Mixed Signals by lloydlobo
I want to share with you the joy of playing this fun little game. Disclaimer: Heavely Vibed with a LLM.
Tune your waveform to match the target. 5 levels · increasing complexity · less time. Hints cost points. Faster matches earn bonuses.
Bugs to fix (will keep updating): - [x] Hint button malfunctions (better to skip for now) - [x] Timer is not so prominent, I guess I messed up the styling somewhere during the rush to submit. - [x] Fixed with circular animating timer
Todo (will keep updating): - [x] Add music - [x] Add multiple background music tracks - [x] Add vfx - [x] Sliders - [x] Make sliders smoother or use fixed steps, or... - [x] Have the sliders on a continuous scale, rather than discrete values - [x] Retry from the same level one lost on, not from level 1 - [x] Interactive tutorial - [x] Balance timers for late stages
To Try List (will keep updating): - [ ] combining different wave shapes? - [x] timer feels a bit too harsh at the start. - [~] more non-AI like design - [ ] make frequency and phase slider smoother? - [!] sandbox (including no timer restrictions) (EDIT: Tutorial makes up for it (for now)) - [ ] pulse (intensity based) - [~] handle regression in sliders (especially phase)
Thank you all for playing and dropping gems of ideas and feedbacks! It really helps shape the game:
Tutorial
Final Stage
Fin
| Current Version | https://mixedsignals.pages.dev/ |
| Link | https://github.com/lloydlobo/mixedsignals/releases/tag/v0.1.0-alpha |
| Original Jam Version | https://ldjam59.mixedsignals.pages.dev/ |
| Original URL | https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/59/mixed-signals-2 |
Ratings
| Overall | 566th | 3.375⭐ | 34🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 436th | 3.359⭐ | 34🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 321th | 3.547⭐ | 34🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 29🗳️ | 48🗨️ |
I think it could do a better job explaining the consequences (I think there was a timer? I didn't realize there was one, and I don't think I had any negative feedback, but I lost, so I must have missed something).
I immediately recognize the interface style from Claude/Cursur; without specific UI instructions, it often generates something like this. It’s better to provide clear UI guidelines so it doesn’t feel so “familiar.”
The slider for adjusting the wave feels too stepped, in my opinion, which makes it feel unresponsive. A smoother, continuous value change would feel much better.
That said, it’s really great that there’s some gameplay progression and a sense of increasing difficulty (we actually forgot about that in our own game for this game jam, and it’s a big downside for us).
Overall, it turned out well!
Yeah, you are right the sliders need to be smoother - even faders like on a mixing board or a synthesizer. Thanks for the suggestion, I'll experiment around fixed steps or lerping of some sorts. I was confused to follow actual sound db progression logic scaling or just to keep it simple for both web or mobile.
> That said, it’s really great that there’s some gameplay progression and a sense of increasing difficulty (we actually forgot about that in our own game for this game jam, and it’s a big downside for us).
Totally! Pretty sure you and your team can add that progression and sense of increasing difficulty post-prod if you choose to!
I'll check out your game, from the preview it looks so polished!
Thanks for playing and all the ideas/feedback!!
So, the skip button needs some points that can be accumulated in the earlier levels. And the faster one solves a puzzle the more points (score) they earn. I hope that is what you were referring to. I'll work on balancing that! Glad you pointed that out.
I see you have a sine-factory game. Looks promising!! I'll check it out and draw some inspiration out of it. Thanks for playing!
Anyway, good graphics. Can't say the same thing about audio (because, well, is not present). Overall, nice game!
P.S. Still can't understand why you opted out of Theme, at least.
Would be great with smoother sliders
Thank you all for playing and for giving thoughtful feedback!
Already patched and pushed few update based on the main points:
- smoother slider behaviour (float-based now) (edit: apart from frequency and phase)
- adjusted match threshold
- clearer timer visibility / urgency
- added interaction sound effects
- added background music
- a few score + UX fixes
- retryable level on loss, and not from level 1
Some parts (like those deeper audio design & overall difficulty curve tuning) are still intentionally kep simple for game jam scope reasons, however, I'll probably iterate on those as time permits.
Really appreciated the detailed feedback; especially from people familiar with synth/waveforms. It really helped validate the core direction a lot.
I just would have like a small tutorial in the beginning without time stress.
But i know a jam is still a jam, so I am happy you got a nice playable game out of it!
About the design as others already said but it is recognizable that its ai immediately. At least that is how it looks :D i like it anyway
The difficulty spikes when the harmonics are added, it took me some tries but overall I still succeeded so that made me happy.
Also good that you added the "skip" button, otherwise it can be frustrating. What's a bit odd though is that it doesn't skip automatically, so you have to click it yourself or otherwise you'll fail.
Your gameplay is also nice, I played the jam version, beat level 1 and almost made it through level 2
Thanks again for the feedback, pushed an update addressing several of the points:
* Improved overall feel: screen shake, floating score pops, haptics
* Better audio: added BGM, improved balance, interaction SFX
* Visual pass: more Game Boy-like hardware feel, clearer CRT and wave readability
* Adjusted signal scroll direction for easier tracking
* Smoother control: float-based sliders, tuned match threshold
* Retry on loss, no restart from level 1
* Clearer timer and stronger urgency cues
Still keeping some things simple due to jam scope, but likely to iterate on:
* Onboarding or tutorial, now a high priority
* Difficulty curve, especially with harmonics and timer
* General readability and balancing
Appreciate all the input, it helped shape this update. Summarized via AI based on the changelog in the repo.
I also played your post-jam version. It looked much cooler, but I'm not sure the music really suited the game. Also I still couldn't really see the countdown easily. I think there were also some regressions, like the parameter steps didn't seem quite so good - at one point I was at +360 phase, and I think it needed like 0 or 1 or something, so it looked perfect but wasn't "locking in".
Nice entry, hope claude didn't get on your nerves too much :sweat_smile:
The audio suggestion is awesome too. I’m experimenting with a subtle low drone/sub version of the waveform in the background so you can kind of hear the shape as well.
And yeah 😅 the countdown visibility and some post-jam regressions are definitely real. I added a lot of polish/features afterward, and mobile sliders especially got a bit sluggish from all the extra systems. Trying to tighten that back up now.
That phase issue was super helpful to hear too. The scoring system has been surprisingly hard to balance. Some methods were too forgiving, while the current one can become too precise once phase is introduced. Reworking that currently. (EDIT: Funny thing is, sometimes even I’ve confused “sine” for “AM” and “square” for “PWM” while testing. Sometimes phase can get pretty tricky there too, so I still need to look into it more 😄)
Also swapped in a shuffled soundtrack now, hopefully a better fit.
Thanks again for trying both versions and leaving such thoughtful notes 🙏
Additionally, I really like the way the gameplay is established using wave patterns. I think this is an extremely attractive element for music professionals. I think it would be even better if the wave patterns could be more diverse and incorporate some noise. Is this requirement too strict? Hahaha... But overall, it's already great!
Having less time for the later levels while new dials are being introduced is a problem, particularly at the point when harmonics are introduced. This is improved a bit in the updated version, with the ability to restart a level rather than the whole game, but it still doesn't give a good opportunity to experiment - in the tutorial, there isn't any motivation to explore the variety of wave shapes that can be created with harmonics. One fix might be to give the player more time for the earlier rounds of a level (or remove the timer altogether, and just have speed affect score).
I don't think the noise slider adds much to the game - having looked at the code, if you're trying to match a signal with random noise, you're better off ignoring the noise - adding noise of your own just drives it further from the signal you're trying to match, since a random number between -1 and 1 is usually closer to 0 than it is to an independent random number.
And yeah, I agree, adding more diverse waveforms, noise, and modulation could make things a lot richer, especially for people familiar with synths and sound design. Right now I’m trying to keep the scope relatively simple and readable, since even phase + harmonics already started getting surprisingly tricky to balance/gameify.
I did see a few other jam entries experimenting with more advanced/additive synthesis style ideas though, and they were amazing. Definitely inspiring me to explore further once I figure out how to keep it approachable without overwhelming the player.
Really appreciate the feedback and kind words!
You were completely right about the timer pressure once harmonics get introduced. It didn’t leave enough room for experimentation/learning. I’ve started addressing that by adding free exploration rounds before some harder stages, plus a “blue timer” state where early rounds won’t fail immediately when time runs out.
Your point about the noise slider was really interesting too. I ended up reframing noise more as a tolerance mechanic rather than something players must precisely recreate. The target can still contain noise visually/audio-wise, but higher noise now slightly lowers the required match threshold instead. The actual noise control is hidden for now since matching random noise directly wasn’t leading to very interesting gameplay.
Still very open to suggestions there if you had a different interpretation in mind for how noise should behave mechanically. Would genuinely love to hear it.
Really appreciate the thoughtful feedback. It directly helped shape several of these newer changes.