Squiggles by Avant-Marde

[raw]
made by Avant-Marde for LD35 (JAM)
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LOADING TO PLAY ABOVE ISN'T INSTANTANEOUS — please be patient for a few seconds!

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It's an exciting day for a tiny tadpole when a bottle with a mysterious figure inside crashes in the pond! Guide the two unlikely friends through ponds to get to the ocean - freshwater is no place for Squiggles the octopus! The tadpole might not be much help at first, but progressing and growing from the experience might see you to the end of the game - good luck!

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Controls:
Alt = alternate between characters
Ctrl = make frog jump (on land only, water is for swimming, not jumping!)

Left mouse button = move the character
Right mouse button = interact

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Credits
Programming; Ava Skoog and Morten Formo
Art, music; Marte Kvamme Strømmen
Level design; Marte, Ava

Twitter (please retweet Ava's pinned tweet about the game!)
@avaskoog
@thedjuske
@zbegra

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NOTES!

No sound effects this time.

Partially because we didn't have time in the end. Implementing dynamic audio for something so dynamic as this octopus in the final hour of the jam... Impossible.

Got started a bit but gave up as time was running out. But it was also difficult to even think of something fitting. Somehow music alone sort of fits this game.

See our previous entries for lots of sound design, tho!

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Same goes for fancy dynamic camera and cutscenes and screenshake and stuff. We've done that in previous games but simply didn't have the time this time.

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Also given the nature of the octopus, it can be a bit bug-prone. But it was an interesting experiment!

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The tadpole was meant to do stuff to help, but we didn't really have the time. But don't worry — froglet and frog do help!

Ratings

Coolness 36% 1666
Overall(Jam) 3.84 99
Audio(Jam) 3.77 111
Fun(Jam) 3.32 380
Graphics(Jam) 4.09 146
Humor(Jam) 2.40 560
Innovation(Jam) 3.58 190
Mood(Jam) 4.14 33
Theme(Jam) 3.74 226

Feedback

Jasmers
19. Apr 2016 · 12:13 UTC
Cool atmosphere!
sadenly
19. Apr 2016 · 12:17 UTC
looks really nice, and controls are very smooth, I like the jellyfish but I got stuck here http://prntscr.com/au5757
Larzan
19. Apr 2016 · 12:18 UTC
Wow, beautifully done, i got stuck after a while with the frog, but i enjoyed playing it :)
Slord6
19. Apr 2016 · 12:19 UTC
Fun game. I like the 'murky' art style and the backing music is nice. The octopus is quite impressive considering it was done with rigid bodies. Bit rough around the edges but that's to be expected with jam games!
SuperChihuahua
19. Apr 2016 · 12:22 UTC
@sadenly: I was also stuck there but you have to grab of of the branches above you and then click on the obstacle
🎤 Avant-Marde
19. Apr 2016 · 12:28 UTC
Thanks to everyone so far. c:

@sadenly: what chihuahua said — you need to press alt and change to playing as the octopus here.
Jin47
19. Apr 2016 · 12:40 UTC
The ambience is very cool and the squid physic looks very smooth. Great game!
LandoSystems
19. Apr 2016 · 13:02 UTC
Great mood. The graphics and the squid physics are great!
SkullPixel
19. Apr 2016 · 13:15 UTC
The atmosphere was very impressive. I really liked the octopus's animations and physics.
axoona
19. Apr 2016 · 15:39 UTC
I really liked the idea and the music, also the animations of the octopus. However I got stuck at a point where I could'nt get the little fellow past the big vertical boulder... and I suppose that the octopus cannot go o land and become a frog
silkworm_sweatshop
19. Apr 2016 · 16:07 UTC
It looks cool but I couldn't get past the vertical boulder either. The octopus could get through that narrow passage just fine but the tadpole could not. And I couldn't seem to move the vertical boulder in any way.
Wisedawn
19. Apr 2016 · 16:47 UTC
Impressive physics, and an innovative use of the theme!
🎤 Avant-Marde
19. Apr 2016 · 19:35 UTC
Thanks again so far! c: I was actually really worried that the octopus physics would be too buggy to enjoy for some people, but it seems really positive so far.

@axoona & silkwork: you can push the boulder up with the octopus, but only from the left side; the little pathway is only there in case you accidentally went to the other side first without the tadpole (or if the rock fell back down again)
Palys Plays
19. Apr 2016 · 20:10 UTC
Very good mood and interesting octopus mechanics makes this game outstanding
Matzigon
19. Apr 2016 · 22:20 UTC
The atmosphere is wonderful. Good job! :)
DSSiege11
20. Apr 2016 · 20:11 UTC
Such a beautiful game! It was really fun to play until I jumped with the frog and got stuck on an edge :( Maybe I'll try again later. Anyway, you did a fantastic job with this game, congrats! :D
EvanEGibbs
21. Apr 2016 · 06:52 UTC
The atmosphere in this game was really great. I just loved the colors and the music. It felt really nice too, the animation was very fluid. Nice job. :)
🎤 Avant-Marde
21. Apr 2016 · 09:06 UTC
Thanks!

@DSSiege11: That makes you two so far! Someone on YT played the game and the same thing happened. :c Never found that bug ourselves. I might fix that later! Here's the video, in case you can confirm that you got stuck in the same place: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s1kga3bqhR4
grayhaze
21. Apr 2016 · 15:47 UTC
Beautiful graphics and audio, but I got stuck on the second screen with no clear way to progress. I could see a sing past the barrier that said "try pushing things around", but nothing I did with either character allowed me to get past. I imagine the shapeshifting aspect comes later in the game, so I'm disappointed I couldn't experience the game properly. I'd love to see this developed further though, as the movement on the squid alone was amazing. Well done. :)
🎤 Avant-Marde
21. Apr 2016 · 17:28 UTC
Thanks, grayhaze!

You're supposed to do, well, what it says — try moving things around. :p There's a big vertical boulder there. Push it with the octopus to get it out of the way. A few earlier commenters apparently got stuck there too.

While it's unlikely that we'll keep working on this game itself, I will eventually need an octopus for my project Vatnsmyrkr (https://forums.tigsource.com/index.php?topic=44264.0), and I may well base some of its implementation on my experimentation in this game, so you can keep an eye on that if you're interested. e:
DSSiege11
21. Apr 2016 · 18:11 UTC
I got stuck somewhere else, as the big frog. Somewhere around the place at 3:45 in the video. I jumped and landed right on the edge and got stuck that way.
Pavel M. Dlouhý
21. Apr 2016 · 18:28 UTC
Nice game. Good job.
🎤 Avant-Marde
21. Apr 2016 · 19:56 UTC
@DSSiege11: Thanks for the info. This morning we tried to bugfix the frog and froglet somehow, so I hope it should be better now.

@Pavel: Thanks!
LOSTALLOY
22. Apr 2016 · 21:00 UTC
The style is very consistent, everything in this game contributes to the mood. I really like the idea of this pairing :)
Franklin's Ghost
24. Apr 2016 · 00:13 UTC
Liked the style of this and thought it worked really well in setting the mood with the simple colours and music. The puzzles were also well done and I liked how you did have to work together to get the octopus to the end.

Do wish the tadpole had some contribution but can understand how hard it is to come up with so many puzzles that work together in such a short period of time. The form changes for the tadpole were also a nice touch and worked well in progressing the player. Also liked the menu and ending drawings thought they were nicely done.

Game reminded me of the cartoon Over the Garden wall which is a good thing.
h2n0
24. Apr 2016 · 08:59 UTC
I really like the Limbo aesthetic that you went for in the game, it played well to the simple mechanics.
Freank
24. Apr 2016 · 09:44 UTC
Hi, nice game ! We're realizing a video with several games of the Ludum Dare #35.
Can you add your game on indiexpo.net ? (it's free)
So we can include also your game in the video ;)
p.s. write #LDJAM in the game's description
🎤 Avant-Marde
25. Apr 2016 · 13:26 UTC
Thanks again, everyone!

@Freank: Yeah, sure, I'll try to sort that out! Thanks!
Riftpoint
25. Apr 2016 · 20:15 UTC
Cool mood and graphic style! Nice puzzles. Congratulations to the team
puppetmaster
26. Apr 2016 · 22:19 UTC
Wow! What a beautiful art.
Very clever theme implementation.
Congrats for your great game!
Nolocality
30. Apr 2016 · 16:55 UTC
Squishy octopus how satisfying you are to blob around with.

Very nice all around, the little touches really add to the mood and feel here. I especially dig the watermark flowing through the background and the rigidbody octopus.

Great job guys.
Rock Eaters
01. May 2016 · 05:38 UTC
cool ambiance and really beautifull game. physics work great too
Sabina Lis
07. May 2016 · 04:03 UTC
Beautiful mood, loved the initial drawings and the color palette. Music too. I enjoyed the idea of shifting characters, i wished the octopus was easier to control since it is so important to continue, great game!
TheCain
09. May 2016 · 21:16 UTC
Good game. It felt complete.
Marius
10. May 2016 · 11:08 UTC
did you put it also on indiexpo ?