Soundscape (Find the Light) by johnbrynte
Can you hear shapes?
In this game you will experience darkness in its darkest form and learn how to truly appreciate the light in life. Use your ears and let the sound of light guide you to the exit.
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- What? How do I play?
You can walk forward and turn. When you turn, the line will move to give an indication to how much you turned. Each line represents a 90 degree turn, meaning two lines make you face the way you came. You want to listen for sounds in the environment, specially the higher frequencies as they will guide you towards the light.
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Walk with UP or W.
Turn with LEFT/RIGHT or A/D.
Best played in a dark room with headphones.
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For the directional sound to work you will need a browser that supports the Web Audio API, which is basically all major browsers except Internet Explorer. So if it doesn't seem to work you can always try updating your browser! Tested in Google Chrome.
Please report any bugs to me in the comments below and I'll try to fix it!
In this game you will experience darkness in its darkest form and learn how to truly appreciate the light in life. Use your ears and let the sound of light guide you to the exit.
----------------
- What? How do I play?
You can walk forward and turn. When you turn, the line will move to give an indication to how much you turned. Each line represents a 90 degree turn, meaning two lines make you face the way you came. You want to listen for sounds in the environment, specially the higher frequencies as they will guide you towards the light.
----------------
Walk with UP or W.
Turn with LEFT/RIGHT or A/D.
Best played in a dark room with headphones.
----------------
For the directional sound to work you will need a browser that supports the Web Audio API, which is basically all major browsers except Internet Explorer. So if it doesn't seem to work you can always try updating your browser! Tested in Google Chrome.
Please report any bugs to me in the comments below and I'll try to fix it!
| Web | http://johnbrynte.se/projects/soundscape/ |
| Source | http://johnbrynte.se/projects/soundscape/soundscape.zip |
| Original URL | https://ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-35/?action=preview&uid=47137 |
Ratings
| Coolness | 59% | 3 |
| Overall(Jam) | 3.39 | 393 |
| Audio(Jam) | 4.14 | 28 |
| Innovation(Jam) | 4.17 | 32 |
| Mood(Jam) | 4.03 | 56 |
| Theme(Jam) | 2.18 | 1083 |
I came to light only once. I tried to understand what I'm doing wrong, but couldn't. The sound didn't help me. Probably should add hints, such as sound.
I tried to run full-screen mode and in firefox and chrome. In both didn't move the strip.
I'll see if I can fix the issue. Please comment here if anyone else has the same or another issue, thanks!
It has been an experiment for me and you guys are the first to test and give feedback on it, which I truly appreciate. So keep hitting me with aggressive and kind comments, because I really would like to revisit this game idea some time! :)
As a JS programmer, the game is really cool (I looked at the source)! I noticed you're using pos3d in howler.js to set the position and it didn't seem to work for me (even though I'm in Chrome). Maybe you could try going straight for StereoPannerNode (it's actually surprisingly simple) and *really* exaggerate the stereo to help out players. Just a suggestion, you obviously have more experience with this :)
@avinashd Oh nice, thanks for the advice! I also experienced some inconsistencies in the panning, but didn't have time to explore the library or the Web Audio API as much as I would have wanted to. Got some ideas how to simplify the sound model thought.
Actually, for all the JS hackers out there, if you want to cheat you can turn on a graphic debug by running document.body.appendChild(canvas) in the console ;)
@ChummyWinds A very good point, that I failed to convey. The idea is that each line represents a 90 degree turn, so two lines takes you back where you came. I'll add it to the description!
Incredibly challenging as well! I was lost at first, but after I grasped the basic idea. It was a lot easier to play.
Managed to get to the end with 1 Death (Darkness) =w=)b
And that's even though I, too, find the need for more direction (hopefully by audio clues!). It can be a turn-down for not-so-voyeur players out there.
I will describe the experience I had:
Started, saw the stripes. Good, sense of direction. Then I started walking.
The sound of the steps were so rich that I just spent some time listening to them. I figured they would change and indicate where should I go, but them I gave up this tactic.
I felt that I was wandering aimlessly for some time, and time, and time, and time, and them...
BAM! Some gooood frequency grabbed my attention. I simply walked forward, and in a reeeaaally satisfying fashion, I saw the light.
I saw it twice. Then I went to write this comment :)
I would love to see you improving on this idea. Not only I feel it has potential, but I'm curious to see some deeper exploration of this mechanic, and how to avoid the obstacles that come within.
@Klaas Yes, well spotted, that is exactly the effect of standing close to a light. The way I built the world, which I've thanks to all of you testers found was maybe not the best way, is to randomly scatter "beacons" around a light source. Each beacon emits a sound within a set interval, high frequencies faster than the low frequencies. When you stand on or close to a beacon the sound will be panned in the middle, even if the light is in fact in another direction.
@theOnlyGoodDrcz Maybe I should take a look at his movies to get some inspiration :)
@MatMortatti So wonderful to hear about your experience, this is exactly the way I wanted the player to feel! And yes, there sure are some issues that needs to be addressed in order for it to reach out to more players. One thing I think would really make this a greater experience is to use head tracking. Imagine using an oculus only for the headtracking and making your environment completely dark! Thanks for sharing, I truly appreciate it! :)
suprisingly for the forth I kept getting "darkness" even though I seemed to be getting closer to the sound
PS: Found the Light 4/4! Second and fourth were very hard to find!
The audio quality was fantastic. The footstep noises were as crisp as if I was making them with my own boots, so really good job on that front.
I felt like the directional audio didn't really work for me, but I'm willing to believe that that is probably more down to my ability than the game's quality. Even so, it might be worth making the directional sound more apparent for players like myself (or slowly increasing the sound's directionality over time (to a maximum, of course) to help players that are struggling with the level).
The concept is fantastic and really reminded me of a much more interesting version of Lost Woods from LoZ: Ocarina of Time.
Not entirely sure what this has to do with the theme, but apart from that, really great entry!