Sleepy Hamster by Karl Erik Saks
You're an overworked and underslept Hamster. The moment you get to bed, the hamster wheel of nightmare begins, robbing you of any rest and keeping the stress of the working week looping back into itself, day in, day out.
Navigate through 3 different levels of nightmare intensities. Anyone to beat level 3 gets bragging rights!
How to Play: * Mouse movement in Menus * WASD/Arrow Keys for movement * Spacebar for Pause * 1/2/3 for different volume levels (We strongly recommend 1) * Survive through the routine, nail beats and collect stars, get as much sleep as you can
Made by: * Karl Erik Saks - General Design & Sound * Rauno Jaaska - Developer * Mykola Herasymovych - Developer * Kersti Mölder - Art * Giancarlo Robles Pacheco - Art
Made in Unity

| Youtube | https://kolebas.itch.io/sllepy-head-hamster |
| Original URL | https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/47/sleepy-hamster |
Ratings
| Overall | 1074th | 3.319⭐ | 38🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 979th | 3.194⭐ | 38🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 1008th | 3.149⭐ | 39🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 1175th | 3.222⭐ | 38🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 445th | 3.946⭐ | 39🧑⚖️ |
| Audio | 427th | 3.608⭐ | 39🧑⚖️ |
| Humor | 720th | 2.814⭐ | 37🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 747th | 3.446⭐ | 39🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 36🗳️ | 49🗨️ |
Fun idea, cute graphics, nice music.
My only gripe was that the movement of the hamster felt sluggish sometimes. Since the hamster can only move on the beat, I wish he was faster to get to his new destination.
Overall, very nice game!
I agree that there should be fewer lanes and that they should be more clearly defined. Also, some stars were not possible to collect e.g. a star on a black bag.
Oh, and thanks for adding volume levels (definitely appreciated)
Here's some constructive feedback you might to work on, if you come around to it:
- The controls didn't work all the time. I had issues with movement inputs being ignored sometimes, wich gets really frustrating in a context like this.
- It wasn't always clear if you would hit an item when changing lanes. The game could use some more visual aids to help the player make informed decisions if a jump in a specific direction would be a good idea. for me, it came down to intuition which didn't always work out. Maybe a slight grid or something could help.
Other than that, a really solid entry. Loved the music and art! :)
[Edit]
Oh hey, it's one of your entries @mykola :) Dunno I you remember, but I played your fire game in the spring. Loved the music there as well!
I do remember that you left very useful feedback for my previous game, still very much appreciate it! This time however, the music is by @karl-erik-saks and I focused mainly on the coding part. And you and your team keep surprising and inspiring by doing beautiful games of enormous scale! =D
I found the first level to kind of be the hardest, because it was so slow! The latter levels kept my interest a bit more, but it was a bit punishing to have to do the first level again every time I died.
It would probably be helpful to have a little more feedback if you try to move on / off the beat, although I figured it out quite quickly.
I think there's a bug with pausing it -- when I paused it for a minute and came back, the items were no longer moving.
Overall a really well-executed game, nice work! :)
I really liked the camera angle of the game. It's not an often used angle so it makes it stand out a bit on that alone. It reminds me a bit of Booster Hill https://youtu.be/SANO28TAiA4?t=94
Like others, I actually didn't realize it was a rhythm-esque game until a few levels and deaths into it. I'm glad the rhythm aspect is optional, the last stage is a little daunting. Though I'd probably be able to handle it, I did play it safe and stop the rhythm movement just to avoid the devastating death.
I personally thought there may be a lot of hamster wheel games this jam but surprisingly this is the first one I played! I liked the game overall, very bold vision with the art and presentation :)
I think I agree with what elemel said, having a grid for the player movement would've made the game a lot easier to play. As it is, it was kind of hard to judge where the collisions would start and stop.