Altruism by calzep

[raw]
made by calzep for LD35 (JAM)
This is a story placed in a fantasy world about Squirt and Lola, who are a species known as Bloops. Lola wakes up from her 1,000 year hibernation to find an isolated area, once surrounded by her family and friends. She seeks out to find any sign of existence that may remain, when she runs into her life companion Squirt. They team up together to find out what happened to the rest of their species, and find out something more horrible than they can imagine.

Being the only 2 left they must use their selfless love and companionship to help each other adventure around the world. They find mystic artifacts that yield new powers for their species, seen never before. They must use these powers to help each other on their journey.

Find all the artifacts and help Squirt and Lola find out what happened to the Bloops, and more importantly, what is beyond the locked door.



-Keyboard Controls-
Left/Right Arrow Keys or A/D: Move Around
W or Up Arrow Key: Jump
E: Switch Character
Space: Shapeshift

-Xbox/Joystick Controls-
Left Analog Stick: Move Around
A: Jump
Y: Switch Character
X: Shapeshift

Ratings

Coolness 57% 3
Overall(Jam) 3.03 737
Audio(Jam) 2.87 529
Fun(Jam) 2.81 784
Graphics(Jam) 2.91 792
Humor(Jam) 2.68 409
Innovation(Jam) 2.75 791
Mood(Jam) 2.77 783
Theme(Jam) 3.44 465

Feedback

andyman404
19. Apr 2016 · 04:35 UTC
What a happy and cute game! This made me smile. Well done!
fprawn
19. Apr 2016 · 04:48 UTC
Cute game, nicely put together, loved the music.

I fell to death a lot, the harshness of missing a jump takes away a lot from the game and kept me from playing more. Maybe checkpoints would have helped?

Pretty good, regardless, great job!
psychomonster
19. Apr 2016 · 07:42 UTC
Cute +1 gfx ! Nice colors and lovely artwork. It is really hard at some points but it is a well done game. Good job.
infabstraction
19. Apr 2016 · 08:31 UTC
The characters are adorable, and I like how they help each other get across various obstacles. The game is in dire need of checkpoints, though. It's frustrating to have to do everything all over again every time I make a mistake, especially if I'd gotten pretty far already.
Ryusui
19. Apr 2016 · 08:33 UTC
Clever concept, but the slippery physics and punishing lack of checkpoints kept me from exploring too far.
Anupam Coleman
19. Apr 2016 · 09:50 UTC
It was okay, I guess. The music was pretty good, the graphics although seemed lame.
davisan
20. Apr 2016 · 01:39 UTC
I tried the game many times, but Squirt doesn't go back to the normal form in the two spikes (by just pressing space it should go back to the normal form, right?), so I couldn't continue the game. But the game has a cool idea, cute graphics and a fun music!
To improve the game many already said: avoid the slippery movement, place checkpoints, make the game the least punitive possible.
🎤 calzep
20. Apr 2016 · 03:01 UTC
@davisan and anyone else with that problem, please note you can't shift back to normal if the other character is still in its shifted form.
Black Horn Studios
20. Apr 2016 · 09:47 UTC
good game! Sounds and graphics give a good travel to early 90´s. Special quote for the main character´s name :)
Avant-Marde
21. Apr 2016 · 09:58 UTC
Switching between characters with different abilities, just like in our game. Neat. c:

I'll try and offer some constructive criticism along with my praise, so I hope you will find this helpful rather than destructive! But I'm well aware that LD time is restricted and that mistakes are easily made — that goes for our entry too. c;

The main mechanics were a good use of the theme and fun to play with. It was a little bit confusing that the transformation previews would show in the right area no matter which character you were playing as tho.

The stereotyping was a bit annoying, I do have to say that. The female character's JUMP is higher pitched? And pink and blue? And the colours of their respective icons? Come on, it's not 1993. The "man of success" quote also felt like you were assuming a male player, something which seems quite common among dudes making games still.

That's the major nitpick, tho. The game itself was nice, so it was just a pity there was stuff like that in there to take away a bit from the overall experience.

I assume you mostly playtested on gamepad so I guess it was easily overlooked, but the keyboard controllers were probably a little dangerous at times (both space and W/up commonly being associated with jumping making me accidentally press the wrong one and dying sometimes, and shapeshift key being perhaps too close to the jump key). I do have a 360 controller, but I never tried playing using that.

Required a bit of old school patience and problem solving, like figuring out that not both characters can pick up the artifacts, or why the shapeshifting didn't work the first time I saw the message (I hadn't gotten the artifact yet). This was actually a bit refreshing in a way, allowing the player to feel a bit clever, but you probably shouldn't have shown the shapeshifting message before it was actually possible to do it. :p

Unfortunately I stumbled into a bug after finally getting across the second bridge and climbing on the L-shaped character after having died many times. I jumped, hit the ceiling, and then I started flying uncontrollably upwards, straight into something which killed me. :c

Can't say much about the audio. The music was nice. I do think jumping sounds, at least if they're this prominent, can get annoying in games with this much jumping, tho. ;p

TL;DR: good mechanics, neat game, a bit unclear at times, and please drop the stereotyping next time, but mostly I liked it for the gameplay itself! C:
davisan
21. Apr 2016 · 16:40 UTC
Ok! Now I got it right! :D
🎤 calzep
21. Apr 2016 · 22:20 UTC
@Avant-Marde that's funny because a female designed most of those aspects. There is a lot of symbolism in this game, the colors of the suites represent feminitity and masculinity in culture. The quote you mentioned is by Albert Eisteen and I would like to believe the word man is used as in minkind or human, it is very universal alike a lot of the quotes in the bible. The colors are an obvious gender differentiation that helps the player understand who the characters are. The voice pitch? C'mon that is nature. Females naturally have higher pitch voices, it's just how genetics work. You are really looking too far into it, and you offended our female designer with this comment.
Avant-Marde
22. Apr 2016 · 15:18 UTC
Sorry if anything came off as rude or aggressive. I just try to leave as extensive and honest comments as I can on every game I play on here, to try and offer some constructive criticism from my perspective. Do what you wish with that viewpoint. c: Cheers!
Mr MadCat
22. Apr 2016 · 18:59 UTC
Cute game.
I might have some info about the bug where one character starts flying uncontrollably. I think it happens when a character stands on the other character as they transform back to normal form. I guess gravity doen't get reset or whatever mechanic you use for detecting when a player is on the ground. Maybe it helps.
SeaMonsterGD
23. Apr 2016 · 09:19 UTC
Overall pretty good i feel. Moving around was a bit slow but the mechanics themselves were not too punishing i would say, in opposition with other commenters.

Checkpoints would be needed though. I was really curious to see more but having to start all over again after a single mistake drove me away from it.

The blobs are cute, the sound effect when you change characters I liked too, platforming not too demanding. I liked it. Although, maybe the level design could have helped comprehension a bit : maybe you can only find the "space to shapeshift" places once you actually have the powers.
lumscum
23. Apr 2016 · 16:52 UTC
Graphics were cute!
pjimmy
23. Apr 2016 · 17:53 UTC
Nice, cool visuals and music
Casey Jordan
23. Apr 2016 · 18:07 UTC
Cute.

Shapeshifting squirt while Lola is on top bugs the game. Squirt flies into space, never to return. D:

Taking Lola and Squirt across the same map areas feels redundant. You could exploit their jump height difference to give them different pathing options independent of one another to eliminate some of this repetitive play.
WERT Studio
23. Apr 2016 · 21:08 UTC
Good idea of the reliable characters. Neat game!
AnMorfeusz
24. Apr 2016 · 17:05 UTC
Very cute characters, loved the music.
The camera is a bit laggy, in the browser.
GGAlliance
24. Apr 2016 · 17:16 UTC
Good music. Beautiful graphics. Maybe if it had chackpoints it could be better (after turning the blue character into a bridge). :)