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How, when no knows what he looks like?

Imagine if the judges have to play 7000+ games.

Make a short and simple game focused on one single game mechanic.  Stick to a genre and style you're comfortable with.  Familiarise yourself with your game engine.

Oh, from the video it looked like the player was restricted to only walking around on the sea floor.

I like the aesthetic.  But the player can't swim?  Sounds a bit fishy to me...

I'm going for number 3 - Dark Streets.  I couldn't find decent horror assets for sea stuff and wasn't sure how to incorporate "song" into a game.  Street scenes are a lot easier to construct and the theme is more open to interpretation.

There's a discussion about how common this graphical style has become in indie horror games.  Should we try to avoid it?  Does it prevent our games from standing out?  Is it at the point where it turns people off playing.

It's incredibly difficult to produce a cohesive art style.  So, what would be a good alternative?

We can all list a bunch of links for programming, art, game design, etc, but it feels like there's not much in the way of resources out there for narrative design for horror games.  The top article I found when searching, appears to be written by AI and a few were locked behind pay walls!

I get general writing guidelines like "show, don't tell", "beginning, middle and end" and "less is more".  But it's not much to go on.

Horror writing feels like it should be easy (how hard can it be to scare people), but I've found it often just becomes comically bad.

I'd highly appreciate links to articles, videos, books, just any good sources.

I really appreciate this so much.  I've read through and I really like these suggestions.  I'm saving them and will see what I can implement.  I'm waiting on the official ratings before adding more to and fixing up the game.

In retrospect, I think I over did the scope.   Time management is a tough skill.

Feedback like this makes game jams so worth it.  Just thank you!

The organisers of the jam should clarify the rules over the use of AI.  

How much of a game is required?  Can it be one single level?  Does the art and audio have to be polished or original works?

That was a cool game.  The art was real nice.  Just needed a little animation.

I get creating a mouse only game.  But, the controls could be improved.  Attacking wasn't obvious to begin with.  You could allow players to attack just by clicking on the enemies and move just by clicking on an empty highlighted tile.

Thanks for the feedback, it's really appreciated.

In traditional stealth games like Metal Gear, Splinter Cell, and lots of others, the enemies are hand crafted and their behaviour is completely obvious.  Sneaking past them requires you to solve a puzzle.  

The issue with translating that experience into the Roguelike genre is how to procedurally generate maps, enemies, and items and have the game's systems provide the stealth experience.  I did try predictable paths, but that became way too easy.  Roguelikes tend towards difficult challenges, so that was thrown out.  I didn't opt for pure randomness either, as that's often annoying.  So, their movement follows a path to a selected point.  If you're in that path for 2 turns, they go into alert mode and move towards you.

Players can hide under certain tables, just like in ThiefRL.  Enemies will still come towards you, but will return to patrol mode, as long as you stay there.

The best chance for players to dodge enemies once detected, is to use the various spells available to them (bottom left buttons).  Getting that balance right though, is obviously a difficult challenge.

Sure.  I'd appreciate it if you could provide feedback for my game: https://itch.io/jam/7drl-challenge-2025/rate/3386291

Looks like a good, if incomplete attempt.

I wasn't able to view any class info.  I had trouble attacking the bobcat, despite having a weapon equipped.  I would have appreciated continuous movement as the game world is so large and open.  Also, the inventory system seems broken.

Despite this the game does look quite interesting.  I'd gladly play an improved version, if you get around to it.

Tough game, especially as new enemies keep entering onto what is a very small arena.  Artwork, music, and sound effects are all decent.

Why not post the controls on the Itch page itself?  That way we don't have to write them down.

The control system seems complex.  I had a hard time going in the right direction.  The view also makes this confusing.  Only some of the directional keys actually move the sub.  I wasn't sure if I had to orient the sub correctly first.  There was no feedback and no explanation of this unusual movement system.  Unfortunately, it's tough to get into this game when just moving around is so challenging.

Very innovative.  I played for a while, but it seemed like the AI was just moving randomly.  I suppose that's why they get the advantage from the start.

Could you possibly provide feedback for my game: https://itch.io/jam/7drl-challenge-2025/rate/3386291

Short, simple and a lot of fun.  I liked the boss intro.

Like the other comment, I feel the artwork could have been more consistent.  The main character is a in completely different style to the enemies.  Also, the game could have been longer.

I wonder if you could perhaps provide feedback for my game: https://itch.io/jam/7drl-challenge-2025/rate/3386291

Could you possibly provide feedback for my game, if you get the chance to?

https://itch.io/jam/7drl-challenge-2025/rate/3386291

Being able to draw was awesome and helpful.  Makes the game stand out a lot.  I liked the look of it.  Very slick and stylish.

Recommendations: 

Not sure why you didn't implement keyboard movement, as it's easy to add in Godot. 

It'd be nice to see on screen stats like health.

I hate to ask, but could you kindly provide feedback for my entry?

Really good and enjoyable Broguelike.  Nice retro graphics, animations, and sound.  

I recommend making the interactions simpler.  For example, why separate inputs for melee and ranged targeting?  Just let player select which weapon to use and then automatically target accordingly.  Also, you should display the player's health in the UI.

So, just very minor tweaks to simplify the inputs and some UI.

I hate to pester, but I'd really appreciate some feedback for my entry. 

It was fun to play and very innovative.  I really liked how you could squish the enemies.

I was able to sometimes just avoid the enemies and rush to the exit.  Maybe make it so you have to defeat them to unlock it.

I got stuck on one level where I couldn't move to the left of a block and so wasn't able to complete it.

I actually managed to submit by the deadline: https://itch.io/jam/7drl-challenge-2025/rate/3386291

I'd greatly appreciate any feedback at all.  I'm more than happy with any criticism.  The entire point of feedback is to gain an opportunity to improve.  I'll happily provide feedback in return, but you must leave a comment or I won't know who you are.

I aimed to help people quickly understand the complex layout using an annotated image.  It's a lot clearer and better than paragraphs of confusing text:

Very complex and innovative.  There's so much in it.  It's fun to fight the enemies.  The game seems like a good and interesting idea, but it needs more development.  There is something to it.

I feel like the complicated mechanics need better explaining.  It was difficult to see terrain properly as it would often blend into the background.  

Cool Balatro effect, by the way.

I did manage to add a load of items, some basic crafting, and spells, as they're familiar territory for me. Used tile based lighting to give it some atmosphere too. And threw in a simple log scene from a tutorial. Enemies have been frustrating though. My first enemy was straight forward enough. Second one was nice and easy, despite being very different. Third one was a real pain!

Still haven't moved to the crucial steps of adding chase and return to patrol states. They'll be quite different from their real time counterparts. Unfortunately, almost all the articles and videos on this topic are for real time. Don't they know how awesome Roguelikes are by now? I've checked out ThiefRL 2 and will probably try something similar, but with more cool items and spells.

More atmospheric with some lighting:

Trying my hand at this idea.  It's strange that the original Rogue didn't have any stealth based gameplay, especially given the Rogue character the game was centred on.

Still grappling with the name and all sorts of other stuff.  Gotten line of sight and dungeon generation all done.  I'm happy with the tile set too, especially the main player character:

You can still release your game.  Try posting a link to it here.  I'm sure people will play it.

A really good puzzle game.  It was awesome that there were multiple solutions.  UI is really well laid out.  Music was good.  

The instructions started overlapping when looking at them multiple times.   The learning curve was quite steep, but after you realise you can just plop down brown hexes where ever, it becomes a lot easier for quite a while.  I was able to often get much higher powers than the goal.

Some recommendations:

- Have some victory sound effect.

- Maybe you could add hover text to the hexes to show what they do.  

- Let players remove pieces by right clicking on them even if they're not the current hex.

- Let players control the rotation using the mouse.

What are the options?

Good to hear.  That crab landing thing does look really cool.

Fun vertigo simulator!

The graphics, lighting, and design are done really well.  A load of work clearly went into this.  I must say the cover image just doesn't do the game justice.  Just use a nice screenshot instead.  Rare, but pleasant to see voice logs in jam games.  Game might give some vertigo, those ledges are insanely small!  Also, you might want to look into the frame rate.

Solid graphics.  Nailed the theme really well.  The music cut out for me, but I did enjoy the homemade slurping sound, though I'm not sure if tornadoes actually sound like that ;)  Bit too easy, but I guess it's like a relaxing walking sim, which can honestly be quite refreshing after playing.  Thank you.

The game just looks and sounds great.  The music reinforcing the aesthetic.  I like the clear design of nature vs machines.  The models look and animate very well.  There are enough visual effects without it getting in the way of game play.  The atmosphere is superb.  

The game seemed confusing at first.  Lots of tough enemies are quickly on you and you can't directly fight back.  It was only when I read the guide that I saw what I was supposed to do.  I think maybe changing the level design might advert the need for that.  For example, the player could be made to simply watch the flowers destroy the mechacrabs from a distance.  It wasn't clear what the differences between the flowers were.  Maybe an easier starting enemy would have made it less difficult to experiment.

Might also want to do something about the frame rate.

Graphics look excellent, though your fish is hard to see.  Sound effects are great.  Ambience is top notch.  Exploration is awesome in this game.  The enemies are creepy and well designed.

I tried to get two of the enemies to injure each other, but it didn't seem possible.

Does the game just go on and on?  I left it after the 4th orb.

I myself tried to think of a maths game, but I couldn't figure out how to make it work.  So, it's nice to see someone trying.

I agree with the others, it feels wrong when you blast enemies and they simply split into smaller enemies.  This idea might have worked better as a tower defence game.

It was a good attempt at something unique and if you don't experiment, you never know.

The simplicity is this game certainly doesn't detract in any way.  The game play is great.  Nice level designs.  Lots of variety in block types and situations.  A one button game like this could do well on mobiles.

That game over menu is the best part.  Like the character is just plain tired of all this.

Just a really well made game.  All out.  Great graphics, animations, music, sound effects.  Nice upgrades.  The bus was awesome.

This was actually a really fun puzzle game.  There were lots of interesting and varied mechanics.  You nailed the theme really well.  Your level designs are great.

Some recommendations:

 - The game should automatically reset when you fall too far down.

 - It's lacking music.  The background ambient sounds are ok, but they're not a real substitute.

 - You should look into using free art assets.  Or perhaps, team up with an artist.

A nice, classic beat-em-up.  Feels very retro.  Art, music, even the sound effects are seriously retro.  I'd recommend enhancing that feel by using a CRT visual effect, so you really feel like you're playing on an old computer or arcade machine.

Felt odd to just be able to pick every upgrade, every time.  Maybe give people a choice of major upgrades, like new attacks, faster movement, etc.  Didn't find any other faults.