Maps of The Darkness by Wolfier
CONTROLS
*Left clicking * on the map will change the tile to a "room".
Clicking again will change it to a "path".
Clicking a third time will make the space empty again.
Left clicking outside the map will allow you to attack
E interacts with stuff.
Q will use a potion if you have one.
Welcome to Maps of The Darkness.
Your goal is to get as far as possible without dying.
Diligent mapping is the key to reaching the bottom.
Your adventure doesn't end until you do!
EXPLORE THE DARKNESS

BUY ITEMS ON YOUR RETURN

| Link | https://landings101.itch.io/maps-of-darkness |
| Original URL | https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/57/maps-of-the-darkness |
Ratings
| Overall | 663th | 3.217⭐ | 48🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 638th | 3.074⭐ | 49🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 458th | 3.213⭐ | 49🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 533th | 3.5⭐ | 49🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 690th | 3⭐ | 50🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 720th | 3.032⭐ | 49🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 49🗳️ | 79🗨️ |
You benefit A LOT from mapping though because its not erased when you head back in. So it helps you clear early levels quckly
Could not go back to base, finished the first floor and wanted to go buy, but was not able to go back.
Maybe "setting camp" where you could upgrade at the first room on each floor could help.
Also if you press "enter" game does not pause and you can see the whole floor :laughing:.
Overall I like the idea, could be further refined with time :smile:.
The map mechanic was also surprisingly cool, but I wonder if how much of a difference the personal drawing makes with floors like this. An auto-updating map would probably feel very similar, besides having to click less often.
I did consider letting you end a run "early", but I didn't get the time to add it.
and ya that "enter" key is one of my debug buttons. I left those in just in case. You can also hit tab to jump to the next floor, which helps with a rare bug where the starting room doesn't have any paths.
You don't really need an accurate map to do anything here. It just has to be good enough for your interests.
Though I really enjoyed the part where you can create your own map! It becomes a bit clunky when it's small on screen. Because I would misclick to the adjacent box instead. If it was perhaps bigger, or the hitboxes were a bit bigger, it would be more easier to draw the map more quickly and efficently while you explore the dungeon.
Nevertheless, this is great work for just being one person!
@VladImperator @botch-frivarg This game is built partially on the bones of a bigger game idea. Largely scrapping ideas i knew would be too expansive for a ludum dare period. The gold is a simplification of having you record POIs (as i couldn't add POIs in the game) and the combat a quick and dirty replacement for more RPG flavoring if i was doing something bigger.
Combat is also fun despite being a bit janky. The only issues I had were when enemies would insta-knock me back into previous rooms, but this didn't detract from it too much. Really fun game!
A small suggestion. From one room to the next you didn't use scrolling it was just a room transition. I would try to add smooth scrolling like Stardew Valley
What did you use to program this in?
Thanks for the play
@locke8 Well TBF I didn't really aim for the theme, the fact that it ended aligning with it at all was pure coincidence. As far as the enemies being too fast I'm assuming you're referencing how they can hit you the moment you enter a room? Ya i should of added a short delay before they can act so you don't get ganked before you can see them.
I love the way you actually have to map out the paths yourself, I thought that was fun and also kept you on your toes to do this and pay attention to where you are going while traversing the dungeon. I also liked the different playstyles that were possible in this game. The combat upgrades for when you want to play more aggressively, slaying all the enemies, the armor when you want to play more defensively and the light, which is extremely useful when you try to avoid combat altogether. The sneaking approach was actually the one I got the furthest with, seeing a good chunk of the room and thus the exits/connecting floors is an incredible advantage.
Music and art fit very well too, I think it really immerses you while you are getting around exploring the dungeon. You did very well designing this game, it's super fun!
I might need to try this game again to see if I could do something different.
All my initial runs ended by dying so I wondered what the point of mapping was. Seems I have trouble with the combat.
I did wait out the timer once to see what happened so it makes more sense now, though my run still ended there as no healing.
A way to go back up would have been nice, or a warp back to the shop to avoid having to sit and wait for a few minutes.
Eventually got the hang of it - I found it hard to resist the urge to fully explore each level and acquire all the gold.
I managed to get to floor 8 but couldn't get back there again as I died way too quickly even trying my best to avoid all the mobs.
Buying anything other than potions doesn't seem worth it as there is no other way to heal.
Enemies can still hit you during the transition between levels which is not ideal.
Also what is the difference in the deloused edition?
The only problem I have with letting you warp back early is that it makes it so there very little threat of dying. As potions are designed to be your healing method. I do agree though that I need to find a solution to that as telling people to either push forward and risk a likely loss or sit and wait doesn't seem that good.
The major difference is that deloused fixed a bug with my darkness disappearing if you had the first upgrade of the lantern, any other level was fine. There were some other minor fixes as well I don't remember as well.
It wasn't that the other upgrades would be unhelpful, it was that I always needed healing and did not have enough gold to spare on the other upgrades. I guess I was losing more health in combat that was intended in the balancing.
My runs always ended due to lack of health rather than running out of time.
You definitely want some level of armor as each level of armor negates one level of damage.