Doomscrolling by iovorobiev

[raw]
made by iovorobiev for Ludum Dare 57 (COMPO)

You ever doomscrolled until you reached the depth of the internet? You know that place, where short videos become extremely weird and you understand it's time to sleep already. This is the game about that.

scroll.gif

Since I didn't have time to do a proper tutorial here is a short summary:

How to play

  • Your goal is to make your stress level 0 (shown on your watches on the left)
  • You replenish stress by watching cat videos and fireplace videos
  • For the rest you have to comment. Every such video causes you stress equal to amount of likes. If you get more likes then the post, you replenish equal amount of stress.
  • You can swipe away any video except troll. Troll will stay there.
  • Clicking "Refresh" causes stress. Your vocabulary is finite per video.
  • Once you run out of battery or get your stress to max you reboot the device and get the new OS update. This might make game easier.
  • Good luck!

gameplay.gif

Tech stack:

  • Unity
  • Aseprite

Known bugs:

  • If you can't press button, try close the "keyboard" view and open it again by pressing comments.

UPD_1

I did 1 update after compo:

  1. Fixed bug when comments were not pressing: this made game unplayable
  2. Fixed bug when you run out of comments on troll. The only way to overcame this was to reboot the game

I didn't fix any gameplay or polishing, although it was very tempting :)

Ratings

Overall 201th 3.273⭐ 24🧑‍⚖️
Fun 220th 2.977⭐ 24🧑‍⚖️
Innovation 77th 3.682⭐ 24🧑‍⚖️
Theme 70th 3.886⭐ 24🧑‍⚖️
Graphics 150th 3.409⭐ 24🧑‍⚖️
Humor 87th 3.19⭐ 23🧑‍⚖️
Mood 198th 3.182⭐ 24🧑‍⚖️
Given 16🗳️ 14🗨️

Feedback

gsoutz
07. Apr 2025 · 10:29 UTC
itch. page is 404
gdman
07. Apr 2025 · 13:50 UTC
From what I see nice sprites, but no game, may be you forgot to press Publish.
Troloze
07. Apr 2025 · 15:39 UTC
No published build :(
LDJam user 336676
07. Apr 2025 · 16:38 UTC
still no game :(
TasakaSama
07. Apr 2025 · 16:50 UTC
404
🎤 iovorobiev
07. Apr 2025 · 18:28 UTC
@gsoutz @gdman @troloze @soloadventurergames @tasakasama sorry folks, created the page late at night and indeed forgot to move the game out of draft state. It should be available now.
grid96
07. Apr 2025 · 22:31 UTC
Very cool interpretation of the theme. I wonder if there any ending to it though or is it as infinite as my feed? I just managed getting over 100% multiple times and didn't notice any consequences for that. Did I miss something?
Ricesteam
07. Apr 2025 · 23:15 UTC
Love the art style. Cool concept but too deep for me.
🎤 iovorobiev
08. Apr 2025 · 10:03 UTC
@grid96 the win condition is to reach level of stress 0. Stress 100 means you rage quit and reboot the device, which leads to the OS update(although the game doesn't show it well:))
Vladcfg
08. Apr 2025 · 10:42 UTC
This is probably the most unique game I’ve ever seen — I got totally hooked!
caffeinetrip
08. Apr 2025 · 11:41 UTC
fyee
GreenRadiation
08. Apr 2025 · 14:13 UTC
Very interesting mechanics and connection to the theme. Sometimes it feels like a card battler :D
Great job!
NiceKot
08. Apr 2025 · 17:09 UTC
Very interesting and unique.

Though the fail conditions are too limiting. You end up losing too quickly each run and it results in extremely repetitive gameplay where you have only WTF options. Stress level balanced okay, but the battery is too low and depletes instantly.

imo, you could either make variety to starting kit of comments. Not just WTFs, or make initial battery larger.

Anyway, props for the idea, really cool!
Seiko
09. Apr 2025 · 13:08 UTC
During the ideation phase, my team and I thought of the same concept. we ended up deciding to do a different, but still - Fun! Thanks for the game :)
LDJam user 379094
09. Apr 2025 · 21:13 UTC
Very interesting game. Very well made.
chloew
09. Apr 2025 · 21:43 UTC
Was fun but unfortunately I think it scales incorrectly for my screen- UI elements overflowing off the page and often I wouldn't be able to select comments. Great concept though, fun writing. Wish there were more kinds of starting comments and more variety.
Skyeward
12. Apr 2025 · 22:19 UTC
Really fun interpretation of the theme and I really like some of the art. Found it a little difficult to understand the comments/likes but really love the idea!
Flinge
13. Apr 2025 · 12:29 UTC
The idea is interesting and definitely unique, but personally I didn’t fully understand how to play — especially how to use the different comments. Also, the UI broke a bit on my screen resolution. Sound was something I really missed — it would’ve made a huge difference. Still, the core concept is strong — really cool stuff!
Liam
13. Apr 2025 · 12:56 UTC
Very interesting concept, think it needed some more balancing and the vocab UI wasn't that clear or helpful to me. Definitely seemed to have some issues with the restart upgrades as well, they didn't seem to get considered on a couple of runs. Overall though: really glad I played, nice graphics for the concept and kept me engaged. Thanks for making!