Unbound by MasterfulMonkey

[raw]
made by MasterfulMonkey for Ludum Dare 49 (JAM)

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A short platformer centered around dashing and escaping a collapsing cave. Don't let the darkness catch up to you! Run and dash with your magic spear to get to the exit portal and escape!

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dash.gif

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I didn't have much time this weekend, but I'm pleased with my art and platforming mechanics in the time I did have. It's not perfect - I didn't add lighting, for example, and I didn't have much in the way of level design, so there's only one short level. So it goes. For my first jam submission, I'm happy.

Was originally planning on submitting to the compo, so I created all of the art for this project. Music is mine as well, but since it's now a Jam entry I used an old song for the ending screen.

Credits: - Unity2DPixelPerfectCollider: https://github.com/RandomiaGaming/Unity2DPixelPerfectCollider - Parallax script: Adam C. Younis (https://uppon-hill.itch.io/indie-tales-parallax) - Woosh sound effect: https://freesound.org/people/moogy73/sounds/425699/ - Footsteps: https://freesound.org/people/bevangoldswain/sounds/54779/

Tools: - Unity - Aseprite - VS Code - Audacity - Petaporon

Ratings

Given 3🗳️ 4🗨️

Feedback

Almagor
05. Oct 2021 · 01:40 UTC
It was nice. The art and music were great. Maybe the dash could be used with another key.
Transylvanian Blacksmiths
05. Oct 2021 · 10:12 UTC
I love the idea, I would like to see a more challenging level and maybe dash with your spear through some enemies. Overall it's a nice experience.
peterfiftyfour
05. Oct 2021 · 10:15 UTC
Great visuals. They would work well in an adventure setting! Something slower paced so we can enjoy them for longer rather than racing past!
🎤 MasterfulMonkey
05. Oct 2021 · 11:28 UTC
I changed the dash command to space, it works better that way. I agree, it's a shame that the concept is only in such a small dose. So much for the best laid plans of mice and men :p

Thank you all :)
MsCarrotCake
06. Oct 2021 · 09:20 UTC
I like the art!

When I played, I just walk to the end and that's it? I thought it was a tutorial level to let me know the controls but then it was the end. I played it three times before reading again about what's supposed to happen. Then I tried not moving. Maybe would be better if darkness were to come a bit faster?

Anyway, good job on your submission :)
🎤 MasterfulMonkey
06. Oct 2021 · 17:39 UTC
@mscarrotcake yeah, it's definitely less of a game than it is a platforming simulator lol. Since there wasn't much to the game, I kept the darkness slow so that you could at least have time to try out the dashing
LunacyEcho
07. Oct 2021 · 16:06 UTC
Cute little game! It's super cool you did this all yourself, and the art style here shows great promise. The platforming itself feels good; the *woosh* of the dash is super satisfying and the character moves at an appropriate speed that nevertheless doesn't trivialize the potential for future power-ups. I know you're aware that this isn't that full of a game, but I think what does exist is pretty solid! Small suggestion: a death screen that shows when you get hit by the darkness? I'll admit that on my first runthrough, I tried going left, didn't notice that there was this encroaching dark triangle, and was confused when I ended back up on the main menu. That might just be me though! Great work :)
Raph_Gi
07. Oct 2021 · 16:08 UTC
The aesthetic is soo cool (I'm a pixel art fan), it's a shame that the game so short. The mechanic with the dash creats many opportunity.
AdamCYounis
08. Oct 2021 · 03:01 UTC
Hey! I think it's clear you had a lot of vision for what you wanted to achieve with this one, but ran out of time before being able to explore those ideas very far. It's a shame to see, but I think what's here has promise, too. You were able to get some nice parallaxing in there, the movement controls have design consideration for the height of the platforms, the character is animated and there's a title and end screen.

I think for sure, the biggest thing to work on next is budgeting time to allow for more of the game to show through, earlier in the jam. This way you'll be able to get clearer feedback about your design from the player comments.

Thanks for making it, and best of luck with future jams!
RIBOUT Horace
10. Oct 2021 · 17:47 UTC
It was just too short... The graphism is really sweet and the feeling on the controler feel good, but we don't have time to really test it >_< it's frustrating.

It's like a good cake, but we cannot taste it because only a small fraction was serve.

But still ! It has a good feeling and it's always harsh to ask for more from jam game, I'm being injuste here
Sofimei
13. Oct 2021 · 03:58 UTC
Hi! Great work for doing everything on your own from the art, to the music and programming / design. I think that being able to create something with a complete scenario, even if brief, is a job well done. Definitely you can use this experience to better understand how to budget your time between different tasks (the same happened to my team on our first dare! We tried to make a complex platformer and I just spent the whole time animating the mc—). I think if you want to make a platformer with a number of actions that require animations, its probably best to go with a smaller pixel resolution and a smaller character design. Something with “chibi” proportion for example (ex. Shovel Knight) would probably be much easier to manage so you can focus on other things in your game~

For the background and level platforms, it may also be good to create assets that are modular, so you can copy/paste and create a more complex level if you needed, without having to draw it all by hand. (Though, the hand-drawn aspects are also interesting. For other bigger projects, I would suggest experimenting with using modular elements where you can, and hand drawing areas that are important or unique).
Best of luck for your next projects!