Down the rabbit hole by bbaf

made by bbaf for Ludum Dare 48 (JAM)

In 2021 the world has changed forever. Billions of people started to believe in conspiracy theories and they became real. All of them! To free humanity from this madness, a lone hero, the last sane scientist of Earth goes deep inside the metaphysical world to eliminate the whole idea of conspiracy theories. And he's armed with the most powerful weapon - true knowledge!

You need to reach the great goal (White stone with purple light).

There are many conspiracy enemies around you, so use your books to beat them.

But be careful and use only the correct book as a counter-argument in a particular moment.
Otherwise, they evolve...

Controls (M&K)

WASD to move

Shift to sprint

Left Mouse Button to use The Power of Science

Right Mouse Button to use The Annals of History

Enter - restart level

Devs

3D/Art: Mykhailo Novoseltsev

Code: Vitalii Zavoloka, Yevhen Lozko

Sound/Main Menu UI: Vlad Melnyk (https://soundcloud.com/zaqq )

Thanks to Taras Kovtun for additional help during the last hours ; )

Link	https://bbaf.itch.io/down-the-rabbit-hole
Original URL	https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/48/down-the-rabbit-hole-2

Ratings

Overall	1778^th	2.8⭐	22🧑‍⚖️
Fun	1687^th	2.675⭐	22🧑‍⚖️
Innovation	1021^th	3.125⭐	22🧑‍⚖️
Theme	1766^th	2.675⭐	22🧑‍⚖️
Graphics	1592^th	2.875⭐	22🧑‍⚖️
Audio	1021^th	3.025⭐	22🧑‍⚖️
Humor	327^th	3.525⭐	22🧑‍⚖️
Mood	1529^th	2.947⭐	21🧑‍⚖️
Given		24🗳️	17🗨️

Feedback

MerlinnSound

27. Apr 2021 · 20:48 UTC

Interesting backstory, where you have to fight conspiracy theories with the power of science or history, which means to shoot figures with books. I couldn't find more meaning in the game though. It's an interesting premise.

hyperspacejelly

27. Apr 2021 · 22:49 UTC

So funny ahah and i loved the music!

Taylor Carroll

06. May 2021 · 15:29 UTC

Interesting Concept, Solid gameplay. The music was cool too.

gamescodedogs

06. May 2021 · 15:50 UTC

Very interesting game changes my perception of metaphysics and overwhelms me with new sensations.

Shimonster

06. May 2021 · 16:25 UTC

It was a fun game with great music. I fell like the game turned from a game about throwing the right book at the enemy to a game about throwing as many books as you can. Other than that, great game!

Volodya

06. May 2021 · 18:55 UTC

Good trash game)))

staircase27a

06. May 2021 · 19:22 UTC

Very interesting concept and liked the art style. It was very hard to aim at a particular enemy as they all clumped together. Some way of making them spread out would definitely be useful.

Also I was able to walk outside of the area and into the mountains and then when I walked far enough I fell off the end of the world and into the "void".

someone

06. May 2021 · 19:30 UTC

I like the music and backstory.
All the enemies clumped together made it impossible to read what they were saying. Spamming both books seemed to be the easiest way to progress.

🎤 bbaf

06. May 2021 · 19:58 UTC

Thank everyone for the feedback, it's very valuable for us!

@staircase27a , @someone Regarding the clumping and book spamming - yeap you are completely right. We saw these issues during the playtest but unfortunately didn't have enough time to handle them.

I guess, the first major post-jam update will be aimed exactly for:
1. Improving enemy AI to make them flanking around a player for better spreading
2. Improving text bubbles to make it more readable
3. Possibly, allow enemies to shoot back with projectiles to increase the challenge

the_body

06. May 2021 · 21:23 UTC

Nice! I really like your theme twist, great sound design!

🎤 bbaf

06. May 2021 · 22:34 UTC

@hyperspacejelly, @taylor-carroll, @the-body, @shimonster Tnx for your comments :heart:
Speaking about music and sound design, our composer has a SoundCloud so you might pay him a visit if you wish to
https://soundcloud.com/zaqq :musical_note:

Hope it will force him to upload releases more frequently :smile:

Conduit

07. May 2021 · 01:48 UTC

Loved the idea, although I felt like I could just spam until I could single out one of the big guys and hit em with that good history/science XD I found the concept really funny though. Great 3d entry :)

Jordan Carroll

07. May 2021 · 13:39 UTC

I'm not sure what I just played but I'm pretty sure I liekd it.

Had trouble reading the enemies ideas fast enough to determine what book to use on them, ended up just spamming and trying to run. Love the theme though!

Chillen

07. May 2021 · 19:18 UTC

Rode around space on a stream of books to phase into an upside down pyramid and examining the lizard people from below. I think that means I won? Pretty fun and funny premise!

dingdingding

09. May 2021 · 18:41 UTC

Really interesting idea! Liked the graphics. Gameplay was very hard and stressful tho :/

BinaryPrinciple

10. May 2021 · 04:55 UTC

I enjoyed the concept. I would recommend to make the enemies of the color of the book just it would be quicker to point out who is who, since there are plenty and move really fast.

I would recommend adding an enemy variation: some walk slower, other faster, others jump.

Still a nice game, I had fun!

VixenMink

11. May 2021 · 02:01 UTC

I like the story!

SecretJuice

11. May 2021 · 02:10 UTC

This was hilarious, I loved it too much. Based on some of the comments I see you're handling a lot of the issues I experienced when I played, so that's great news!

If your interested, I played it on stream here: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1017517813 starting at about 1:13:25ish

Great work guys!

🎤 bbaf

14. May 2021 · 17:45 UTC

@conduit @jordan-carroll @chillen @dingdingding @binaryprinciple @vixenmink @secretjuice
Thanks for your feedback, really appreciate it!

Returning to the enemies and their quotes. Despite the bad readability and grouping (that requires improvement, no question :smile_cat:) there are still a few hints for aiming:
- color
- letter in the brackets

![text.jpg](///raw/6ca/c/z/426c2.jpg)

🦎 Conspiracy signs are everywhere 🦎

Also, there is a short moment when enemies are invulnerable. When a lizard is silent (no text above the head) you can't damage or upgrade him.