Below the Machine by HolySparks

[raw]
made by HolySparks for Ludum Dare 57 (COMPO)

Screen 1 2.jpg

Compo entry made for Ludum Dare 57 under 48 hours.

Below the Machine is a short action platformer with roguelite elements.

Humanity has built you to reach the depths of the Megastructre in the hopes of breaking out of it.

Controls

W, D: Movement

Mouse click: Attack

Made in GDevelop 5; all art, code, design etc. by me.

Developer thoughts

Me and my team decided we would each submit a compo this time to practice going through the entire development process. I had some trouble with real life stuff on the last day and had to cut the game a bit short, mostly by lacking testing and balancing. Still, I'm glad how it plays.

Ratings

Overall 273th 2.854⭐ 26🧑‍⚖️
Fun 274th 2.646⭐ 26🧑‍⚖️
Innovation 289th 2.354⭐ 26🧑‍⚖️
Theme 263th 2.771⭐ 26🧑‍⚖️
Graphics 245th 2.917⭐ 26🧑‍⚖️
Audio 231th 2.413⭐ 25🧑‍⚖️
Humor 224th 2.167⭐ 26🧑‍⚖️
Mood 284th 2.438⭐ 26🧑‍⚖️
Given 23🗳️ 25🗨️

Feedback

OadT
07. Apr 2025 · 09:31 UTC
Liked that you have to collect the dash and dive ability. But gameplaywise it was to hard for me :smile: The dash felt a bit too slow and I wasn't sure about its range
lindote
07. Apr 2025 · 21:29 UTC
Proud of you, @holysparks!
The game nice, and fun. I Liked the dynamic of the movement (dash, etc) and the enemies.
The only this is... it seems that I am playing Dark souls, level hard...hahaha.
zichemerr
09. Apr 2025 · 12:12 UTC
Cool idea
LDJam user 287424
09. Apr 2025 · 13:34 UTC
Well done to create a mini-Metroidvania during a compo! I'm a big fan of that genre. Collecting abilities that give you more access to the map is just such a nice feeling natural progression. And I like that you've randomized the location of the abilities on each run to give the game more replay-ability. I liked the character designs, although the attack animation could be a little faster, and some destruction animations for the enemies would make killing them much more satisfying. But I understand that getting those levels of polish into the game is time consuming, and hard to do during a compo, especially when life gets in the way. Great work!
jeremyfa
09. Apr 2025 · 19:00 UTC
Damn, it's hard xD I though Dash wasn't working, then understood from a comment here you need to find it in the level, which I finally did. Didn't go very far because I'm not very good at it, but that's a good COMPO entry! One minor thing: the WASD keys won't work on a non-qwerty keyboard. Ideally, to solve that, you'd need to use keyboard layout-independant codes (scan code) instead of key codes, but I don't know how that translates with the engine you are using. Nice job anyway!
Game-mon
10. Apr 2025 · 08:10 UTC
Cool game, i love the concept and the upgrades! Unfortunately the game just feels impossible to play, there are hazards everywhere, quite impossible to dodge them all. With a bit of balancing it could be really fun!
LDJam user 5243
10. Apr 2025 · 12:25 UTC
The controls together with the slippery physics made it quite hard to play. Together with the slow attack-speed it felt just weird. This is a case of something that isn't wrong per se. It's mostly a question of fine-tuning the movement and speed of things. Nice entry though :)
LDJam user 280624
10. Apr 2025 · 18:41 UTC
I really loved the dash mechanic and the different attack animations. And overall, the visual style turned out very appealing!
ljg
11. Apr 2025 · 19:37 UTC
Cool game! Does the dash not go through enemies? I think some music would have really made it. The art was neat, well done.
byebye
12. Apr 2025 · 20:10 UTC
Nice game! I missed having some checkpoints every 2-3 items picked up.
Agraffs
12. Apr 2025 · 20:26 UTC
Nice concept, interesting physics like the dash. Would like to see how it ends up if continued after the jam (with graphics and UI at their best). Gg !
Flying Dog Fish
12. Apr 2025 · 20:49 UTC
Why are the Roombas after me? Anyway, a solid platformer. The special abilities that you collect are a nice touch.
henk
13. Apr 2025 · 19:24 UTC
I had to give up after getting too frustrated. Even after several tries, my success on each run largely
seemed at the mercy of the random enemy/item placement and randomized shooting directions of the turrets.

The slow back-swing feels similar to the whip from spelunky, but
spelunky's whip is waaaay faster than that, allows you to turn around between
the back and front swing, and has no gap between the back and front swing during
which you can't deal any damage.

Additionally, in spelunky the enemies are less frequent and have more predictable behaviors, the
viewport is much larger, and the game has multiple ranged weapons. All of these features together allow the player to plan paths through the level without taking any damage, despite the whip's limitations.
By contrast, in this game I see no way to reach the bottom without taking
_some_ damage, barring some stroke of luck.
kiv
14. Apr 2025 · 05:13 UTC
Nice and fun game, tha dash is super cool!
Eugenik
14. Apr 2025 · 08:09 UTC
Nice job! This game is awesomely innovating.
Ammonit
15. Apr 2025 · 10:04 UTC
What are these awesome sounds?)))) They totally lifted my mood!
atsh
15. Apr 2025 · 13:05 UTC
Very fun game, I really liked the animation for such simple sprites, both for attacking and dashing

The hardest enemy in the game is the cannon that shoots everywhere, it felt a bit random sometimes. The health pool was generous, but it was a little disheartning to lose dash if you're dead

Great entry overall
Ace17
18. Apr 2025 · 11:19 UTC
> What are these awesome sounds?)))) They totally lifted my mood!

Is this game supposed to have sound?
koalabear
23. Apr 2025 · 17:17 UTC
Fun idea !
Untitled Studios
25. Apr 2025 · 20:21 UTC
Fun! Really cool art. I felt that it was a bit too punishing to have to fully restart when you die.