Harmony Bloom by Bensonance

[raw]
made by Bensonance for LD34 (JAM)
Bloom Harmony is a tranquil musical puzzle game about growing melodies and soothing the world back into growth and life.

Click to move (holding click works too), click to plant, mouse wheel to change plants, hold down left click to make longer noted plants. Generally a mouse is important here.

Sound is very important!

With blank cues, try match the note of the puzzle solution played to the note of the trees you can place!

Ben Myres - Design/Programming
Sean Goncalves - Design/Art/Sound
Tim Harbour - Music

Ratings

Coolness 71% 3
Overall(Jam) 3.28 558
Audio(Jam) 3.38 313
Fun(Jam) 2.81 787
Graphics(Jam) 4.00 211
Humor(Jam) 1.95 817
Innovation(Jam) 3.32 383
Mood(Jam) 3.40 362
Theme(Jam) 3.66 528

Feedback

kmakai
15. Dec 2015 · 11:05 UTC
Awesome! I quite liked your entry. The visuals and sound were excellent, and I think the difficulty curve was just right. The only bugs I noticed were that the character sprite is occasionally shown behind walls, and that after planting one color in a slot, then trying a different color, that one would sometimes play the previous color's note (I think?).

I really liked some of the small details like the bird-cursor landing, and the hints.

Fantastic job!
gene-z
15. Dec 2015 · 11:05 UTC
Nice game, nice concept
prymidion
15. Dec 2015 · 11:30 UTC
Very pretty-- the graphics reminded me of Superbrothers, Sword and Sworcery, which is a very good thing.

Found it a little tricky to understand what was going on at first.

Impressive!
saucygames
15. Dec 2015 · 11:38 UTC
no web :(
LostTrainDude
15. Dec 2015 · 11:39 UTC
Really interesting concept and pleasant execution :D

I always enjoy games that make music somewhat a core part of the gameplay.

It took me a while to figure out that you could actually hear the solution before planting the seeds (maybe it's written in the game but I forgot\missed it!).

I'm wondering if you are planning a larger game... I'd definitely play it!
x92rwzb
15. Dec 2015 · 12:30 UTC
Fun little game.
koocachookies
15. Dec 2015 · 12:50 UTC
Beautiful pixeled graphics. The mechanics are also cool but the game didn't stop crashing :(
BubsyPoochies
15. Dec 2015 · 15:54 UTC
We enjoyed this one a lot, the mix between growing plants and harmonic sounds packed with nice pixel art graphics and a mysterious atmosphere makes a really pleasant experience. Would love to see this one growing further into a bigger game, very good job!!!
Rodaja
15. Dec 2015 · 17:45 UTC
It feels like this would be a tiny part of a much bigger story/game.

I felt myself being more guided by the visuals than sounds themself, but I understand you put the visual cues to avoid it being too difficult.

The overall calm tone of the game is well done, though the place felt a bit too big and empty. Some passages could have been made of smaller corridors or have some decorative props of some type.

Good job!
StitchesMagoo
15. Dec 2015 · 18:14 UTC
Hey guys, awesome entry! Absolutely love the art! Interesting mechanics as well.
newbeings
15. Dec 2015 · 22:26 UTC
Really nice - very similar to our entry in some ways. Well done!

I found it visually difficult to distinguish where i could walk (was fine after i figured out the things were pipes not walls) - I also found the mouse confusing because - kept forgettting if i was using bird or shadow to click.
oparisy
15. Dec 2015 · 22:39 UTC
Liked your music, loved the idea of the bird cursor with its idle animation. I had difficulties understanding that I could walk on the pipes, their color scheme was disturbing I suppose. Got stuck on walls corners often, which was slowing me down.

I had some difficulties with the puzzles and the order in which I should solve them.

Nice atmosphere and execution overall.
francoisvn
15. Dec 2015 · 23:05 UTC
Pretty cool, reminded me of Sword & Sworcery in style and pacing. It took me a moment or two to figure out how to play, but once I figured it (I think!) it was quite a relaxing experience. I did get a little confused with the bird cursor and its shadow - I kinda expected the character to walk to stand on the shadow
KZdev
16. Dec 2015 · 00:29 UTC
Ok so I got this error the first time I played. I wasn't able to replicate it a second time but it happened when I click the thing that makes the water come out.

############################################################################################
FATAL ERROR in
action number 1
of Step Event0
for object PuzzleParent:

Push :: Execution Error - Variable Get 0.containedPlant(100034, -2147483648)
at gml_Script_scr_PlaySolution
############################################################################################
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
stack frame is
gml_Script_scr_PlaySolution (line 0)
gml_Object_PuzzleParent_Step_0
hadesfury
16. Dec 2015 · 11:21 UTC
Great game ! The one thing that bothered me was that travel distances were a little too long. Even though the 2D art is gorgeous, I don't feel the backgrounds offer enough variation to justify such long distances.
But still, it's beautiful and I loved the atmosphere. I hope you develop it further !
Tuism
16. Dec 2015 · 11:31 UTC
So esoteric! I liked that you're trying something very different, but I feel like it missed the target on being a game... Unless I missed something completely :/

- Where's the gameplay? Progress amounts to matching exactly what's given with what seemed like an overly complex set of controls. Simon says, without any real-time challenge aspect.

- The travelling between bits seemed very unnecessary and uninteresting. The same gripe I had with Shadow of the Colossus and Titan Souls.

- I couldn't work out what to do with empty blocks and gave up. Leaving them empty resulted in the crack of a wrong option. Couldn't see any other control options.

Otherwise:

- Amazing graphics, Sword & Sworcery esque, of course :)
- Pleasant sounds, though a bit sparse.
- The bird metaphor was cool, but there was a bit of a disparity between having a shadow indicating where the bird "was" vs where your click lands. It's weird.
- Great juice and details.

Cool experiment, perhaps needs a bit more thought on the mechanics to make it work-outable rather than rote copying what's there. Of course, I may have missed something completely :/
Warboys
16. Dec 2015 · 13:38 UTC
It's super unclear that the plant plots are linked to those coloured squares, took me a good 3 minutes to figure that one out... then I had to backtrack all the way to the start to do the ones I'd wandered past :p

The mood is really nice, and I love the effects (especially planting some big fuchsia flower in that dead forest). Very swords and sworcery feeling too.
Lullaby
16. Dec 2015 · 22:54 UTC
Really really great graphics, lacks of a nice song to finish it ;)

Nice use of the theme and well done ;)
Garris
16. Dec 2015 · 23:48 UTC
This game was really neat! I liked the incorporation of the theme, and the game play was smooth and interesting. Nice audio, and I really liked the little lady character and her bird. Very cute.
Jumpshipmusic
17. Dec 2015 · 09:39 UTC
For anyone interested in the music, I uploaded the full tracks here: https://soundcloud.com/jumpshipmusic/sets/harmony-bloom :D
Anshul Goyal
20. Dec 2015 · 03:12 UTC
Gorgeous art! It took me some time to understand how the planting works.
Zyow
22. Dec 2015 · 15:23 UTC
Nice concept with great graphics! Nice job!
klianc09
25. Dec 2015 · 21:45 UTC
Looks and sounds beautiful. Liked the details like the bird sitting down when not moving.
I was very confused what to do at first, but I ran around and somehow pieced it together bit by bit. I missed the information about being able to hold down to get longer notes, so I was very stumped at first. Make sure all the tutorial information can't be missed at the beginning. Also the map seemed to be unnecessarily huge.

(Also I managed to crash it by clicking around randomly the first time around, sadly I can't really tell what exactly was causing it.)
EwChap
29. Dec 2015 · 05:10 UTC
Great concept, great game. Loved the style and the artwork. Would love to see more.