itch.io

Great graphics, intuitive gameplay, and excellent movement! I adore the way our little character sticks to the walls and ceiling for a second, it's so satisfying and gives a good amount of grace period before falling to prevent it from being frustrating, very fun!!! Excellent job :D

Edit: after seeing screenshots of the fully mossed ending I had to try and get it- glad I did :D

I loved this so much!!! I was having so much fun playing trough the levels only to see the next one called epilogue and I was so sad to realise I'd reached the end- and then so happy that I got bonus levels to play!! So much whiplash

Excellent game, very nice graphics, I love the details of being able to click around the level and interact with things, it's so much fun!! I was positively delighted when I realised I could ring the bell :D On the rainy level with grandpapa frog I had to pull out a chair for him, even if he wouldn't come in out of the rain </3 

I will say the background music is a little bit unnerving, it's sorta relaxing which I presume is the vibe you were going for, but the discordant notes make it a little bit eerie?? But that may just be me :p

Some feedback I would like to suggest is making it more obvious when a level has to be completed by a certain turn, as I thought they all had that mechanic to begin with! Something like a star under the cutoff turn could help signify that specific bonus is needed! Additionally, it'd be handy if pinning the notes and cupboard open persisted through levels and level restarts! :D 
ETA: It'd also be useful if visual indicators of effects were more consistent! It sometimes takes a second for e.g. stinky waves to start showing, so it'd be a neat lil QoL fix :3

I noticed a couple of little bugs (bugs that I assume the frogs will probably eat in future versions): a visual glitch with the froggy limbs where they don't line up with themselves, and occasionally dialogue spoken by the wrong frog (speech bubble in the wrong place), both are super minor but I figured I'd mention in case you weren't aware of them! :D

But yesyes anyway, I really had a lot of fun playing this, the mechanics are super interesting and I love the way the levels objectives vary- such as purposefully making things stinky for a froggy bog ball (which is so on-theme!!), and leaving the kids socks wet (what a peculiar little dude <3) I love it so much, and the mechanic of turning white clothes black by ironing them is so freaking funny I love that 

Cool game :D

Cute! :D

Loved this!! The secret endings gave it extra replayability- I loved the good ending <3

Loved this gen played for an hour straight <3 Failed miserably in my first run, read the comments, and won in my second! :D

For anyone wanting a hint:

As asdaldo said in the comments below- the blue sparkle effect means temporary armour (first move only!), this makes armourtages VERY useful :D Also-! For some creatures it's more helpful to create them at level 1, use their attack until health depleted, and then merge, this is most useful with the armours again to make the most of their, well, armour! :D

Super cute!!

Love this game!!! Absolutely lovely visuals, such a simple art style but so easy to see and understand everything <3 the ui in the top right could afford to be a little bigger to see our stock easier, but it isn't a huge deal. You picked a great track for the game, it's fitting but doesn't get tiring to listen to on loop c: 

Had a lot of fun strategising, and managing resources, kept me on my toes cuz I thought I had a decent stockpile but boom!! Food shortage!! Panic!!!!!

Ended up getting the same crash other people mentioned- for me at least the trigger seemed to be there was no sand left on the level, so ig the game didn't know what to do sjdkfhdkjg- but yeah had a lot of fun, good job!!

Honestly I love this game, I love the primarily black/white colouring with some accent colours to pop, and the whole concept of farming moths <3 Genuinely really enjoyed this!!

I saw you mention in another comment about making a remake/sequel so!! Here is a bunch of feedback and ideas :D

• As others have said it gets difficult to keep up with the number of moths as you progress, I think it'd be great to be able to sell moths & caterpillars, as this way you can cut back if you feel overwhelmed, and it also means you can keep farming silk for clothes! (Currently I can't really afford to have more moths so rip to my potential clothes </3)
  • Speaking of- it'd be cool to be able to spin things to sell! E.g. selling our clothes, maybe things like blankets too! 
  • It'd also be useful to have a preview of the clothes before we make them- I didn't make the connection that e.g. "suit" meant the whole tophat outfit (I was expecting a purple suitvest or something slapped over my sprite without changing the hat for example!)

• It can be a bit finicky trying to interact with the right thing when multiple things are stacked, I've especially had trouble trying to feed moths sitting in front of plants/seeds. Not sure how this would be fixed- maybe a different key for feeding, and another new one for reorganising layouts (plant pots, and the cupboard I mention below!)

• It'd be great if there was a way to store seeds, maybe a cupboard you could set up/fix (more use for planks!) so you can restock and grab from there to stop cluttering of the level! (Could have another by the incubator for eggs & pumpkins :3)

• It'd also be neat to be able to drop items down to the bottom floor while you're on the middle one to save a trip down! 

• To begin with I had more time than I knew what to do with, but later on I was struggling to get everything done in time- perhaps a speed upgrade or even an upgrade that slows the day/night cycle could be very useful! :D

• For the pale moths- I presume they can eat both blue and purple food, if so it'd be neat if they prioritised whichever you have more of (mine ate the blue I was already low on sdjkhfkjdfg)

• I like the concept of the miracle water however it does mean even more items we need to carry which really builds up towards the end of the game. Maybe another upgrade could be the ability to hold stacks, so 2 items and then another upgrade for 3? 
  • It'd also be useful to be able to use the miracle water even after you've already watered so you don't get locked out!
  • Additionally- perhaps sprinklers could be another thing to fix :D (Buying metal pipes, maybe?)

• It'd also be useful to have a little counter of how many hungry moths you have yet to feed- the more you get the more difficult it is to keep track of them all!
  • Could also have a feeder to unlock later on in the game that you can fill with food for them to auto-eat from? (And maybe a little dinner bell to ring :3) That may be more difficult though if you fill it with food but then need said food for something else (e.g. feeding caterpillars) Just unlocked the lantern! Seems useful for feeding except for the bug (pun intended) where it's hard to feed em when they're standing in front each other >.< Also have to ferry the pumpkin flowers down- but a being able to carry multiple items would help with that!

• It'd be useful to have an indicator of when it's getting late! I know the sky gets lighter- but I'm not necessarily paying enough attention to know if it's not dark yet or if its already been dark and it's now morning :0 A simple "It's getting late..." could work :D

Ok phew that's a lot sdjkhfgfdkj!! But yes I really enjoyed this game, it's incredibly charming and the caterpillars especially are SO cute oh my god- I love the way they follow you to beg for food and the lil antenna wiggle they doooo <3<3<3<3 Love the visual key as to a moths state- hungry with droopy wings, fed with spread wings and pink blush (which means it's also colourblind friendly! I'm not, but others may be :D), and curled in and grey for starving! (Which oh my god I felt so bad when I first saw that djhgkdfj)

Also really enjoyed the character's dialogue, especially the phone interactions sjdghdkfjg they were so funny :D Super interesting implication that there's more moth nurseries out there, and these strange people somehow knew we were here (I wonder what they do with the dust and silk?? :0) I wonder if the fireflies told them!! 

Anyway, great game!!! Excellent work :D

Love this!! Had a ton of fun playing, great music and love the art (especially the intro it's so cute!! I love the squeaks)

It can be a bit fiddly at times trying to get the low health rats to eat, if they voluntarily moved towards it when at less than 100% health that'd help! (At first I thought it was because I was damaged and that they were too loyal to eat the food <3) ((They were not </3))

I also noticed that the health is restored when they get powered up, could be neat to have a low health rat prioritise getting the item, but not really that big of a deal

Also I love the TMNT reference in this!! I wanna bet they have a chance to drop pizza >:D Speaking of- is it completely random when they drop food or explode upon death? :0 Do the diff enemies have different loottables/drop chances? I presume diff loottables at least since spiders sometimes dropped small cheese chunks and I saw a few cats dropping croissants- it'd make sense for the bigger ones to drop bigger food :0

It was also a bit hard to tell at times what the lab and radio rats do- I think the labs run and attack first, and the labs explode(?) on death? (Or maybe that was something else, tbh I wasn't paying a huge amount of attention, I realised the best method was to charge right past the baffled enemy and have the tides of my sea of rats crash around them, completely engulfing them)

But enough about that, now for the picturats!! :D

I had so many rats at this point that they were carrying the mousetrap along with us for the ride

PUT THE MOUSETRAP DOWN OR I SWEAR I WILL TURN THIS ARMY AROUND RIGHT NOW

Thank you

And here is my highest total of rats I managed to get! :D

307!!!!!! We are gonna need a lotta pizzas.. at this point I no longer had to finagle getting the low health rats to eat the food, any edible item was simply Consumed

Definitely took a few runs (most miserable fails) before the RNG (rat number generator) gods decided to shower me with trashbags and feasts <3<3

Excellent game, I am very cheesed to have played it

Loved this!!! Super fun and inventive puzzles :D I will say I did get pretty stuck on a couple, (e.g. J1 and L1 I think??)that didn't have hints (often the solution was really obvious once I realised it after like..10 mins jdfhgjkdf)

But yes very cute game and I had a lot of fun, plus bonus points for rat!!! :DDD

If anyones stuck on the last one and wants a hint:

You can't get to the coins, so how can you get the coins to you? :3

This is really cute!! Would've been physically easier to be able to click & drag instead of all the clicking, but still a very cute game with a very adorable rat (whoever did the graphics did amazing)

Loved them pancaking!!!!!! Flat rat!!!!!!! :DDDDD

Edit since I just saw the description about it not working on mac- I'm on a mac so seems it does work now! :D

Damn this was awesome!! Played it over several days and had so much fun :DD I saw the game mentioned as inspiration for several other games so I had to come try it and I'm very glad I did! Also appreciate the honesty of using ai art and hiring an actual artist to redo it, as an artist it means a lot <3

But yeah great story and excellent mystery, did get stuck a few times so the optional magnifying glass hints was appreciated :D Also love the general physical setup and layout of the game, with the family tree including pictures and jobs, and the 3-part search on the computer (and of course the notes feature, my god I ended up writing so much on some pages that the text is tiny sjdkfhkdjg), great game I had a lotta fun!!

9/10 yippee :DD love the art!!

Loved this!!!

cool concept and execution! the snake guy is a really fun design

Super fun! :D

No problem at all, I look forward to seeing it! 

If I may add one last note, having finally prestiged I will say the mutation costs are a lot higher than I expected for how long it took to get the points, I would suggest making it a bit easier to get mutation points!

Just letting you know I've encountered this same issue when respawning at Zone 8!

Ok first of all the visuals and aesthetic are incredible, the black and white and the filter making it look like an old horror movie?? Perfection.

The gameplay is pretty decent, I'm enjoying it and so far the progression feels mosty well balanced! 

I have noticed an issue with the runners in that they oftentimes aren't actually any faster than the shamblers? I thought they were entirely bugged until I had one actually running ahead, while simultaneously having another that couldn't overtake the main shambler hoard. This also makes the Runner Rush sigil unreliable as I have no way of knowing if it'll spawn useful runners, or if I'll be wasting my contagion points.

Speaking of contagion, I really like that mechanic, it's great to have a resource that is only for that run, meaning I can spend as much as I like! With the brains and flesh I need to weigh up spending it now or saving it for the next run (Which is also good! Having both types of currency is good for variety :D)

There is some confusion in the wording, namely upgrades saying "X per level", and I wasn't sure if that meant per zone? Like if passing each zone in a run levelled up my zombies, then I realised it probably meant per level of the upgrade? I think it'd be clearer to just say e.g. "+10% health (+30% currently added)" or something along those lines! 

It'd also be useful to have a graphic of each human character when talking about the types, as it leaves me guessing which one is which :0 It'd also be great to have a little notebook or bestiary of the human types to more easily reference them, as currently their pages are buried in all the other tips and new upgrade popups. Perhaps a notebook with the human image on one page and their information on the other? Just an idea! 

I also wasn't entirely sure if the "total health" for each zombie type meant all the current units added together, or the health for a single unit. I'm leaning more towards the latter but that is another thing that could benefit from clearer wording! 

It'd also be nice to have a slower scroll for the upgrades, as currently scrolling goes far too fast to comfortably navigate the list! There's the same issue with the sigil list, but with that one you also can't even click and drag making it even harder.

Also "Best Zone" made me think the highest zone I'd reached, making me think it'd bugged when it didn't update when I hit Zone 5! Turns out it means best zone completed :p

For one last quick suggestion, it could benefit from a dedicated pause button! Thankfully it is possible to pause by going to the glossary, but that is a few clicks, so a specific pause button would be a bit more fluid, but it isn't exactly a big deal if not!

But yes I really am enjoying this and again I adore the aesthetic and visuals, the characters all being black with a pixel outline really fits the vibe as well as being visually simple to avoid being too visually busy when there's lots of characters on-screen! I also really like that all the silhouettes merge together with just the single outline rather than overlapping outlines, it's a small detail but it does a lot!! Overall this is a very neat game with enjoyable gameplay, great job!! :DD

Honestly this is a neat idea! I will say the photorealistic images may be difficult for people afraid of the bugs in question, I know I was uncomfortable with the image of the centipede as I have a phobia of them- it might be good to do it in stages! Like start out with the fun fact and a cute cartoony drawing of the bug, and then once you've been primed with the cute and endearing information, you can click to reveal the (edited to be crunchy like these images) original image the drawing was based on! Might make it a bit less in-your-face :0 Could also maybe like scribble hearts around them (the realistic images), or a silly hat and monocle over their head, to make it more fun! :D

But yes I do like this and I think it could work!! The fact about the centipedes did help a little bit, I'm still very uncomfortable with them but maybe a little bit less so now! 

Also I discovered you can edit the text on the pages lol

Edit: Forgot to say but I love the voicelines when navigating to the diff pages it's so fun!!! :DDD So whimsical and silly 

Cute!

Took a moment to understand how some things worked, but was pretty fun and definitely an intertesting concept :D

Ooooh this was cool!! Love the catfish that made me laugh, and great music choice!

I love this!!!! Perfect artstyle for the feeling of the game, great sound design and music, and a fun gameplay loop! I kept thinking I'd reached the end of the demo only to unlock several more upgrades!!!!! This was a lotta fun :DDD

Honestly pretty fun :D

I love this!! The whole concept is awesome and the graphics are really nice, and the gameplay loop is very fun! I love the details of lots of types of ores, such as tin, rather than the typical copper/iron/gold/etc, I imagine once the game is done there'll be a whole bunch and it'll help give it a lot of depth!! 

I do have some feedback, mainly about the rails! 

1. It'd be way easier to be able to move in the minecart using wasd rather than holding down left click, it'd be more intuitive and help give your finger a break lol

2. Ideally you wouldn't be able to pick up rails while it's not selected in your hotbar, I misclicked a couple of times and ended up picking up rail pieces and having to replace them, imo you should only be able to edit them while you've got them selected!

3. It'd be neat if there was a way to auto-stop at rail crossways, as currently you just zip past any other routes connected, meaning if you want multiple directions connected to the same rail, you have to slow right down and awkwardly get perfectly positioned to turn, or make separate railways which wastes time in getting out of the old cart and into the new one
Ideally you wouldn't lose the speed momentum, it'd just stop, you tap a direction with wasd/arrowkeys, and then you continue at full speed! 

But yeah, I really like this!! Very fun gameplay and a super nice take on minesweeper, I like that we keep a level of progress post-death in terms of upgrades (unsure if that's intentional tbh- could always be a toggle in settings for the full game!) as it means losing isn't quite as crushing as it is in base minesweeper :p There's also the absolutely incredible feature that mining takes a short while, it's actually an excellent way to prevent misclicks!! The number of times I've lost a minesweeper game cuz I clicked wrong is incredible (detogatory), so it's sosososo appreciated to have a function to prevent that!! And! It works super well in the setting too, as it makes perfect sense for our lil guy to take a moment to mine through a block!

Speaking of said lil guy, I love them!!!!! They're so cute what a creature <3<3

Gah this was already so much fun, looking at the description and seeing mentions of things like smithing ingots just makes me so excited to play the full game!!!!! :DD

Love this!! Great artstyle and the controls are really nice :3 

I have had a bug when trying to exit the conversation from the science mole, it won't change the screen away from him. It happened when I visited both before getting the party invite quest, and after getting the quest. If I continue pressing W to move forwards, it zooms out to the island view, but clicking to exit the island does not exit it, I can see my position changing in the compass bar background at the top of my screen as I move left or right, but I cannot actually move forwards it seems (I was going to try get to another island to trigger that interaction to try and break free from the bug, alas)

Regardless it's a very neat little game and I've enjoyed what I've played so far!! 

Cool game! Love the concept of us being a brain and customisable upgrades that act differently depending on how we use/order them! 

I will say the controls were a bit finicky, changable keybinds would help with that! I also found the tutorial area very confusing, I've replayed it but I still cannot figure out how I'm opening the first gate or why, and the ones after that were just trial and error figuring out which weapon type worked on them- I'm not sure if there's a trick or order to it, if there is I couldn't understand it D: Same with the enemies, I assumed e.g. the green enemies would be weak to the green weapons but they all seemed to damage them equally? So not entirely sure how that worked there lol

But I did have fun!! And I really like the setting, it's very strange and intriguing with the living brains and the chunks of inert brain matter scattered around- and the visible stars and galaxies though the gap!! It really makes me wonder just where exactly we are and what is going on! Very cool :DD

OHH!!! Nysects being cats makes so much sense I think you must be right!! 

I loved this, gorgeous art and I love how there's glimpses of scenes when you haven't got all the elements, and all you can see is specifically the pieces of what you put in, like an individual character! Also love how the backgrounds are colour-coded based on which party that scene involves, it's a helpful little hint without ruining the difficulty! :D 

This is so freaking cute!! And I love the music track, it fits the vibes perfectly <3

Oh my god this is was so much freaking fun!!!! I was unsure how to begin but as soon as I got into the groove I was done for, I don't even know how long I've been sitting here working it all out, it was genuinely so much fun :DD I adore games styled on translation and figuring out foreign/alien words via context, piecing the things together, and the fantastical aspect with the strange creatures gave it extra flavour :D

Spoilers!!

Throughout the game, as I shaved down on my list on unknown words, one just kept confusing me with all the different ways they were described - the Solaam, and it was right at the end when I was re-reading The Signal that it suddenly hit me that it was addressed to us, that we were the Solaam! And that we were figuring out this family tree and history because they asked us to! They're the ones that sent everything! At first I presumed it was uncovered via archaeology or something, and we were historians going through ancient texts to understand the past, so it was such a cool twist :DDD

Also I gotta say, we sound so strange with giant tunnels and being big enough to step on these people, yet they trust us and our omens, considering our final word as law. There's so much in this setting I wanna know more about, are the Solaam humans, and the people are tiny? Or are the people humans, and we the Solaam are bizarre giant creatures? It's all so interesting!! :D

I had a lotta fun with this, 10/10 (and I really liked the art too! Very clean and easy on the eyes, and I enjoyed how you could get glimpses of their personality through their expression and how they held themselves! I also enjoyed the visual variation in how they all look)

Edit: Also I love that there were some gender neutral characters, idk if it was intentional but it surprised me and made me smile, I wasn't expecting it given the more medieval-style setting (visually at least), but as an enby it always makes me happy to see us around <3

Just letting you know I’ve made a recipe list in the comments! It’s the comment right above this one :3

Love this!! Super fun and of course absolutely lovely pixel art <3  Also loved the humour!

I made a recipe guide for those who wanted it! Please keep in mind that the game seems to be designed to encourage trial and error in finding recipes! The colour of the flame is a hint as to the next item type if you're stuck :P 

So please, to not ruin the discovery:

Only click each recipe once you've unlocked it!

I love this! Super creative and interesting mechanics, I really like how they built on each other to become more complex :D I will say the battery replacing is pretty fiddly, it's hard to get it to rotate how you want so it'll fit, and also it was hard to understand the person speaking sometimes, but I still had a lot of fun playing :DD

I love the mood of this, and the pixel art is very very nice :DD (Sidenote: t's so good to see actual pixel art in a game, I've seen so many lately with ai generated 'pixel' assets, so good god is it refreshing <3) Great audio too, love the little squeaks <3 Also like the audio cue of the ~danger music~ when things start to get real bad, it was fun to realise and learn, I love it when progression in a game is a mixture of in-game upgrades and the player actually learning and getting better, it's so much fun!! :D

Did get frustrated a couple times when losing all my fish cuz I died, but in all honestly that's probably on me for being too risky >:] 

It also took me a hot minute to realise I could let go to give the fishing line some slack- in hindsight it makes sense with the colour of the bar turning to red, but it hadn't clicked! I thought I had to keep holding it cuz the instructions just said 'hold' with no mention of letting go (despite me having played other fishing games/minigames where you let go...once again that may just be on me ._.)

But yeah! I enjoyed the variety of mechanics for the fish, really made you think about the best time to call it, e.g. with the dark trickster making it beneficial to stop sooner rather than later! It was also fun that some adjacent fish bonuses were per-tile-in-contact, and others (like same-species bonus) just needed a single point of contact, it helped limit any repetitiveness in the bonuses, having those different rulesets which of course also affects layout! I also loved the variety of shapes the fish had, and how especially the eely ones had such strange shapes, it makes fitting them together pretty fun :D Also neat how the ourobourus is a perfect circle with a little gap for fitting a little fish in! (I was delighted when I got the ourobourus + goldfish in the middle, just like the background art :D). I just love all the shapes and the ways they fit together!! Not just up against each other but also working around the edges of empty spaces for the empty cell bonus! I also of course like the way the fish increased in strangeness as the game went on, it may be a common fishing game trope but by god it's a good one! 

I also really appreciated the fact that you can left-click and let go to pick up a fish rather than having to hold it down- it meant it was actually possible to right-click rotate using a trackpad, it makes all the difference and I always notice when games have that so thank you! :D Also means less finger strain :3

Overall very fun, visually wonderful, sweet and succinct story/premise, and the end animation was really cute :D (Also appreciated that it repeats in case you miss some of it, which I did the first time!) It could honestly be extended if you ever so felt like it, with higher prices for the locks and maybe an extra page of inventory, hooks on the side of the boat for holding spare fish while sorting, maybe a weather machine to check the likelihood % of each weather event next session, etc! But of course only if you want, it definitely feels complete like this, no sense of anything missing! 

Edit:!! Oh and also before I forget, I encountered a bug where I frantically was sorting just before the fish sold, and I tossed a snail shell for an empty slot bonus, and the money calculation stopped and the fish weren't removed from my inventory. I went out, came back, and it counted everything and yoinked the fish as normal (probably giving me a duplicate score on a fish or two that were counted before I chucked the snail overboard). Far from gamebreaking, just thought I should mention it!
((Also-
It'd be neat if there was a 'sell' button so you could sort fish before they're totalled up and removed, since it's often a scramble to finish sorting as you're being extracted! Unless, of course, that's entirely intentional, in which case I respect that you conniving little bastard >:P /silly))

I just realised the carpenter is not a chicken, but rather a ginger-haired man with a moustache. 

He's still a chicken in my heart

(Great game!)

gorgeous artstyle <3