You nailed it!The game has good graphics, good audio(although it gets boring after some time), I loved the idea of the chat, their whole conversation and the mood it gives.Good work!

I loved this game! It's so fun trying to balance being in the conversation with fighting the boss, it's really interesting

Guys, you should add a cover image of you game ! :)

Nice concept.
You propose a very complete and innovative experience. It's very fresh and fun.

Congratulations to the team.

Living that heal life has never felt so realistic.

The game is kind of funny! Great audio and dialogs. As for me, chatting parts seems a bit long. But good work overall!

Very interesting and original concept. Cool!

Really nice concept, well done ! I could not beat the boss though, never been quite good as a healer. Loved it ! :purple_heart:

Very interesting concept. The text addition adds a nice amount of depth to the work and the background audio/narration is hauntingly beautiful

Very interesting and fun to play, it's like a game in the game ^^

Awesome Game!Everything just fits together.

Congrats to all of you guys!

Cool game, i like it :D :thumbsup:

Good dialogue and unique gameplay! I'm not great at this style of game, so I found myself more invested in the chat than the boss battle. Appreciated how you gave lots of time at the start to figure out the controls before the battle really begins. Great entry!

Great narrative and very original in the execution.

Really interesting take on MMO mechanics and dealing with toxic gamer culture. Very cool idea and a great start. I loved the boss art and the general idea of dealing with your teammates while boss fighting. Some suggestions:
-several of the narrative buttons didn't really accurately reflect the narrative option text when selected
- I liked balancing between healing and the chat. Rather then switching between the boss doing nothing and then dishing out tons of damage, perhaps you could make the boss damage slower but do both narrative and healing at the same time.
- having to follow the text added a lot of pressure and made it really interesting
- I liked having to play the healer, it felt like a good fit for the narrative role.
- the middle section of fighting the boss with no narrative felt really long.
A really interesting look at gamer culture and toxicity. Great start! I hope you keep working on this.

@dylan-fries Thank you so much for your feedback ! Really interesting input :D
We had a few ideas to balance the narration and action phases a little bit better but they are all kind of complicated to implement. Not sure we'll have the time to fix this issue unfortunately, but we'll try our best !

@red-ash Its all good. Just suggestions. If you continue development past the jam it is something to look at. Good work!

i like this game

really interesting concept with great execution. love it :D

Ha ha! This was very fun to play. Kudos! Great idea that fits suprisingly well.

The concept is great, it was fun to play. The dialogues just bring in a unique charm to this game. Good job!

Great concept!! The audio was a bir weird, I must confess...
I was eager to try this game, since I usually am healer in mmo games, so..... I would be pleying a game about my healer life LMAO
I wish you guys would keep working on this project... maybe separate the narrative phases from the fighting ones... like... fghtint, and then some narratives... more fight, and more narratives... and like.. maybe skilling up? Again, this is just some stuff I would love to see if you guys decide to work pot-jam with this game! I would surely play it

I love the concept. It was very fun playing your game, I love playing an healer ;)

Really enjoyed your game, the number keys didn't seem to work for me so I had to click the abilities to cast the healing spells which made the chat a bit awkward to reach since i kept having to move the mouse from the right to the left and back. Really neat concept and really well executed

@darkmax14 Thanks for your feedback ! We'll try to fix that bug if we can :D

Fun to play event if 'am not good at MMO nice to have this part as support / healer. Good job team keep it up !

Really funny writing while juggling the MMO raid combat! I actually haven't played an MMO in years but you guys totally nailed the feeling of guild drama and dealing with terrible people lmao, even right down to the way the dialogue is written. I think my only suggestion would be to have more music haha, great job overall

Fantastic entry. One of the best written entries I've seen.

Oof, fun game, the characters were believable in that they hurt me to interact with :P I think it was a really interesting concept, and felt well put together. I like how much talking happened during the raid, reminds me of some people I've played with.

The tunes were awesome, and I liked the visual assets a lot. Kill that pig monster!

This is a brilliant idea! Absolutely creative. My one critique would be that it was a little slow. Almost too easy, it would be (in my opinion) more fun if you were really balancing your attention between keeping the party alive and also doing the social aspect.

This was good, i kind of got invested into the story more than i should :laughing:
Great game, i enjoyed it a lot!

A bit long for an LD game, but I do really like the idea! The mechanics were simple but had a nice mmorpg feel, and the chat was fun to read.

This is a wonderful idea for a game! Seriously, I would buy a finished version in a heartbeat, I love it. What a cool premise. The chat was really enjoyable, as well as the choices. I had a bit of a hard time with the actual healing, but that was on me as I didn't realize I could scroll over the buttons to see what they did. When I hit restart, the characters moved around but I couldn't actually fight or chat. Great game though, fantastic job.

@aditon thanks for the feedback ! there was a bit of back and forth on how whether we should have damage during the dialogue phases - we noticed some people thought the game was a breeze and some others would absolutely not get it and fail at the first phase, so we erred on the side of it being easy.

@nvrskipgameday Thanks for the kind feedback ! The game does a poor job of explaining you can mouse over spells, and depending on which game you play usually it can be not obvious at all. We will make sure to not make that mistake again

@neon thanks a lot ! yeah we had a plan for the duration at first and then went completely overboard ^_^

How the hell you were able to pull off such an amazing art/graphics in such a limited time. I am soo jealous of you right now.... :laughing:

A really interesting mix of mechanics! I enjoyed reading the chat a lot. As for the battle, it seemed a bit slow and unforgiving (which is probably realistic, but I don't know since I'm not an MMO player). I'd have very much liked it if this part of the game was easier and faster, so that I could get to the next narrative bit quicker. The visuals are very nice, as is the audio. Good job overall!

This was a real surprise. I thought I was going to play a RPG type game, but it turned into a social exploration of the guild dynamics I see in online gaming.
It was a really refreshing and interesting ludum dare entry and definitively worth playing. The gameplay itself served it's purpose and was good enough to stay engaging.

Dang, if only it was on Mac. Or the source was available.

Wow! Nice game! the aesthetics are so cool :3

I hope it's okay that we lost; I didn't know what my spells do. The lower-right part of the interface was off-screen on my ultra-wide monitor. I think this is a great idea for a game! Felt pretty cool to play. Good work!

@michael-gosling We went ahead and made a WEB GL Build ^^ However custom cursors don't work online, so you won't have the feedback to know if you can cast a spell or not. Sorry :/
@madbarron Thanks for the feedback ! We'll try to fix that bug if we have time.



It's so hard to pass the second round, hahahahahah, I think there could be a checkpoint just for the people of Ludum Dare to be able to experience the whole narrative, hahahahahah.

I'm just really curious, hahahahah.

@gustavo-christino We did add checkpoints in the Post-Jam version ^^ We had a little bit of problems with the restart button and only managed to make it work the next day : you can continue from the phase you lost, keeping the teamates that were still alive. Thanks for the feedback btw !

Análise...

1 - Mecânicas, Aprendizado e Fluxo:
O jogo tem forte caráter narrativo, tendo por desafio manter vivo (através de cura e outras interações) um grupo de batalha em uma cena típica de MMORPG.
Além disso, o jogador pode interagir de diferentes formas no bate-papo do grupo de batalha (e ir descobrindo ações tóxicas por parte do chefe da guilda, que joga com personagem feminino, assedia sexualmente (ao menos) uma das integrantes do grupo e tenta tirar vantagem em tudo (pedindo mais loot, pedindo todo o loot, dando desculpas fajutas e até mesmo (segundo relatos) usando bot (no personagem anterior))).
Aprender a interagir com o bate-papo foi extremamente rápido, intuitivo, divertido e interessante.
Tomar as decisões na cena de combate, por outro lado, foi uma experiência que demandou mais prática (o que, infelizmente, demanda rever toda a história anterior, gostaria que tivesse check-point antes de cada cena de combate).
Algumas habilidades simplesmente não funcionavam ao clicar (não sei se é a sensibilidade do meu mouse ou se eu entendi algo errado).
A interface de usuário também não me foi muito amigável, não entendi o que era ter muita vida ou pouca vida (talvez utilizar a barra vermelha escurecendo para mostrar a vida dos personagens seria algo mais visível/compreensível (para mim)).
O jogo tem tantas interações e habilidades, que eu realmente achei um excelente resultado por parte do grupo de programação.
Há muito o que polir (inclusive seria possível melhorar a HUD e os feedbacks sonoros), além de dar maior sinal (quem sabe contagem regressiva) para começar cada rodada de combate.
O scroll vertical do bate-papo parece funcionar ao contrário do comum (não sei se entendi direito).
PS: A inteligência de alguns membros do grupo poderia ser mais clara ou melhorada (mas talvez tenha sido proposital para simular a inteligência humana).
Sobre o fluxo de jogo: achei muito difícil avançar (e a punição muito agravada por cada derrota, coloque check-points por favor, hahahahahah).

2 - Gráficos, Áudio e Narrativa:
Gostei dos gráficos, ainda mais considerando o tempo de game jam. Creio que o tamanho do bate-papo (ou mesmo a moldura dele) possa ser melhorado (quem sabe permitindo um pouco de redimensionamento por parte do jogador), isso em versões pós jam.
A trilha sonora de fundo: achei engraçada, divertida e (brevemente) estranha. Isso porque eu não sei o que o cara estava falando (sensação de estar sendo hipnotizado ou algo do tipo, hahahahah).
Senti falta de mais feedback sonoro do ponto de vista de efeitos sonoros.
Sobre a narrativa: muito interessante (faz a gente refletir sobre o que as pessoas fazem e também sobre o que podemos fazer (nós estando errados, ou nós estando no papel de suporte).

3 - Cultura:
O jogo bebe da fonte dos MMORPG com fortes críticas sociais, creio que seja um dos melhores jogos que eu joguei nesse sentido na LD46.
Com os devidos polimentos, creio que possa ser feita uma campanha em cima disso (entregar esse jogo gratuitamente em algum bundle etc).

4 - Monetização:
Não creio que o foco desse projeto seja monetização, apenas creio que alguma organização não governamental (ONG) poderia angariar fundos para o grupo produtor se manter em tempo pós LD, para entregar uma peça ainda mais polida.

Analysis…

1 - Mechanics, Learning and Flow: The game has a strong narrative character, with the challenge of keeping a battle group alive (through healing and other interactions) in a typical MMORPG scene. In addition, the player can interact in different ways in the battle group chat (and discover toxic actions by the guild boss, who plays with a female character, sexually harasses (at least) one of the group members and tries take advantage of everything (asking for more loot, asking for all the loot, making fake excuses and even (according to reports) using bot (in the previous character))). Learning how to interact with chat was extremely fast, intuitive, fun and interesting. Making decisions on the combat scene, on the other hand, was an experience that demanded more practice (which, unfortunately, requires reviewing all of the previous story, I would like to have a check-point before each combat scene). Some skills just didn't work when clicking (I don't know if it's my mouse's sensitivity or if I got it wrong). The user interface wasn't very friendly to me either, I didn't understand what it was like to have a lot of life or little life (maybe using the red bar darkening to show the characters' lives would be something more visible / understandable (for me)). The game has so many interactions and skills, that I really found an excellent result on the part of the programming group. There is a lot to polish (it would even be possible to improve the HUD and sound feedback), in addition to giving a bigger signal (maybe counting down) to start each round of combat. The vertical scroll of the chat seems to work contrary to the usual (I do not know if I understood correctly). PS: The intelligence of some members of the group could be clearer or improved (but perhaps it was intended to simulate human intelligence). About the game flow: I found it very difficult to move forward (and the punishment is greatly aggravated by each defeat, please place check-points please, hahahahahah).

2 - Graphics, Audio and Narrative: I liked the graphics, especially considering the game jam time. I believe that the size of the chat (or even its frame) can be improved (perhaps allowing a little resizing by the player), this in post jam versions. The background soundtrack: I found it funny, amusing and (briefly) strange. That's because I don't know what the guy was talking about (feeling like he's being hypnotized or something, hahahahah). I missed more sound feedback from the point of view of sound effects. About the narrative: very interesting (makes us reflect on what people do and also on what we can do (us being wrong, or us being in the support role).

3 - Culture: The game draws from the source of MMORPGs with strong social criticism, I believe it is one of the best games that I played in this sense in LD46. With the proper polishing, I believe that a campaign can be made on top of that (deliver this game for free in some bundle, etc.).

4 - Monetization: I do not believe that the focus of this project is monetization, I just believe that some non-governmental organization (NGO) could raise funds for the producer group to stay in post LD time, to deliver an even more polished piece.

@red-ash, I will download the new version. '-'

@gustavo-christino Okay, so :
- Thank you so much for your feedback ! You clearly spent a lot of time playing our game and writing your comments so thank you <3
- We would love to continue working as a team some day, however with our current situation (most of us are still students) it's going to be complicated to make a more complete version of this game. However, we're working on the polish in the Post Jam version on our free time !
- So sorry about that checkpoint thing... It's actually my fault :sweat_smile: I learned to use Yarn Spinner for this jam and struggled with some errors near the finish line, which prevented me to make checkpoints work in time... I had to spend a day or two to make all that working properly :/
- Thanks again <3

\o

This was really refreshing.! The whole presentation with the in-game chat, and the background gameplay was so interesting and different, and you did a great job with the characterisations of the various players. It all felt very natural, and well made. Congrats on a successful Jam!.

"Alles Vergängliche ist nur ein Gleichnis"

Oh this game is too real :'D No problem whatsoever immersing yourself into the shoes of Sachka as someone who's experienced quite the bit of guild-drama and raid-healing!

What I found somewhat out of balance was the gameplay sequences - they felt very challenging and not really telegraphed all to clearly, but then again, that's just the ordinary experience of an unorganized, multi-tasking dungeon group :D

Great work overall, thank you so much for the efforts you put into this game. They really came through!

/edit: Oooh, what I also really liked was the portrayal of people through simple movement: You have the sturdy, somewhat bored tank and healer, the overambitious little brother DPS who just has a lot of fun with the game and the dickhead elitist dps who doesn't even move most of the time but just loooves to tell people how bad they are. Fantastic little touch that makes such a difference!

Ah, this game brings back memories of me playing on supports in MOBAs. Nice entry. Love it.

That was quite an accurate representation :laughing: I quite enjoyed it! Well, except for that god narration - what the fresh hell was that? Felt totally out of place to me.

The boss itself was quite weak (I don't mean hp-wise, it took proper ages to kill him, I mean attack power) and the healing too easy - it felt like no challenge to keep everybody alive and I could outheal the floor aoes, so no reason to use the push allies skill, really. Wish there were portraits of teammembers to click on for targeted heals - would be more pleasant than searching around on a map.

I was sad to discover that the narrative drama is not really reactive. After Ellefys offered me to stop healing the others, I told him to suck it and stopped healing him instead, see how he likes that :wink: So he died but there was no reaction. Sad.

I was also sad to discover that my character is a sucky healer. I mean, what kind of healer lets the tank die all the time? You always keep the tank alive! :wink:



@fabula-rasa Hi and thanks fo the feedback !
- I didn't understand what you meant by "god narrative", are you talking about the narrative in general or a specific moment in the narration ? I'm curious about why you find it "out of place" ^^
- About the thing where it doesn't have any impact, indeed this part is used for character building more than anything else. I was the one implementing the dialogues and I had to learn to use YarnSpinner for this project. I kinda struggled implementing some stuff and for that specific part, we just didn't have the time to make it work.

@jalik I meant the one playing from the radio, nothing in the story. I played the game again just to check :) and it's called "watts_lullaby"

This brought back some WOW memories!

What a cool idea! and seriously, screw that Ellefys jerk! (I always let him die on purpose, and frankly, he's being such a noob while acting like hes soooo cool, so it's not like THAT was being hard) at first I lost but then I managed to kill the fucking swine with my guuuurl <3 I've never played WoW, but I assume it's a standard to have pain-in-the-ass long teamfights with a fuckload of loot in return, so good job ^^ (all I know about teamfight is from playing League and ESO, so I think I can judge on the toxicity ^^')
The sound of the old guy talking about Goethe and shit was weird, trippy and kind of calming, lol
(I didn't pay too much attention because I was focused on the game and can't really multitask, if i'm doing something primarily and then listen to something while focusing on the first thing it's kind of like I dreamt about it, if that makes any sense? I'm weird ^^)

Anywaaaay, good job on finishing your game! :)

@fabula-rasa @fatpenguin Yeah so the god narration thing is my fault, I just wanted to turn one of Alan Watts' lectures into a lullaby, aaand... I kinda just picked the first one I found at random without considering that _people might actually make the effort to understand it._ It's _absolutely_ meant to be trippy and dreamlike though!

Nice game! I really like gameplay, it is very interesting idea to make story inside chat. I very like it!

@madbarron Hi ! In the latest version of the build, we should have fixed the problem ! The icons should be well placed, even on your ultra-wide monitor ^^

interesting idea, I liked the music. Very creative and fun

I actually enjoyed the concept. It looked like a round based rpg from the screenshots but turned out to be something completely different. That really caught me by surprise. I liked the dynamic between the characters and the drama that unfolds with each round. Though, I thought that the actual MMORPG game play part was a bit bland. I'm not a fan of the genre in the first place and this was even less involving for me. The lack of sound effects and good contols/user feedback for the spells did not help either. Of course, it would be kinda impossible to expect a polished mmorpg like boss battle in that kind of time frame, but a little more fun in the game play would've been nice. Also, it kinda drew itself out pretty hard. That's another thing I don't like about raids in the genre :) I couldn't keep up with the healing in phase 3 or 4 and lost. I was really interested how the story would unfold, but you can't get me to play another round of being a healer in a MMORPG. The art was adequate and the soundtrack was very fitting. No problems on that front!

All in all, a very unique and interesting approach to the theme and good job on subverting my expectations. The game play was not my cup of tea, but I bet other people had fun with it. Keep it up!

I love the narrative part of the game, but... I'm not really a fan of the MMORPG part, to be honest. While I like the *concept* of it, it the different kinds of heal seem redudant (and hard to grasp), I think I could've done with other supporter spells, and at least for me it's really hard. Maybe part of that is because of the missing feedback though - a few sfx for "healing", "can't cast, on cooldown" and the like would've done wonders. But well, I'm mostly sad because I can't get through the healing phases and because of that I can't experience more of the narrative.

Petition for a super-easy mode so other noobs like me can experience the story?

@tobiasw There is more feedback and the possibility to restart not from the begining but from the last phase you played in the post jam version if you want to give it another try !

@red-ash Regrettably, that's the one that I played! I guess I'm just not really good at this type of game ;)

The restart button didn't work for some reason. I clicked it multiple times, nothing happened. I clicked the "quit" option to see if buttons work at all - yeah, that worked, haha. (But since it doesn't revive dead characters, I guess it wouldn't have done much for me anyway? I assume with more characters dead it either becomes impossible or slows down to a crawl?)

@tobiasw Thanks for giving it another try, so sorry about that bug, I think you're the first person to have encountered it :/ When you loose all your teamates you're supposed to respawn with the whole team. I don't know what happened unfortunaltely, we'll try to fix it :smile:

@jalik I just checked the Player.log file in the hope of finding any errors there, but no such luck. Guess you're on your own :|