I'll be danged if this dragon isn't the cutest thing I've ever seen. The music is also wonderful! I had some trouble with pressing so many buttons at once, but then I've never been very good at platformers. This game makes me wish I was better at them!

Cute graphics. Addictive gameplay. :thumbsup:

Great graphics, great music, love the retro game but please add a gameplay supportm it's too difficult to play with a keyboard. (and its easy for UNITY)

I had a really hard time aiming and moving with the same keys. I think it would be a lot easier to control if the arrow keys handled movement and jumping, and the wasd handled shooting.
Very nice art and sound though.

Great submission! Use of the fireballs as a dual-purpose ability (delaying the firewall and assisting in movement) was interesting. I had a tough time getting the fireballs to always go in the direction that I wanted, but it was an execution error on my part, not the game. That said, linking the jump command to automatically aim the fireballs down and left might have helped.

Super challenging but super fun! Love the art, very cute.

This game is good! It's just held back a bit by the controls. I wish space would do the same as shift while in-air, so that it would be a bit more ergonomic to play. Any key i could click with the right hand instead of shift would also be better.


The last level was like murder by carpal tunnel, but i got there in the end.

Well done!

Fun platformer. Love the fact that the fireball not only gives you a boost, but also pushes the lava back :D

@iguanana Thank you! I spent far longer than was in my schedule on the dragon's sprite + animations, but I think it was 100% worth it. In my design doc for the game the character was just called "fat little dragon". The controls aren't as intuitive as I liked and also I think I made it a bit too hard for a game jam. I've been playing too much Celeste! I really appreciate you playing and leaving feedback!! :D

The music and sound effects are good and don't distract from the gameplay, the three-ish levels I played were fun and I would've continued if my pinky finger muscles were stronger. The controls are a little difficult to use as others have said but everything else is nearly perfect.

@mixon00 Thank you! The art is probably what took the longest :)

@robowarrior1982 Thank you, I really appreciate the kind words!! Yeah, I think playing this with a controller would be a lot better. I'm not entirely sure whether I can do that before the end of the voting period, but I'll check :D

@graphite Yeah, I think the controls are pretty unintuitive looking at it today. I didn't have the amount of time I wanted to for playtesting, so I couldn't see that issue (it only felt fine to me because I was the one working on the game for 2 days). Thank you, I'm very glad you liked the art and sound ^^ - I really appreciate you playing the game and leaving feedback!

@dindotjs Yes you can implement controller support, i don't think it's a **new** feature for this kind of game ^^.
PS : you can patch, correct bug, add export to other support, just don't add content in the voting period.

Loved it! I think I agree with the general opinion that remapping a couple of the buttons would help with the comfort of the controls, but it didn't really hold me back from playing at all. The graphics are adorable and they all mesh together really well into a fun style. I like how the levels were designed to force you into some close shaves with the lava wall - great job!


That was hard! But what a blast. I really hurt my pinky playing this and ended up using my left hand for arrows and right for shift. I wish the right shift key worked like the left. The art was fantastic. The difficulty level was perfectly challenging. I just had a lot of fun. That "aha" moment when I realized I can go higher by aiming the fireballs down was epic. Thank you for the game!

@tiny-pig Thanks, I put a lot more effort into the music + sound than I have in previous jams. I think I accidentally made a pinky training simulator - I'll check whether it's against the rules to change the keybind after the deadline, since I don't want people to not be able to play the whole game because of the controls (it was originally V until I changed it to shift at the end because I thought it would be more intuitive - I'll see if I can change it back since I literally have a build with V instead of shift). I really appreciate you playing and leaving feedback!! :D

@robowarrior1982 Cheers for the response. I'll have a look at that in a bit (I've only done controller support using the newest input system and that also completely broke webgl so I'll have a look at the other way)

I love the music and the graphics but the controls are a bit too unwieldy for me :(

Other than that, great work!

Could really need some different controls other than that, this is great. I only played to level 4 but the levels are challenging and feel quite rewarding when you finally understand how to beat them

@ubershmekel I'm really glad that you (minus your pinkie) liked the game :D - I'm going to upload the build with V for the fireball now (that was what it originally was) because almost everyone has had trouble with shift. Right shift would also probably be a good option - I might make it be right shift as well if V is still an issue. I was v happy with the art but it basically took the entirety of the first day - so I'm happy you liked it. I was worried about it being too hard, and I made the lava slower on most of the levels (multiple times) because you had to be literally perfect. The "tutorial" area wasn't as clear as I wanted, but I think everyone figured it out so I'm happy :D Thank you for playing the game and leaving feedback!!

@ghost-wave @spthiel Thanks for leaving feedback! I've just uploaded a version with the controls changed so it isn't an endurance challenge for your pinkie, since almost everyone has had a problem with the controls. I'm really happy you liked the game (minus the pinkie pain) :D

@defrag Thank you! I'm a big fan of dual purpose mechanics so I was happy I could implement one into this game. To be honest that's probably a problem with the controls - for some reason I'm really good at coming up with unintuitive control schemes and I didn't really get the amount of playtesting I needed before the deadline. I really appreciate you playing and leaving feedback - it'll help a lot with future projects :D

@waffleworksgames Thank you! I was worried about the difficulty making it frustrating instead of making it fun and challenging, but so far nobody has said that it's been frustrating, which I'm really happy about. Making the character cute was my goal, it was just called "fat little dragon" on my ideas doc. It did mean that it took 10x longer to make all the art, but I think it was worth it. Tysm for playing and leaving feedback :D

@p0l4r Thank you! I'm glad you liked it ^^ I changed the controls to shift just before the deadline, but I've just uploaded the build that has the (original) keybind of V, which I think is more ergonomic. If that's still not great, I might change it to right shift or enter, since you still need to be able to fire while on the ground. Thanks for playing + leaving feedback!! :D

@mrscythe Thank you for the kind words! Dual purpose mechanics are my favourite thing in games like Celeste and Downwell so I'm trying to work them into my games :D

Sorry, but controls just kill it for me, and I'm no stranger to platformers. Not even tough as nails ones like Meat Boy or Celeste. But here, I only barely made it past level 3 and couldn't get any farther. Maybe eventually I'd get used to the controls, but I died way too many times on levels that seemed fairly easy in concept.
Everything else was good though.

@kbf123 Thanks for the feedback! I agree that the controls are kinda unintuitive. What would you change the fireball to? Ik it needs changing but I'm not entirely sure what to. I'm rlly glad you liked the rest :D

@dindotjs This is kinda off the top of my head and probably not easily implementable, but maybe if you could shoot freely, either via mouse, or twinstick style, it might be easier?

@kbf123 Yeah mouse would probably be better

Great little platformer. Definitely think the control layout could do with a look, but once I got both hands involved, I didn't find it too bad. So pleasant to play, which is lovely. Great game for the timescale.

@judgezedd Thank you! What do you think about Right Shift or Enter to shoot? I think changing the aiming to mouse would be stretching what the rules allow, so I'm probably not going to do that. I'm very happy you liked it. Thanks for playing and leaving feedback ^^

Nice platformer. Graphics are great as well as sound design. I feel that the flaws of the game have been highlighted by others already, but it's easy to pick up and play. Nice job!

Is that essentially a Tabaluga The Dragon simulator? :dragon:


Pros:

- Simple, clean, warm graphics.
- Good level design and catchy traps
- Good that you actually start the run after moving the dragon
- Neat 'fireball-jump' mechanics
- Simple, yet effective soundscape
- tutorial at 1st level is a plus

Const:

- Oh god the wall-fireball-jumping controls. They break the flow to a point you become frustrated. A big miss on that part
- The actual controls mapping keys are very close to each other. Rather unintuitive to use, at least from my part

A pleasant and enjoyable experience. Excellent job!

very cool great concept with the shooting for momentum but i wish you could jump with space

What a fun game!! Not going to lie, I rode the struggle bus for most of it with the controls, but it was still super enjoyable. I sent it to my partner and he beat it quickly, and we both had a lot of fun with it. Music is cute and the dragon sprite is adorable! Lovely work!

pretty cute and fun game :) reminded me of celeste a little which I love, Wish I could play more but the controls were very tough so I gave up after a while, still pretty awesome :D

Fun game

@charlesschar @mikoziq @tested @teenythanos @apphons6 @collin-visser
Thank you all so much for playing and leaving feedback!!
First thing I get that the controls are still pretty bad. I think this is the last time I will change them as after this I'm very much pushing the boundaries on what's allowed. I think the fireball aiming should be independent from WASD, and instead should be controlled by the arrow keys (so one hand isn't doing everything). I'm going to make pressing any arrow key shoot a fireball in the opposite direction, and that should (hopefully) fix the issues. I really want people to be able to experience the game how I wanted them to without getting bogged down in the controls, as it seems that a lot of people here like the concept but are put off by the controls.

I'm super happy that so many people liked the art! I spent probably too long making the art, and I was pretty happy with it after I made it (the character especially :D). Celeste is definitely a massive inspiration for me, and I'm trying to follow their philosophy of helping the player in every way you can, especially on this game.

The level design is something I wanted to get right - I didn't want it to be one of those platformers where you basically just jump over barely different gaps for the whole game. Celeste and various other great games were also definitely a big inspiration here too (Maddy Thorson has a very good GDC talk about level design). The GMTK youtube channel also has some v good resources for level design.

Sound isn't my speciality (but I want to get better) so I basically powered through sound effects and music to the best of my (lacking) ability. I'm pleased the audio went down pretty well with most people :)

Yeah, I think this character is now canonically Tabaluga the Dragon. (Also I only just realised I forgot to give the dragon a tail... thankfully nobody noticed)

I expected like 6 people to play this because of just how many games were submitted, so I really can't thank everyone enough for taking their time to play my game!! :D

I've just updated the game's controls again - I think that it's significantly better now and shouldn't be an issue anymore :D
I probably won't get a second chance with most of the people who played, but hopefully new people coming in should have a much better experience.
If you're leaving feedback, please tell me about how you found the controls.

I like that game but oh boy it's challenging !
The graphics are amazing, it's really cute. The controls feel good.
I like how you guide the player for the first fews steps and then we have to figure out the best strategy for the levels.

Really good job!

From reading the comments, the controls are a concern here. Thank goodness those issues were fixed.

With that being said, the gameplay is pretty simple, easy to pick up, though I did have one bump, namely at the first level, when I was trying to jump over the spike pit using the fireballs. From there, the obstacles got more challenging, especially when my muscle memory is starting to adjust in jumping on the left, but the lava made it before I did!

The graphics are a highlight, with the wonderful pixel art, especially with the character design of the dragon, the fireball gauge, and the lava contrasting well with all of the brown, warm palettes of the environment. The music's pretty solid, though unmemorable.

The potential of 2D in Unity is underrated, and this game brought out the best of what it can do.

Overall, this game's challenging, but a good one! :thumbsup:

Great entry! It took some time to master which direction to shoot the fireball but i love concept.

Pretty fun! It was a nice, quick experience with a bit of challenge to it.

I thought the dragon design was cute and well animated. The graphical style in general is pretty good and has a nice cartoony style to it. Fits well with the upbeat and bouncy music you've got going on. Also, the animation for resetting a stage is pretty humorous, nice work there.

Controls were good. It took me a moment to get the hang of using the fireballs to traverse the stages, but it was a cool idea that worked well once I did. A funny thing of note, the lava wall won't start moving until WASD or Space are pressed, so it's possible to navigate a fair bit into some of the levels just by using the fireballs. Definitely isn't necessary to complete any stage, of course, but it was fun to play around with.

I felt that the levels ramped up in difficult pretty smoothly, with the last level being tricky but certainly manageable (though the speed at which the wall was moving was pretty startling at first XD). I do wish that there were more levels to the game, as the "Thanks for playing" screen came up just as I was really getting into the game. But it's always nice to see a fun, short, polished experience.

I noticed that there was the ability to shoot fireballs upwards, which I assume was just a consequence of the way that the shooting mechanic was designed since it wasn't used anywhere. I wouldn't know what would be a good way to use it, but it would be cool to see an iteration on this game in the future to see what sort of levels you could come up with using the mechanics with more time to play around with design.

Great work on this entry. It was really enjoyable!

Controls are fun! Game gets a little challenging at the end, would be nice to have a medium level before the vertical corridor one. Art looks amazing.

I made it and it had a consistent difficulty curve but boy was it hard! The last two levels both had a significant difficulty spike compared to the previous one but it was pretty cool once I understood how to pull through.

Also, the dragon is cute, generally nice visual art.

The platforming controls with the dual use of shooting at the wall to hold it back and propelling yourself forward were pretty interesting and something I haven't seen like this before. Nice work :)

The concept was interesting, but it felt a bit underexplored, I would love to see some more levels (although this was pretty good for a 48h entry).

One thing that bothered me a lot was the paralax scrolling. I'm not sure what's going on, but sometimes the background just flickered in a weird way. :/

Anyways, it'sa solid entry.

[Thanks for submitting your game to stream!](https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1457959497?t=02h17m26s)

This game is trickier than it looks! I'm glad I was able to finish it though, once I got the hang of it, it was pretty rewarding!