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Hi and thanks so much for everything you wrote! 

I feel like one can mix and match anything stylistically as long as one goes about it sincerely. I did have a framework for the story, but it was a very loose one, and I ended up just letting the details develop as I went along, without trying to force it any which way beyond the very basic idea. So there's some mooing involved, indeed.

The setting was very much inspired by Dante's Inferno, which I put a personal twist onto, and I mixed and matched the motifs from there with various images that just made sense in my head that all best reflected the story that wanted to come out.

Some of the imagery had a very accidental origin. For example, I had this stylized flower I always used to draw in Procreate by using some of the basic brushes, and I realised it looked an awful lot like a poppy. I did look up the symbolism of the flower and found it very fitting, so it just organically clicked.

The park with the cherub statue is a real one. And I did indeed often use to find myself carrying over coffee cups from a nearby café and sitting on the benches next to the pond with someone. The cherub statue is a somewhat of a fiction, and your interpretation basically correct, albeit with somewhat sharper contours and more concrete meaning for me, but that's only natural.

Again, I thank you so much for your words! It really does inspire me to keep at this. For now, this is just something I do when I get some time off, but I do have ideas and plans to incorporate it into my professional life, so it definitely gives me some much needed confirmation that my thinking is on the right track!

Thank you so much for your words! Means a lot to me and gives me motivation to keep working!

If you think it's my mother and father, then perhaps it is! Suffice it so say that it's so cool to see how other people interpret something that I made. Sometimes the meanings are clear to me, sometimes less so, but in the end I often end up having an entirely new perspective opened to me that also makes sense to me!

Again, thank you!

Thank you!

Thanks for commenting and playing! Appreciate it. :)

A beautiful eulogy.

Hihi!

Quick question. Are the thematic suggestions for the human companion to be taken as mandatory, or is the type of relationship  with the companion arbitrary, as long as the technical requirements are fulfilled?

Basically, can the companion also be a stranger one meets in the woods?

Thank you!

Fair enough - I figured it might be on the verge. Thanks for taking the time to have a look at it.

Hi there! For anyone interested in the game, I have made a page for continued development. I've fixed some bugs that made it into the jam version, and I'll keep fixing issues, add one or two more encounters and tweak the time management mechanic, so as to create a more engaging experience. Thanks!

https://wiryconcord.itch.io/instrument

Hey, I'm so sorry it took me this long to reply to this!!! I literally went on vacation and had been sorting out some other more pressing matters, now that the jam was over, haha. 

Thanks so much for persisting and actually restarting! There was a lot of bashing my head against the wall when I exported and uploaded the game for the first time two hours before the deadline, and realising that a bunch of pretty difficult problems popped up that were never an issue in the engine.

I'm happy you enjoyed the little content I managed to scrape up. In a perfect world, the narrative elements you enjoyed would have taken the forefront, but for the jam I am happy with the form the "demo" took. I am actually in the process of planning out how to carry on working on this and releasing something with a few hours worth of content, so hearing that the things that were important to me struck a chord with you is very encouraging! 

Again, thank you for taking the time to play the game despite the bugs and for writing what you did! <3

Hey, very cool game! Took me back to high school when I was playing Crimsonland during IT class. :) 

I think it's a very cool idea to incorporate the blood types the way you did and a fresh take on power progression! One actually has to decide which enemies to kill in order to maximise progression and prevent regression, instead of simply picking up or ignoring random power-ups that drop from random mobs or bosses, or choosing from a set of however many either by levelling up or entering the next room. I love that luck plays such a big part as well: first you have to get lucky with the power-up combination, and then also with the correct zombies spawning! And between those two random rolls, that's where skill comes into play.

I think you limited the amount of zombies that can spawn, I guess divided into waves, right? It gave me the opportunity to run after a specific combo I wanted for 2-3 minutes before progressing into the next stage, and I feel like you shouldn't be so nice, haha. You should force us to make tough choices by keeping the onslaught coming, and if we can't get that sweet ricochet or +1, or we're desperately trying to avoid the longer reload time, well, it's either that or getting overwhelmed!

But then again, my max time was like 5 minutes because I need to git gud, so maybe some mercy does not go amiss for players such as myself. :D

You could also expand on the shadow mechanic - certain mobs that spread shadow, others that spread light, or mix it into the blood types somehow so you gain some agency on how much shadow or light there is on the terrain. And again, make it so that you have to choose what's more important - more shadow, or a nice juicy gun power-up. Or make it so certain power-ups come as a double-edged sword. But these are just random thoughts of mine for where you could take it further, if you were planning on doing so - I had a lot of fun playing it already!

Very cool! Thanks. 

Loved it! I laughed from the very first conversation with the mention of doomscrolling and knew I was gonna have fun. :)

It's a very cool take on the theme and, although the term 'alchemy' might invite us to do so, you chose not to go about it in a pretentious way, which is so cool. Your alchemy is simply natural medicine. It's tea. A kind of witchcraft in and of itself that we've explained away in a banal way nowadays and consider to be nothing special. And yet, if we choose to look at it that way, it can become nothing short of brewing a magic potion or a healing salve.

The shadows simply being negative thoughts whisked away by surgical application of the pertinent plant is also very sweet.

I really liked the gameplay loop and think this could be a lovely puzzle game if you were to keep working on it. You could expand on your three basic teas to create more complicated puzzles and even take inspiration from games like Desperados or Shadow Tactics for level design.

Anyway, that's just a few thoughts. Again, I really liked the game - thank you very much!

Thanks so much for your words, it really makes me happy to hear your thoughts about all the things I'd been obsessing about for the two weeks I slaved over the project. :) I pushed myself to the limit in terms of realising what I envisioned, and I'm happy with what I managed tgo accomplish, but there's work to be done yet (if not for the jam version)! :)

I'm really happy you enjoyed the game! From a gameplay perspective, I really want to make it a player-friendly experience that can be both challenging and forgiving at the same time. I didn't manage to implement all the quality of life measures I would want (the levels with the descending elevators and the one with all the portals are both particularly horrible offenders in that regard), but I'm glad it did not deter you and that you could have a good time! :D

And yes, the storytelling is also very important to me, even though I chose a slightly more fragmentary approach in this game. The final and complete story is still partly obscured even for me, but perhaps that's the way it's meant to be for now! :)

Again, thank you so much!

Thank you very much for your comments! I tried to be merciful with the respawns, indeed! I learned before that just because I play through a level 50 times in order to make sure it works doesn't mean that someone picking it up for the first time will have quite as easy a time. :D

Our work is never over. :) I'm truly happy whenever I stumble onto something tackles the human experience head-on. Grats on the result and on creating literally everything. One can tell that it means something to you, and that translates very clearly into the work. Thank you!

Hey, thanks very much for your comment! Yeah, I was pondering the elevators, because in a perfect world I would have had time to implement a kind of "bonk prevention" mechanic, that gives you a bit of leeway if you're 1-2 pixels off, so that I could keep the collision but at least make it not quite as mean as it is in the jam version. I'll definitely put more thought into it when I start dismantling the mess I made in the last few days of the rush to the finish line. :D Again, thank you!

Hey it's a really great game, I liked it a lot! From the very beginning I thought already the visuals were very stylish. When I saw the shadow following me around and I thought - oh, this is gonna be fun. :D And indeed it was. Very enjoyable combat and game loop, and you really put a bunch of content in there. Really good job!!! 

Thank you so much! Glad it worked well for you! 

Great design. Love the visuals and music, it's a very chill game. And I defo did get the 2048 inspiration - the other games you mentioned I'm not familiar with.  I can see this being a really cool game to play on the phone, actually, just like 2048! The only thing that takes getting used to is to recognise the order in which the potions progress from least to greatest (which in 2048 is conveniently done by the number itself, haha). Great job and I hope you release this!

Hey! I like the game a lot. The number 1 thing I would suggest is to bind the flashlight to the RMB, as somebody already mentioned. Maybe you could add the option to make it a hold instead of a toggle? I find myself forgetting about it and running out of juice, and I feel like if it were a dedicated hold, I'd be more mindful of when I'm using it. But that last one is just a quality of life improvement idea, not a criticism, I could just learn to pay more attention, haha! :D Very cool, thank you!

Cool game! Like DevPie said, the game loop is on point and very fun! Great work!

Hey, I went back to the game to see if I could replicate what I thought was a bug and, honestly, I couldn't. So either I imagined it yesterday or it was a freak accident. Didn't at all mean to be negative, I think it's a really fun and smart game!

Spectacular game! Very simple and elegant, and all the more moving and to the point for it. Congratulations!

Hey, max points for art direction and style. Really well thought through and one can tell you cared about the atmosphere, dialogue and presentation, which is just as important as gameplay itself, in my opinion! I like the idea for the game A LOT, as well as the implementation. I think there's some kinks to iron out, but for a jam version it's minor. The jumps at the very beginning are very tight and it takes a lot of attempts to get them right, so that's just a pacing thing.  Also, If I used multiple blue sulphur potions at once the behaviour was unpredictable - sometimes they would both work, sometimes only the last one to be thrown, and sometimes they would randomly swap between one another, and that would cause me to fall. Or at least I think it would - I wasn't always certain if I could step on the platforms if I didn't have a blue sulphur potion on them. But all that aside, there's a really special game here and I'd definitely want to play it if you keep working on it and release a fuller version in the future!

This is a seriously cool and well executed game! I love the puns and the voice acting, haha. The, visuals, music, mechanics, all very well done. Great work! My only gripe was that I couldn't figure out where the firewood was - I didn't recognise it because I was looking for the icon itself. I restarted the game once because of it, only to later accidentally click on it under the table. Anyway, this is an excellent game and something you should definitely continue working on!

Hey, like the others, I also didn't really manage to get out of the first room. I had a look at the GDD to make sure I wasn't missing anything, and I really like the idea and the approach to interpreting the jam themes, but I sadly couldn't make anything happen. :( 

Hey, it's a cool idea! I think it just needs further development and polish. It took me a few minutes to figure out how to select the runes I need, because I thought it cycled through all of them at first. I didn't understand if there is any benefit to changing the runes in a certain order, or if holding certain combinations of the left and right rune give special powers, other than just targeting two enemy runes at the same time. I think it could be a cool mechanic to add, so that the combination of two runes makes an effect that is greater than the sum of its parts. I think there's potential for a fun game here, if you intend to keep working on it! :)

Hey, lovely game! I love the art direction and in terms of the overall feel of where the game could go, I had to think of Children of Morta. The atmosphere is very charming. It reminds me  a lot of Magicka. Obviously, here you're more of a necromancer (or slimemancer), and you let your minions do the work. I think there's potential for a great full release here! :)

Hey, I loved it! I think the PS1 era of graphics is such a good fit for this kind of genre. Defo getting Resident Evil vibes from it, with all the benefits of  modern movement, shooting and camera logic. The atmosphere is great - I think the lack of music made it all the better for it, and made the sound effects pop out even more. The mechanical door scared me so much every time, even after I knew what to expect. I see the umbrella corp of this world has roots in alchemy! :) I don't know if you intend to develop it further, but I think you have the foundation for a great game here!

Hey, thanks so much for what you said! It truly means a lot to hear such positive feedback. I definitely put a lot of effort into it, and there's a lot of effort to put in yet, but knowing that people actually like the game is what makes it worthwhile. I'm sorry it took me so long to reply, it's been a hectic day. I'll have a look at your submission tomorrow, I'm dead tired and I just wanted to thank you before I go to sleep. Till then! :)

Hey, that's the second time someone mentions Celeste, which makes me very happy. :) Of course I've played Celeste, and of course I love it to bits. It's a huge source of inspiration. Thank you!

Thanks so much for the feedback! I definitely need to think about the control scheme as it's the #1 issue people have with the game. But with the positive feedback I'm getting, I'm definitely going to expand upon the project and see where it can go. Again, thanks so much! :)

Oh wow, thanks so much for your words. Makes me very happy to hear those two titles in reference to my game! :D It makes me think like I can actually expand upon this properly and add more mechanics and content. I consciously decided against adding too many mechanics for the jam, and limited myself also in terms of length. I know I went overtime anyway,  but it felt wrong to push it to the extreme on a project that is technically meant to be made in 3 hours, ha. And that image is just too cool. Thank you so much! :D

All clear! Yeah, controller definitely plays better with a trigger holding the bounce. Thanks again for all the input, I'll definitely apply it! :)

Oh that's great feedback, thank you so much! I wanted to add more levels and objects to interact with, but I needed to just finish it and upload it. :D But you've given me motivation to expand upon this  a little bit, then. :) What would you prefer when it comes to the keybinds? I'll  make them editable, but I'm  curious to know what comes more naturally to you.  Thanks again! 

Fun game and cool idea! Took me a while to beat the last level. :D I feel like you could get away with fewer positions for the cursor, or maybe even make it a square  - I only used one parallel and one diagonal position because both the short or long side can push the ball away. But I resorted to that because I was too slow otherwise, haha. Great job!

Very elegant! It's very purist in it's simplicity and all the better for it! Great job!

Hey thanks so much for the constructive feedback! Yeah, I think it would work better on a controller, but after a while I got used to it, so it didn't even register on my list of things to think about. :D

Hey, thanks so much for your words! Happy you liked it. :)