All But Starlight Here by cottontshirtz

[raw]
made by cottontshirtz for Ludum Dare 45 (JAM)

This game was designed for use with Tobii Eye Tracking in mind. This game WILL WORK if you don’t have the peripherals, but the visual effect itself will be less powerful.

NOTE:

There has been some issues with understanding the objective so I'm going to give a few hints to get players started.

  1. Walk along the cliff to your left until you get to the two pillars in front of you. (Follow the lit path)
  2. Pick up the flask on the altar. This will lock you in place until the next step is complete.
  3. Look upward towards the large swirly star that is framed in the window of the pillars. (If not using Eye Tracking, place the 'no eye track' icon on the star. If using eye tracking, just look at the star)
  4. Once the star does what it does, there will be a clear path through the rest of the environment.

Screenshot<em>01</em>Hint.png

This game is titled “All But Starlight Here” which is in reference to the poem Enosis by American transcendentalist poet Christopher Cranch. While enosis is a complicated political issue not addressed in this work, the poem is quite nice...

This game follows the letter but perhaps not spirit of the theme. I used this LD as an opportunity to construct an experience around an abstract visual effect I have been working on for some time. In short, this effect “adds detail” where the user is looking. If you are not using the Tobii Eye Tracking, ‘where the user is looking’ is set to the center of the screen where the ‘no eye track’ indicator is present.

Screenshot_02.png

CONTROLS: This game uses standard WASD and mouse controls, with left shift for a (slow) run and the space bar for a (short) jump. The jump is mostly used to free the player if they get stuck on some set geometry (usually it’s the steps down that give the character controller trouble).

NOTE: This game is fairly intensive in terms of both graphics (visual effect) and CPU. I was unable to test this game on a variety of systems so I don’t know if it will work on Mac, Linux, or systems with integrated graphics. Please let me know if the game does not work at all for you, including the issue you’re seeing and your system specs and I’ll try to get another copy of the executable compiled.

CREDITS:

Matt Mitchell for the use of his Crotales

Anna Martin and St. Michael Catholic Church for the use of their space for the purposes of recording.

Ratings

Overall 904th 3.056⭐ 20🧑‍⚖️
Fun 981th 2.694⭐ 20🧑‍⚖️
Innovation 315th 3.528⭐ 20🧑‍⚖️
Theme 895th 2.806⭐ 20🧑‍⚖️
Graphics 434th 3.722⭐ 20🧑‍⚖️
Audio 601th 2.778⭐ 20🧑‍⚖️
Mood 414th 3.5⭐ 20🧑‍⚖️
Given 15🗳️ 21🗨️

Feedback

firetwoonenine
08. Oct 2019 · 01:24 UTC
Interesting (trippy!) visual effect, but beyond that I don't know what I'm supposed to be doing. Feels more like a tech demo for the effect than anything else.
🎤 cottontshirtz
08. Oct 2019 · 01:35 UTC
I mean, that's not too far off.

Travel along the wall to the left towards the two pillars to begin the game proper.
Danny88881
08. Oct 2019 · 01:40 UTC
Whoa, this game was a trip and a half. The fans on my laptop were so loud while this game was running lol. The visual effects and atmosphere are nice but I don't really know what to do. I walked to the pillar area and grabbed the glass dome, after that I get stuck and can't move anymore.
🎤 cottontshirtz
08. Oct 2019 · 01:48 UTC
Sorry, I didn't have a lot of time to play test...

You have to look at the star above, it will be between the two pillars about halfway up when you're stuck in place. If you're not using the eye tracking, just put the 'no eye' icon on the star and wait a bit.
Jieyi Na
08. Oct 2019 · 02:25 UTC
The graphics are really cool. But besides walking around I don't know what I am supposed to do, so I think it would be better to include an intro to explain what are the objectives.
yokuday
08. Oct 2019 · 04:30 UTC
I love the game overall but it wasnt that easy to control the player.
Rrawrr
08. Oct 2019 · 05:12 UTC
Nice visuals, mate. I like this "distorted" textures. Feels like you are in a dream or something. I have found a bottle in the fountain, and suddenly stuck to the basement where it stayed)
Tygrak
08. Oct 2019 · 16:29 UTC
I love walking simulators or whatever you want to call these games (even made two in past LD's :D). The ambient sounds and mood was beautiful. I don't have the peripherals so the visual effect you used probably didn't work as intended. To be honest I wish it could have been toned down a bit, maybe in the games settings, but I still really enjoyed the visuals. I love love the particle effects, especially when floating on water. ![Untitled-1.png](///raw/f13/z/28d95.png)

Overall, great experience, wish the effect was a bit lessened, loved exploring everything. The ending was very nice too.
miu
08. Oct 2019 · 16:48 UTC
the visuals of the game are quite nice, but unfortunately, I had trouble seeing the little lights at first due to it, I think the game felt a little repetitive and adding more interactivity or a narative to it would make it a greater game, also the end was pretty beautiful visually, but maybe you should make it into a cinematic
apart from that, it's impressive you could make all that in only 3 days
🎤 cottontshirtz
08. Oct 2019 · 16:58 UTC
@miu Thank you for the review. As stated in the article I have been working on the visual effect for a while but the environment is new.

We're the lights you were having trouble finding the lights on posts or the ones that fall to the ground?
miu
08. Oct 2019 · 17:04 UTC
@cottontshirtz the one I had trouble finding were on the ground
🎤 cottontshirtz
08. Oct 2019 · 17:12 UTC
@tygrak Thank you for the review and I'm glad you liked the environment. Just went on a hike a few days before and got inspired.

Can you describe what you mean about the effect bring toned down? How would you like it to be different? I'm still working on the effect so any feedback you can give is welcomed.
Tygrak
08. Oct 2019 · 18:50 UTC
@cottontshirtz well, I don't really get how it works so, if it's a shader, I don't know a lot about them, so I don't know how possible it is. I mainly just mean how for example if you are looking at one place, everything is moving, even though you are not moving and looking at just one place. I wish everything was just a bit less wobbly you know? :D Even when you are looking directly at something, it still moves quite a bit. It's possible that with the peripheral it works really well, but I can't test that because I don't have it :).
🎤 cottontshirtz
08. Oct 2019 · 20:43 UTC
@tygrak I can understand what you mean. When using the eye tracking the majority of the 'wigglyness' is in the periphery of your vision and your brain kind of overwrites it when you look to the edge. I will keep experimenting with the effect to see what kind of things I can get.
Nodli
09. Oct 2019 · 10:48 UTC
Wow, this was quite an experience !
I'm guessing that there is some Voronoi Diagram involved and some kind of iterative refinement between frames but I can't figure out how you did it exactly. I would love to see the source code.

It's a big difficult to orient yourself at first because the lights are included in the effect, you could maybe render them separately like you do with the stars.
Karanveer
09. Oct 2019 · 10:53 UTC
well, the graphics are unlike any other that i've played yet...other than some stuttering of frames (for me/mypc) it was good. kinda more towards the MOODy category. GG
🎤 cottontshirtz
09. Oct 2019 · 11:01 UTC
@nodli That's pretty much right on the money. Check out the [Jump Flood Algorithm](https://www.researchgate.net/publication/4263565_Variants_of_Jump_Flooding_Algorithm_for_Computing_Discrete_Voronoi_Diagrams) to see how the Voronoi Tessellation is being calculated. After that you just have to have an 'input texture' that determines which objects become seeds for the Voronoi texture.

![VT_Seeds_Texture.png](///raw/56b/2/z/29175.png)

For this game, the 'input texture' is coming from a camera that's in lock step with the main camera and can only see one layer. The only objects in that layer are unlit white spheres that are raycast out into the environment and get placed at the ray hit-point. Everything past that is a total hack of fragment shaders.