CRAWLER CRAWL by Sean Carrick

made by Sean Carrick for Ludum Dare 52 (JAM)

Its Dark. Quiet.

Your torch continues slowly burning your hand as the flame eats the tar-soaked branch.

You are this years designated Crawler. You've passed through the opening into 'The Dark' some odd hours ago- or at least it feels so. Time is irrelevant down here, the passing of such only documented by your shrinking torchlight.

You trip, stumble, and almost drop your ceremonial mallet. Illuminating the hazard that nearly rendered you unconscious marks a worrying discovery - last years crawler, still face down in the stone. He appears calm, asleep almost; if it weren't for the extreme malnourishment on his face.

You clench your mallet. You're not ending up like him.

Controls

## - Left Mouse Button: Capture Net ## - Right Mouse Button: Mallet ## - WASD: Movement ## - Space: Jump ## - Left Ctrl: Slide ## - Movement + Wall: Wall Slide/Jump

Hey Jammers, thanks for checking out my little game. This weekend was really busy for me so I was on and off development, and ended up with a much smaller game than I was aiming for initially. Maybe in the future I'll add a dungeon cave generation system and possibly some upgrades you trade the bugs for at a central hub on the surface for? Who knows. It was a fun little project and Im happy with the outcome. If you find any issues let me know!

Original URL

https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/52/crawler-crawl

Ratings

Given

4🗳️

3🗨️

Feedback

ADIS

09. Jan 2023 · 15:53 UTC

Hello, Sean, I had a blast playing your game: the movement is like I am inside Quake 3 arena or something - that's really interesting mechanic to put in a horror-like game. The graphics are also beatiful.

However, sometimes it's really hard to tell when you need to use mallet or net because the are no visual clues on bugs.

I have reached the second level, but there were too much bugs to capture, so I have gave up. To push the gameplay even further I would have made the score for the "parkour" style movement or some weapon to catch bugs from further away. Then put some heights in your maps, give player a hook, and you will get some insanely fun experience.

Good job! 4/5

🎤 Sean Carrick

09. Jan 2023 · 21:27 UTC

Hey there, @adis, thanks for trying out my entry! I will admit I probably made the map a little cramped for the movement style of the player, which makes it feel sort of pointless... I like your ideas! Definitely going to mess around with this project in the future.

JingleJosh

09. Jan 2023 · 22:02 UTC

cool vibe! the spooky bugs are and fear health mechanic is a really cool in game way to make me avoid them, *although I was definitely going to do that anyway*
catching the bugs is really fun! The spooky cave is dope, needs some ambience for sure. Like some commenters said, I dont think the level is playing to the movements strengths *or vice versa*
consider what is the vibe you are trying to give and what can you do to strengthen it?

LDJam user 221750

11. Jan 2023 · 09:06 UTC

Nice game. I like 3d aesthetic a lot. Sad there's no audio, it could be very moody! Movement feels great.

🎤 Sean Carrick

13. Jan 2023 · 23:32 UTC

@kiberptah Thanks for playing! Yeah unfortunately ran out of time for audio. I'm doing these jams to try and boost my ability to leave mechanics as-is instead of being a perfectionist and spending too much time on them... Next time!

Gabrimer

14. Jan 2023 · 02:49 UTC

Wow, this entry really triggered my arachnophobia! (In a good way, haha)
I was astonished by the horror aspect of the game. Making me have to go upfront and face my fears to clear the objective was super trilling, so I was a big fan! The controls felt super smooth to manage, and in a way they felt a bit similar to how you control a character in "Apex Legends". Not sure if there was inspiration from it, but credit to you for managing to make it feel nice to play! I made it until level 3. ![score1.png](///raw/41f/c4/z/5664c.png)

I do wish there was some audio to support this game, because I can imagine how much it could impact on the gameplay. Like making so that the music adapts to how much your danger bar has filled up, stuff like that. It would make players be even more on their toes! Great stuff though, and I'm looking forward for the next entries from you.

Oh and final note, when I was cornered by 2 bugs in a small area where you had to crouch, I managed to quickly go out of bounds in a jump, but then my character quickly jumped back to the map. My guess would be that I had a lot of momentum going.

Porcus_Pie

14. Jan 2023 · 03:24 UTC

This was fun! The movement was absolutely buttery, I'm so used to playing very typical 3d fps type games during jams this was a breath of fresh air. I found the environments had a really nice atmosphere to them, they were dark and dingy and it felt really quite oppressive in the best way possible. I think maybe some more landmarks to help navigate might be good? I felt like I was running around in circles. The bugs were really neat too, all of them were pretty easy to distinguish just by visuals, and I knew what I had to grab and what I had to avoid. Similarly the fear mechanic was a really innovative way to look at losing, less health and more how much can you stomach. If anything the fear kind of mimicked the fear of losing as when it was up, I was stressed. I will say I could barely get some of the hitboxes working, I would swear I would net a bug and it would just run away, and that definitely made it hard to keep playing at some times. I also am going to be a broken record and say that audio would have really made this mood just 11/10, but it's a jam so 100% get the lack of any. Overall though this was a really nice feeling game with a nice atmosphere to it, good work!

Mohamed_DKD

14. Jan 2023 · 03:33 UTC

love the atmosphere and the art, really helps in selling the idea of fear and claustrophobia, but feels like the controls are bit hard to grasp especially hitting the insects with the net

🎤 Sean Carrick

14. Jan 2023 · 05:00 UTC

@gabrimer @porcus-pie @mohamed-dkd Wow, super impressive on getting to that level, Gabrimer! Im really happy you all liked the player movement, I actually did take some inspiration from Apex, and also majorly Ultrakill (super fun game!) Though I'm kicking myself a bit as I made a "Chance to capture" mechanic that I didn't telegraph to the player very well; Those little blue bugs have a capture chance of 35% (35 hits out of 100 have a chance to capture it) so getting 7 is a really big undertaking. Spiders also have a really low chance, I think around 10%.

With more free time and a bigger team I'd have loved to add audio but all my usuall jammin buds were busy for the new year and I got into this jam late anyway.

Big thanks for leaving such nice comments! :smiley: :two_hearts: :two_hearts:

JormaRysky

14. Jan 2023 · 13:02 UTC

Very smooth controls, feels like Turok 1 with that head tilt. Actually feels better, jump is not botched on this one. Prolly best fps controller in this jam.