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Thanks Crev! Means a lot to me that you enjoyed it!

I did it, ma. I finally touched grass.

Nice little game! Love the music especially!

Thank you Bear Shaman! Yeah the enemies were a evolving balance to get right. They start off very mild but get more twisted as time goes on. I cut some particularly nasty patterns near the end of the development time to go a little easier on players, I think that was the right call. Thank you for your kind and generous assessment of my game 😊

I agree with the others that this is very difficult in its current form. I personally thought the firehead enemies were very fast, and I thought it was tough that the flying enemies shot directly downward and most of my units shot directly upward, making it quite tricky to effectively keep them out of harm's way. So more unique firing patterns on the squad could help with that, the bow is a nice start. I also wanted to suggest formations rather than individual positions. You could let the player customize a number of these that could be changed on the fly, and they set up their units to their liking before the fight. Combined with some upgrades, that's a nice strategy layer. All that being said, I like seeing like ideas like this because they're obviously trying to break new ground. What would a multi-unit bullet hell / heaven look like? You made me wonder. Thanks for that.

Thank you Captain, aye aye Captain! Glad you appreciated the controls, that was a tough decision, but ultimately I think it's right for this game too.

woooo that last level is a doozy. I can honestly say I enjoyed this game the more I played it. I especially like how the slimes noticeably weigh the player down too, so you there is a trade-off to just trying to horde them. It was interesting to stash them strategically, or use them to kill enemies. And I find it gracious that you gave the player a ledge grab on top of it all too. Nice little jam experience!

Huh. Cool. Interesting. Nice space cubes. I liked clicking on them. It was like clicking on little fireworks. I didn't really get the second Breakthrough part where the particles kind of pulse in and out of the planet core, but more clicks kept things going. I handled the upgrade screen the same way, clicking with wild abandon as I couldn't make sense out of most of it in order to make an informed decision. Did not detract from my experience, to be honest. I was wondering if the game would scope out to eventually form suns, solar systems, star clusters, and galaxies. It didn't, but you know... it could. Nice little prototype :)

Ah, I'm glad I got you invested! I suppose we all wish we could have magnetism all the time, but life just isn't that way. Thanks for playing!

Ah, too bad it's so short! I was expecting to use Stone & Gold to build an Adventurer's Guild, which would then need weapons and armor and riches to gear up Heroes and they would be sent to Dungeons and... well you get the drift, I'm sure. Pretty easy to imagine this spinning out into a whole incremental fantasy. This isn't the only node based incremental game I played in this jam, there was another one, Forge Master or something like that? Do you see a UX or other advantage to going with nodes and not like a city builder or inventory or other more traditional setup? It's interesting to see cropping up and makes me wonder about its possibilities. 

Thanks Brandt! Glad you had fun :)

Love the pun in the title. The "special" connections were by far the best and most interesting part of this game for me, I wish there had been many more! There was a couple of times, when I realized the caller actually could have been connected to someone else, but I didn't do it in the right order or during the right call, resulting in a failure. Obviously this becomes very fraught with possibility very quickly, but a few more edge cases would have made the experience felt more smooth. When will we get the lore about why the Germans of this small town only communicate in English when speaking over the phone? Hehe, nice game, thanks for it.

Thank you Anthony! Yeah, it was fun to make. I knew the scope wasn't too out of control this time. I figured that I had to be on the right track when I caught myself not just playtesting code changes but continuing to play the game for itself afterwards and having to make myself stop and get back to work, of course usually forgetting what I was testing for that time and whether it worked or not 😂

Hey thanks Taz, glad you enjoyed it. And ah yeah cool, thanks also for guinea pig testing it on Linux. I want to stick it on my Steam Deck but haven't had a chance yet. I have the Scores saved in a Google Sheets document.

That's what I like to hear! Thanks for playing, Roger.

Nice little space adventure. Well that escalated quickly! I went from fighting one or two ships to like a dozen all at once! Somehow, I made it to the next station and made repairs. I enjoyed the boss battle and the cool fly-by animation at the end too. I wish the beam laser was longer, if felt more like a downgrade imo when range is safety. All in all, I had fun and I can rest now that the Galaxy is reconnected again.

You'll look back on your early work with nostalgia eventually, don't you ever dare delete it. Keep at it, trust the process, remember the only real competition is with yourself. Thank you for your kind and generous assessment of my game.

Cool novel concept. I like the flavor of the intro and the desperate picture of the last intelligence on Earth clinging to life. It eventually seemed to me that there was no way to win this game, so I allowed it to end. I think you had room here to progress the difficulty with more burned out tiles as time went on. Eventually progressing to an almost impossible difficulty would have nicely fit your theme of desperate survival. I also would have liked it if I could have clicked and dragged my mouse from the rod all the way to the battery to draw the path. All in all, this was an interesting entry and I love seeing such creativity in someone's first project. Well done!

Thank you!

A tomato? A measly tomato? I am the chosen racoon. How about a freaking entire Birthday Cake?!? I need more racoon mythos, I was getting into it. A few more stealth mechanics to deal with the "Wardens" would've been nice, either a stealthy crawl, or a chew toy distraction, perhaps the humble cardboard box? But you guys already packed a lot in here in ten days, so I understand we have to be reasonable in the end.

The underwater sonar sound for the gunfire is just *chef's kiss* 👌 Love the mood and the dread of navigating this rectangularly haunted sea. You managed to make those squares so scary! Another credit to your audio implementation, I'd say. I wanted to come here and complain about not being able to shoot more, but upon short reflection, I understand it would not have worked for the atmosphere.  Kind of reminded me of a devlog series I watched on Youtube for a game called Feed the Deep. Well done entry, good work.

Thanks Collider! It was a busy ten days 😅 I felt that a Leaderboard was an absolute must for this particular game to complete its Arcade hook, I think I built it on Day 5. Glad you enjoyed.

I thought my memory was doing pretty well until Level 8, then it all fell apart 😅 I liked the juicy effects of a successful match, you display a good understanding of color.

aaaaaaa thank you Biscotti!

Real they're taking the hobbits to Isengard vibes. You weren't kidding, this was tough. My years of Wizard Academy training were thwarted multiple times by ankle-high shrubbery. This could have been made a lot more forgiving if Planar Shift also set a checkpoint that the player respawned to upon death. Just a thought. I loved the guy straining so hard in the corner lol. Journal intro was a nice touch too. Glad I can get back to Skype-ing with my wizard bro again.

I'm putting this in the Accolades trailer 😂

Pretty cool, I don't think I've been a Swirl of Light in a game before. I like how all the puzzle areas felt different. I wasn't able to figure out the East path solution with the other swirl though. I agree with the comments about checkpoints, I think any beacon you lit should stay lit across deaths, it fits with the central theme of the tree's growth and the repetition of re-solving already solved areas doesn't offer much value to the player - even Dark Souls leaves open the doors that the players unlock along the way. All in all, this game has a unique feel all its own, and I think that's a credit to you hand-crafting all your assets. Nice work!

Yo DSG! Great seeing you play this on stream this morning while I had my coffee. So glad you enjoyed it. I have had multiple people tell me about their Nokia snake nostalgia! I am right there with you guys. Simpler times...

Really cool and nicely juiced up with many little details. Love the soundtrack especially. The puzzles scaled up in difficulty appropriately. My only nitpick I might offer you is that I kept forgetting if the Up arrow was up left or up right, similarly for the other keys. Maybe a 60 / 30 perspective could have alleviated that. Or maybe it's a skill issue and I need to git gud. Nice little jam game, I enjoyed solving it! I hope these two blocks eventually realize the precious importance of their shared connection...

Ikaruga is an all-timer but I have to admit I never beat it either. I also share a soft spot for the companions. Glad you appreciated the novel controls, that was a tough choice, but it felt more right to me to hit the level of flow I was seeking to induce in players. Thanks for stopping by!

Nice hedgehog. Coconut made the whole thing worth it. ❤️

For a first game, this is a pretty novel concept. I like that you didn't just go with something that everybody does for a early project, like Snake 😅 What I mean is that this shows real creativity. I liked getting into the swing of the slingshots, and then realizing later there was actually a bit of puzzle-solving on top of the mechanical skill required in choosing the order of planets. I did eventually realize I could slowly detach from an orbit ring and just steer my ship to the next planet, or even back to the one I just left, which removed a good portion of the challenge. One solution to that would be if the player's steering while not in orbit was limited or disabled. All in all, it was fun to pretend to be an astronaut sling-shotting my way around the solar system 🚀next time - you're not allowed to skip audio. I forbid it!

Yeah, I was lucky to have enough time to try and add a layer of game feel to every "thing" that happens in the game, with only a couple of exceptions. Including SFX, it took multiple days! Worth it though, I agree. Your game was super cool too, it needs a life on mobile devices. Thanks for the kind words and thanks for playing 🙏

Snake++ would've been a great name! I wonder if its under copyright... 🤔 Thanks for playing, Chroma

Gotcha ya stupid clanker. Thanks for bringing me back to my childhood to flex skills I honed apparently only for this moment. Nice art style too, I like it!

Damn Mongrel, top dog of the Leaderboard. LEN is me by the way, the only score above yours as of this comment, and yeah, that's my personal best, left there as a challenge to ambitious players. You might be the chosen one! 😝

Yeah, I tried to get it fully supported on mobile browsers before deadline except I couldn't figure out how to get the right turn working with touch input. I wanted it to be Tap Left half of Screen -> Turn Left, Tap Right half of Screen -> Turn Right, but I was surprised to find I could not find a way for the itch browser to determine whether a click was from a real mouse or a touch input. If I just put that logic on for all clicks, it would be very confusing for mouse users left clicking on the right half of the screen so that doesn't work, I need to filter based on device type. If anyone knows how to do it, please chime in!

I suppose I could focus on an .apk for Google Play, but browser seems so much more accessible, but not sure if that's also true for mobile devices. I might need to take another dive into it, several people have mentioned mobile at this point. Thanks for your input. And yeah, Leaderboard is getting crowded, defend your spot! 😝

Thank you Kraft! Yeah, I had all the major systems in by about the halfway point of the jam, including the enemy waves, the powerups, and the Leaderboard, so I had lots of headroom to give everything a second or third go-over to make it all shine and work together. I am pleased you noticed. :)

Oh, this was fun, I love a good tower defense and yours had a nice unique feel to it. It was pretty obvious to me what made the big guy spawn, so after my first run failed, the second time I saved up a surplus to get ready and absolutely unload on him. Maybe if he spawned based on a timer, the player would have some harder choices to make whether they want to invest early in economy or defense. Also I loved your choice of music. Nice work, I had fun here :)

Hi Lestavol, glad you enjoyed it. As for inspirations, I'd say Snake and Asteroids are the most prominent ones yeah. There's also some Space Invaders in there, one of my buddies even insisted I should name the game Snake Invaders. Also Gradius was a big influence for me personally, I played the hell out of  the R-types. I could similarly list any number of Bullet Hells and Schmups emerging from that era. Pong or Pinball is present, I'd argue there's even a bit of Pac-Man here too, where you switch from Prey to Predator at the drop of a hat. I even prototyped a Pac-Man style power-up in this game that would make enemies flee from you, but ultimately scrapped it as it was buggy and shared too much ground with other power-ups.

But mostly that's just name-dropping. I was inspired by the vibe of that time, when you'd go into an Arcade with some quarters and randomly play something really weird but fun above all, maybe with an offbeat name, barebones graphics and no tutorial. Maybe it wasn't even in a language you could read. So many ideas were connecting and cross-pollinating during those early experiments, you might recognize some part of the gameplay but be surprised by other elements emerging. There would be only a couple of buttons to learn, and while some cabinets would capture interest for a few minutes/quarters, some players would become determined to get their initials on the Leaderboard. I thought I'd try to make a game that would've fit neatly into a corner of one of those arcades.

I decided to play the version on your Github page that you mentioned in case that had some kind of essential update, and I have to say that the AI voices totally took me out of the story. I was kind of stunned to come here and see the reviews. Then I checked the itch version of the game, no voices! I think the narrative certainly works better without the AI voice cast, sometimes less is more. Not that I'm expecting anyone to have a full voice crew on hand for their Jam game, but the package presentation matters, if that makes sense. Also figuring out who you need to connect is maybe just a little too easy if you only have to listen for a person or street name. I think you're just getting by with the AI silhouette art, but the voicework is a bridge too far, in my opinion.