Deep Dark Deadly Forest by Itskdog

made by Itskdog for Ludum Dare 48 (JAM)

Deep Dark Deadly Forest Manage a village on the edge of a Deep Dark Deadly Forest. This is my 3rd event. The first two were solo. This game was created by my brother and I. This is his first event.

UPDATE - Fixed a major bugs with the monster, the gathering resources math, the storehouse, and added a cost info. Original game is at the bottom.

UPDATE LINK - ZIP FILE TOO https://drive.google.com/file/d/1p50EXD8wyLNY28yrm0yW62tpLPufPuwC/view?usp=sharing

About This Game:

The Deep Dark Deadly Forest is a simple village management game where the player must lead your group of tiny villagers to expand and grow their village. Through their hard work at gathering resources, building hut, and crafting weapons they can increase their population. Their only real problem is the Dark and deadly forest where they must venture in order to get the resources they need. But be warned, what lurks in the forest waits for them. And only with enough courage, which can be aided by the weapons they carry and the more monsters they are able to avoid, will they see their dreams met of making a great village on the edge of the Deep Dark Deadly forest.

Features:

Custom naming villagers.
Resource gathering system.
Constructing and Upgrading Buildings.
Simple craft system.
Cute villager chit chat.
Increasing village population through resources and building.

Original https://drive.google.com/file/d/1S3AKxPgJBPvOEOaGDYg9tHX8gHo01b/view?usp=sharing

Update with Zip	https://drive.google.com/file/d/1p50EXD8wyLNY28yrm0yW62tpLPufPuwC/view?usp=sharing
Original URL	https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/48/deep-dark-deadly-forest

Ratings

Overall	617^th	3.686⭐	37🧑‍⚖️
Fun	653^th	3.5⭐	37🧑‍⚖️
Innovation	598^th	3.486⭐	37🧑‍⚖️
Theme	662^th	3.829⭐	37🧑‍⚖️
Graphics	822^th	3.75⭐	38🧑‍⚖️
Audio	640^th	3.514⭐	37🧑‍⚖️
Humor	430^th	3.329⭐	37🧑‍⚖️
Mood	713^th	3.639⭐	38🧑‍⚖️
Given		53🗳️	48🗨️

Feedback

NaBo369

27. Apr 2021 · 12:26 UTC

This is honestly a pretty good game!
The art is good, the controls are pretty straight forward and the constant tips in the top left corner of the screen made things a lot easier. So really well done on making this game

🎤 Itskdog

27. Apr 2021 · 20:52 UTC

@nabo369 Thanks. There is a major bug that needs to be fixed.

Dobrila

28. Apr 2021 · 08:50 UTC

great idea ! i liked the art. the game name is 10/10 xD

mira

28. Apr 2021 · 09:12 UTC

Good step with the in-game tutorial. Gameplay is simple and the graphics decent. I really like the camera look after clicking on a character, but I wouldn't be angry at all if he waited a while before I gave him a task. In sum, good entry.
And maybe it would be wiser to prepare a ZIP file for easier game downloads :slight_smile:

Marat

28. Apr 2021 · 09:17 UTC

Good game. Keep it up

bnmkt

28. Apr 2021 · 09:36 UTC

Hi!
Visually it's excellent even if I find the readability a bit complicated at some points but I still had a great time.

The customization of the villagers is very interesting, I liked renaming some of them with names of people I don't like and making them do dangerous tasks 👿

And I'm of the same opinion as @mira, putting the game in a ZIP file wouldn't have been too much. By the way there are platforms like Itchio, kongregate and so many others, which allow to manage the download and even play games made with Unity directly in the browser :3

fizzbark

28. Apr 2021 · 09:43 UTC

Neat graphic style, really unique and gives it a creepy folklore-ish feel that really lends itself to the mood. The ability to add name villagers is a little touch that makes the village feel personal. The first time I rang the bell it wouldn't stop ringing and I had to restart unfortunately.

🎤 Itskdog

28. Apr 2021 · 13:22 UTC

@mira @bnmkt Thanks for playing. I will definitely put it in a zip. Totally forgot about doing that.

🎤 Itskdog

28. Apr 2021 · 13:23 UTC

@bnmkt I had the same idea for naming them. That's why I put in naming. :)

🎤 Itskdog

28. Apr 2021 · 14:30 UTC

@fizzbark Thanks for your comment and feedback. Did you click the bell again to stop it?

Pavel Smejkal

28. Apr 2021 · 19:45 UTC

Ooo, the forest! I must say really enjoyed the voice lines and sound effects. However, it was quite difficult for me to play because I did not know how many resources I need to do each upgrade/to craft each weapon, I'd be nice if the message also mentioned how much of what is missing. Also camera movement using A/D or arrow keys would have been nice. After having many villagers it would have been also helpful to distinguish who does what at the moment by maybe giving the villagers some icons, or simply coloring them but this way it emphasised the "random villagers with low attention span" vibe :)

Anyways, good job!

🎤 Itskdog

28. Apr 2021 · 20:18 UTC

@pavel-smejkal Thanks for the feedback. We wanted to out those in, but just ran out of time. I'm glad you enjoyed it.

Timbertoes

29. Apr 2021 · 04:08 UTC

I really enjoyed this. I like your choice of an offbeat retro color palette. The gameplay was pretty cute and fun once I figured out how to encourage them to make weapons and pitchforks. Awesome interpretation of the theme. Keep making fun games. :)

miej

29. Apr 2021 · 05:38 UTC

really neat sort of game! one thing is that it took me a good long while to figure out how to actually craft/build things. wasnt super clear that i needed to manually assign the little dudes to do particular tasks by clicking on them individually. but overall an interesting idea, and nicely implemented!

Videt

29. Apr 2021 · 14:20 UTC

Nice game, pretty fun! Love that strategic stuff of gathering resources, managing them and building infrastructure

Viperux

29. Apr 2021 · 18:11 UTC

Nice game, i liked the idea behind it and the graphic. After a little bit the distance to travel to gather the resources was too long and i used a little trick. Switch a chatacter from gather to another state (i used idle since it stops him from retourning to the village) and then switch it back to gather made him transport back home multiple resorces with a single trip! An example: https://gifyu.com/image/ty3n

Was funny to explore the map to the end a build up my village. Good job!

🎤 Itskdog

29. Apr 2021 · 19:58 UTC

@viperux lol You know that was bad programming on my part. The state machine for the villagers doesnt check if it already has resource to put it in the store house. Thanks for finding that.

ardorugus

30. Apr 2021 · 02:51 UTC

First, I thought I heard samples from Worms. But then there were some cute lines (however could be more and sitcom like, maybe with the text shown over the villagers' heads). Apart from sounds this game has very nice design and the strategy/survival idea is intriguing. UI felt confusing a bit. Maybe, it's just me, but it's easier to get resources up the screen, while tutorial - at the bottom. Cool touch with managing every single villager (even re-naming them), though this process would be much easier if put in UI (say, right top corner): click villager, get the top corner schematics, click what to do, click another villager, etc. Yet, had a cool time with that, thanks!

🎤 Itskdog

30. Apr 2021 · 10:13 UTC

@ardorugus Thanks for playing. Designing ui can be tricky. We originally had the resources at the top. We felt that since your eyes are mostly at the bottom to put the resources there too. Really, the game needs a proper tutorial and icons and color for the resources.

todward

30. Apr 2021 · 15:27 UTC

Great graphics, first cute than spooky entering the forest. The voice lines gives the villagers an personality, great touch. The Menues for build and smith need some work, it's difficult to smith a sword without building a stick accidantly first. Also some ressources are not gathered by my villagers. But after all a nice management game.

🎤 Itskdog

30. Apr 2021 · 20:48 UTC

@todward Thanks for playing. That was an issue with smithing. Didn't have time to change it. We would just ring the ring and then pick the commands.

oramun

01. May 2021 · 10:57 UTC

Really liked the Audio and Graphics. The management system was very well implemented, the only issue i had was by managing the task directly from the villagers i had to check each one all the time to see what i had assigned the tasks to them and ensure that i was doing enough of each. When one died collecting stone for example i had to go through and see which other i had also assigned to it to worr out how many i had sent to their deaths :P. As someone already mentioned maybe a UI section to see how many are assigned to what task would be handy but i like the idea of the bell to call them all back.

It would also be noce to see what resources are required for things as i tried to upgrade my storehouse a few time s but could not wokr out what resources i needed or maybe i messed it :P

gnevesdev

01. May 2021 · 11:04 UTC

Gorgeous art style and the mood is just perfect!

🎤 Itskdog

01. May 2021 · 12:32 UTC

@oramun Thanks for the feedback. Some of those issues were fixed in the update version.

@gnevesdev Thanks for the comments.

CrispyBun

02. May 2021 · 13:31 UTC

This is a cool one! Although I couldn't get very far. First of all, it'd be nice to have some sort of indicator for how many resources you need to upgrade a thing. If there is one, I didn't see it. The tutorial was also boring and long, just text on the screen, and it somehow never ended, it just kept looping and going back to the first text. I got stuck tho, because (I'm pretty sure that's what happened at least) my storage got filled up with stone, and I think I needed wood to upgrade things, but I couldn't collect any since the storage was full. But, it's a *really* cool take on the theme, I like it a lot. The audio is also really fun, it reminds me of old flash games. I also really like the art, except maybe the background, those beige lines in the blue sky look a little off. It has tons of potential, it's just a bit messy at the moment. Gj!

🎤 Itskdog

02. May 2021 · 13:37 UTC

@cripsybun Did you try the update version? Some of the issues were fixed.

naali

02. May 2021 · 17:43 UTC

Nice job.

Re-Lo

02. May 2021 · 18:40 UTC

Amazing game I had much fun. I don't not why, the graphics look weird but i loved the style it's pretty unique. The voice lines were really fun like they were having fun "uuuuh the forest" then they went to the forest and a monster hand slaped them in the neck and died. I loved it. The problem i found was the resource managment I couldn't teel how much the builds costed, and the smith mechanic, i had to manually tell one of the villagers everytime i wanted something that they were smiths and what they had to build but overall really nice game. Good job!

🎤 Itskdog

02. May 2021 · 19:01 UTC

@re-lo Thanks for the feedback. The management aspect of the game needs some work.

BorderDestroyer

02. May 2021 · 21:42 UTC

This is a really cute game you have here! I particularly enjoyed the little voice snippets that the villagers say throughout it, that was what really sold this game to me! Fantastic job all in all!

🎤 Itskdog

02. May 2021 · 22:08 UTC

@borderdestroyer Thanks. It's also fun to name the villagers.

NDHR Productions

05. May 2021 · 15:09 UTC

The art and sound was amazing! Overall, the only improvement I'd suggest is letting the player know how much a building upgrade would be, but besides that it's an amazing game. I absolutely loved the voice lines.

🎤 Itskdog

05. May 2021 · 15:43 UTC

@ndhr-productions Thanks for playing. The game does need like a context menu.

Lisichka

13. May 2021 · 15:16 UTC

Graphic very strange but plaing in this was fun

zubspace

15. May 2021 · 21:14 UTC

This game has actually a bit more depth than you first think. Somehow I'm not very good at managing my people and it's hard to tell, how to improve. Maybe the gameplay stresses me out a bit? It's like you are given all the tools you need at once, but you don't know how to effectively use them...

On the other hand I like that you gave those small villagers a bit of personality. The sound effects get old after a while ("Ewww the forest"), but the graphics really have some life.

Thanks for the game!

🎤 Itskdog

17. May 2021 · 20:34 UTC

@zubspace Thanks for playing. If you ring the bell all the villagers will come and it's a little easier to manage them.