Plague Friend's Deathly Journey by sakura_magika
Plague Friend is stuck in a time loop of leeching their patient. There's got to be some way to escape! Travel back and forth in Plague Friend's timeline, talk to people, and leech your way out of the loop.
This is my first Ludum Dare and my first game ever. I hope you enjoy playing it as much as I enjoyed making it!
Jam version (v1.2): https://sakura-magika.itch.io/plague-friends-deathly-journey
Improved Post-Jam version (v6.0): https://sakura-magika.itch.io/plague-friends-deathly-journey-post-jam-version
CONTROLS: * Move with Left / Right Arrow * Jump with Z / Up Arrow * Talk / Interact with Spacebar
Fabulous art by @moski:
Gameplay previews:
Hint:
If you find yourself stuck in a loop, here's a hint for you.
Gb rfpncr gur ybbc, lbh'yy arrq gb nibvq cnlvat gur thneq gb trg vagb gbja...
Changelog: ``` v6.0 Golden Master update * Added main menu! * With new music!! * And an in-game escape menu!!! * Added options menu for audio volume control * Support single-single-leeching! * Support triple-leeching!!! * With extra special dialogue * New music for final sleep * New dialogue box * Secret button to display hints for dialogue you haven't found yet * Dialogue heard % and number of loops completed now persist between launches * Separate talk and jump buttons * Hospital doors now visually open and close * Various minor dialogue rewrites
v5.3 Treetop update * Added more hidden dialogue * Fixed a bug where you couldn't jump if you slid/fell out of a dialogue zone while the dialogue was in progress
v5.2 - The Key To Success Update * Added The Enchanted Key That Time Forgot
v5.1 - Bedbug Fix * Fixed getting blocked in a dialogue zone by a bouncy bed
v5.0 - Platformz Galore Update * Added platforms! * Wow!
v4.1 - Cleanupdate * Fix backtracking after talking to the Nurse * Fix various bugs when you restart the game * Dialogue polish
v4.0 - Make some noise update * Add beautiful background music * Add silly sound effects * Smooth out game start and sleep sequences
v3.0 - Come to life update * Add dialogue bounce for each character * Add dialogue % complete on game over screen * Fix getting stuck if you backtrack at a certain point * Dialogue improvements & polish
v2.0 - Post Jam version * Dynamic celestial bodies * Ye mystical clock * Improved and additional (secret) dialogue * Various visual polishings
v1.2 - Backtrack fix * Fixed getting stuck if you backtrack at a certain point
v1.1 - Minor fixes * Fixed inventory box not displaying * Fixed dialogue dismiss/present loop
v1.0 - Initial Release * Get ye plague ```
Ratings
| Overall | 711th | 3.567⭐ | 32🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 726th | 3.4⭐ | 32🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 519th | 3.586⭐ | 31🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 387th | 3.966⭐ | 31🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 842th | 3.5⭐ | 32🧑⚖️ |
| Humor | 210th | 3.7⭐ | 32🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 593th | 3.583⭐ | 32🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 41🗳️ | 48🗨️ |
Really great first game. Next time post more comments on other games so you can get the ratings you deserve.
Congrats!
Unique art style is what it's all about! I thought the graphics are very pleasant and add to the vibe of the game well. The whole game felt like a relaxing walk outside with some very witty dialogue. Some music and perhaps some sound effects would make it even better, but of course it can be hard to fit everything in with the time limit. I wasn't able to break the loop but enjoyed the game nonetheless.
This game definitely deserves more people playing it, I think the font used to show the game title in the screenshots is a little jarring. I think making the font more swirly and smooth like the rest of the game could help attract more people in.
Thank you for making this very pleasant experience, and very well done!
*~Jack Soulie~*
P.S. It's super cool to see that you keep updating the game after the event. Wish you the best of luck!
@stellarbeargames I opted out of music ratings because I didn't think it would be fair, since I did the music post-jam, but I'm really glad you liked it! A hint to break out of the loop, you need to avoid paying the guard a coin to enter the gate. (If you did this, but still couldn't break out, then yeah, somehow, you found a bug.) I regret not starting to play the other entries in the game jam sooner, I was working really hard on continuing to update the game with everything I wanted to put in it but couldn't for the jam, so I neglected to play the other entries until I was done. I should have had more balance between playing and reviewing other games, and continuing to improve my own.
@firetwin I added music and sound effects in the post jam version, as well as a bunch of other visual touches, extra dialogue, and platforming. If you want to give it a try, I'd love to hear what you think! I'm glad you enjoyed it, same hint for you: after going through one loop, try going back in time to avoid paying the guard a coin to enter the town. And yeah, I could probably use a better font to make the game feel more enticing.
@gamescodedogs I'm glad you liked the disjoint theme and style. I remember happy tree friends from middleschool hahaha, I can see the similarities. Thanks for playing!
@hgcummings Wow, thanks for the compliment! I don't consider myself a visual artist at all, I just tried to draw everything as quickly and simply as I could. I also think there's more potential for different kinds of puzzles with this style of game. The butcher is my favorite character for sure!
What shines most about the game, in my opinion, is the *dialogue and humor*. The characters, especially Plague Friend, were just so unpredictably bizarre, but at the same time likeable and charming. Their dialogue felt unforced and was just all around super fun to read. It provided an excellent reason for interacting with the characters as much as possible to see all the possible wild things they would say, and as such also a driving force for progressing and seeing the game through to the end.
When it comes to *art*, the game also feels really different - it's this blend of really well made visuals, and stuff that looks kind it was kind of scribbled down quickly. This made the game's atmosphere casual and playful, which definitely interacted well with and emphasized the humor.
The *gameplay* was quite simple at surface level, but the time travel mechanic made things a lot more interesting, letting you bend the rules a bit by bringing things from the future into the present into the past, vice versa. A great idea that fits perfectly with the theme! Not to mention, the humor of the game once again shines through with the way Friend interacts with the other characters and the environment.
Overall, the game kept me playing until the end with its peculiar art style, sense of humor and mechanics. Well done! :smile:
UPDATE: I just discovered that the graphics was not shown correctly in Firefox!! and I just played it like that and I really enjoyed it! (that tell how catchy your game is)
I noticed that when I was rating your game, then I saw the screenshots, which were so different of what I have played, so I switched to chrome, and oh boy! that a beautiful looking game :smiley:
i'm so glad, and honestly relieved, that folks are receiving the visuals so well, i am completely new to drawing, this is the most i've drawn since i was in grade school, and i was really really nervous about having to make all the art my self for this jam. i actually painted everything just using my mouse, point and click... it was extremely tiring. i'm glad it turned into something that people like.
i'm really pleased with how the time travel mechanic turned out, and i think it would be cool to take it further outside of a jam setting, and come up with more complex interactions. thanks for playing <3
@div00 oh wow, how embarrassing! blame unity, hahaha. i feel exactly how Plague Friend does from that screenshot, i can't believe you actually played the entire game without any backgrounds!
@danielblanco3d i'm so glad you enjoyed it, thanks for the praise! i was really nervous about doing the art myself, this is my first time with digital painting a whole world from the ground up, and i ended up painting it all with just a mouse, so i was really nervous about how it would turn out. amazingly, it's turning out to be really well received, wow!
i'm definitely sad that i didn't have time to do any audio in the jam version, but i actually spent a lot of time making music and sound effects for the post jam version of the game. i had a lot of fun making the music and sfx, so i hope you have time to try out the post jam version too and tell me what you think!
So yeah, I played the Jam version, but just seeing such a detailed changelog made me already think highly of this game. Having the opportunity to go back to an already submitted game and further polish it that much must meant that you had a great time working on it to being with.
And I must say, it shows. While gameplay wise it's not necessarily spectacular, it's quite a fun take in the "fetching" genre. I like how thematically it's a journey across time, with simple yet effective puzzles. #Doubleleechpower
Pudgy plague doctor will always have a place in my heart. Kudos! :whale:
I like how the characters all had their own font, as a way to give them some personality. ^^
I also like what you already did for the post-jam version! Nice sounds, music and more graphics, and a lovely sun and moon. :smile:
Well done!
I would like to see this game open with an inciting incident, and follow a traditional plot arc more. If you set my expectation, provide some urgency, raise some questions, then I will be motivated to answer those questions and discover what the story is. This would also be aided by tasks that are more complex. It seems like this may be difficult since your game is basically 1D, only moving left and right, so physically going to different places to explore may not work as most games like this do.
Well done, hope to see more added to this!
@ranjan meow!
@reallyqbert thanks for the feedback, I'll have to look more into best practices for scaling UI elements at different screen sizes. In the Post Jam version, think the way I have it set up is that they should always be the same size relative to the screen size (e.g. inventory bar being 1/5th the width of the screen). In the Jam version, I think they are a static pixel size, so they probably only look right at 1920x1080. Trying to figure out how the UI canvas layout stuff worked was like the last thing I did before submitting, heheh.
@ghuyajil thanks for playing!
@rhoff95 mm yeah, that's a very good point about the hook, it does have a pretty slow start, and things don't really get interesting until half way through. maybe sone kind of experience in the beginning that gives you a taste of the previous night's bloody activities would set the mood better, and be more motivating to see what the game has in store. maybe even simply starting at the point that you leeched the patient, instead of starting when you woke up the morning after.
especially in the context of a jam, as you said, games have a lot of competition to fight for attention, and players are jumping from game to game very quickly. I would love to try my hand at more complex puzzles / tasks! now that I have some experience with getting the basics set up, hopefully next time I can spend more time on more interesting gameplay.
@midorimelody aww yay, thanks!!
@peace-of-cake-games oh wow, really? I might revisit this world in the future to expand upon it, and make more complex / challenging puzzles, it's really grown on my over the course of making it!
@virtual-turtle-studio wow, I'm really glad you played it to the end! cute yet disorienting was definitely the vibe I was going for :3