a pretty hefty rig and it seems the lighting/shadows is causing the character to move really slowly. on other machines. He's actually quite agile. Really regret not adding an option to disable the performance hitters. Really sorry about that, but thank you for playing. I'll be posting a video to show normal gameplay.
Thanks for the compliment on the procedural vines! Considering packaging and uploading to unity asset store for others to use in platformers.
Rate Vines! by jwelliver for Brackeys Game Jam 2023.1 - itch.io
Checking out yours now. Thanks!
Rate Vines! by jwelliver for Brackeys Game Jam 2023.1 - itch.io
Rated and reviewed yours - Looking forward to your feedback as well. Thanks!



