itch.io

wow, you made a lot of game! do I see that correctly, that you modeled all of you assets yourself? if so: very well done! big Tomo fan here! super charming world.
I didn't really care for the combat so much, but that's a me thing for any 3rd person meelee combat game. nice thing was though, that Tomo is so fast when she sprints - I just ran by them no problem. sure, I had to do something against the boss, but I used my beloved sprint to run circles around him a stab him now end then. All I want to say is: the thing I enjoyed the most was zooming around with Tomo, that was a blast! Sonic would be proud.

those pesky cubes! super interesting submission. the game is so simple, yet the orthographic presentation with great textures, the added challenge from the spinning and the great music and sounds and then most of all the competetion with other commenters make this so much more compelling than a "click-the-right-box" game should ever be. I hope you don't take this as me dunking on your game idea (which I do, but only to make a point) but rather as me being amazed by the excellent execution of that idea.  great job, for real.
oh, and I topped out at 440 - my hatred for cubes might not be strong enough yet...

that was a tall order my friend. think about your game (after playing a lot of different games and genres this week) made me realize that adventure games are probably the most difficult (singleplayer) genre to pull off in a gamejam, because their magic really comes from the unique combination of all its different components like puzzles, a world to explore, interesting characters and a narrative and then visuals and audio to bring it all together. you definitely pulled off a lot off that workload and you can see can see the promise of a really cool adventure game that delivers on all of these things. but I think you overscoped on a lot of these categories and making a smaller world and a shorter more contained story might have been a better pick? sorry for rambling. your game gave me quite a bit to think about and so I just did it here :-)

thanks. that's a helpful insight!

get out of here.
that was quite challenging.
the challenge was not to feel like a total imposter in face of so much quality.
I barely managed, but I made it and feel okay now. one might even say 'inspired'.
so, thanks for the challenge <3

okay, that's a very good reason. i can respect that a lot.

transcript of my playthrough:
oh HELL NO! get me out of here! way too dark! give me a flashlight! maybe 'F'? no, wait what is 'F' doing? OH! FIREWORKS! that will definitely scare the scary ghost girl with bad teeth away, heheheheee... NO! DIDN'T WORK! RUN!RUN!RUN! WHERE ARE THE ITEMS? AHHHHH! oh, wait 'Exit'? nice. I'm the BEST! no problem...

such a promising setup for a game - both narratively and gameplaywise -  really hyped by the idea. and your physics system seems rock solid. I can't wrap my head around why you would not implement sound in a pinpall game as like the second thing you do, but I guess we all have different priorities (I started my game with looking for free mechanical keyboard sounds ;-) )

I came across a couple of submissions that used really powerful free pixel art tools for generating planets and galaxies and I thought, why not let you know about them, maybe there's something for you in there:

Deep Fold's Space Background Generator:     https://deep-fold.itch.io/space-background-generator

Deep Fold's Pixel Planet Generator:    https://deep-fold.itch.io/pixel-planet-generator

that's a pretty cool idea for a game! I was instantly reminded of the katamari series, which is just objectively one of the best games series in existence, so no pressure ;-) would be great to drive through actual oversized living rooms and the likes, but as a proof of concept, it was pretty convincing already.

my mother asked the same thing ;-)
I was hoping players would feel motivated to find the answers to these questions on their own by experimenting, formulating theories and testing them out, but that does come with the risk of scaring away players that just feel frustrated.

but to answer your questions: you have to enter the right number in order to progress to the next level (there are 65 in total). to do that you need to understand the clues the game is giving you in various ways.

a highly accessible and well polished game. I think if we consider relaxing-challenging as a spectrum for games, our games sit on opposing ends of that spectrum. still very much enjoyed it. the only game I kept playing while rating and commenting so far.

a big win for simplicity. also: the first time I rate the music 5 stars :-)

oh wow, I don't know how you render these graphics, but please keep doing that. it's so unique and does make me feel a little uneasy as well. the game feels nostalgic, even though I don't remember that games have looked like that ever. it's like: it reminds me of a childhood that I never had... woha, that's so on brand with your story though...  I don't know if I played too many submissions, but I am on a streak of games that feel kinda trippy and I am so here for it.

ps: something tells me, there's gonna be ultra-violent scenes at some point in the teknopunk universe. is that me projecting my own dark fantasies, or is there a violent subtone in this game?

how do I even start... First things first: I played around 60 different entries so far, and I think this one is - without any sarcasm - actually my favourite one. the strange part is, I am not even sure if that is by accident or design, so bear with me, I will have to do some monologuing here.
the game succeeds spectacularly in creating a deeply unsettling feeling - this much I am sure was intended. the thing that fascinates me so much is how all of the games imperfections adds to that feeling: the low poly graphics, that are so basic and (please excuse my honesty here) obscenely ugly and shown in clear daylight, the enemy behavior that isn't clearly communicated but then does weird stuff like teleport you randomly making the game seem to glitch out, and those creepy shadowy crawlers that seem invincible(? who can really say), the obscure UI that make simple tasks like putting in a 4-digit code feel like a true accomplishment, the need to jump up stairs, the capsule collider shadow of yourself, even the massive framedrops down to 1fps seem intentional. the whole game feels like it was found on a cursed disk in some 90s psycho-thriller-black-mirror-episode. I thought about why I kept playing this clearly broken or at least rediculously unpolished piece of a game, why I was so fascinated with it even though I might have just discounted it as a pretty badly developed game, and I think I came to the conclusion that it was the sound design that brought it all together. it was the part of the game that was so clearly expertly crafted, that it convinced me that all the other pieces were intentional as well. it convinced me that you used the language of broken and unpolished video games to intentionally create an unsettling game that at least for me was therefore so much more interesting and compelling than a game that would simply expertly recreate the optics of big budget horror movie.

so, yeah. I don't know what you will make of this review, but I had to get that out.
Also: can you tell me if there's anything beyond the blue flag? it feels like a symbol of a goal that should be reached, but as nothing happened I can't be sure if this it the end. which - following my above logic - again just adds to the mystery of the game, so maybe don't tell me ;-)

I'm not sure if the "start-with-fancy-assets-and-find-the-game-later"-approach will get you anywhere. Sorry if I'm overly critical, I always loose my filter towards the end of a jam. Yes, the game looks absolutely stunning - but where do you go from here? how do you create a gameplay that matches these optics? or are you satisfied with mainly showing of assets that other people created? I truly believe these hyper realistic assets are a trap for solo developers that will give you an illusion of making a great AAA game but are actually a dead end, not really making you progress as a developer. but that's just my two cents. if you think I'm full of it, that's totally fine.

high quality work here on all accounts - well done team. my only wish would be to set the dung ball on fire when rolling it through the fire to kill dem zombie bugs with rolling fire dung. 

I enjoyed the retro artsyle and the story was charming. I think you could exaggerate the big world / normal world contrast a bit more - maybe having the player character in the smaller world be actually smaller as well? or playing around with different pixel sizes for the tileset.  or including huge obstacles that are just every items in the big worlds, things like that. 

great character art and idea for a game. it is a bit too transparent in it's mechanics right now - there should be other consequences and repercussions to your decisions to make them feel meaningful. right now the game seems to force you to say yes often enough to someone until some threshold is reached, which does not really work as a core gameplay mechanic.

I enjoyed the playthrough, though I had to use the hints for the final "twist" if you know what I mean. to be honest, I thought the game might be broken not to accept my solution - which is a mean thing to think, but maybe it's helpful how I got there:
the controls where quite unintuitve, especially the zooming back out part. I restarted the game a couple of times, because I thought I was locked in a specific view and could not move back to the overview. after a lot of painful try and error I learned all the hotspots to move the camera back, but especially the journal one was really hard. I don't know if you wanted to make the controls a puzzle on it's own, but the effect was rather that the game felt buggy to me, which is why I rather thought the safe was bugged, then to look at the clues again and rethink my solution.

I hope you see this as constructive criticism rather then me dunking on you game, because I actually really liked the concept and the narrative and the puzzles - so all of the seemingly important stuff. but if the game feels buggy because of complicated controls it might prevent players from enjoying these things.

I like the minimalistic concept of the game, I think it definitely has potential. 
but for it to work you really have to polish all of the components - which is the extra challenge for a minimalistic concept in my opinion. a fun action game can be fun in its crappiest form, but when you are aiming for cosy vibes and player expression the minimal viable product must be way closer to the final product than most other types of games. I hope I don't sound overly critical, just my two cents of thoughts.

a wonderful entry. I loved the contrast between the technical world and the very humane music. and your take on the theme was spot on - really smart world design.
the timer was quite brutal sometimes, so I am wondering if failing some tasks led to the bad ending for me? 
i understand the timer is crucial for there to be a challenge, but maybe think about and try some variations if you want to keep expanding the game? like, maybe there's a general timer and it is about how many tasks you can accomplish, or a rating system for each job, so it's not failure after failure. but I still enjoyed my playthrough - thank you for the good times.

the POTENCH! keep at it!

that intro was spot on! the title is hilarious as well. and the small guy perspective is really well done.
gameplay is a little rough around the edges for me. the defending of the cookie and the running around to get more ammo is not really mixing well in my opinion. and I hoped the 5 second rule would make it into the gameplay somehow. but all in all, still a memorable entry. thanks!

I really liked your take on the theme and bravery of telling such a personal story. not as in "full of personal details"  but rather making a relationship and their personal memories the focus of a story.
I feel very conflicted about the AI generated art though. on the one hand it fits the vibe of the story very well and I think it is fair to say that you couldn't have drawn all these images even if you were a professional artist in time, so I totally get it. I mean I used generated art to create an ad campaign for my own game, so I get it.
But using that studio ghibli style when it is commonly known that its creator furiously hates the use of his lifes work for image generation.. it's tough. this shouldn't come across as a judgement, like I said: I get it from a developer's point of view. it's just something that I as a player have always in the back of my mind when I am playing and that prevents me from really diving into the story.

cute!

great style and super unique concept. the clues are VERY sparse and mostly repetetive though. so in the end I still clicked randomly on all green spaces to find it. it's probably hard to create a balanced puzzle like that based on real places, but I enjoyed the tour through berlin none the less (I think it's the first time my actual home adress was featured in a game)

but I also wouldn't consider the place you are looking for a green area worth recommending ;-) it's mostly concrete and some patches of grass! I mean, have you ever been to Rehberge? now THAT is truly a magical green space...

got the quatsch quartett back together, those little rascals! 
the game felt really trippy somehow: the combination of over-the-top AAA graphics and a somewhat jenky/unpolished gameplay and the goofy narrative created a weird feeling of disconnect that was somehow... strangely engaging? using graphical assets of a quality that outshines your coding abilities usually spells catastrophy, but you kind of make it work. it was probably thanks to kacki that little turd.

I smiled the whole time - something about your game was just inherently funny. starting from the spot-on title, the cheerful animated character and the explosion sending you off into space: i was very amused. I'm not sure if the main game mechanic is working 100% as it is supposed to be, but it kinda added to the charm that the we sometimes just randomly sunk. honestly, just put a second player into it and have players push each other off the platform (or play coop - -their choice) and your are golden :-)

very impressive, wow. a unique gameplay mechanic that totally fits the theme AND well written characters with personality AND awesome hand-drawn art? you really meant business here, didn't you?

thanks!
you are right, my interpretation of the theme is not very obvious - but it's there. I wanted to capture that feeling of very old electronic toys with super limited output (like a couple of LCDs or a handful of LEDs) that still managed to create the experience of interactive worlds and mystery in the mind of their players. I still have fond memories of endlessly playing with this as a kid for example. so I guess "tiny worlds" to me means very limited technology that invites the players imagination to fill out the blanks -  as a contrast to modern "open worlds" that are vast and spelled out in every detail but might feel empty and meaningless.

haha, sorry for monolouging a whole manifesto on you, but I wanted to spell it out once for me, too :-)

very cool idea to reduce the fields for towers so drastically and have them interact with each other (I guess it's only the coffee truck for now, but there's quite the potential here)
I adore how you brought the little guys to life (and death) with so few pixels - reminded me of the classic lemmings game in the best way possible.

aha, another mini-game aficionado! super charming game with truly funny dialog and a great narrative hook.
I think the mini games themselves could use a little more juice/game feel and the whole game would profit from sound effects, but in general I really enjoyed my playthrough.

what a cool concept! I loved the straight forward name that made me instantly hyped.
the battle system with 3 different attacks was a really cool choice that made it unique and interesting.
I found the winning combination to be left grab + right cross + sting and so I never really changed that approached - so if you want to move forward it would certainly be good to give the player more meaningful choices here. but the basis for a cool game is definitely there. well done! 

everyone making it to level 45 (no matter how) is brilliant in my book. thank you for the kind words and your time.
the hint in level 45 has a bit of an attitude and makes you wait - but it is there ;-) 

to be honest, the puzzle type you seem to have problems with is a 100 times easier with the right outside knowledge (which is the binary numbers system in this case) and I always felt a bit uneasy to include it because of that - so you can totally blame the game.

mmh, I'm pretty sure the second globe was still black when I entered after finding the first scroll. strange. maybe I missed a trigger by not solving all the puzzles correctly?

really liked the art direction and how you incorporated the chip circuits into the game design (I mean the glowing paths). top-down 3D is still underused and can look so cool (like how the columns in your game bring depth to the visuals for example) 
I immediately felt the players movement was too slow but then I realized there are upgrades, which motivated me to keep playing. I think however the upgrades have too little effect. I think I bought the movement speed upgrade 6-8 times and still felt too slow to deal with the enemies. especially for a game jam it might be good to be generous with these things, right?

wow, thank you for the high praise!
the web build plays surprisingly good on mobile by the way.

super impressive, team. starting from the hilarious story and player character to the beautiful (handcrafted? good lord!) world to the cool puzzle and platformer mechanics. I found myself trying to cheat by taking blocks from previous rooms with me, and now I am wondering if you actually need to do that in order to collect all eggs/scrolls? I haven't gotten that far yet (but you should absolutely do that).
a small (hopefully constructive) critique: I felt discouraged to go on after collecting the first scroll in level 1 and got send back to the hub world, with the only option to go back into world 1 again and solve the same initial puzzles a second time. for a new player the telekinesis controls are a bit finicky, so solving these puzzles again felt more like busy work.
Still, at the end of the day a massive achievement.
please tell me you did the voice yourself as well? it was *chef's kisses*

crazy good. that's all i can say right now.