LudumData

John Highland and a Special Golden Crown by VladImperator

[raw]
made by VladImperator for Ludum Dare 58 (JAM)

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Genesis

You are a famous treasure hunter and alpinist John Highland and your specialty is climbing the highest peaks known to mankind. This time the government of Highlandia has made you climb the highest mountain of Highlandia, the Highlandland, to retrieve the Special Golden Crown™ once worn by the king of Highlandia. In your fashion you might venture off to find other treasures to entertain your hiking spirit. Are you up to the challenge?

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Credits

  • @VladImperator - engine and game coding, graphics
  • @tuh - thumbnail artwork, music

Trivia

  • The game was made with my own game engine in C# just like all my other games :P
  • The game features adaptive music
  • Press F11 or ALT + ENTER to enter fullscreen

System requirements

  • Vulkan 1.3 capable graphics card
  • Windows 10/11 (works on wine/proton)

Game's executable file is Summit.exe

Original URL https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/58/john-highland-and-a-special-golden-crown

Ratings

Overall 209th 3.75⭐ 24🧑‍⚖️
Fun 323th 3.455⭐ 24🧑‍⚖️
Innovation 195th 3.591⭐ 24🧑‍⚖️
Theme 739th 2.75⭐ 24🧑‍⚖️
Graphics 557th 3.25⭐ 24🧑‍⚖️
Audio 313th 3.381⭐ 23🧑‍⚖️
Humor 467th 2.795⭐ 24🧑‍⚖️
Mood 441th 3.476⭐ 23🧑‍⚖️
Given 29🗳️ 24🗨️

Feedback

Ulziton
Oct 06th · 23:07 UTC
very cool one, like this
kkritikov
Oct 06th · 23:14 UTC
It's sad that this game doesn't have a browser version
Melomaner
Oct 06th · 23:24 UTC
That’s really cool! I especially liked that the progress is saved =D You could improve the controls a bit and make it work on mobile :)
evil23
Oct 06th · 23:54 UTC
Nice game! Mouse control get's tiresome really fast. I could imagine something like WASD + click/move so you just select the limb you want to control and don't lose the handle all the time.
Matthew Rose
Oct 07th · 00:55 UTC
Interesting movement mechanics, the race to try and get one of your hands back on the wall before falling was fun. Thank you for not making me restart from the bottom every time I fell or I would never have reached the top XD
Artalasky
Oct 07th · 15:54 UTC
Oh, that's something unusual. It was interesting to try it.
Caominh Le
Oct 08th · 00:31 UTC
This is a really neat game. The physics are fun to play with, and the rock placement makes the entire track a cool puzzle where you have to learn where to place your hands and feet to get reach and when to use only 3 anchors. Thanks for not making me restart from the bottom whenever I fell. The music is so relaxing, especially with the clouds -- reminds me of an open world exploration vibes. Are there any other secret treasures along the way to the top? I was trying go to the right at the bottom crevice but gave up. Also, John is probably one of the world's best contortionists
Asad
Oct 08th · 16:12 UTC
Nice game my time was 41 minutes and 5 seconds and I enjoyed every second spent there! :3
tuh
Oct 08th · 20:51 UTC
@caominh-le If you click TAB you can see all collectible treasures which are all around the map. I can tell you that there is one at the bottom right. GL if you care enough to get them all- I did a 100% in 35:04 knowing the placements.
NNO1
Oct 09th · 06:04 UTC
This is so much fun! Took me a while to get the hang of controlling this character though lol
Jonction
Oct 09th · 23:41 UTC
Great game! I think it could be a little more instinctive with an UI element telling you when you are in grabbing hitbox or not
ACartlidge
Oct 10th · 00:08 UTC
This was really fun! I got into the flow of trying to place my limbs properly, and it made me laugh whenever all my feet were bunched up in one of the cracks. I think it's cool how there's a balance of placed you can reach without risk (3 planted and 1 limb moving) vs places that have risk (2 planted, 1 moving, 1 dangling). Nice work!
tenshi42
Oct 11th · 01:43 UTC
Very nice !
got the end but at what cost !
![2025-10-11 03_41_24-John Highland and a Special Golden Crown 1.1.png](///raw/8fd/7/z/6f3ca.png)
Sirplop
Oct 11th · 04:53 UTC
Really fun, refreshing concept for this jam! Lovely audio, very chill. A good, solid entry for what looks like your good, solid game engine. Keep up the good work!
good.enough
Oct 11th · 21:55 UTC
Huh. Won't run on my computer for some reason.
Shasaur
Oct 11th · 22:06 UTC
Couldn't run for me, crash on start :(
ConCaerus
Oct 12th · 02:32 UTC
Very fun game! The music combined with the calming gameplay mechanic really gave the game a cozy vibe. Great job!
LDJam user 179298
Oct 12th · 18:08 UTC
@good-enough @shasaur I'm very sorry to hear that and sorry for the inconvenience. May I know what gpus you guys have and if there's a log in the logs folder?
LDJam user 179298
Oct 12th · 18:17 UTC
@ulziton @kkritikov @melomaner @evil23 @matthew-rose @artalasky @caominh-le @asad @nno1 @jonction @acartlidge @tenshi42 @sirplop @concaerus Thank you all for playing our game! We appreciate all the feedback. :heart:

@tenshi42 Hope you had a great time!
fabY
Oct 13th · 16:56 UTC
I feel like the theme of the jam could have been better integrated to the gameplay itself but the controls, the music and level design are great ! It feels good being able to simply rest and not being rushed into making decisions, not restart from the beginning on failure. Good guy John, very polished game congrats !
Diralf
Oct 14th · 13:26 UTC
Awesome implementation! I'd like a bit more highlighting to tell whether сharacter has latched onto a ledge or not. Overall, it very well conveys how the character feels in the moment and how hard it is for them, really drawing me into the process. Excellent game!
Dianavi
Oct 14th · 14:30 UTC
Very cool game
lima victor
Oct 17th · 09:21 UTC
While playing Peak I was thinking "And how would a real climbing simulator look like? Would it even be playable?". With this thought I set myself to beat this game and I really liked it

I like both an idea and how it was executed. The character feels very responsive and realistic in terms of posisble positions, most of the time available actions were clear, and having to change limbs fast sometimes make experience better. The only issue I had is that character can't straighten arms even when legs are disconnected, but there were workarounds

Also it felt awesome when music changed for the first time, but when it changed and I saw the snow it just felt incredible
Anatol.w
Oct 21st · 17:27 UTC
nice game