Thanks for checking it out! Your absolutely right that the tutorialization could be done better. Definitely one of the main things that needs to be addressed post jam.
Tomasz Wiercioch
Creator of
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I learned next time to test what the game looks like in full-screen on itch before submitting :p
Also to prioritize a tutorial next time. Towards the end I had a few irl friends playtest and saw how, without any guidance, what I thought was a relatively simple mechanic can still be confusing to first time players. We tried patching it with a quick last minute 'How to Play' graphic, which helped a bit, but next time I'm definitely making sure the tutorial is more than an afterthought.
Lastly this was the first time I worked on art for a fully 3D game jam. I've used blender to make pre-rendered stuff for 2D jams before, but this was my first time making something in real 3D and getting to practice that whole pipeline. I definitely got a lot more comfortable and quicker at pumping out a lot of assets in a short time frame lol.
That's really cool of you to do! Here's our team's game if you'd like to check it out: https://tomawash.itch.io/shrimpin-around
Solid foundation for a dungeon crawler here! I liked how the constant spinning and not having complete control of your aim puts emphasis on your positioning instead. The upgrades felt nice and powerful (especially love the twirl that fires bullets around in a circle).
If I may give some criticism, the difficulty ramp is pretty slow in the beginning, with the first few floors feeling the same with no increase in challenge. It isn't until the roomba enemies are brought in that things start getting a bit more difficult, and by then you may lose some players before things get really interesting.
Overall enjoyed playing it, very well put together!
I dig the chicken vs egg loop theming and all the unique mechanics you came up with. Dropping eggs down below to hit buttons while gliding over gaps is very satisfying. Level design was clever but a bit rough around the edges in terms of visual clarity and precision (things like buttons overlaying spikes, jumps that you just barely make, very thin platforms to stand on, knowing which chicken has what properties). It could definitely make for a fun full experience with some more polish. You cooked!
The dungeon looping and seeing secrets hidden in plain site on revisit felt good, left to a constant cycle of "am i stuck" into "aha!" moments. Loved the Mario 2 inspiration as well, a nice mechanic to pull.
My one criticism is the controls, having jump, pluck and unlocking doors being tied to 3 different inputs felt a bit un-intuitive and led to a lot of misinputs. Condensing it down to two buttons (as well as allowing for WASD movement) would be appreciated.
Fun game overall!
There's definitely a lot of room for polish, but your game is very playable and forgiving to compensate. Making crafting automatic was a good call, as well as keeping your resources with each loop. It reminds me a bit of early app store games like Pocket God where you combined elements to create new discoveries, but with an element of exploration. Nice work for your first jam!
I enjoyed bouncing around the place on the mushrooms. The looping of the weapons, while a cool idea, didn't feel like it impacted play much outside of being a bit annoying when trying to figure out which direction my attack is going to be in. I think there's a lot of cool potential here for a speedy platformer where players need to get into a rhythm of cycling through weapons and adapting on the fly, however I think it could be explored in different ways if you pursue this mechanic further.















