Hello! The prize for winning this jam was for you to stream a video of my game - where can I get a link for that video to share on my own socials? Thanks!
Loressa
418
Posts
6
Topics
71
Followers
124
Following
A member registered Mar 02, 2021 · View creator page →
Creator of
Interactive fiction set on the Martian frontier.
Interactive Fiction
Play in browser
A text-focused choice-based detective game in a mystical setting.
Puzzle
Play in browser
Recent community posts
Presidential Rise (Demo Version) jam comments · Replied to Ilusif Studio in Presidential Rise (Demo Version) jam comments
Notes from gameplay:
Nice intro section with how-to and definitions.
The cycle “never know what secrets” is a great show-don’t-tell example to immediately get the concept across. Most IF players instantly understand the click cycle, but for players new to the genre it's not intuitive. In my last game, a YouTuber didn't understand the concept at first. You do a great job here of leading the player to click it and then showing what happens
Game formats well on mobile. Only issue I'm seeing is pics being cut off on the right side
Countdown backwards in years is effective
Effective font switch to convey old school gaming at the Zdlelda part
Nice music here - is there music earlier in the game that didn't play (potential bug?). Edit: ah, I see, it's music for each game! Clever.
Nice text effect on “I froze” - I like how the shake is at odds with the action described, succinctly demonstrates the conflict you were going through. Consider a line break afterwards and maybe centering the line for higher visual impact.
Lol at the heterosexual sims file
“And then Eric came out” - effective to have just this text on this page.
I didn't feel like playing anything - great subversion of the pattern you've established.
The Mass Effect page drives home the importance of bisexual representation and sharing stories from a bisexual point of view…which is exactly what you've done with this story!
Page with “cinema’s concession stand” is missing line breaks between paragraphs
Dragon Age music doesn't play until the page afterwards. Intended?
References page has a formatting error in the link for typewriter effect
----
I really enjoyed this. Thanks for baring so much of your own story - representation is important and I saw so much of myself in this story! I even teared up a bit. I like the framing of using video games and the formatting swaps were effective to reinforce that storytelling binary. The writing is clean, approachable and has some beautiful moments of description and humor. Awesome work!
Notes from gameplay:
- Nice detail to include an icon for the game application
- Interesting art choice. It definitely gives a "funhouse" vibe. I think making all the art share the same style will help with visual appeal.
- The visual effect on the platform is interesting! It doesn't really fit with the current graphics, but I'd definitely save this code for a future project - it would be great in a cyberpunk themed game.
- I like that you made the scenery animated, although I think the animations could be improved by being slowed down.
- sound balance has issues, inconsistent levels
- Death! sign is cute
- I like the audio feedback from collecting coins
- Nice job returning me to the start when I "die"
- Nice job with a score tracker! The score isn't resetting when I am returned to the start, however
- Nice job with movement and detection of obstacles.
- Is the ghost supposed to kill you, or is it just for decoration?
- Gameplay is very intuitive, just press spacebar to jump! Edit: is this autoforward intended?
- I like the change in facial expression when you jump!
- Jump feels smooth, nice job on the physics. I like the ability to double jump!
- Consider if you want the camera centered on the player or the platform - centering on the player can be disorienting when the jumps are high
- Got stuck on a lower level jumping from a small platform chunk to the scarecrow surrounded by coins
- Interesting, after restarting the game I am now being hit by blue flames, eyeballs, etc. These weren't here on my first run through!
- I like that I can squash the blue flames
- Stuck on the second scarecrow
- OH. I JUST REALIZED YOU CAN USE THE ARROW KEYS! Much easier now :P
- There are multiple levels! Nice job having different colors and themes on each of these!
- Good visual cue for end of level with the purple staff
- What do these balloons do?
- It looks like falling off a platform sends me downwards until I find the next level. Unfortunately, on level 1, it just makes me fall forever!
- Kapow! Punching birdies!
- One of the platforms is moving! This seems like a cool idea, but I think it's glitching, doesn't reappear after death.
- Reached the end and started back at level 1. Score of 42,200!
- Really nice work with your placement of coins. Some offer challenge (between the spiders) while some are perfect for where the jumping will take me. Great job here!
Overall, I can see that you've put a lot of work into this project! Keep it up!
Notes from gameplay:
- Nice instructions telling us what to do! People is typod
- Ghost sprite is cute, reminds me of Slimer from ghostbusters :)
- Looks like there are icons cut off on the bottom
- Spacebar to jump. Should the whole screen be bouncing with me? Looks like the camera is tethered to the sprite
- Ok, fire bad! Don't want into that :P
- Nice audio feedbacks on failures and when I collect Luigis (?)
- Movement feels very smooth.
- I think the timing of some of the incoming punches could be improved. It feels like I have to sit and wait sometimes to be able to avoid them, but with a platformer you want it to be go go go jump go go jump, you know? The ideal runthrough should feel like a smooth dance.
- Punches only come through once - maybe put them on a cycle?
- Left bottom needs a wall to stop player from running off the map
- The momentum is...interesting. It feels a bit too much, but if the animation shifted as the player slowed it might feel more intuitive. I think right now there is a visual disconnect between the sprite and how it's moving.
- Got 24, after many tries!
- Nice job including a play again button. I like the design of the button, with the little reflective glare in the top left. Mind how text fits into that, see how the g clips out?
This is a fun effort! It was a tricky little puzzle :) Great job for an early game dev project, keep up the good work!
Can't access devlog page.
<Error>
<Code>AccessDenied</Code>
<Message>Access Denied</Message>
<RequestId>YQXFRA7MSK3JSJSQ</RequestId>
<HostId>+FTio/c5ogbvO0HuLIzIIyPRF2C/ugHNS4/OsjomzpF87ea61sRTMsc9P7I+hfnm3d+DhEKz4eF7ZtCN2lzfhQ==</HostId>
</Error>
If you can fix that, please reply here and let me know and I'll give it a read through before the jam ends!
Presidential Rise (Demo Version) jam comments · Posted in Presidential Rise (Demo Version) jam comments
Notes from gameplay:
Splash screen:
- Music is decent. Not too distracting, melodic. A bit too repetitive, I think. It eventually shifts to a much more soothing melody. Maybe just shorten the intro of repeated chords?
- Title font is too pixelated to easily read. Button fonts have nice legibility while still being pixelated.
- Typos and grammatical errors, such as in continue (should be saveD game) and difficulty
- Would be good to be able to select gender
Intro:
- Skip all button is nice feature
- Art is very pixelated...
- Loading icon, can't tell what that is
- "Printing" noise gets a bit grating
- Nice text, though feels a bit chat-gpt, maybe spice up the wording to inject some personal style
- Wish I could be a female president...
- Grammatical errors ("on what do I say", missing period, etc)
- Text box feels a bit too long on a wide screen, maybe have it adjust in width based on screen size?
- You switch tense from past to present when the dialog part begins - is this intended?
- Nice sprites for the dialog
- This intro is looooong without any gameplay
Game:
- Story impact report looks nice. Conveys information well and looks polished. Nice use of green text to reinforce something changed.
- Overall UI looks polished. I like the box shadows, nice touch.
- Background noise overlay is a lot. Chatter, sirens, etc, becomes a bit distracting
- A tutorial is great to have, but this needs to be more interactive. I've just been hitting next for the entire game.
- Try to keep tutorial information in-character. It's odd to see the secretary of state saying "as the game is generated"
- Music is sounding nice. There are some pretty tracks in here!
- Info dump, I'm kinda forgetting what I've already been told
- Why is text flashing in the building request?
- Create button in the building request doesn't seem to do anything
- Help section is great, although the repeated opening paragraphs about what the game is are unnecessary and hinder finding useful how-to info. Very obviously chatGPT - need to edit the results it spits out. To not do so suggests to players that the game is just copy/paste from a LLM, although I'm sure you've put a lot of work in
- Clicked game world and now I'm back in the infrastructre overview, have to click next through again
- Maybe add a setting to adjust text display speed
- Lots of cool setup here! I'm in the building section and there looks like lots of future gameplay. Maybe guide players through where to click to build that first landfill. I forgot how many I need to build by the time I found it.
- Looks like I'm being forced to next day?
- Claimed the landfill result. Guess stuff is just done instantly?
- No more requests, what to do now?
- Oops back in main menu., from settings popup. Maybe put close on the left and then main menu on the right. Left is what we read first and consider the default click option.
- Confused about the game world. I can zoom in/out and drag it around, but is it just there for background aesthetics? Doesn't seem like I can interact with it.
- Can't unlock anything, not enough technology
- Next day, I guess? Maybe I'll get a request...
- Had to skip several days to get another request
- Feels like I'm just clicking buttons. Create, create, claim. Not doing much thinking or making choices
- Hit next chapter
- The dialogue writing could be improved a lot
- I can demolish buildings after creating them and still claim rewards
- Next day button displays a visual error while the popups for day change are displayed
- Lol why does the president own 60 food trucks
- Visual effect on demolish is nice. Not clear what demolishing does. Do I get money back? Sound effects imply that I do, but I can't see my stats from the building window, so I can't see any changes updating
- Destroyed all the police, fire and hospital. I still seem to be quite popular. The people crave anarchy!
- Multiple requests of the same type can queue up at once if you skip and don't build. I was able to complete 2 solar power station requests at once with one building command.
- Lol I'm at super high popularity now. Who needs hospitals!
Overall, it's a complex and ambitious effort. I like the polished UI and all the stats and charts, but I think the core gameplay itself needs to be refined and made more interactive.
Hello, other jammers!
I have unfortunately been in the hospital. I've now added our game's devlog and will be playing through all the games!
https://loressa.itch.io/pindan/devlog/755913/pindan-devlog-for-dropbear-jam
Thanks again for such an extensive playthrough and such useful feedback - I'm pleased that you eventually understood my concept of the evolving item descriptions. If you wait a few hours, I'm hoping to get a fully functional build up. The current built SHOULD get you through to the end if you just want the story, but it doesn't have all the item descriptions/magazines yet. Also I might add a third ending and I'll punch up text a bit (deadline writing!). I was ill for part of the jam and missed 2 days of dev, so I'm doing catchup right now.
I can't address all of the feedback in this next build, it's mostly just focused on finishing content, but I appreciate a lot of your points and will work them in where I can.
There is an overall theme/reason for it all, but I won't share what I was going for until I've added the rest of the content - hopefully that will explain this. This is kinda an experiment in oblique/indirect storytelling, though I've gone rather heavy handed in it.
The Arcbow Anthology jam comments · Replied to Projekt Kloszard in The Arcbow Anthology jam comments
Thanks for the feedback!
The web version is the entire game - it's made in twine using html, CSS and JavaScript so a big part of the jankiness is me still figuring out how to make stuff and learning how to code. The original version of the archery minigame was in my last game Delve - you just clicked buttons to select your aim (high/medium/low) and draw strength. This new iteration was a project for me to learn how to create CSS animations and SVG maps which interacted with JavaScript functions.
Do you have any suggestions for ways to improve the minigame?
Improving the overlay images is the first goal. Those were some 11th hour creations heh. I was thinking of adding a reticle overlay which the player could adjust to different power levels to see where the shot should hit if they are at 50% or 25% power, for example. That would help focus the game around the timing element.
Which parts of the story feel most rushed to you? Where did you feel like you wanted to explore the world a bit more? I'm going to be expanding this out for a future feedback jam, and would appreciate your feedback!
Thanks again for playing :)
Cool twist on pong! Took me a bit of time to realize I was the red orbs - at first I thought, wow I'm really good at this game, but the controls don't seem that responsive... :P The AI is quite good and definitely beats me but if I had a teammate to play this with, I image it would be a different story! I love couch co-op games and feel like this could be an early prototype for a 2-player console game. Maybe AI could decouple and have each orb move independently. Could get quite complex and fun.
Notes from gameplay:
- Graphics are simple, but work fairly well to convey what they are. Chests are clearly chests.
- Enemy art and explosion animation is well done, reminds me of old atari games like Turrican
- Music is a bop, but could be a bit more spacey to fit the game vibe. Loops well. Replaying the game via space does not END the prior playing track, so tracks double up.
- Left click on rock while holding pickaxe doesn't seem to mine
- Shooting feels smooth, intuitive and easy. Aim handles nicely and enemy wave movement speed is a nice challenge without being too hard.
Decent little prototype to test out some different mechanics. Nice use of sound and art assets to create a cohesive experience.
Camera being fixed makes this disorienting to play, but I seem to have got the hang of it eventually! Got up to #2 on the leaderboard! Looks like there may be a memory sink, however - the longer I played, the less responsive enemies got. Sound began to cut out and lag and the entire game became very slow when trying to enter my name for the leaderboard. Very tricky enemies. Maybe start them out a bit more slowly, so the player isn't being killed in the first few seconds. Once I had some time to move around, the game became easier!
Good use of simple UI/art, sound and a core mechanic to create a cohesive minigame!
Notes from gameplay:
- strong, identifiable pixel art. This is clearly the moon with earth in the background. I like the little thruster animation!
- Some of the trash feels too fast for the robot. Maybe consider something like speed boosts
- The momentum of the robot adds a fun layer of difficulty
- UI to tell me how I'm doing would be helpful
- Funny cut scene after losing. I like the shadow on the font, makes it crisp and legible
- the "ending" page is confusing. Are these clues? Different levels?
- somehow I ended up in your code? I'm guessing these are different endings I can discover?
- Yep. Did the "don't move" and got another ending, heh
The gameplay itself could be improved and tightened, especially with the addition of some UI/sound and perhaps one more movement mechanic. Beneath this, there's an interesting little surreal narrative going on, which I found engaging!
I think this is a good basic start for something like a mindfulness app! The text could be made easier to read, some sound could help enhance the 'de-stress' vibe and maybe consider user input options, like different types of coping activities (outdoor/indoor/art/etc). Nice job with the moving background art!
Notes from gameplay:
- Unclear which sprite I am controlling
- I think I'm the one on the right, although there is a second ship with the same design rotating the sun as well
- Struggling with controls. I seem to have gotten myself into a crazy spin which I can't stop, so my ship looks like a fidget spinner on steroids
- Gravity doesn't seem to affect my ship the way it does other items on the screen? I move right through the orbiting field of debris and hit the sun every time (edit: using gas helped)
- What am I aiming at? The other ship? Some color coding of assets may help here, eg making that ship red and mine green, making shots different colors/larger
- Why are there comments from 2 years ago on the main itch page?
Interesting concept and I like the use of gravity to enhance the classic asteroids game. Controls feel tricky to figure out and difficult to use. I seems to win most by just setting my ship spinning wildly.
Clever use of 3-D space for Go. I've seen chess and connect 4 with this concept - go is a very ambitious adaptation! I unfortunately don't know the rules for go, but figured them out a bit while playing. Managed to beat the AI with a smaller-size cube, Ending the game seems like it's missing some logic - no indication of who won, and need to fiddle with the play AI command/cube size or restart the game to play another round. I think the display could be made a bit more clear to read. On the larger cubes it can be tricky to track which depth level I'm interacting with after manipulating the cube.
Very interesting concept! I bet this would go over very well with fans of go!
Notes from gameplay:
- i like the color scheme!
- pixelated font is tricky to read
- appreciate the page of instructions!
I think this has potential to be fun, I'm just not really understanding how to play. I kinda think I get it, but if the goal is to match up the pixels on the borders, I can't see what those are once it's been played. A third contrasting color might help a lot here. Happy to do a replay with more instructions :)
Interesting! I haven't heard of this console before and struggled a bit with the commands at first until I realized I had to click - click + keyboard isn't very intuitive, but I understand the browser version is basically a port.
The writing is great and very evocative! If there are any branching choices here, I can't figure out how to find them. Tried looping through a few times, but seems like it replays the same game.
Notes from gameplay:
- Nice music, though it's a bit too repetitive. Making it a few bars longer would make it feel less samey-same. There's also one beat which feels like it slurs a bit too slowly.
- Great font choice. I like the flash on "press space to begin"
- Great cut scenes!
- Unsure what the mechanics are meant to be. Replaying.
- Figured it out - I thought at first that one of the sprites being shown was my own character.
- Is there a penalty to missing shots? Is there a penalty/bonus to doing multiple shots at once? Edit: seems so
Fun concept, though I'm not sure how intuitive it feels. The right half of the keyboard isn't one people tend to feel as comfortable blind-typing with. Overall presentation was fun and cohesive, with a nice little story framing the gameplay.
Strong solid concept and well-polished!
Notes from gameplay:
- Commands feel a bit overwhelming when reading the itch page. Good move including a tutorial!
- The mechanic to sacrifice life to save the planet sounds compelling on first read!
- Music is funky, beautiful and intriguing. Definitely gives me space vibes!
- Movement education in the tutorial is great, having to navigate to a specific spot really reinforces how it works!
- Art is polished
- Great details with visual feedback on the shift becoming active
- Really cool concept!
Overall, I think you made a great, polished version of a fun concept! I found myself overwhelmed at first, but I think this could be a type of game people find addictive - different controls may help with this. For example, this feels like it would suit a controller well. I could also see a slowed-down version as an educational game for kids. Fun concept, and well-executed!
What a creative concept!
Notes from gameplay:
- really like the music, chill and good loop
- pixelated text is harder on the eyes
- nice audio feedback with mouseover/click
- tutorial option is helpful, felt overwhelmed reading the commands on the itch page
- jump noise is super cute!
- would be nice to have less jarring visual feedback that you've selected an alien, didn't realize it was visual feedback at first, thought it was the game glitching
- oh wow this concept is really cool!
- am I supposed to bounce off myself? I don't think I have the timing skill for that. Can't figure out how to get past the tutorial level teaching about confirm orders. Keep falling on the jump to the platform with the eye.
- ah finally got the jump. Difficulty feels a bit overtuned for a tutorial.
- Browsed through the different levels and played a few. This is a really cool concept!
- maybe some extra bright hues or shadow behind the mushrooms to highlight they are interactive, I had forgotten they were and they seem to blend into the background versus standing out as interactive elements
Overall, I don't think I'm skilled enough to excell at this game, but for the right niche of players, this seems to have the potential to become very addictive! I could also see this being morphed into a couch co-op concept where each alien is controlled by a different player. Very creative and well-designed! The music was chill and unobtrusive, while the graphics leaned into the simple pixel style with a pared-down and visually-pleasing color palette. Great work. I could definitely see this expanded out into a bigger project!