Trivia Hart in "The Case of the Porcelain Tricorn" by blobo
Mayor Crimson's prized "Porcelain Tricorn" has been stolen! It's up to the best detective in town (Trivia Hart!) to crack this case wide open. Using her trusty "Metagame & Watch", Trivia can see where something has recently been, or perhaps where something will be!
About the game
This is a point and click adventure game. The game is probably 5 to 10 minutes long. These are pretty simple puzzles, nothing too mind bending.
Have you ever played a game on a "Game & Watch"? Every object has fixed positions on screen, and you can see silhouettes of objects that aren't present. I thought it would be fascinating to make a mystery game where you can see objects that aren't currently present, as a means to gain information and solve puzzles.


Controls:
The Mouse: Point and click to examine or interact with your surroundings. - The "Metagame & Watch" will allow you to uncover clues.
Escape: Pause the game, and adjust volume if needed.
All feedback is appreciated! Thanks for playing.
Let me know which ending you picked. :)
Ratings
| Overall | 4th | 4.392⭐ | 53🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 6th | 4.225⭐ | 53🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 42th | 3.824⭐ | 53🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 141th | 3.373⭐ | 53🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 7th | 4.422⭐ | 53🧑⚖️ |
| Audio | 1th | 4.51⭐ | 53🧑⚖️ |
| Humor | 2th | 4.588⭐ | 53🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 4th | 4.392⭐ | 53🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 33🗳️ | 78🗨️ |
The Game&Watch part makes the game stand out without feeling too gimmicky, and although it kinda demands a redraw of each room, you managed to include a lot of rooms.
The amount of spoken dialogue is crazy for a compo game, even for you. I imagine a quick post-compo with subtitles for my fellow ESLs could be a good idea.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cjlkSQFEShI
Loved the voice acting again, especially the band. The musical theme was nicely consistent with different styles depending on the scene. I almost didn't find the only upwards going way even after placing the item needed for it. Mostly polished game, didn't see actual bugs. The plot was fun too. Good work!
Too bad you didn't have time to draw and color everything.
Also made a video of my runs:
https://youtu.be/oH1KSD0JzQ0
My best time was 02:25:52. It WAS the spike ending though, so Trivia Hart scholars might contest it. My time for the other ending was 03:35:32, but I lost some seconds to tomfoolery in that run, alas.
So yeah, I already talked about it in the video, but I wanted to write again, that I think this was one of the funniest Ludum Dare games I had played yet. I was giggling the whole way through, there was constantly something funny happening in the audio lines, the animation or in the background, so many great jokes, some of them even went over my head the first time (BARber, how could I miss that!). There was a lot of attention to detail in this game, and that made it a blast to play! Since you wrote that you will never draw that much for a Ludum Dare ever again, I also want to point out that the art was amazing. The animations of the characters (the dancing guy!), the backgrounds and especially the lighting effects in the alley, those all looked superb! The metagame and watch transitions looked super cool as well, especially the one on the title screen. Just fun to play around with, it's great! I took the simplified drawings in the endings as a humorous way to end the game, they did not change my view on this game's art being amazing. Sound was great as well, I especially love the transition when you enter the BARber or go back to the alley, that transition between tracks is super smooth. And of course the amazing voice lines, an unbelievable amount of work must have gone into them, but it paid off they sound super good and super funny. You made a super hilarious awesome game, amazing job on that!
https://youtu.be/juytfbK6gT0
The voice acting honestly made me chuckle. Feels like there's a healthy dose of self-awareness here, and it makes the whole thing really charming. Definitely the most impressive game I've seen so far in this compo jam.
I chose to just arrest the guy... I wonder what content I missed out on!

I cannot believe you drew all this for a compo game - how did you have any time to write, code, and voice it?
"Eh... 2am-ato 2pm-ato?" Has got to be one of the funniest lines I've ever heard in a game - not kidding.
And yes - you got me with the spike pit. Guess that makes me a little content goblin!
Fantastic work - absolutely adored every second of it - your hard work and hand cramps paid off.
Really nicely done, wonderful amount of content. I would have liked just a _little_ more that made me think (or feel like I had to think) - about the only time I felt like I was doing something more than "click next and listen to the adorable dialog" was when a guy was hungry and I knew where the burger place was. Despite that, the content was great fun, so I didn't mind =).
**edit:** thank you so much for the video review of my game! Now I see some people do not have strong enough computers to extract the archive in time. I should optimize the game more.
And my god did you read me with that ending twist hahahaha. My partner and I were playing it together and somewhere halfway through they said "why are you going there, clearly you dont have to go here?". To which I replied: "that's exactly why I'm going there first, I wanna see if there is any hidden extra content". AND NOT A MINUTE LATER DO WE GET TO THE ENDING AND MY GOD WE WERE CRACKING UP :joy::joy::joy::joy:
Needless to say, I had to jump...
Played it again for the true ending though ;)
Really such a treat to play, incredible job.
Thanks for making this :heart:
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Also, I love getting more into voice acting for gamejams, do you have any tips on recording and writing narrative?
Unfortunately, English isn't my native language, so I sometimes lost the thread of the narrative. But thanks to the folks in the comments, I was able to finish the game.
A magnificent Compo game!
I also can't read sheet music ):
Finished it in 19 minutes — got stuck a little bit 😂
Everything’s awesome!
Great stuff as always 100th_Coin!
Nothing more to say, obviously as a non-english speaker subtitles would have been a plus, but the voiceover make up for it and I get that adding subtitles would have been an extra layer of things to manage while you already managed to put up so much content.
Congratulations and awesome work !
I like how you break the fourth wall in the end haha And yes OF COURSE I jumped, of course you knew I will. And I knew that you knew, and I knew what I'll get but I did it anyway. Some things can't be avoided.
After that I speedrun everything to get the true ending.
Great humor, great art, really impressive for a compo game!
All characters are interesting, I think its one of the best games, that I played on this jam.
Art voice acting music and gameplay were on point, such a cool entry.
The arrow above the stool was really hard to find for me, I spent like 10 minutes looking for the club everywhere... 😅 Before and after that, it was smooth sailing for me.
So while having a detective vision which shows states of the room in the past and the future is a really clever idea and solves some problems of this genre, there is still a possibility of an item or an area that you totally miss while staring at it until you mouse over it.
Most of the objects in the game actually played some part in the story. But the drunk guy, the janitor and the man with an expensive burger didn't play much of a role. That's okay, just something I wanted to point out.
Also, it's possible to grab music sheet for a second time, but I didn't find any application for it, not sure if it's a bug or a well-hidden secret.
Which I have to say, additoinaly to seeing the extra cutscene it was pretty fun trying to go as fast as possible!
Loved the jokes here and there and the voice acting is super, also despite a few weird arrow hitboxes the overal experience went really really smoothly, congrats guys!
Now behold for my TRUE ENDING SPEEDRUN TIME!!

gg
I feel like you explored a different genre compared to what you usually do, and you did it pretty well. Maybe it was a bit less "crazy" than what I expect when starting your game - except for the humourous part of it. But I still enjoyed it anyway, so good for you!
About humour - I think I missed a few parts for not understanding everything that was saud. I wish there were subtitles to help me :D
Good job!
Another fantastic entry, it seems very difficult to make a point-and-click of any satisfying length for Compo and you managed to pull it off. I liked the meta "respawn" mechanic, although it admittedly took me a couple tries to realize I could jump in the corridor before the "boss fight."
Loved all the little jokes and puns in the dialogue and environment, and leaning into the absurd tropes of detective stories ("You knew the song I was singing while committing a crime?"). Already looking forward to whatever you cook up next.
It’s so random that I couldn’t stop laughing for a while
I didn’t choose to jump into the spike trap the first time, but I was so curious about what would happen that I played again and jumped in — only to find out nothing happens and the game just ends >////<. I think if I had jumped in the first time and realized the game just ends and I have to start over, I’d laugh in frustration >///< like, ‘What was I even expecting?’
Just a random doodle — the image of someone wearing a bunch of hats at once is just so funny

Thanks for the singing <3 Amazing Vibe! lowkey feels the first time you enter snowden in undertale :D
I'd say it was worth it! :hole:

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*Very impressive* adventure for a COMPO-game!
There was only a little bit of technical jank here and there, but didn't take much from the experience.
- I was quite confused at first because you could use the plank as a bridge without picking it up first.
- The hot-spot/access-arrow for the secret club was a bit hard to pinpoint.
But those are minor nitpicks. This game was a joyride!
Gotta love the voice-acting in all its silliness.
My favorite delivery of yours was the antagonist's deadpan line: **"I can't stop dancing."** Combined with the frantic two-frame animation it really _fleshed out the character._ :man_dancing:
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The use of "game&watch"/shadow-mechanic was both stylistic and innovative. I'd say almost genius in its simplicity.
Some of the rooms felt a bit empty with only a character and walls, but quite understandable given the time. Your clever use of shadows in the corners gives some feel of depth to an otherwise empty space.
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But yeah, very good job! Goes to show that it all comes down to the scope and trying to implement what's essential.
Made me want to do a fast&silly point 'n' click adventure myself. Haven't done those in years!