GMC Jam Discussion The Gratified GMC Jam #6 Discussion Topic

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ParodyKnaveBob

Guest
That's weird since none of the other 10-or-so games I've played have said that...
 

Bingdom

Googledom
That's weird since none of the other 10-or-so games I've played have said that...
Likely because either Ragarnak or Alice unzipped the zip export file for you so that the Jam player can run it straight away. (I've never downloaded the mega zip before, so I'm unsure how it's all set up)

I'm not sure if editing one of my posts will alert a member of me quoting/mentioning them. So, sorry for double posting.

nice game, but its strange to play as bingdom killing bingdoms
@blacklemon, I didn't intend on making a game of me shooting different versions of myself. It's just my art style. :)
 
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zendraw

Guest
@Ralucipe yes, yo game is quite somthing, the concept is great and id say the presentation also. i think it wuld make like a good mechanic for a bigger game, like your a cyborg or somthing and as you kill stuff you find parts and combine them with you, so you become like a battleship pretty much. add that with some strategy for the enemies and i think we have a great game idea. altho there was another game with the exact same idea but shooting at zombies i think. but it was very messy and hard to play.

@Bingdom yeah im just foolin. the game was solid and enjoyable. good job!
 
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IcyPenguin_

Guest
Hey there. I feel sort of guilty for not bringing this up before. Some were already quick to point this out, and I don't blame them, but everything in my game was made before the jam. Reason being this was my first jam and didn't have a clear understanding of the rules and thought that premade stuff was allowed. I'm not trying to use this as an excuse, just an explanation. Again, pardon my n00bishness. Everyone made great projects. If this affects my rank on your list, I get it. I might enter the next one and do it right if people who do these regularly are okay with that... :(
 
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0.Bytes

Guest
Hey there. I feel sort of guilty for not bringing this up before. Some were already quick to point this out, and I don't blame them, but everything in my game was made before the jam. Reason being this was my first jam and didn't have a clear understanding of the rules and thought that premade stuff was allowed. I'm not trying to use this as an excuse, just an explanation. Again, pardon my n00bishness. Everyone made great projects. If this affects my rank on your list, I get it. I might enter the next one and do it right if people who do these regularly are okay with that... :(
If it was not intetional, there is no reason to feel bad, of course your game should not be ranked at all because it would be unfair with the other games, but besides that it is okay, imho there is nothing that could not allow you to join the next jam, it's okay =p
 

JackTurbo

Member
Hey there. I feel sort of guilty for not bringing this up before. Some were already quick to point this out, and I don't blame them, but everything in my game was made before the jam. Reason being this was my first jam and didn't have a clear understanding of the rules and thought that premade stuff was allowed. I'm not trying to use this as an excuse, just an explanation. Again, pardon my n00bishness. Everyone made great projects. If this affects my rank on your list, I get it. I might enter the next one and do it right if people who do these regularly are okay with that... :(

GMC Jam Rules
  • the entry might use assets (graphics, audio, scripts, extensions, Marketplace resources etc.) created before the Jam, whether by team members or someone else; however, the credits should make clear where the assets come from and which were made before the Jam
Its fine and allowed in the rules, you just need to flag what assets were created prior to the jam.
 
Hey there. I feel sort of guilty for not bringing this up before. Some were already quick to point this out, and I don't blame them, but everything in my game was made before the jam. Reason being this was my first jam and didn't have a clear understanding of the rules and thought that premade stuff was allowed. I'm not trying to use this as an excuse, just an explanation. Again, pardon my n00bishness. Everyone made great projects. If this affects my rank on your list, I get it. I might enter the next one and do it right if people who do these regularly are okay with that... :(
Hey man it happens, at least you’ll know for next time. This was my first jam as well, and I’m sure you’re not the only one to make this mistake. GMC Jams are seasonal so you’ll have another shot here in a few months. ;)
 

dadio

Potato Overlord
GMC Elder
@IcyPenguin_ - yeah don't worry too much about it. Just try to stick to the "spirit" of the Jam properly next time by doing everything within the 72 hour timeframe.

In other news, I did make a "game" *cough* (took approx 15 mins to make it...) for this Jam, but my connection and/or dropbox were not playing nice at all when I was trying to upload it (5 mins before deadline, lol) and then it went too far past da deadline so I just left it out.
The world has been deprived of a true Masterpiece!!!*

Maggot-Convergence.jpg

I'm really impressed with the quality this time round, and happy to see a bigger turnout too.
Hopefully I can get around to reviewing/rating at some point.

*Or possibly just spared yet another pointless joek gaem, lol.
 

lazertrax

Member
I think I need to clarify something about my game after reading some of the reviews. You can't pass a level if any of the monsters can see you (horizontally or vertically). I tried to make the level names hint about the way the game is played instead of a direct tutorial, but I guess I failed miserably :D

@NightOwl35 thanks for your nice review :) and I hope this clears things up a bit. So in level 3 you got to make the monsters stop on the left side of the level, they shouldn't be on top of the exit.
 
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Sinaz20

Guest
ALERT!!!

My machine says "Untitled by @notcreativeEnuf4_1" (Game.exe) has Trojan:Win32/Azden.B!cl with Alert Level: Severe!
I got an anti-virus ping on another game. I have this feeling it might be the nature in which we're using an executable to run a bunch of exectuables.

I contacted the author, and he just shrugged. That particular game that pinged you was not the game that pinged me. It is most likely a false positive... unless we've become a community of hackers using hastily made games as vectors to infect each other. :p
 
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NightOwl35

Guest
@NightOwl35 thanks for your nice review :) and I hope this clears things up a bit. So in level 3 you got to make the monsters stop on the left side of the level, they shouldn't be on top of the exit.
Ah yeah...I went back and played it real quick to see if I could do it haha. Funnily enough I did it on the first try and can not figure out what I did again. Anyways, the way I beat it was I had two at the top left, and the other two collided next to each other to the top left of the goal.
 
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Misty

Guest
ParodyKnaveBob said:
ALERT!!!

My machine says "Untitled by @notcreativeEnuf4_1" (Game.exe) has Trojan:Win32/Azden.B!cl with Alert Level: Severe!
I got an anti-virus ping on another game. I have this feeling it might be the nature in which we're using an executable to run a bunch of exectuables.

I contacted the author, and he just shrugged. That particular game that pinged you was not the game that pinged me. It is most likely a false positive... unless we've become a community of hackers using hastily made games as vectors to infect each other. :p
I don't know man, it feels like things just got real. Accusing someone's game of being a virus is a very serious accusation.

However, the game was exceptionally shoddily made. And the anti-virus was very specific about it's identity. Perhaps we should actually take this more seriously. Perhaps the mods ought to be consulted about this.
 

Joh

Member
I've received some of comments on confusion as to what you are supposed to do in Cardvergence. (as well as some appreciation, which is nice)
Most unfortunate since I thought it was a very simple concept and I put in instructions (which I will assume were not clear)

@Aegirbard ,@RealBadHombre , @Misty , and anyone else interested
First you pick a Goal card (value) as does your opponenent.
then you place a first card as does your opponent. (with goal of ending Close to your goal Value)
Depending on who placed the highest/lowest value, one player becomes Maximum, the other Minimum
From then On
The cards you play must always be between Maximum and Minimum. (and you have no choice, the cards are blacked out otherwise, also why your turn gets skipped sometimes)
If you are maximum, your card becomes new maximum. if you are minimum your card becomes new minimum.
-> these properties lead to convergence. (the played card will tend somewhere in the middle)
The last card played is compared to both goals, closest goal wins. (Delta=difference between goal and last card)

TLDR: play card between max and min and try to keep the last card value closest to your goal.

Hopefully this helps. Easy should also help understanding how to be good. (the Ai, will act stupidly, letting you grasp bad approaches.)
 
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trg601

Member
If it makes any difference, my antivirus automatically deleted almost every one of the games in the zip, and putting them in quarantine for looking suspicious.
(Even my own game, hilariously enough)

I think there will always be antivirus problems in the jam, but on the other hand, if someone did want to transmit some sort of virus through this jam, it would be very easy...

I wonder if it would cause less problems if we left the games in their own zip files?
 

Reign

Member
The Converging by Reign, YCCCM7, Schwee. Game wasn't that great. The bullets seemed too weak to kill the fast enemies on time, and the knife attack didn't always seem to attack in the same direction of the player. This resulted in me unable to attack enemies, and/or them slipping by me or killing me. There was no music, so the game felt rather empty. The graphics were non-color coordinated and seemed random. There was no music to add an atmosphere. There was no polish to the game, the default windows mouse cursor was used, and no crosshair was added to the game. And there seemed like only one enemy type repeated over and over again, at least in the first wave. 2.5 stars.
Sounds like you opened it for 2 seconds and closed it. There are other weapons you can buy and other enemies. Did you try placing turrets in build mode or use the shop? Unfortunately, the hud doesn't show it, but there are like 7 build items(3 turrets, land mines, traps, and barricades) and 5 weapons(knife, rocket launcher, shotgun, pistol and laser rifle). I thought the pistol was too weak as well. The colors were definitely off because we all contributed a bit of art using different color palettes(I used Nes). I think the mechanics are alright, but team focused too much on content instead of polish and none of us took the time to really balance it.
 
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I think it's because the antivirus can't find the official creator of entry (the official publisher of the program), so it reads it as an "Unknown Publisher" and panics because it's deemed "unofficial". This happens even when I try to run some of my own games. I don't know how to go about preventing it, but I'm pretty certain that's the issue. I've learned to just ignore it if you can.
 
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ghandpivot

Member
Norton removes everyone's game for me including my own because the files aren't popular enough. Isn't that just one big glorious punch in the gut for an indie dev...

1 more batch of reviews is up.

Accusing someone's game of being a virus is a very serious accusation. However, the game was exceptionally shoddily made.
For the first part, not really. He just said it was flagged by his AV and found that weird.
And for the second part, that's just rude...

And lastly, if you're actually worried:
No - It's clean.
 
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Bingdom

Googledom
A few people have failed to identify the theme in my game.

@Aegirbard, @IcyPenguin_ and everyone else if you don't get it.

The theme comes into play with the modules in your gun. You get 2 modules and combine them with your gun (or combining the modules together, however you want to look at it), adding abilities.
The only way you die is when an enemy converges with you (walks up and grabs you).

As you progress through the game, you are encouraged to use the new modules. It makes it much easier to complete the level. As mentioned and explained in the readme, each enemy has a weakness.
 
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ParodyKnaveBob

Guest
Thanks, folks, for bringing in further evidence concerning the trojan alert, and especially @ghandpivot, for manually scanning the one particular game I'd mentioned. I've now added this to my original alert post:
I spoiler'd the above for historical reasons, but apparently the "oh no, a game has a trojan!" alert is a false positive we each might suffer (probably somewhere between GM's self-extracting EXEs and the GMC Jam Player's EXE-running-EXEs, especially with uncertified authors running amok, lol). Nothing to see here. ~nod~
On a related note:
He just said it was flagged by his AV and found that weird.
Fwiw, my primary goal was to protect others from infection; if it came down to the game getting purged of problems and then resubmitted, so be it. (Also fwiw, what I called weird was the number of other games not getting insta-deleted by my AV if they all had equal problems.) Of course, if we're all getting randomly flagged by some AVs and blanket-flagged by others, then I agree, either the ZIP got infected $F^ b or yeah, just overzealous AVs vs. indie devs with a no-installer-rule to follow.

Since this probably has no bearing on the dev's choices, design, etc., I'll just go ahead and d/l it manually from the Games topic and give it a whirl before continuing my other reviews/scores/etc.

EDIT: Searching "trojan:win32/azden.b!cl" online gave me a bunch of links of people trying to deal with false positives on it, including one where someone reported that MS confirmed.

~~

EDIT: Regarding the GMC Jam Player

To anyone who'd like to know, you can paste its exported text without butchering your line breaks by first clicking the forum text editor's wrench-on-paper icon (Use BB Code Editor) to just get a raw <textarea>. Paste, then go back to Rich Text Editor (via link) if you like, and voilà.

Some feedback for @Alice. $:^ ]
Btw, I like how your buttons and text connect so visually with the GMC itself. $E^ }

Overall, great job with it. My issues and suggestions below reflect the fact I like it, intend to keep using future iterations, and hope to see it improved. $:^ ]

Flat black icon on standard black Windows 10 taskbar, eep.

SUPER early into use, I saw "Best" (or something similar) conveniently written in blue next to rated elements, but very shortly afterward, that disappeared, making me default to sifting through each game noting the "Best" takers myself. I like the idea of your added convenience and hope you can fix that for the future. $:^ J (Oh wait, this was just during a super-brief time I manually marked my first ranked title to be "Best of," huh? In that case, ... too bad, auto-displaying which are best would be nice, ha ha.)

Apparently, the "Continue" button in the center is never, ever seen again once the first game comes up. Therefore, instead of merely changing the button's text to match the similar "Next Entry" button, I suggest you drop the center button altogether and perhaps replace it with "[ Game will appear here ]" or similar better text, which I so far believe would also be better than a blank area since it makes it clearer that "Next entry" won't just auto-start a game or anything the first time a user uses it.

I do wish the "N/A" buttons would somehow show they're what's chosen instead of merely acting as a "Reset" button. (Perhaps to reset a row, one could just click the already-highlighted button.)

Upon clicking "Next entry," one expects the next entry to auto-focus and the big center panel to change to show the next entry's info. Currently, the focus remains on the current game, but the big center panel changes to the next entry. (Not preferred, but even consistently keeping the current game in focus and in big center panel after clicking "Next entry" would be better than the inconsistency right now.)
 
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Misty

Guest
Sounds like you opened it for 2 seconds and closed it. There are other weapons you can buy and other enemies. Did you try placing turrets in build mode or use the shop? Unfortunately, the hud doesn't show it, but there are like 7 build items(3 turrets, land mines, traps, and barricades) and 5 weapons(knife, rocket launcher, shotgun, pistol and laser rifle). I thought the pistol was too weak as well. The colors were definitely off because we all contributed a bit of art using different color palettes(I used Nes). I think the mechanics are alright, but team focused too much on content instead of polish and none of us took the time to really balance it.
Nah, I played it for at least 10 minutes. I may play it again with this new information, but the overall feel of the game itself wasn't motivating to me. I view it as the essence, or core of the game, the foundation. If you add features around a poor foundation, its just building around a poor foundation. I might be able to add .5 extra to your rating, but I can't promise much more than that.
 
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Aegirbard

Guest
I just wanted to say, that as this was my first game jam, and first gamemaker game; I appreciate all the comments feedback. It all helps. I'm not sure at this point if I will improve the game or simply chalk it up as a learning experience, but either way, your feedback helps me immensely, so thank you to all who take the time to put comments in.
 
I just wanted to say, that as this was my first game jam, and first gamemaker game; I appreciate all the comments feedback. It all helps. I'm not sure at this point if I will improve the game or simply chalk it up as a learning experience, but either way, your feedback helps me immensely, so thank you to all who take the time to put comments in.
I'd like to say the same. I absolutely love how supportive the community is, and it's part of what keeps me motivated to make more games and to share them with everyone. I'm really pleased to be a part of this community as it's really helped me get through a lot as a game dev and also as a person. I would also like to thank everyone for providing feedback for TW0. I knew when going into this the game would lack polish and would probably be nearly unplayable (which it most certainly is, especially with the level with the two windmills. Playing the game after the jam was over, I had gotten past the level myself, albeit after many, MANY deaths.) My goal wasn't to make the game hard but to present a unique concept that would make a name for the game itself, for example like how climbing is designed in Getting Over It with Bennett Foddy. It's completely unique to the game, and I believe that's part of what gives a game it's character. I might make improvements to TW0 later on down the road, or I might let it be an experience and leave it at that. Again, I thank y'all for your support. You guys are awesome. :D
 

speedchuck

Member
There are a couple of reviewers that have actually liked my game enough to put me in the top 20% of their rankings! :) That's awesome. Wasn't sure if anyone would like the concept. Apparently the tutorial thing could have been clearer. Sond someone said the controls were not responsive, which I don't understand. But overall the reception has been pretty good for the little mess I turned out.

Woo!
 

ghandpivot

Member
I haven't played all too many games yet but I've had the same issue in a lot of them. People are using the word "Converge" in their tutorial, to prove that the game indeed fits the theme. However, since the word converge can mean everything from moving towards eachother or to line up or to actually merge together, it's really hard to understand a lot of tutorials (as you simply haven't played the game before and don't know the mechanics). It also doesn't help that converge is a complicated word and I'm not native in English.

There are a lot of these examples. @speedchuck, you say "Don't let any colors converge". As a new player, I have no idea if colors can actually merge, so everything gets really weird for me. I read it as "Don't let any colors merge", since that makes sense in the kind of game you're making, and I have to ask myself "well how do they merge then?". It made me super confused and it took a while for me to understand that it meant the more simple "don't let any blocks of similar colors touch".
 

speedchuck

Member
There are a lot of these examples. @speedchuck, you say "Don't let any colors converge". As a new player, I have no idea if colors can actually merge, so everything gets really weird for me. I read it as "Don't let any colors merge", since that makes sense in the kind of game you're making, and I have to ask myself "well how do they merge then?". It made me super confused and it took a while for me to understand that it meant the more simple "don't let any blocks of similar colors touch".
Was it your video I watched then? Yeah, I could have made that clearer. Probably would have, if I had thought for more than 5 minutes after the tutorial instead of throwing the game and source file online and then forgetting about it. Thanks for the feedback though!

Definitely not blaming you. :p
 

Ladi_Pix3l

Member
I just looked at some of the reviews for my entry and I actually got the feedback I was expecting.... is that bad? lol
 

Yal

🐧 *penguin noises*
GMC Elder
To everyone going "Fusionman is impossible to lose once you collect enough criminals"... no, it's very possible to lose :p Basically there's a limit to how many criminials you can merge with at a time, and they have limited HP, so if you don't micromanage the shape properly you'll get a disjoint blob somewhere partially offscreen and no criminals directly stuck to your body, so you can't shoot enemies effectively OR avoid damage effectively.

The one time I make a game that has proper balance, nobody sticks around to see it... x3
 

Ladi_Pix3l

Member
To everyone going "Fusionman is impossible to lose once you collect enough criminals"... no, it's very possible to lose :p Basically there's a limit to how many criminials you can merge with at a time, and they have limited HP, so if you don't micromanage the shape properly you'll get a disjoint blob somewhere partially offscreen and no criminals directly stuck to your body, so you can't shoot enemies effectively OR avoid damage effectively.

The one time I make a game that has proper balance, nobody sticks around to see it... x3
If you had a leaderboard I'm sure Id be up there. 20 minutes straight thinking there was an end lol then decided to stop trying
 

Joh

Member
Cardvergence help

The goal:
Play card between max and min and try to keep the last card played value closest to your goal.
It doesnt matter who played the last card, so if your opponent plays something close to your goal, skip your turn.
Note that your opponent has a goal of his own, you want the last card to be closer to yours than his.
Max and min are the value of respective previous card played.

Tip: play a goal near the "mean" of the league (7, 26, 50) and try to approach it slowly. that is don't play a card very close to it straight away.

Hope this helps!

@ghandpivot
Just seen your video review. I was a bit scared since... most ppl didn't understand my game, but I really enjoyed the experience. Got to see you go from not understanding, to understanding which was great and genuine display of my failures. (from my point of view, everything was obvious but I was clearly wrong)
The only thing you might have missed is that you can leave your opponent with the last card (skip turn) if it is already closer than anything you can play. Who played the last card doesn't matter.

I do want to say, that while it probably confused many, the word converge was deliberate and not plugged to fit the theme.
The reason I even thought this game up, was from a math (limit) perspective. the long series that remain between two values that get smaller and smaller until it converges. (Convergent series)
say 1, -1, 1/2, -1/2, 1/4, -1/4, ..., 0.

When playing its a bit hard to see, but this is what you do (since you can only play between min and max that get closer and closer).
As you rightfully observed, you want to pick a goal near the middle and "approach" it from whatever extreme (min or max) you feel most confident in.
Also, since you only have half the control, it really is more about Trying to force "convergence" toward your goal, then placing cards near your goal (which is a bad strategy).

But enough justifiying my poor explanations, you review was quite constructive.
If I had to do it again, id show the last card move towards the closest goal card to convey "proximity", probably change the word Delta to "Difference".
Think hard on how to explain it.
Draw line from last card to goal card (to emphasis on what is compared to)
Show the difference (with last card) live. thats what the empty dark box were there for. but I decided against for the result screen surprise.
Maybe remove 13 league, its too easy to have no move available and when all turns are auto skipped its confusing.


@RealBadHombre
Cool of you to notice the Ai, It did take really long. Was planning on having wild cards, but The ai took me way too long. I also had Extreme difficulty in mind but had to drop it (Estimating opponent (your) goal, counting cards and simulating all moves).
With how confusing the game ended up being, I'm not even mad I dropped all these things.
 

Micah_DS

Member
I still haven't played anyone's games from this jam, but I will finally get to start playing them tomorrow. Really looking forward to it!

So when's the next one?
That's the spirit! I can't wait for the next one either. Though I probably need that few months break before the next one so I can actually improve enough to accomplish something more complete, especially since I won't be able to get time off work next jam.
 

ghandpivot

Member
Cardvergence help
@ghandpivot
I do want to say, that while it probably confused many, the word converge was deliberate and not plugged to fit the theme.
The only issue I had in your game is that I though the cards would converge and have their numbers added up. This line of though comes from playing dozens of games where merging happens before playing yours.
 

Perseus

Not Medusa
Forum Staff
Moderator
So when's the next one?
The next Jam will be hosted in February; I'll announce the exact dates down the road, but it will most likely be held during the last weekend of the month (or the one before it depending on how things go for me). FYI, GMC Jams are to be hosted every February, May August and November as that's the outline which was decided upon after a community poll to ensure 4 iterations per year with least possible overlapping with other game development events. I am pleased to see how big this Jam turned out to be - hopefully we can make the next one ever better with extra love from YYG, more promotion and dedicated forum space!

I'd also like to take a moment to say that I couldn't be more thrilled to see the enthusiasm of our reviewers this time around. Keep up the good work everyone! ^^

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

The response mine and JackOatley's mini-game entry has been receiving is pretty good and fair enough so far, especially after considering the fact that I wasn't able to spend more than around 6 hours on the entire thing because I had things come up in real life and last few hours of the Jam got really hectic. We were also sharing meagre activity time, so I had to base the game off a list in a text file after a brief discussion to make sure Jack and I were on the same page about the concept. Jack did a fantastic on the graphics and core game design, and I am quite proud of the result.

Also, @ghandpivot: You can move the player ship away from / closer to the center circle using the Up / Down arrow keys or W / S. I watched your video review and I agree with everything you've said, but it looked like you were hugging the center circle the whole time, which possibly didn't make it as entertaining as it could have been for you, had you moved towards the outer circle. ^^'

@Aegirbard: Actually, nothing was supposed to happen when the enemy ships reached the center. Your goal is to survive and shoot as many of those as possible while they existed (amidst the "convergence" of the bullets towards the center and that of enemies, too). You earn more points depending on how far from the center the destroyed ship is, and nothing for those that destroy themselves upon reaching the center. Though if there was some sort of penalty, it could have led to a more exciting gameplay, but also a very difficult one as it is right now due to constant infux of enemies, lack of ammo and fast enough reflexes deeper into the game.

@Ralucipe (and @Tyche to some extent): Maybe you found the shooting mechanics bizarre / confusing because there's too much going on at once to realize what is actually happening with the bullets? Basically, the bullets, being one of the two "convergence" elements of the game, move towards the center, and then split out. Here's what happens:

Thank you to everyone for playing the game and sharing your honest thoughts!
 

Reign

Member
Nah, I played it for at least 10 minutes. I may play it again with this new information, but the overall feel of the game itself wasn't motivating to me. I view it as the essence, or core of the game, the foundation. If you add features around a poor foundation, its just building around a poor foundation. I might be able to add .5 extra to your rating, but I can't promise much more than that.
Rate it how you think it should be rated, I just wanted to make sure you're aware of the features in it or it wouldn't be a fair review. I'm not sure why YCCC made the damage on the pistol so low or randomized the knife swipe rotation, but that's part of the polishing and balancing we didn't have time to get around to or I would have fixed it because I thought the same thing as you, but it is simple as changing a value not a broken foundation. I'm not sure what your definition is for "the core of the game" or "foundation", because your complaints are what i'd describe as lack of polish which is the outer most layer and I agree that it's missing. From your review though, it sounds like you didn't read the README and were unaware of 75% of the mechanics. You are easily able to fight off most of the enemies by just placing turrets, but it sounds like you didn't place any, try the other weapons or even get passed the first few waves to see the other enemies.
 
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andev

Member
Ok so last night I was thinking about the way the jam player rated games and how it could be improved (because I think the Jam player is awesome, and honestly motivated me to play everything way more than without it).

upload_2017-12-3_17-42-53.png

So instead of predetermined categories, you could choose your own categories to rate games on, and also how much influence each one had over your final score. The maximum points could also be set really high so you could be more accurate if you wanted. And of course the games could be ordered automatically if you wanted, so you don't have to manually sort them.

There would also be a "bonus" slider, which would allow you to award extra points that were not applicable categories for other games.

The N/A box would actually remove the total from the final score, so using the concept image, if the game had no story, the 5 points you could earn from it would not be included in the final total denominator.

Other ideas:
- Ability to "rename" games to help with ordering the final rankings (I couldn't remember what games were just from their name, I had to rely on my comments").
- Preview images shown with the games.
- Playtime counter to show how long you tried a game for (optional for players that don't want to show that)

Long stretch ideas:
- If the forum code isn't changing, send a HTTP get for the voting topic to download other people's ranking posts and calculate the current scoreboard.
- Have it "merge" other people's ratings/comments with games, which would then show after you'd rated a game.
- This would be useful for developers too to see comments on their games without having to sort through the long list of posts.

Any feedback on this?
 
I like that. I've already basically done that myself with a spreadsheet, although having it incorporated into the voting program would be cool. That would make it easier to export.
 

Ladi_Pix3l

Member
My game honestly almost had nothing to do with convergence. I was sitting for like 8 hours like "THIS IS SUCH A DUMB THEME" and wanted to pull my hair out. Obviously I'm the problem but still, this was my first Jam and I wanted to enter. I was surprised that many people liked the graphics. Most of the sprite animations had about 8 frames. Nothing special really.....Still was nice to hear that it was nice enough to not be hated though :)

The game was Simon's Escape
 

ghandpivot

Member
I just posted another 1.5 hour video. It includes reviews for:
Vyking, Bingdom & KrotoR, Ninety, Ralucipe, Andev, Sinaz & FredFredrickson, Shadow_Lancer, trg601 & Moon489, Reign & YCCCM7 & Shwee, IcyPenguin, Lolslayer, NickKall, Cloaked Games & Barvix & HayManMark, Sohom Sahaun & Enrique, ParodyKnaveBob, Rio-85
 
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ParodyKnaveBob

Guest
@ghandpivot,

Duuude, I just watched 3.5 of your reviews, and I was in pain every time you left a game without reading its afterword! $:^ , You missed out on something pretty cool in HYPERSPACE, and I answered some of your concerns about GMC Jammin'. ~exhale~ (Of course, you weren't really into reading anyway, I saw, hence your confusion on HYPERSPACE's powerups work, heheh...)

Re: GMC Jammin', thank you for your assessment-in-good-faith nevertheless. $:^ J (I've never heard of the title on ArmorGames you'd mentioned, btw -- but I'm unsure whether you were only comparing mechanics or if it had the same meta theme.) As I posted on the previous page, I agree with a lot of your review of course, and I'm glad you saw the concept past the meager application.

Regards,
Bob
 
@ghandpivotYou missed out on something pretty cool in HYPERSPACE, and I answered some of your concerns about GMC Jammin'. ~exhale~ (Of course, you weren't really into reading anyway, I saw, hence your confusion on HYPERSPACE's powerups work, heheh...)
Ha ha, I'm glad you liked my game enough to mention that, even if it's such a small thing. A lot of people don't read much though. I do end up with the dilemma though about if it's worth including an in-game tutorial over just writing it in so I can fit more game-play. In a full title though, I would ideally teach all of the mechanics with nothing more than symbols for the buttons you need in each situation where you need to use it.
 
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ParodyKnaveBob

Guest
Ha ha, I'm glad you liked my game enough to mention that, even if it's such a small thing. A lot of people don't read much though. I do end up with the dilemma though about if it's worth including an in-game tutorial over just writing it in so I can fit more game-play. In a full title though, I would ideally teach all of the mechanics with nothing more than symbols for the buttons you need in each situation where you need to use it.
Yeah, for me, one of the most awesomely fun build-ups before playing a game as a kid was poring over the manual. Soaking in all the style, the atmosphere, the characters, the mood, the technical information, $:^ P ...but my entry in Jam #3 on the old GMC burned me on today's audience's expectations. (Not preferences nor ideals, but baseline standard expectations.) I wrote a funny page of information, including feature-not-a-bug nonsense and instructions, and people walked away confused and claiming it was unplayable etc. $:^ | The information was accessible from the first screen, but I learned few could be bothered to press the down arrow key. (The drastic change in audience makes me wonder if I should be trying to make games at all sometimes, and I'm not exaggerating. Actually, scratch that, it's easy for me to forget, other kids my age often skipped manuals and just started button-mashing, too. Suddenly makes me wonder how games like The Legend of Zelda even got off the ground in the States, and again, not exaggerating -- but then, RPGs did take decades to catch on it seems, hm. Just adds to my never really feeling like I fit into the game dev community at large, but anyway.)
 
I know how you feel, Bob. I get sort of disappointed with every entry that doesn't have some sort of readme or anything. I like seeing the controls and credits and sometimes a little bit about the story or gameplay or whatever. It's fine in some of the simpler games though.
 

ghandpivot

Member
Been trying to boot my game on android FOR A WEEK NOW. It's absolutely ridiculous, working my way around one error after another. Finally got it to actually boot, feels like I've put more time into this than actually making the game. The cache-location was too long (dont ask how I figured this out...), there was a lack of support for xbox-inputs which prevented it from compiling for some reason, Lint analysis instantly terminated every build, texture pages were too big, the latest release of the NDK was corrupt the few hours I downloaded it until it was almost instantly patched 4 hours later. What a ride... :rolleyes:
 

JackTurbo

Member
I know how you feel, Bob. I get sort of disappointed with every entry that doesn't have some sort of readme or anything. I like seeing the controls and credits and sometimes a little bit about the story or gameplay or whatever. It's fine in some of the simpler games though.
Didn't include a read me in mine because I tried to get most of that info on our first screen so that everything was in game. Dunno if it worked or not? But I guess nom nom was one of the simpler concepts in the jam.
 
Didn't include a read me in mine because I tried to get most of that info on our first screen so that everything was in game. Dunno if it worked or not? But I guess nom nom was one of the simpler concepts in the jam.
Yeah your game was nice and simple, and explained well in game. It was one of my favourite entries.
 
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ParodyKnaveBob

Guest
re: IcyPenguin's review

GMC Jammin' by ParodyKnaveBob

Even after reading the afterword, this barely is about convergence. Maybe instead of using your profile pic as the player character, you should design something else. I get that it was representing you working on the game, but the only thing I found appealing was the fact that it was about the Jam itself. 1.5/5
1. Agreed, barely about convergence. Only while piecing the game together did I realize its incidental connection to the theme, which I thought was pretty cool. $F^ P (Elements converging to a whole -- although the published game didn't match my fuller goal, thus missing out on more elements to converge, but w/e.)

2. The real reason I wanted to respond: You in fact didn't "get" something, but it's hardly your fault. I understand how you could have this misconception, and I hate that. My avatar was a default placeholder that I felt was stupid to have in the final build; the real intention was to let you, the player, get your own avatar in. $:^ b The readme and game text were about you the player working on a game metaphorically. Too much meaning/content/etc. got lost in those 64-or-so hours the game didn't receive that weekend. ~shrug~ Oh well!

3. You gave it a just score, thank you. $:^ J
 
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IcyPenguin_

Guest
re: IcyPenguin's review

1. Agreed, barely about convergence. Only while piecing the game together did I realize its incidental connection to the theme, which I thought was pretty cool. $F^ P (Elements converging to a whole -- although the published game didn't match my fuller goal, thus missing out on more elements to converge, but w/e.)

2. The real reason I wanted to respond: You in fact didn't "get" something, but it's hardly your fault. I understand how you could have this misconception, and I hate that. My avatar was a default placeholder that I felt was stupid to have in the final build; the real intention was to let you, the player, get your own avatar in. $:^ b The readme and game text were about you the player working on a game metaphorically. Too much meaning/content/etc. got lost in those 64-or-so hours the game didn't receive that weekend. ~shrug~ Oh well!

3. You gave it a just score, thank you. $:^ J
Thanks for clearing some stuff up, @ParodyKnaveBob. Does this mean you want a retry?
 
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IcyPenguin_

Guest
Also, @ghandpivot and @Siolfor the Jackal, yes. Everything was made prior to the jam, you can read more in this very same thread right here:
Hey there. I feel sort of guilty for not bringing this up before. Some were already quick to point this out, and I don't blame them, but everything in my game was made before the jam. Reason being this was my first jam and didn't have a clear understanding of the rules and thought that premade stuff was allowed. I'm not trying to use this as an excuse, just an explanation. Again, pardon my n00bishness. Everyone made great projects. If this affects my rank on your list, I get it. I might enter the next one and do it right if people who do these regularly are okay with that... :(
 
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