Hey all! We've now released a downloadable version of Blood Quest on Windows, macOS, and Linux!! It runs much better, and we've even made a custom installer for windows! :)
If any macOS and linux users could please check it out just for bug testing that would be wonderful, as we don't have those devices ourselves.
Please download it and check it out here!
Play Lifeless Treasure here:
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/44/lifeless-treasure
Hi everyone, if you missed it here is our game for LD44. You have to make your family become more and more powerful by managing the lives of your heirs, marrying them to gain money and influence !
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/44/les-liens-du-sang!
After a failed attempt at a roguelike for #LD43 I tried to learn the lesson for this time, so I set submitting a somewhat decent entry as my main goal. To do so I'd really have to keep scope under control.
Enter Overburnt
Last Friday after work I felt too tired to brainstorm ideas with the final round themes as I usually do and went to bed early to have a good rest. That way I could have an early start on Saturday morning. I wasn't too keen on the final choice because it felt too limiting, but an idea started to take shape relatively soon (you can see it on the notes screencap below):
Time management with a capitalist-ish setting + "permadeath" (or rather, perma-fatigue...).
With the International labour day just around the corner I thought it was a good match with the theme both mechanically and from a narrative point of view: You would play the role of a salaried worker exhausting him/herself to maximise the income for a somewhat sociopathic patron. I also happen to like the game mechanics in games like Overcooked or Diner Dash, so I had a thing.
Even if the idea stuck quickly I kept resisting it for some hours, searching for something better, until I stopped wasting time and started designing. At this point the game was intended to have a cooking thematic (the title, the "recipes" terminology and even the README on Github still reflect this), and I'd have a player character controlled with a gamepad or a keyboard moving around to do the job. The effects of fatigue would be obvious, since an exhausted player would move slower, or be able to carry around less things.
However, after spending time creating a placeholder walk cycle I reconsidered: I had almost nothing ready at that point and player control could take time to get right. I decided to push it down on my priority list and start with simpler drag and drop controls, with the avatar now being a part of the interface, as in DOOM. This would buy me more time to have something functional sooner, but then I also began thinking that a cooking time manager was quite derivative, so I changed my mind again. Instead of cooking I switched to a "fantasy town" theme, where customers would be heroes trying to equip themselves. With these two changes the game finally took real shape in my head, and actual work would start.
Theme connection is unclear on the game's current state. In my head the theme fits like a glove, but right now that doesn't show up in reality.
First, the fatigue mechanic isn't fully fleshed yet. It's missing impact in gameplay, there's barely any audiovisual feedback, and levels right now aren't punishing enough so you actually need to hold the brakes and stop optimising the crafting pipeline in order to rest a bit.
Second, I also wanted to have a fixed, small "salary" the player would earn at the end of each level so she could notice how smaller salary was compared to the earnings she's made on that level. This wasn't prioritary, so it was also cut from the submission tasklist.
And then there would be other more obvious mechanisms, like having pictures showing conversation between the player and her boss, which were never really on the table for the COMPO to-do list.
Lots of time wasted on Saturday. You can see a glimpse of this on the Ideation section. I wasn't really convinced about the game I wanted to make for several hours, and while I believe the decisions I made were correct in the end, a lot of time was wasted to arrive there. That time could have put to way better use, such as...
No time for sounds or music (again!!). :sob: I've made some tracks now for the first post-compo version, but I'm cranky that I couldn't do anything for the actual submission.
You can hear a bit here (no effects yet, though): https://youtu.be/cHKijHNQGNU
Controls may be unclear if you haven't read the (admittedly long) "HOW TO" screen text. I noticed this while showing the game to a couple of friends who struggled to figure out how they could craft things or give them to customers until I explained. In my mind controls are really intuitive (even if they still need more polish), but on the one hand I have played similar games in the past and on the other, there's this tiny, tiny detail: I f*cking made the game :sweat_smile:
I have on my post-compo task list a couple of entries to either improve the "how to" screen or, even better, teach the player to play in-game, but I shouldn't take for granted that people will immediately grasp the controls.
And well, this is pretty much everything. In general I'm pretty happy with the result, and I expect someone can enjoy playing the game.
Thank you if you've read up until this point :D
Calling this a post-mortem seems extra-fitting for Soul Searching...
Since the end of the JAM I have received some great feedback, which 100% will help me develop the game, and more importantly my skills generally. As I said, this was my first ludum dare (second gamejam) and first platformer-styled game, and I wanted this to be an exercise in learning and developing. It has definitely been that.
What Went Well
The feedback I have so far received for the artwork, both character-wise and environment has been very positive. This is massive for me, as even though I enjoy and feel proficient in character spriting, environment art is something I have very little experience in. With this game, I wanted to get the mood right. It is a game that focuses not just on life and death, already deep topics, but in the human condition, morals. And actually asks the player to consider the objective/subjective nature of morality. Do some people deserve a second chance at life? I felt that quiet, but creepy music was a good fit, and a low saturation palette in a dark environment lit sporadically would add the correct ambiance. I felt also, that the player (Grim) shouldn't be running around, it's a sombre game; he should move slowly. This is a point of contention. I feel the dialogue is good too, and this has received mixed feedback but I think this is down to teh random nature of the dialogue. Upon generation, each NPC villager is assigned a random story ID, which determines the several options of this they may say, and what they say depends on the state of village life (e.g. whether you have killed all the businessmen, or priests, or whether pox is spreading through the village/whether you have killed all the pox-ridden people), however this, I now feel is too "behind the scenes" to be appreciated by the player...
Improvements to be made
Leading on from the dialogue, feedback has been that it would be better if it was more obvious who was dieing and who deserves to survive/die. I wanted to leave this partly up to the player, but I can definitely think more about changing dialogue to make personalities more extreme to make it easier for the player (but everyone has good and bad, right?). Another way I though of dealing with this is to add to the HUD or icons over the villagers. For instance, a little icon to show they are ill/dieing upon speech. Maybe, assign NPCs with a morality score (which determines partly their dialogue) and this can be conveyed on the HUD in terms of how much "good/bad" you have taken from the world?
Another improvement would be in terms of story, and this comes from watching my game being livestreamed on Twitch. It's currently open-ended and potentially could be played forever, but I feel a larger, over-riding story arc would help create a fun experience to work towards for the player. I am unsure how I want to do this, but maybe something to do with the morality taken/kept in the World mechanic I touched upon above. Obviously, the map and game itself would have to be increased to fit a larger story arc, but it's only small currently because of the time-constraints of the jam.
Movement was a contentious point. I felt movement of the player should be slow, to fit the mood and ambiance of the game. But many players of the game have expressed a desire for player movement to be faster, and with higher jumping. Again, after watching the game being played on Twitch, and seeing players struggle with jumping, I certainly agree I need to adjust the jumping mechanic. I will also make slight adjustments to player movement to increase walking speed... but not by much... Like I said it was my first platformer, and I do feel my design on platform placement/player jumping needs to be refined, with the feedback I can confidently go ahead and adjust. Knowing it wasn't quite correct the first time at least informs me what it shouldn't be like.
The Play + Rate is still going on, plenty of time left, so maybe there will be a second post-mortem but that's all for now.
Thanks for playing and rating!
Turns out you can't name a post 'Hello!' due to copyright conflict with the song. XD
Just wanted to introduce my game; Sigillis! In this one, you draw symbols on the screen to cast spells. There isn't any keboard controls to remember, you just need to draw patterns. Seems easy enough. Or is it? This simple little mechanic builds complexity throughout your playthrough, so the game becomes quite an interesting challenge! I'm so happy with how it turned out, surprisingly fun, and I'm glad I got the chance to innovate.
If you can spare the time, I would love for you to play the game (available on web), then if you could, I'd be infinitely grateful for a rating and comment here!
LD has been an awesome experience thus far, and I hope everyone else is loving it as much as I am. I'm so sad that it's frequency has been reduced to twice a year, but that just means I'll have to make the most of the two we have. I hope you enjoy my game, and have a good day! :smiley:
Please comment with your games so my team and I can rate them!!! We had so much fun playing all the games in my last post like this that we just had to do it again. Please don't be shy and send me your games!!! :) and if you like, you can check out our game here! :)
What a crazy day. What a crazy week for that matter. Thanks a ton @kylazaur , watching you reviewing Cats Without Cars on Twitch, seeing you playing the game we created was really an experience we will never forget! Also thanks a ton for all the amazing feedback we got.
Beeing part of this beautifull community is really one of the greatest experiences I ever had and I enjoyed every second of it scrolling through all these breathtaking pieces of art you people created! Please tell me if you want me to look at your game, cause I really can't get enough ;D
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/44/cats-without-cars
Keep voting and leave us your feed back, you rock!!!
https://youtu.be/JEaYybE82KU
You can play the game through your browser at This link.
I've been working just as hard all week as I did for the jam and I'd say that Fools Fortune is coming along swimmingly! As of right now I've finished;
With that said there's still a lot left for me to finish;
(My three favourite cards thus far)
I'm also debating doing an "unhinged" suit, that doesn't exist in actual tarot that would be another 14 cards (28 scenarios) that are all joke scenarios.
Hopefully Fools Fortune will turn out as good as I'm hoping! Any and all feedback is greatly appreciated, if you have any questions as well feel free to throw them my way!
Don’t forget to play and rate Fools Fortune here; https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/44/fools-fortune
You can follow Fools Fortune’s post jam development at:
Twitter;https://twitter.com/Gear_Steak
Itch.io;https://gearsteak.itch.io/fools-fortune
Fight fires and help push us from 18.75 to 20 ratings!! Play here
...better late than never! Please enjoy this fighting game called Tamashii.
Read the itch.io description for controls!
To begin with, I created a sketch of what our logos and potion bottles will look like.
The idea with a bottle of "skull" or the emblem of "shield and sword" were not bad, but in order for all the elements to look organically in our game, it was necessary to abandon the details.
This is how the second stage of the picture looked, with which the programmer could already work, but, of course, were not ready. Well, the result was such a result 😁
As you can see from the picture, we decided to change the view of the last bottle to the cake. Becouse this element is not a subject for sale, but it restore player's HP. Therefore, it looks like something edible, and not something that can kill "Snow White" 😖
You can play the game through your browser at This link.
Climb your way to the top in the chillest new battle royale, Peak Myths!
FREE TO PLAY IN YOUR BROWSER!
64 FANTASTIC COSMETIC ITEMS!
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/44/peak-myths
- BOB (yes, that's the game's name, just BOB)
Hey guys! After some feedback all around, we've decided to list here the possible game endings, so that some of you may go after them, if you wish. As we'd have loved to create an achievement screen in-game, this is our workaround while LD play+rate time doesn't end. We're very excited about this little one and about all the receptive feedback everyone is giving, in and out LD. Maybe we keep working on this one even after the Jam.
But be aware that the rest of this post is SPOILER sensitive, okay?
[FRIENDLY SPOILER WARNING]
So, we'll post a more complete post mortem with our insights, tribulations, justifications, etc., but basically, if you already played the game, maybe you have noticed that it basically runs with 3 attributes, being one of them the visible Energy meter and two other hidden values, Hope and Chaos. This other two keep going up and down following the player's answers, sometimes both changes, sometimes only one, depending on the answer, but one of them always changes. Here is the endings list, as "achievements titles", and how to achieve them. Good luck!
BASIC ENDINGS - New Home - Survive until a certain number of turns. - Powerless - Just let energy run out.
MID-GAME ENDINGS - Spoiled Humans - Keep the Hope attribute at 100% for 4 consecutive turns. - Hopeless Humans - Keep the Hope attribute at 0% for 3 consecutive turns. - Rage Quit - Keep the Chaos attribute at 100% for 4 consecutive turns.
QUESTION/ANSWER DEPENDENT ENDINGS - Cold BOB - Let people be sacrificed and keep the Chaos attribute at 100% for 4 consecutive turns. - Mad Captain - Accept Captain to take command of the ship for a while and keep Energy around 0%~20% and Chaos around 70%~90% for 4 consecutive turns. - Greater Evil - Accept the Alien refugees in the ship and keep the Chaos attribute at 100% for 4 consecutive turns. - Defective Ship - Deny avoiding the asteroid belt, then deny fixing the hull with the machinery and keep Energy around - 0%~20% and around 70%~90% for 4 consecutive turns. - Sick to Death - Accept funding the Doc experiments, then deny the Kid's demand on keeping the lights on, and let the energy runs out.
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/44/les-pattesthe-legs
