Nice little metroidvania! :) Found the Thank You message! Only thing that bothered me during gameplay was how the jumping physics behaved. Other than that, nice entry!

Excellent concept/interpretation of the theme. Fun little mashup of Metroid and Mario (loved the Pirahna Plant/Skree enemies). The controls seemed kind of floaty (which, having played Super Metroid, is not a problem, but it would be for new players), and the graphics were inconsistent at best. The music was reminiscent of the Item Room theme from Super Metroid and really helped set the mood. The level design is fairly intuitive while not being too straightforward (the hallmark of any good metroidvania). Overall, I give it a 3/5.

I really want to play this! It looks awesome, but I could not find a Mac download. You compiled in Linux, should be able to build it in Mac OS. I'll try to play on a Windows machine tonight.

Would love for you to check out our entry in the Jam:

https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/38/super-natural-defense

Decent entry, I liked the idea and the mashup. Only critique would be that the controls are a little too floaty for my liking. Other than that a great entry!

@tacomabert I uploaded a OSX build, couldn't test it. I think you only need to give the right to run.

Wow, I can tell a lot of effort went into designing this! Loved the music changes and graphics, and the puzzle kept me hooked. Great idea and well done!

If you're interested in checking out our entry: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/38/rovr

i enjoyed the idea of being inside the head of mario, and using black and white with the contrast of collecting colorful objects was very good. however, the game controls needed work. they were very sluggish and the jumping mechanic was not very good. overall good game.

I guess I didn't read the description properly before I started, because the zooming in on Mario's head really took me by surprise! This was a really neat idea and I found the exploration compelling, but it is let down by the jump physics and slow, slippy movement. I got into the "thank you" room after only having collected two items. I would be eager to start again from the start if the movement was better.

Some probleme on the platforming (jump). But the idea is cool. Nice entry !

I enjoyed playing through the game. The jump controls felt a little off, but I really liked the art-style inside the head. Nice work!

There is a lot of content on offer here, and it's well thought out too. I like how you turned each color of Mario's face into a different zone and made the objective to color in his face. That adds a certain level of guidance through an implicit objective that never has to be directly told to the player. keeping the map grid in line with the pixels in Mario's face is also clever. Whenever I got lost, I could just look at the map to see where the current region I hadn't gone to is. The secrets were all well hidden and I appreciate both of the Easter eggs. The changing colors were also a very visually satisfying way of marking progress; it really made the world feel alive. Having the music change with each new color was also a nice touch. If I had to critique one aspect of the game, it would be the controls. Mario is known for his very smooth jump, but this jump is stiff and awkward. In general, the character should have their Y velocity go down little by little when they jump, not suddenly reverse all at once. The game definitely could have benefited from a proper jump arc. Regardless of this issue, I really enjoyed my time with this game (and, yes, I did play all the way to the end).

Neat idea, I like how the levels are designed based on the mario's sprite. I also liked the variety of inputs available, I ended up going with WASD with space for jump because I was able to jump and crouch at the same time (something you cannot do with the directional keys). I did get one case where by jumping while crouched I ended up stuck in some of the question mark blocks, but aside from that this was a pretty solid Metroidvania, great job!

Playing on the keyboard was pretty awkward. Controller is probably a lot better... overall pretty good!

I played this game, for more than half an hour, and completed it. Pretty challenging, with a well-designed map (some of the stuff may have been hidden a bit _too_ well, but, I did find it, so, works for me).

My only complaint is to do with the controls/physics. Even switching back and forth between wasd and arrow keys (and eventually settling on both at once, wa_d for move and down arrow for duck), my hands hurt after playing this. Probably would have been a lot easier with a controller, but the weird jump physics didn't really help - none of the jumps were impossible (obviously), but some of them were more difficult than I would have liked.

That may sound like a lot of complaining, but I definitely still really like the game - almost certainly the LD38 entry I've stuck with for the longest amount of time.

OH, and before I forget: The music was really good, and the premise was really amusing. I love me some Metroidvania, so even with slightly weird controls, I definitely am a fan of this game.

Great level design going on here!!!

The music is good, but doesn't really fit the game IMHO ; the character is a little clunky to control, especially the constant velocity jump, which takes some time getting used to.

I also got stuck in the floor, after releasing the "down" key while I was crouch-jumping and the character was touching the ceiling: the game "corrected" the position by moving the character down ... into the floor. Fortunately there's a restart button!

All of this sounds negative, although I really liked this game ;
The clever and intuitive level design teaches how to use the upgrades you collect without needing text, (as any good metroidvania should!), and the minimap is nice. 4/5 !

This is a pretty well designed metroidvania with a good amount of content, especially given the time-frame. There's a well thought out progression of items as you move through the game, and I think I even saw some potential sequence breaks. The overall goal of adding colours to a grey world is quite interesting and it's neat how adding colours changes the world slightly.

That said, there are a few flaws. The fact that the camera only moves when at the edges is annoying and leads to blind jumps. The jumping is awkward - there should be some gravity/acceleration to it rather than just going straight up and down. The game's reliance on hidden blocks feels really cheap, especially since your fire rate is so low. Even when you're shooting in the right area it can be hard to hit the destroyable blocks.

The graphics are alright and the zoom in/out at the start/end is really cool. The music's not amazing or anything, but it was fairly good and it never got annoying even after a pretty lengthy amount of time.

Overall, it's a really nice game with a few clear issues.

A very good idea and a considerable amount of work!

I can see you're polishing the game further, so a few issues I'd like to address:

- jumping, while a lot better than the original submitted to LD, is still a bit awkward. The momentum that builds up, plus stopping time/distance would suggest physics-controlled movement, and that's really tricky in a platformer. With more precise controls, and less momentum, it would allow for both faster movement, and more dynamic gameplay - though that probably would mean you'd have to ditch physics and program the movement from ground up. For platformers, that's unfortunately usually the case.

- there's a problem with background/foreground sprites: it's not that easy to differentiate them at a glance. Shadow on background sprites - or blur, anything that would hint at 'distance' would really help.


The mechanic with crouching is awesome :) As is the whole game and idea behind it, really fun. If you manage to work out the movement and background/foreground differentiation, it should really win some players over :)

Cheers, and leaving my rating, thanks for your feedback on mine :)

Some of the better level designs I've tried this LD so far! I agree with most of what the others have said. Was expecting mario-style controls. I also got my head stuck a couple of times while standing up near a roof when crouch jumping.

I did not finish the game after getting stuck but I liked it so far. Good job on a fine entry!

Nice game, and a great call back to the classic Metroidvanias. I really enjoyed this, and the music was really good and atmospheric, especially after getting the brown square. the acceleration when you started walking was a bit too slow for my liking, however I found that platforming was decent enough that I still felt satisfified when I completed a really hard bit. The graphics could have also used a slight improvement, as the orange colour was rather jarring. But as a fan of Metroidvanias I had a lot of fun with this one

Impressive

I was not able to finish it, i got stuck trying to pick up the mushroom. Got stuck in the nose with a too far jump to reach the mushroom and no way to go back... probably I am missing something

Up till that point I liked it very much

Can't ask for more than a tiny Metroidvania.. I liked the music!

Great game! Loved the idea, the metroidvania of it all and the little touches like the changing soundtrack. On the negative side the jumps felt a bit floaty and the palette didn't make it easy to tell blocks in the background and foreground once the first colour was "freed".

Nice metroid platformer. Found yellowizer, gun and "Thank You" and stacked)
Wasn't sure how to make a jump in the top right room - after plenty of tries I gave up.
About controllers - IMHO accelerating/deaccelerating is too smooth and slow.

Anyway style, sound, and design are well fit to each other and I like playing it.
Good Job, guys.

Cool game! It took me a while to understand the controls, but they aren't bad once you get the hang of them. I think I will come back and try to beat it, because I am intrigued by the premise! I liked the music although I wish it looped better. Good job!

Yes, another little metroid platformer.

Nice design, lots of switches, a lot of hidden stuff and... pixel perfect jumping.

As almost everyone said here before, this game at the current stage is simply too hard to even complete.

Some of the "impossible" jumps are technically possible (and I've done it once, but I didnt got some other item so i had to get back), but now i cant do it any more.

Which is a shame cos otherwise it'd be a much better metroid platformer than my LD entry... :)

Still, a good job!

@mikel, @korvyashka, @g12345
It took us 1h to find out where you got stuck with a "impossible" jump. Congrats!:sunglasses:
With the new jump physics you could reach a place (2 pixel) you only should reach with jump boots.
But you did it :astonished:.
We only tested the difficulty jump and not the impossible one.

In the newest release 1.2.1, I changed the level design to make it clear you new to find the boots first.

Many thanks to all which gave us useful and constructive comments. I appreciate it. It helps us to improve our game and give you fun to play it.

I thought I'm just posting an image here, with the new version...

In this version I actually found the top part, which i didnt before.

Also I never found the boots. But I did found 3 different ! blocks.

http://imgur.com/rYfdyg7

@g12345 https://i.imgur.com/zD0l5tj.png You were so close!! :wink:

update: Now I see it!! Lol :astonished:, you are a very good pixel jumper!! Will add a block to go outside!!

Warning: A large file and spoiler!

http://imgur.com/j1av7tA :smile:

Awesome mashup! I would've liked to have my character move just a tad faster, as backtracking felt kinda tedious with his current movement speed. The secret disappearing blocks were a wonderful addition, made exploring feel rewarding when you discovered a new passageway. Loved that the music changed as you filled the world with color (the tracks were pretty groovy too!)

Loved this game! It had so much content! The jumping controls were really solid and overall the game played well, I got lost a few times, but it was only ever temporary.

Might be worth putting an easy mode in, that shows like cracks or some marking on walls that can be walked through or shot. I had no issues with it, but I could see some people having a hard time if they don't know to check for it.

The moment when you hit the first block and you get that big color/music transition is super good! I was pleasantly surprised when I clicked through to find a lot of great original art and original music. I think this is a great effort for such a short time :). Certainly, one of the best entries in LD 38 for sure.

I really like the idea, very nice components and well implemented. The music is very good too. There are only a couple of things I would improve, The keys on the keyboard, maybe something customizable would be nice. ALso, it's not clear which blocks can you shoot and which blocks you cannot shoot, I'm not sure if this was made to encourage exploration but it's a little bit annoying sometimes not being sure if you can shoot something or not, anyway that's a minor things. Really solid controllers and nice game overall.

The controls were really floaty and the jumping was pretty bad. Its usually not a good idea to add in hard jumps unless your controls are really polished. Otherwise its kind of frustrating. Secret passages are almost never a good idea. At one point I ended up just jumping into every wall to see if it was a passage. Despite these things the level design was fairly good. Some of the art such as the vines was nice while other stuff such as the player or the tiles were kind of bad. I did end up playing this for a while before I get stuck so that probably means that it is somewhat fun.

Very nice.

The controls were indeed too floaty / slow. I know Metroid wasn't particularly nice about its destructible / ghost block placement, but in this game, it was really too arbitrary! Having the map right there helped, obviously, but I felt the difficulty it introduced was too artificial. Same goes for the ghost block labyrinth at some point, it mostly seemed like a time delay.

I loved the second track :)

Nice game. I like your interpretation of the theme. Since I am a real fan of metroidvania-like games, I had a real good time playing yours. I was a little confused at first, because you said, that your game has gamepad controls, but obviously you have to bind them before using (should be mentioned somewhere). Well in the end I did find out and played through the whole game with my x-box360 controller (works pretty well!).

Thanks for your contribution.

I would have liked to play more but the jumping physics kinda spoiled it for me. I gave up after failing a jump (top left area) for the 100th time.

Cool little metroidvenia! Graphics were simple but effective. Well done :)

Physics felt really floaty and sluggish, and the camera lags behind a little too much. The music was pretty dope though, and the game itself is pretty creative and good. Also really cool to see someone else using Godot!

Wow, seriously what an amazing use of a theme, I really really dig the idea behind this, it's seriously awesome! The gameplay can feel a little floaty at times and a bit off but the idea behind it all kept me playing a little bit longer, it's 100% something I'm coming back (when I've got more time) to finish fully. Well done! :D

(And to answer your question on my game jam, yes, I made it all in under 72 hours. I had about eight hours sleep total that weekend, I honestly think I tried too much again, should of scaled it down :/ The music was made in about three hours, I just have some awesome plug-ins that help big style.)

Seriously well done on your game, it's such a great concept! :D

Solid entry! The quantity of content of the whole level is nice. Physics feels a bit too odd and slow, that's definitely something to tweak well to have a good feeling. I'm not used to metroidvania genre but the level design felt sometimes a bit too nasty (like when you need to try out if you need to shoot a block or just go through it and with tricks at some places ><).

But overall, great job ! And you made a game ;)

Nice, unusual setting choice to fit the theme with a lot of content. Interaction was relatively responsive, even if the physics were a bit floaty. The music was great, but the graphics.

The main issue I had with the game is the fact that it kept breaking its conventions arbitrarily. I mean, exploration and discovery are key to a Metroidvania game. However, hiding paths behind generic tiles is not the best way to encourage that: it can make sense for secrets at times, as long as you provide some subtle hints to get the players thinking how to reach a seemingly inaccessible spot, but not so much for the main path. In some cases a tile would be breakable (or walkable), then the next one, looking exactly the same wouldn't, and there were no way to distinguish which case it was except for trial and error, which for a relatively large map can be frustrating.

With some improvements in terms of visual feedback and art style, plus some small tweaks to the physics this could be an awesome entry, and you sure did a lot in 72h, so congrats!!

The concept was good and the sound was great, but the player control felt very slugish and it was hard to figure out what to do with no indication of the hidden routes.