Thanks, friend. Honestly, I started a day late and I spent the whole time wishing I could add more. I agree with you, 100%, and I appreciate the feedback! :)
I tried to play about an hour ago, got stuck on the Unity loading bar (several times, actually), but I came back now and it was worth it. Loved the creepy ambiance. Really good with headphones.
For a first game, this is not bad! The only thing I think you should keep in mind is that dinos spawn pretty frequently, and especially early on while you're too weak to handle them, things can get a little unmanageable. But still, the art looks pretty good and I do like slinging rocks at dinos.
It felt really good to zip around and creating platforms to jump / bounce off of is always something I love to see. My only suggestion for you is to make it a little easier, or to add easier stages early on because of the difficulty spike.
For your first game jam, I have to say this is pretty d4mn good. I'm going to give my feedback in a little sandwich, in a (Good | Bad | Good) so I can write everything I can down but also spread it out properly.
Starting with the positives: great idea. Imagining a sentient pipe knocking down birds is pretty funny. It's also clever how you subtly incorporated the theme: [Trade Offs]. Birds come at you quickly, so you build up points quickly, but it's also hard to get to them all and to stop them.
Moving on to some of the negative feedback (remember that none of this is intended to target you nor hurt your feelings). The problems I encountered amount to glitches or maybe a connection error (probably from my laptop because I'm in Florida during one of the worst rainstorms I've seen this year). For me, your main song gets choppy/glitchy, and so does the sound effects while playing. What's strange is that your game over theme is completely fine. Also, I don't know why but the resolution became really small, and some text was shrunk as a result.
One more thing I should mention is about the natural course of infinite side scrollers. Due to the fact that they're infinite, they really suffer from repetitive gameplay. That's why most mobile games (including the original Flappy Bird) are really fun to play for the first time but lose their charm over time due to the same action happening again, and again, and again. I don't blame you for this, because I admit I have no idea how to solve this problem. My best guess as to how to solve the problem of infinity is to maintain unique engagement for a long time. Maybe a story could help, or more mechanics to change how the game is played. Still, infinity is infinity, and nothing can last forever.
Back to the good things, you gave this game a really great feel. The pixel art is super consistent with the chiptune music and the UI. There's no crazy juxtaposition nor contrast between a pixel art game over screen and a painted start screen. Through and through, this game is definitely arcade, from the high skill ceiling to the score counter being in hundreds to the timer. It's as if you turned Flappy Bird into Pong, especially with how you control the pipe and stop 'balls' (birds) from entering your zone.
Also, get your idea done quickly. (mostly quickly, don't rush or sweat it) For me, I've been unable to submit to several jams because I took so long to handcraft the perfect idea that I couldn't finish the game :( Remember that you can ruin a great idea with a bad game, but you can use a great game to help an underdeveloped idea.
Nooope, not at all! You still have about 2 days to finish your game. Even though the submission date says to submit it by April 1st at 12:00AM, this jam is lenient enough to let you submit your game around/during judging, but I would try to get it done before then. It's my first jam too, so I wish you luck!
