The voting begins! With ~26 entries total, the voting will last for around 15 days until Tuesday, 11th December, 23:59 UTC DOWNLOAD ZIP (~600 MB) The ZIP with all entries is linked here. The ZIP includes, aside from the games themselves, a Jam Player tool. It is strongly recommended to use Jam Player to play the games. Mega: Whole ZIP Prizes Spoiler Jam Prizes The top 3 entrants and best-of winners will be featured in the Hall of Fame, and will choose the themes for the next Jam. Community Prizes Please don't forget to check if you aren't eligible for one of community prizes contributed to this Jam's pool, and poke the prize givers if necessary! (if you are the one giving away the prize, especially the one for specific entries, please contact those who should receive the prize) How to vote? You must make a single post with your votes, which might include the games ranking and optional awards for best games in specific categories. When you name a ranked / awarded entry, please use both the game name and the authors, as just a title or author isn't sometimes enough to tell which entry you mean. Preferably, just use the directory name from the game ZIP, as it identifies the game correctly. Please refrain from posting until you have reviewed at least one entry. For a vote to qualify, you must rank at least top 3 entries (without ties), and they must be accompanied by at least a short comment explaining what you liked about them. Also, you cannot rank your own entry. Aside from top 3, you can vote for: Best use of Theme Best Concept Best Presentation Best Story Best Devlog You can vote for best reviewer, too, but that might or might not be counted, since the best reviewer is chosen arbitrarily by the Jam host. Also, you can rank as many other entries as you like, all the way to the very last entry. However, ties are not allowed, and entries from the first tie onwards aren't included when counting the votes. Voting post template Using this template is not mandatory, but it can be pretty useful. If you have your own idea about voting, feel free to get creative, but please make the voting data (ranking and best-ofs) clear, easy to process and in plaintext. (this template is also used by Jam Player when exporting votes and comments) Spoiler Code: [center][b][size=7]My amazing reviews![/size][/b][/center] [size=6]Top 3:[/size] [size=5]First place[/size] Short comment about the first place... [size=5] Second place[/size] Short comment about the second place... [size=5] Third place[/size] Short comment about the third place... [size=6]Best ofs:[/size] [b]Best Use of THEME:[/b] ... [b]Best Concept:[/b] ... [b]Best Presentation:[/b] ... [b]Best Story:[/b] ... [b]Best Devlog:[/b] ... [size=6]Full ranking:[/size] [spoiler][list=1] [*]first place... [*]second place... [*]etc... [/list][/spoiler] [size=6]Comments:[/size] You might post your comments here, or, if you tend to write long and detailed feedback, make a document elsewhere and link to it here. Providing feedback to each ranked entry is not mandatory, but generally people appreciate that. How results are decided? (the information here is not necessary for voting; it's mostly for people who want to understand how votes are calculated to produce the final results) When it comes to the games ranking, the voting system used is 1/(rank + 1). It means for each ranking an entry appears in, it will get a score of 1/(rank + 1), and no score for other rankings. When it comes to best-of awards, the winners must have gathered the most votes in their respective category. If multiple entries have the most votes, the Jam host may choose one or more entries among them to win the award. This is to avoid situations when e.g. 5 entries tie for 2 votes for the best devlog, and they all win; at the same time, it's still the community that decides which entries get the most votes. The best reviewer is chosen arbitrarily by the Jam host, but the community opinion may be taken into account (just not in a "systematic" way). Let's get voting!
Ralucipe's Reviews ALL REVIEWS COMPLETED 1. Lock and Key by Relic Everything was very well-done - from the shape-switching features, to the pH and temperature features, to the different levels, this game went the extra distance to avoid falling flat. Most similar jam games from the past tended to fall flat because of a lack of these sorts of elements to keep the game interesting. Really, there's not much more you could've done with the concept without it being overkill. In this sense, the biggest limitation for this game was the concept itself. I enjoyed the gameplay for the most part, but it inevitably became stale after I played each of the different levels once. Again, there's little more you could've done to prevent that besides choosing a different concept entirely. Goes above and beyond to show a thorough connection with 'Chemical Reactions'. I don't know of anything that I would do to further improve the graphics. Audio was great all around. 2. PHAGE by FrostyCat I've never seen a game like this before... the closest thing that I can think of is Reversi. And I'm B-A-D at Reversi. Nonetheless, I spent a ton of time on this game. The concept and rules of the game were well thought-out, and I couldn't poke any holes in them. The varying maps kept the game interesting, and because of the level of strategic depth, this game has potential to be developed into a full-blown product. Really the biggest hampering on my experience was that the AI was really, really hard to beat. Or maybe I was just bad. Either way, never being able to win was a bit disheartening, even if I prefer a challenge to a cakewalk. Graphics and audio were well-executed and there's little that I would've done to improve them. 3. Gambrawl by Siolfor the Jackal Now THIS is the kind of game that I was expecting for 'Overcome the Odds'! Combat itself, which is accompanied by a very well thought-out and polished setup, leaves a lot to be desired. Either the enemies are laughably easy or they brutally murder you without ever leaving an open window for you to attack (looking at you, black ghost things). Zombies in particular were ridiculously easy; no matter how many of them there were, spamming the attack button was a guaranteed win. I felt that the blue blobs were the most balanced, but even then all it took was some basic timing skills to come out victorious. I loved the card and dice system, it just needed a few more characters to round them out. Nothing more that I could ask from the menus or the graphics. I loved the choice of music. Sound effects needed a little more variation. Best-Ofs Best use of Theme: Gambrawl by Siolfor the Jackal Best Concept: PHAGE by FrostyCat Best Presentation: Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc, Toque Best Story: <undecided> Notice: votes are subject to change in the case of a score appeal Spoiler: Full Ranking Lock and Key by Relic PHAGE by FrostyCat Gambrawl by Siolfor the Jackal Little Lost Hero by GameDevDan Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu Overcome by Sam Spade Snowball in Hell by AndrewN Au Debut Ca Va by Team Vive Le France Duality2 by Matharoo King of Deals by joh Eel Lady Cat Contest by TinyGamesLab Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc, Toque Against All Odd by Yal Zombie Assault: Against All Odds by Misty ROYal RUMble by Misu, Yal My Gold by NazGhuL I Wanna Get To School In One Piece by SP202, Solistix Black and ****e by Ghandpivot Find the Cure! by UnEarthlyEthan Rise by The M Woodcutter by darijs1 Overcoming all Aliens by Micnasr, Dengar Reel Fruit Slots by Oyakiiv Johnnys Escape by Bart juegOS HD Early Access by Alice, Mercerenies I cast votes for games by assigning each of them a set of scores for different categories, each of which have been carefully weighted. I also write feedback explaining the scores for each of those categories. This system has seen multiple iterations over the last few jams, and I am confident that it's an effective method of assessing a game's overall level of quality, while also providing clear criticism for the developer on what to improve. For more information on how I rate and review games, check out the spoiler below. Spoiler: How do I rate games? First and foremost: my scores are used only for comparison purposes. They do not have any other hidden meaning as to the quality of each game. (For example, 26-30 = great, 20-25 = good, 15-19 = okay, etc. These ranges do not exist.) There are three main categories I score each game on: Overall Gameplay, Theme Inclusion, and Overall Presentation. Each of them (except Theme Inclusion) break down further into subscores. I will explain each one. Overall Gameplay (14 total points) This category rates the mechanical content of each game. It has more weight than the other two categories because I believe that gameplay mechanics are what ultimately make or break a game. Player Experience (8 possible points) This is basically my assessment of how 'fun' the game is. Setting all other factors aside (menus, graphics, theme, etc.), I am looking for sheer entertainment value. Some questions I ask when scoring this: How much time did I spend playing your game? Did I feel like that time was well-spent? Would I want to play this again later? Quality of Mechanics (6 possible points) Setting aside entertainment value, this subscore is about the level of effort put into the design and programming of the game. This is intended to give games proper credit for high-quality features even if I gave them a low score for Player Experience. Some questions I ask: Were the game mechanics well-thought-out? Did they provide sufficient strategic depth? Were these mechanics soundly programmed? Theme Inclusion (7 possible points) This is how I factor in the theme to my scores. Games that do not connect to a theme will be severely handicapped in their final score, but they can still earn a decent ranking. Most games that clearly follow a theme will earn a 6 in this category (7 is reserved for games that went above and beyond to find creative ways to follow it). Some questions that I ask: Was it clear to me how the theme appeared in your game? Did you feel the need to explicitly explain to me your theme usage? Overall Presentation (9 total points) This category is about the game's presentation. It is weighted less than Overall Gameplay because, while the best games need to have good graphics and sound, having poor assets won't totally kill your score. Menus/Interfaces (3 possible points) This subscore is where games with polished menus and GUIs can earn proper credit for such elements. Questions that I ask: Did your game properly introduce me, or did it just throw me straight into the action? Are there interfaces where appropriate? Quality of Graphics (3 possible points) This one is pretty self-explanatory. You don't need commercial-quality art to get a perfect score, but graphics do need to be very visually appealing, and to feel like they belong there. Quality of Audio (3 possible points) Also self-explanatory. Usually I dedicate 1.5 points to the sound effects, and another 1.5 points to the background music. If you're missing either one, it's a 1.5 point deduction each. Penalties There are additional expectations that I have for games which do not fall into categories. Usually, any penalties will be one of the following: No instructions or controls provided. This is a big one, and with it comes big point deductions. I really, really don't like having to mash buttons in order to figure out what to do. No way to restart game without closing and/or re-opening. If your game is designed to be replayed, then please just automatically restart it. Game froze or crashed. Self-explanatory. Appeal Your Score If you feel that I did not properly play/judge your game, then you are more than welcome to PM me to try and fix that. However, if you received a poor score as a result of negligence to explain something important to me within the game itself, then your score may not be changed upon appeal. Tiebreakers Ties will be broken in the following order: Higher 'Theme Inclusion' score Higher 'Overall Gameplay' score Higher 'Player Experience' score Higher 'Quality of Graphics' score Arbitrary choice
Acr515's Reviews all reviews subject to change 25 / 25 games done! If you feel that I unfairly rated your game at all, please PM me! I'm happy to look at any game again if I missed a key feature of your game. I have rated all 25 games! Great job everybody with your entries! I played some great games, and I can't wait to see how you all rank overall! I will not be reassessing games in cases of game-breaking bugs. If you've re-released your game due to issues, I'll gladly give you my feedback, but it won't impact your ranking. I will, however, follow suit with other reviewers in reassessing games if a new jam ZIP is released. Best-Ofs Spoiler: Reveal your secrets Best use of THEME: Gambrawl by Siolfor the Jackal This was by far the most creative use of Against all Odds without question. Runner up was Lock and Key by Relic. Best Concept: PHAGE by FrostyCat I spent more time on this game than I'm willing to admit, and it really challenged me! Best Presentation: Lock and Key by Relic The attention to detail in this entry was what won me over. Close runner-up was Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc and Toque Best Story: I Wanna Get To School In One Piece by sp202 Best Devlog: PHAGE by FrostyCat Best Reviewer: Ralucipe Complete Rankings Spoiler: Reveal your secrets PHAGE by FrostyCat Gambrawl by Siolfor the Jackal Lock and Key by Relic King Of Deals by joh Black and ****e by Ghandpivot Snowball in Hell by AndrewN Au Début Ça Va by Team Vive Le France Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu Duality2 by Matharoo Zombie Assault: Against All Odds by Misty Eel Lady Cat Constest by TinyGamesLab Little Lost Hero by GameDevDan Overcome by Sam Spade My Gold by NazGhuL Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc, Toque Against All Odd by Yal I Wanna Get To School In One Piece by sp202 Find the Cure! by UnEarthly Ethan Rise by The M ROYal RUMble by Misu, Yal Overcoming All Aliens by Dengar, Micnasr Johnny's Escape by Bart Reel Fruit Slots by Oyakiiv Woodcutter by darijs1 juegOS HD Early Access by Alice, Mercerenies Comments Spoiler: Reveal your secrets Against All Odd by Yal The game was fine. You received high marks for your presentation and theme usage, but the gameplay was a little uninspired, testing a player's keyboard affluency without any strategy. The mood set with the music and fonts was quite effective. Still a neat little game! Au Début Ça Va by Team Vive Le France You know, I'm not exactly sure what was going on, but regardless, it was pretty darn cool. A couply nit-picky things: The control scheme was pretty awkward, having my left hand on the arrows, my right hand on my mouse, and then needing to frequently remove my left hand to smash a key that appears on the screen. Having a WASD option would be a quick remedy. Also, it was kinda difficult to discern my bullets from the quick, bright background. In general, I thought the game was way too fast. That said, I still really liked it. Your graphics are the best I've seen so far, as was the audio. I also really liked the font you picked for the GUI. Your compliance to the theme was also pretty solid, albeit slightly uninspired. Nice job! Black and ****e by Ghandpivot This game devilishly tested my patience while also somehow holding my attention long enough for me to reach its disappointing conclusion. The minimal sound effects added to the mood more than it subtracted from it, which I liked. The music was pretty repetitive, and it didn't do a whole lot for me. Your graphic style was pretty much perfect for the game you made. In terms of the gameplay itself, it was a little angering (which I'm sure is what you aimed for), but I was pretty darn close to quitting the game before I finished it. Speaking of the end, I was terribly disappointed by it. I don't really know what I expected, though. Your adherence to the theme was okay (overcome all odds?). You worked this genre well though, and even though I was a little irritated I enjoyed myself. Nice job! But I hate you for that fake flag. Duality2 by Matharoo As someone who doesn't browse the forums with as much regularity as some others do, I didn't massively enjoy this game and its story... I was a little lost on some of the dialogue and concepts. In terms of actual gameplay, the combat was simple enough to where it didn't take me long to learn it, but it didn't take me long to beat either, although it was still pretty entertaining. This is one of the most graphically-polished entries I've played so far. The audio and music were quality too, and fit the game. One of the more annoying things was the progression of dialogue, which was both slow and completely outside of my control. Eel Lady Cat Contest by TinyGamesLab I beat this entire game even though I accidentally pressed the R key THREE TIMES to reset the level and accidentally restarted the game... That aside, your graphics were pretty good and your audio did its job (meowing death noise was morbidly amusing). The gameplay itself was good as far as puzzle games go, but I couldn't really find any connection to the theme at all. Good job! Find the Cure! by UnEarthly Ethan Overall, the gameplay definitely reflected the theme for chemical reactions, but it was a little boring after the first few colors, as I found it was more a test of trivia than of skill or strategy. Gambrawl by Siolfor the Jackal I spent a lot of time on this entry and ended up amassing $17,000,000 without a loss before I decided to quit. The interface and game was really well put together and thought out, and it fit the theme perfectly. The graphics were also great. The primary gameplay flaw was, well, most of the fighting. Blocking was infinite, so I could stand in one place and block for however long I want, countering at will without penalty. Battling was just pretty one-dimensional in general. I think this idea needs only a little development to become something great, though. Good job with your entry! I Wanna Get To School In One Piece by sp202 I thought the time-altering piece was really neat and well put together, even if it lacked any reasoning for it. The game was pretty short, but I enjoyed what little of it there was. Nice job, and I hope you expand on this idea later on down the road! Johnny's Escape by Bart I really wasn't able to figure this game out. The movement of the player was ungodly slow, and guiding him around was troublesome too. I frequently found myself watching my character walk around in circles trying to reach the target I clicked. If this one simple thing were fixed, the game would look much more polished. I couldn't figure out the balancing of the chemicals. While you received points for full compliance with the theme, I didn't really get all the chemical stuff. All I was able to discern was a bunch of fluctuating numbers and some chemicals here and there. I liked the graphics you produced. They were simple, but got the job done. In future iterations, I would suggest adding visuals for the values on the side instead of numbers, and some more instructions. You have the foundations for a nice game! juegOS HD Early Access by Alice, Mercerenies Uh... It's a sample room, but that's it. It looks like the option is to wander around, and none of the other controls don't really do anything. What's there is pretty, but otherwise there's no gameplay at all. King Of Deals by joh This game took me many tries to understand, but I ended up really liking it. The graphics left a little to be desired, but the interface and user experience was really positive. The smooth yet quick movements of cards was a really nice touch as well. One of my main criticisms of the gameplay is that if you don't start with a good hand and everybody else does, no one will want to trade with you, and you're pretty much doomed from the start. Little Lost Hero by GameDevDan I found a few annoying aspects of this game. Being hit simply by enemies being adjacent to me was one of the worst parts. Also, the enemies which move onto random squares were pretty annoying, and undermine the concept of the game. It made it darn well near impossible to make it through some levels without dropping a heart or two, since I have no idea where the enemies are gonna land. The presentation and graphics were strong. I also really liked the music, which helped advance the mood you were going for. Unfortunately, I couldn't figure out what theme you were attempting to use, so you received low marks for that. This game is polished, and you've produced a solid product! Lock and Key by Relic Great game! The graphics in this game in particular were very well thought-out. The very subtle effects that were taking place on the foreground and the background really added to the mood of your game. My only beef with the game was how it felt like I was constantly micromanaging my enzyme's stats, which would've been alright except that the controls felt a little slow the whole time. Otherwise, great job! My Gold by NazGhuL The single, glaring flaw of the gameplay was the inability to fend off the zombies in any matter. No matter how furiously I threw potions and collected gold, the number of zombies eventually became insurmountable, and they were taking gold faster than I could replenish it. If there were different potions, for example, then my review would be completely different. In terms of sound effects, they were pretty basic but they did what they needed to. The music was well done (I saw that you wrote it- nice job!) and your graphics looked good. Your adherence to the theme was solid and about as good as I've seen so far for chemical reactions. Your game was so close to ranking higher; it was just missing a single gameplay mechanic. Good job! Overcome by Sam Spade Good god, your text is hurting my eyes... Can't say I understood anything I just played. The graphics and sound were of a very high quality, I just didn't know what I was doing. I guess the game followed the theme "Overcome all odds," but it wasn't very apparent to me. If controls were included, I would've ranked this game much higher. It's evident that a lot of time was spent on this. Overcoming All Aliens by Dengar, Micnasr There were a lot of potential areas of improvement in this game. You had a very simple concept (not bad at all) which could've looked a little more refined with some simple additions. Firstly, some background music and better audio in general would've led to a much better experience right away. Second, the graphics in general needed some improvement, but the lack of a non-default font and an in-game background was pretty glaring. These are all pretty simple fixes, and these alone will lead to a more polished product. I understand this was your first game jam; good job, and I hope to see you doing more! PHAGE by FrostyCat I enjoyed this game a lot more than I thought I was going to! The graphics got the job done, the audio meshed with the game really well, and the gameplay was particularly rigid; more than any entry I've played at this point. I didn't like that there wasn't a tutorial, but I see you noted that in your afterward (and you wrote out some instructions in the readme). I don't have much else in terms of criticism. Really great job! Reel Fruit Slots by Oyakiiv AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH DEFAULT FONT I'm not really sure what was going on for most of the game. The audio was of a relatively high quality, but the gameplay didn't seem to make all that much sense or be all that cohesive. I also didn't really see the theme in your gameplay at all either. Rise by The M I was really becoming invested in your concept... until the game crashed when I hit the next level! It also crashed when I hit the green bonus block. I think your connection to the theme was pretty solid, and your graphics & sound accompanied the game well too. Really sucks that I couldn't clear the level though, and I wasn't able to see how the game would evolve. Some criticisms of mine would be that the swinging felt like it took too long to reach an adequate momentum. Also, death was a little harsh; I found myself doing the same things over and over again because I barely missed a landing. The laughably slow movement speed didn't help this either. Good job with the entry! ROYal RUMble by Misu, Yal Gameplay was pretty basic and easy for me to grasp. Bravo for creating a 3D game for this jam! The graphics got the job done. It gave me a sort of PS1 feel, and I liked it. I couldn't find a tie-in to the theme, and you lost points for that. While your gameplay was basic, it was a little too basic, and it didn't do much for me like the other entries did. Snowball in Hell by AndrewN Nice job with this game! The audio and graphics were really tidy, and your gameplay was, while simple and slightly unimaginative, still fun. One of my problems though was that increasing your size didn't really help at all during the game itself. I was always able to outrun the lava without issue, and the fireballs didn't make enough of a difference to make it worthwhile, either. Overall, nice job with this game! Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu The graphics were pretty brilliant. The gameplay was pretty lacking though; the connection to the theme was slightly uninspired, and throughout the game it became more advantageous to just avoid everything except for my shape and color without changing. Also, as I progressed, the game became way too fast for me to even aim at anything at all. On downhills, I couldn't even move downward, and I was trapped to the ceiling. The subtle sound effects and the music worked well with your game. Good job with your work! Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc, Toque The presentation of your game was overall excellent, but the gameplay mechanics lacked greatly, as most weeks consisted of only two to three jumps. The humor was nice and added to my enjoyment, but the gameplay itself didn't do very much for me. Woodcutter by darijs1 My health slowly began to drain as soon as I began the game. I was confused at first, but then I realized after looking at the instructions menu that very important GUI information was being cut off by my monitor size. So, unfortunately, I was never really able to do anything else except run around, chop trees, and inevitably die. I saw no cohesion to the theme (overcoming the odds of nature? Kinda basic), and the lack of music or other sound effects besides chopping wood took a hit on your rank. I liked the graphics though (except for the usage of the default font). The game was just missing content (and the bottom of the GUI). Zombie Assault: Against All Odds by Misty Good job with a 3D game! I felt the gameplay was lacking inspiration. The theme didn't really seem to tie into the game at all (unincluding the title), and the gameplay was simple and unaltered from what a regular zombie shooter would look like. The graphics got the job done, but more could have been done with them. I found the strategy was pretty straight forward too; cramming myself in a corner for a majority of the games allowed me to frequently find success. Your game was solidly programmed and developed; it just didn't quite hit the mark like others have.
My rating system: 40 points max. 15 points for game quality, 10 for graphics 10 for audio 5 for adherence to the theme. Game quality includes overall enjoy-ability of the game. Notice how I didn't put story or atmosphere as a category. If a game is not story focused it should not lose a point for having no story. For instance, a casual or competitive game does not need a story, therefore should not be penalized. However, if a game's story detracts from the enjoyment of the game, it will lose some points. However, if a game has a great story yet the gameplay is only average, it will naturally gain points for having a great story. Game graphics includes the visual aesthetics of the game. This is not focused on raw polygon count but rather how the graphics fit together cohesively as an artform. For instance, a low polygon game, that is more artistic than a high polygon game, will score more points. Game audio includes sounds and music. You cannot have an enjoyable game without audio. When I am around others and I stay up late playing games, sometimes I am told to turn the sound down. Playing the game with no sound greatly reduces the enjoyment of the game, so games with no sound or music will lose points. A game with no sound and music will get an automatic score of only 3 points in this field. However, a game with annoying sound or music will get a score of 0. A game with only music, but no sound, will get at most a score of 6. A game with only sound, but not music, will get at most a score of 6. 5 is a bonus category. How well did you obey the theme? Games that merely obey the theme will get a 3. Games that creatively expand or combine the theme in interesting ways will get a 5. My favorite rating system next to my own: Ralucipe. His or mine should be adopted as the Official Rating System of the GMC Game Jams. Reviews finally complete: Spoiler: Reviews: King of Deals by joh King of Deals is a card game. Quite simply, the games graphics seemed pleasant in terms of the overall color scheme. However, I detract a point for use of the default font, which is squiggly and uneven looking. I also detract some points for having no audio or music. Score breakdown: Game quality: There was no readme, and in-game instructions had improper grammar/capitalization and were unclear. Instructions felt like reading a vague PowerPoint presentation or lecture, would have been better to have an in-game tutorial walkthrough, such as what was done with card games such as Hearthstone. Thus my gameplay score is unclear since I did not understand the rules of the game. 5/15 Graphics: Presentation was generally nice, except for the default font. 8/10 Audio: No sound or audio. 3/10 Theme adherence: The theme of the game was Adapt, however my understanding of the rules was unclear. 3/5. Overall: 19/40 Woodcutter by darijs1 Woodcutter is a survival game in the wilderness. However it does not capture the majestic atmosphere of being in the outdoors or wilds. There is no music and the game suffers from frame rate issues, and overall is very bland and dry. I did not enjoy playing it and did not spend much time on it. Game quality: As in most survival games, the game GUI and instructions are a bit complicated, so I won't deduct points for it being complicated to learn. That being said, the game was simply unenjoyable as a game. It had frame rate issues causing it to move in slow motion. There is no overworld map to know where you ought to be going, and you can only see ahead a few meters, which is not realistic for a simulator such as this. Thirdly, there is an invisible wall that stutters you into place, the wall is only a few meters from your starting point, so it doesn't seem like a simulator. 1/15 Graphics: They were very visually bland coupled with bad framerates. Drab colors and no textures. Sloppy menus and default fonts. GUI elements that exceeded the bounds of the display. With graphics this bland and such a small field of view, there is no reason for low framerates, the code should have been optimized to not render objects outside of view. 1/10 Sounds: There was no music or sounds except for a dry walking sound which dried out my throat when listening to it. However there was a tree sound that sounded nice. 1/10 Theme: Adherence to the theme of overcome all odds. 3/5 Overall, I did not enjoy this game. 6/40 Overcome by Sam Spade Some kind of cellular combat game. It was really avante garde, and the combat was unclear. I didn't like the overall style of the menus, they gaussian blur seemed dry and inorganic. Game quality: Strange and avante garde. I defend by holding space then letting it go. My visual feel is obstructed by the gaussian blur put on everything. Dead enemies look almost the same as regular enemies so its hard to tell whats going on. Holding "defend" key didn't seem to make me immune, and still taking damage. Letting it go didn't always seem to lock on to enemies or hit my target. There was no clear in-game tutorial, but instructions were included in the game menu. The objective was to survive until the music was over, I managed to survive about 30 seconds. 3/15 Graphics: The graphics were unique but the monochromatic nature of them made them a bit boring. I did not care for the overly fuzzy menus which seemed a kind of false, inorganic kind of blur. 3/10 Audio: I could not detect any problems with the sound or audio, they were ok. 5/10 Theme: There was no story and just abstract. Loose adherence to the theme of overcome all odds. 2/5 13/40 Little Lost Hero by GameDevDan A unique dungeon crawler game. I like this game, although it seems a bit difficult to predict enemy movements. Predicting enemy movements is the core gameplay mechanic of the game, therefore it is a bit hard to play. Gameplay: Unique and original gameplay. However, predicting enemy movements, the core of the game, was a bit hard. I kept dying on the 4th level and gave up. However the story and style really sucks me in and makes me want to play. I give it 12/15 Graphics: The graphics really suck me into the game. 9/10 Sound: Music is spot on and really fits the game. Genius. 9/10. Theme: Adherence to the theme... I don't know what theme this is supposed to be...Adapt? Dodging enemies is pretty much in every game, so seems pretty weak. 1/5 31/40 Find the Cure by UnEarthly Ethan I wanted to like this game. Really, I did. But I noticed some deep flaws that just made me stop playing the game. It is a color match game that simply requires far too much effort to be a good zencasual kind of game. Game Quality: For starters I thought this was going to be a nice casual game that I could relax. But upon closer inspection I realized the threshold to reach a color was too precise. To put it simply Windows supports over 16 million colors. A precise threshold means you may have to try 16 million times to get the right color. I don't know what his threshold was. It was probably not as precise as that. But mostly the game was just guessing and hoping to get it right after failing many times. Which I guess is like a Thomas Edison science project of him failing the lightbulb hundreds of times. But I don't think a game like that is fun to play. The game also has a flaw where the sound still plays even when you aren't pouring the vial. 3/15 Graphics: Pretty casual, a bit sloppy but nice. 7/10 Audio: Music pretty good although the sound has that flaw where it plays a water sound even when you aren't pouring. 7/10 Adherence to theme: Game was pretty creative in terms of chemical reaction. 4/5 21/40 Against all Odd by Yal Eh. Basically I thought this game was gonna be good, judging from the screenshots, but it wasn't. Yal would say my low rating is because I have some eternal grudge against her from back in the good ol' days when she used to flame me. But it isn't. Let me put it simply...if Yal made the next Halo I would give it a 10 out of 10. Basically, this game is not her best work. She made a couple games which I enjoyed, such as a 3d lava game and a rocket game of bikinis. This game is a downgrade from her other games. Game quality: Eh. It's a typing game. And not a very good one at that. The text has no outline or shadow so I can't see what I'm supposed to type. I'm not sure if there's a fullscreen option either, most typing games have a bigger resolution so its easy to see. It is supposed to be a casual learning game, yet I have to bend over and squint at the screen. The general idea of the game was okay so I give it 5/15. Graphics: They are pretty solid but not much detail was put into them. And the fonts don't have outline and interfere with the gameplay. 5/10 Sound: Had to play it again because I don't remember it that well. The sounds were on the good side of ok, like a flash game. 6/10 Adherence to theme: Have to say it was pretty creative and funny. 5/5 21/40 juegOS HD Early Access by Alice and Merceneries Okay so I'm playing as a floating pokeball. I'm liking the graphics but not knowing what I'm supposed to be doing. I did an upgrade and it just seems like a demo room with no gameplay. Game quality; I'm liking the movement, but its just a testbed room. 7/15 Graphics: Great graphics. 9/10 Audio: No audio 3/10 Adherence to theme: 0/5 19/40 Johnny's Escape by Bart "Here's Johnny" - Jack Nicholson. The object of the game, I guess, is to escape the ship. The story is funny but the game is just eh, not my cup of tea. Game quality: You are supposed to stand in certain areas in order to get your body's chemicals to be balanced. I didn't really know what I was doing. There was no sound and just a long complicated list of chemicals in a somewhat hard to read font. I read the read me but it didn't help much, and the movement seemed laggy and inconsistent. Narrow field of view making me unsure where to go or what I was supposed to be doing. 2/15 Graphics: The graphics were simple and not bad. 7/10 Audio: No audio 3/10 Adherence to theme: Chemical reaction, solid, 4/5 16/40 Lock and Key by Relic This game actually looked like it was going to be pretty good, but sadly it is unplayable. Certain broken features keep this game under lock and key. Game quality: It was a neat and educational idea for a game, playing it made me feel like I had almost learned something. However, I played it with a gamepad which was recommended. And following the tutorials it said to hit A button to change temp. Yet no matter if I pressed A button once or twice, or held it down, it would not do anything. So the game was unplayable. I tried then to play it with keyboard. But the keyboard controls were even worse, I could only move one direction and was stuck there and could not move backwards. I give it a six because the game almost had something, but messed it up with the controls. In reality it is a zero since the game is unplayable, but I am feeling generous.Upgrading it to 8, Relic told me I must stand on the Temp Up platform to increase temp, so now it is playable, but only with gamepad. 8/15 Graphics: Neat and scientific looking, 9/10. Audio: Sound and music is good. 9/10. Adherence to theme: Great use of chemical reaction, 5/5. 31/40 Liquid Bacon by Acr515 Ralucipe A hilarious take on junk food and the modern age. I didn't finish it and I will come back to it later. Game quality: Funny and a well made game. Uses chemical reactions perfectly. However most of the npcs are repetitive clones of each other. Game is also brutally hard. 13/15 Graphics: Nice and neat. 10/10 Audio: Sound is good and music is good but loops too repetitively, and no sounds of npcs or combat sounds: 6/10 Adherence to theme: Great use of chemical reaction, 5/5 34/40 Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu Okay, I really liked the graphics of this game. The graphics of this game knocked my socks off. But games cannot live by graphics alone. Game quality: Although I really enjoyed the feel of this game, at about level 10 I started to fall asleep. It was pretty repetitive and pointless. It would have been more fun if everything was subdivided into actual levels you had to beat. The gameplay had some elements that may have sounded good on paper but didn't form well as an actual game. For instance, the actual character moved around too slow, and so high scores are more or less based on luck rather than skill. The objects move too fast for human reflexes to adapt to, and there is a secondary bonus for also changing the shape, so you must both change the shape and color within a few milliseconds if you want to get the bonus, couple that with the fact that colors are changed with Cycles rather than mapped directly to keys... 9/15 Graphics: The graphics knocked my socks off. Really sciency and proves that gaming is truly an artform. 11/10 Sound: Sounds were great and fit will. Although the repetitive music lulled me to sleep. 9/10 Adherence to theme: Generic adherence to theme, 3/5 32/40 Black and ****e by ghandpivot Sort of like a troll game like that one trap game Markiplier had to play. In it, the game features pitfalls that serve to irritate and frustrate the player. Game quality: The game was very frustrating. After dying about 20 times, I got all the way to the boulder, which made me lol, because it defied the laws of physics in a hilarious manner. Overall the game is very frustrating but offers a challenge to overcome. That being said, frustration fest platformers are not my cup of tea, but it offers some degree of replayability since most players will not beat it the first time. 13/15 Graphics: Minimalist and did the job. 9/10 Sound: Chill and fit the mood. 9/10 Adherence to theme: Good adherence to theme, 5/5. 36/40 Rise by the M Meh. I had high hopes for this game and was watching its progress in the dev logs. I thought this game would be good but it wasn't. After I defeated the first boss I was relieved by an level loading error which saved me from having to play the game any further. Game quality: The game is buggy and the physics are horrible. I frequently find my character dissappearing and glitching out of the map for no reason. The physics don't carry momentum correctly so the vine jumps are unneccesarily hard. And you crawl around at a snails pace which is boring and a complete waste of the player's time. When you fall you also slide around ridiculously and often fall off the edge due to the fake physics. The gameplay is tedious, repetitive and boring. It is walking around at 1 mph then swinging back and forth before you climb every ledge. Every ledge is the same deal. The boss mixed things up and helped the game, but the boss was very easy too. 8/15 Graphics quality: I was initially impressed and anticipating the graphics due to the dev log, but in game they appeared shoddy to me, everything had that cheap American plastic look like it was made out of plastic and grimey. 4/10 Sound: No sound effects and the music was empty and melancholic which fit the tedium of the game. 4/10 Adherence to the theme: No idea what theme it was supposed to adhere to. 0/5 16/40 Eel Lady Cat Contest by TinyGamesLab This is a wall hug puzzle game similar to some older GMC Jam games. Overall, it's pretty good. Game quality: Most of the puzzles are good. The pleasant atmosphere allows one to feel at ease with solving the puzzles. There are no serious flaws with this game. 15/15 Graphics quality: The graphics quality is good and pleasant. The pleasant graphics allows one to feel at ease and solve puzzles. Older gm games of the past had bad graphics, interfering with the ability to feel at ease. However, there are some typos. 10/10 Sound: The sound was nice, but no sound effects. There did not seem to be a win music either. 6/10 Adherence to the theme. No idea what it had to do with the theme. 0/5 31/40 Gambrawl by Silfior the Jackal. It's like one of those Capcom street brawler games, but watered down. Game quality: The frame rate seemed a bit poor, even though the game only had 1 enemy on screen. People can blame the fact that I don't use my best computer to rate these games. But again, there was only 1 enemy on screen in a 2d background, there should not be lag. Pong should not lag, Atari should not lag, Capcom should not lag. There was no blood either which was lame. There was only 1 attack as well. There was a card and dice mode which seemed tacked on and extraneous to the gameplay. 2/15 Graphics: The presentation was nice, but bland. No blood and drab colors. No impact effects either. The animation did seem fluid though. 5/10 Sound: There was only barebones sound effects, it lacked the artistic flair of the Capcom games, no announcer or anything. 3/10 Adherence to theme: No idea what it had to do with the theme. Standard. 3/5 13/40 Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc and Toque It's a game where you play as an old man trying to get a date. You jump over objects to make it to a destination. It started out funny at first but got lame and unfunny after the first few levels. Game quality: Frame rate was good, however the gameplay was really basic and repetitive. It also featured some bugs where dogs would spawn at the door causing you to lose a life no matter what. The story started off funny but after the first few levels the devs got lazy and it started to become boring, the ending was very lackluster as well. 5/15 Graphics: The animations were fluid, but some of the colors looked like a mess. Some of the characters were also very pixellated. 7/10 Sound: Sound was good, 9/10. Adherence to theme, pretty good adherence to theme, 4/5. 25/40 My Gold by NazGhul It's a new take on the zombie genre, collect gold before getting it stolen by zombies. As a game, its pretty tedious... Game quality: You have to first splash water on rocks before you can collect the gold. Since it is a top down shooter that takes place in 2d space, this is pretty tedious because you can't aim the trajectory of the water, so you have to either hit it near a wall or take many steps back to hit the rocks. And you have to do this repetitively to collect the 3000 gold. The game engine is pretty solid and the movement and collisions feel smooth. The zombies pretty much make a bee-line to your gold pile and steal all of your gold, so it's a pretty tough game. 9/15 Graphics: The graphics are pretty solid. 8/10 The sounds are pretty good, but the music is repetitive. 8/10 Adherence to theme is good, mixing against all odds with chemical reaction. 4/5 29/40 Snowball in Hell by Andrew N It's basically a IceClimbers/Pit clone of the NES. Game quality: It's pretty repetitive and beating the game offers no rewards. There are no powerups or shields and its a 1 hit you die kind of game. There is no incentive to play again. The jumping physics are kind of tedious and the movement physics not very smooth. 5/15 Graphics: The graphics were nothing short of amazing, retro done right. 10/10 Sounds: The sounds are pretty good, but the music is repetive. 6/10. Adherence to the theme is weak. 2/5 23/40 Reel Fruit Slots by Oyakiv The game is a weird roulette game, it was pretty horrible. Game quality: The game is pretty difficult. I wasn't sure what my objective was supposed to be either, besides winning an endless amount of bets. 3/15 Graphics: The graphics are positively awful, although the bouncing effect is kind of nice. 3/10 Sounds: The sounds are ok. 6/10 Adherence to the theme is good. 4/5 16/40 PHAGE by Frosty Cat A great and original board game. I didn't win, but I had a good time. Game quality: The game is unique and original. However, the AI takes a long time to move. 14/15 Graphics: The graphics are good. 10/10 Sounds: The music is great and casual. 10/10 Adherence to the theme: 2/5 Weak adherence to duality and against all odds. 36/40 Au Debut Ca Va by Team Viva La France All flash no substance. I'm not sure what this game was. Game Quality: The game was too hard, having to use both mouse and keyboard in an awkward fashion to dodge oncoming obstacles. The game was laggy which I suppose was a good thing, without the slow motion I don't know how I could have dodged at all. Readme contained no information on how to play. 2/15 Graphics: The graphics are good, the explosions are weak. 9/10 Sounds: The sound is good, but no memorable music. 6/10 Adherence to the theme: 2/5 Weak adherence to duality and against all odds. 17/40 Nicolete by matharoo Not the greatest game. It's a top down game, what more can I say. Game Quality: Game was laggy and slow paced, fighting an onslaught of bug monsters. It was pretty repetitive. 4/15 Graphics: The graphics are good. 10/10 Sounds: The sound and music is okay. 6/10 Adherence to the theme: 0/5 Don't know what it had to do with the themes. 20/40 I want to get to school in one piece by sp202 Sort of like a mix between Braid and Mario. It was really short. Game Quality: The game was really fun but it was very short, only 1 level. For this I have to subtract some points. It had a time mechanic where you could go back and forth, and it was very well put together. 12/15 Graphics: The graphics had a neat VHS warp effect. The monster truck was also very funny. 10/10 Sounds: There was no sound. 3/10 Adherence to the theme: Weak adherence 2/5. 25/40 ROYal Rumble by Misu and Yal It was a stupid troll game, what can I say? It is a remix of Treefall Studio's Perpetual Orb, except even better. Game Quality: Great game, similar to Marble Blast Ultra, except with more responsive controls. The ceilings don't even have collisions, which enhance the game's ease of use. However the code is poorly optimized and lags, load times take a long time too. Also it would be nice to show the level count because I gave up near the last level, it was too hard. And I don't know how many levels you have to do to beat it. The game sort of reminded me of Bowser's train in Super Mario 3D World. Overall, it was the best WW2 game I've played this year, plus it was 3D and the Quaternions were strong in this one. So I give it 14/15. Graphics: The graphics were good and even had real-time shadows. The Nazi flags were 2d but created an illusion of being 3d. The graphics had so much realism I felt like it was more of a WW2 simulation than a game. 10/10. Sound. The music was genius. The sounds were superb. 10/10 Adherence to the theme: Slightly above generic adherence 4/5. 38/40 Spoiler: Rankings 0. Zombie Assault by Misty 1. ROYal Rumble by Misu and Yal 2. PHAGE by Frosty Cat 3. Black and ****e by ghandpivot 4. Liquid Bacon by Acr515 Ralucipe 5. Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu 6. Eel Lady Cat Contest by TinyGamesLab 7. Little Lost Hero by GameDevDan 8. Lock and Key by Relic 9. My Gold by NazGhul 10. I want to get to school in one piece by sp202 11. Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc and Toque 12. Snowball in Hell by Andrew N 13. Against all Odd by Yal 14. Find the Cure by UnEarthly Ethan 15. [B][B][B]Nicolete by matharoo[/B][/B][/B] 16. King of Deals by joh 17. juegOS HD Early Access by Alice and Merceneries 18. Au Debut Ca Va by Team Viva La France 19. Rise by the M 20. Johnny's Escape by Bart 21. Overcome by Sam Spade 22. Gambrawl by Silfior the Jackal. 23. Woodcutter by darijs1 best use of theme: Liquid Bacon best story: Liquid Bacon best concept: Phage best presenation: Stream of Adaptation best devlog: Phage .oO() Fanfare, and lounge room ambiance for my oncoming reviews... ()Oo.
REVIEWS TOP 3: Liquid Bacon by Acr515, Ralucipe So much fun ! This is going to be my favorite no doubt ! ♥♥♥ Overcome by Sam Spade Impressive game. So good looking, I can't even imagine how you did that ! Well done Sir ! Eel Lady Cat Constest by TinyGamesLab Very funny use of the theme ^^. A very well executed and good looking classic concept. BEST OFS: Best use of Theme: Against All Odd by Yal Best Concept: Find the Cure! by UnEarthly Ethan Best Presentation: Overcome by Sam Spade Best Story: Duality2 by Matharoo Best Devlog: PHAGE by FrostyCat FULL RANKING: Spoiler Liquid Bacon by Acr515, Ralucipe Overcome by Sam Spade Eel Lady Cat Constest by TinyGamesLab Little Lost Hero by GameDevDan Against All Odd by Yal Gambrawl by Siolfor the Jackal Lock and Key by Relic Duality2 by Matharoo Zombie Assault: Against All Odds by Misty Find the Cure! by UnEarthly Ethan Black and ****e by Ghandpivot ROYal RUMble by Misu, Yal Snowball in Hell by AndrewN Reel Fruit Slots by Oyakiiv Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu PHAGE by FrostyCat My Gold by NazGhuL Rise by The M Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc, Toque King Of Deals by joh Woodcutter by darijs1 I Wanna Get To School In One Piece by sp202 Johnny's Escape by Bart juegOS HD Early Access by Alice, Mercerenies COMMENTS: Spoiler Against All Odd by Yal Oddly elegant and intelligent ! Take my heart ! ♥ Black and ****e by Ghandpivot Well I have been shot to death by my own body. This game is great. I love the fact that you can lose by pushing your final reward into the depths ! Duality2 by Matharoo This game is about a girl who has a dog as a friend but who hates every other kind of living things, so she kills them to steal their souls. Oh, and there is a 99.21$ DLC with Donald Trump in it. (Awesome) Eel Lady Cat Constest by TinyGamesLab Very funny use of the theme ^^. A very well executed and good looking classic. Find the Cure! by UnEarthly Ethan Ow creepy ! And awesome concept ! Gambrawl by Siolfor the Jackal Very good idea using the odds to encourage the player to take more risks on his own choice. Had a lot of fun ! I Wanna Get To School In One Piece by sp202 That is a short game for sure. But great concept ! Johnny's Escape by Bart So cuuuuuute ! juegOS HD Early Access by Alice, Mercerenies I enjoyed this demo thing King Of Deals by joh Very nice concept ! Liquid Bacon by Acr515, Ralucipe So much fun ! This is going to be my favorite no doubt ! ♥♥♥ Little Lost Hero by GameDevDan A very good little game with a fine balance between harder chalenges and more quickly gratifying levels. Lock and Key by Relic Oh Man that's gross ! But I love it. My Gold by NazGhuL A challenging game. Very fun to try out all the combinations ! Overcome by Sam Spade Impressive game. So good looking, I can't even imagine how you did that ! Well done Sir ! PHAGE by FrostyCat Incredible concept ! And the theme fits just right. Reel Fruit Slots by Oyakiiv A game so amazingly simple, it can steal endless hours from your time. Handle with care ! Rise by The M Unfortunatly the game crashes after the first boss. But the small part I have been able to play is great. Exellent concept and cool music too ! ROYal RUMble by Misu, Yal Your sound design is definitively against all odds ^^ ! Amazing work ! Snowball in Hell by AndrewN A fair challenge in the cutest shell ! Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu Sweeet ! Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc, Toque A very easy game, still nice and well executed though ! Woodcutter by darijs1 A few tweaks and it's gold ! Zombie Assault: Against All Odds by Misty Dude ! You actually made a legit fps ! Awesome ♥
TOP 3: 1. Snowball in Hell by AndrewN Good game! All really well done. It was frustrating at times, but I “overcame the odds” of my frustration and beat the game. 2. Duality2 by Matharoo Very cool. Loved the part with HeartBeast. 3. Eel Lady Cat Contest by TinyGamesLab I won! I'm glad I could 'helip'. (sorry, I couldn't 'helip' myself) Anyhow, cute game. Nice graphics. 'Helipng' cool cats everywhere. Full Ranking: Spoiler 1. Snowball in Hell by AndrewN 2. Duality2 by Matharoo 3. Eel Lady Cat Contest by TinyGamesLab 4. Find the Cure! by UnEarthly Ethan 5. Lost Little Hero by GameDevDan 6. PHAGE by FrostyCat 7. Against All Odd by Yal 8. Lock and Key by Relic 9. Gambrawl by Siolfor the Jackal 10. Rise by The M 11. My Gold by NazGhul 12. Overcome by Sam Spade 13. Liquid Bacon by Acr515, Ralucipe 14. Black and ****e by Ghandpivot 15. ROYal RUMble by Misu, Yal 16. Woodcutter by darijs1 17. Zombie Assault by Misty 18. I Wanna Get To School In One Piece by sp202, Solistix 19. Overcoming All Aliens by Micnasr, Dengar 20. Reel Fruit Slots by Oyakiiv 21. Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu 22. Johnny's Escape by Bart 23. King Of Deals by Joh 24. Au Debut Ca Va by Team Vive Le France 25. juegOS HD Early Access by Alice, Mercerenies Comments: Spoiler Against All Odd by Yal I wasn't sure about this game when I started it, but by the time I got into the twenties, I broke into laughter at the ridiculous sillyness of this game. I'm still chuckling as I write this. I don't know if it was the music, of the dumb two-frame animation, or the fact that I'm typing spelled-out numbers to kill zombies. Actually, I think it was the magical combination of all three. This was remarkably amusing for such a thrown together, last minute game. Strange that it scored so high in my list, but it meets all the criteria for a game. Nicely done. Au Debut Ca Va by Team Vive Le France Wow, that was super annoying, sorry to say. Obnoxiously loud both aurally and visually. Controls were very uncomfortable for me. It didn't take long to turn off this game. Black and ****e by Ghandpivot Rage quit because I couldn't get past the second falling platform. One thing I noticed was that the joystick was too sensetive to movement. It made the game unnecessarily harder to play. ( -1 for late entry.) Find the Cure! by UnEarthly Ethan The 10th color was very difficult. I almost gave up. But, I finally got it. I think primary colors (red, yellow, blue) would have been better, but using green instead of yellow made it offbeat --- which matched the music and the surprise ending cutscene. Simple game mechanic, tiny game, but pretty well done. Loved the art at the end. Gambrawl by Siolfor the Jackal Not too bad, but got repetitive pretty quickly. The frontend and intro were too long and seemed glitchy. (After a re-play, what I thought was glitchy didn't happen. Must have loaded weird due to virus scans.) The character in the background was so dark I almost missed it. The idea you had for that was great, but just missed the mark I think. Nice job with the graphics, tho. Pretty good transitions, but I think they were way too slow. The dice rolling was kinda wonky, too. (To clarify, the animation wasn't to my liking -- just seemed "off" somehow.) But those are minor things. The fighting mechanics seemed nice, but those wraiths are devestating! I Wanna Get To School In One Piece by sp202, Solistix Nice rewind effect. Didn't care for the bratty kids, tho. Using the 'F' button was a strange choice. Also, using A/D was equally strange. Could have just used the same arrow keys and spacebar, I would think. Johnny's Escape by Bart This game seems sorely unfinished. Looks like a victim of scope. Some interesting ideas here, but this ends up being a demo of ideas and not really a game. Just some thoughts as far as game mechanics go, try making things easier for the player by making those tiny switches bigger and easier to click, or at least increasing the mask size. Also need to stop the pathfinding when the destination is unreachable so we're not endlessly bouncing off walls like a broken robot. juegOS HD Early Access by Alice, Mercerenies Yep, the art looks great, tho the character blends in with the background too much, maybe. King Of Deals by Joh Sorry, but I simply could not understand the rules and instructions for this game. Trying to play it anyway didn't help any, either. Liquid Bacon by Acr515, Ralucipe The art was great! Seems full of discovery and the game has some good humor, but the game just goes on and on and takes forever to get anywhere. By the time I get some things to try to mix, I'm too afraid to mix them because they might be wrong and it would be wasteful, or they might be wrong and hurt me. Wasting the ingredients or dying at this point would just make this go on that much longer. I've already spent over an hour on this game and still only have 5 of the 8 items. I had to quit the game unfinished. Also, there's a strange thing with the music playing on top of itself. Lock and Key by Relic Kinda neat, kinda weird. I kept trying to use the trigger to power my levels and the A button to change my shape. Lost Little by GameDevDan Nice puzzles. Some easy, some tricky. Loved the ending. Nicely done. My Gold by NazGhul Golden Victory! After figuring out my supply was unlimited, I quit being careful and just went all out full-throttle. Once I got chain reactions going on zombies trying to get my stash, I could run around throwing water everywhere. Kinda fun, kinda not. The distance restriction (closeness) was annoying. I should be able to throw at my feet (drop). Overcome by Sam Spade Some pretty crazy graphic effects going on here, but I couldn't get the thing to move around or attack when I wanted. Sometimes it did, but mostly it didn't. No idea what was going on, really. Couldn't figure it out. Overcoming All Aliens by Micnasr, Dengar A game of inevitable death. So sad. No sense of progression besides more and more aliens. The game worked fine tho, and I scored a thousand and some odd points. Not horrible, but looked like a game made by a new programmer. PHAGE by FrostyCat Nice ambient music, but the computer is too smart for me – can't win a single round. Whatever, I wasn't ever very good at Othello or Go, either. One thing that would be nice is to be able to turn off your move by reselecting the piece you selected, if that makes sense. Solid work on the game, tho. (I played the “fixed” version and saw no difference.) Reel Fruit Slots by Oyakiiv That was really quite strange. Not sure if those two game mechanics go together all that well. Cool music, tho. Rise by The M Still a bug in the “fixed” version. The first screen in the 3rd chapter (Rise), when I jumped, I hit the wall and disappeared inside? Player didn't respawn afterward. Kind of a slow moving game, but still enjoyable. (-1 for late entry.) ROYal RUMble by Misu, Yal Rage quit on the third level. Controls were responsive, and the game ran smooth. Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu There was no way I could change shape and color fast enough to play this game. I was completely panicked and unable to match anything, ever. If I avoided everything and just kept the same shape and tried to change the color to match, I only did slightly better. Perhaps it's just not my kind of game, but it seemed excruciatingly hard. I tried several times, but finally just said, “screw it” and tossed my computer out the window. You owe me a new computer. (Neat tunnel graphics, tho.) Woodcutter by darijs1 I made a fire for the first night, but I got hopelessly lost on the next day and was unable to collect food. I suck at axe hunting, I guess. The interface could use a lot of work. I found myself stumbling around with the controls trying to remember what's what and how to do. I played a second time and this time I was able to get some meat, but I got hopelessly lost in doing so. Maybe a guy in the woods could build a fire anywhere, not only at a designated firepit? Also, a simple inventory item of a compass should help find your way back to camp (arrow pointing the direction)? Zombie Assault by Misty Holy cow! Mouse aiming movement was so sensitive it almost gave me vertigo. Level 'easy' was not easy. It was a massive onslaught from a huge herd of zombies. Sure, the game is a 3D FPS, but “3D FPS” doesn't magically make a game good. Lighting was too dark also, but I think the camera movement was what really killed the experience for me. Sorry. Better luck next time.
GameDevDan's Reviews and Votes Was pretty easy going this time with so few entries. Note: my game is called LOST LITTLE HERO, not LITTLE LOST HERO as it appears in the Jam Player. Easy mistake to make, pretty sure I did it myself a few times. Top 3: Lock and Key by Relic Nice concept and really neatly executed. The small intestine stage lags for me but that actually makes it easier to get more points as you have more thinking time haha. Online highscores are a really cool feature, not just because I can compete with the other jammers but YOU can also tell who really played your game for long enough to rate it and who didn't Rise by The M Unique idea, I really like the concept. It's a little slow-paced, I know the character is going through a great struggle but I feel like they should be able to drag faster for the purposes of speeding up jam reviews lol. I really do like this entry though. I wanted to see more of it but it crashes after the first boss. BUGS: Fatal error when collecting the green cube on the left of the first level (after you get the hook). Fatal error when beating the first boss and continuing to the grassy level (which I see briefly before it crashes). PHAGE by FrostyCat I really like the idea of these new board gamey things. I like this one, particularly as I'm fascinated by phages and have used them in a few games of my own (Antibody Blast springs to mind). My only problem with it is, the CPU seems borderline invincible. Like it's programmed to always make the best move without flaws? I'm probably just bad at the game but it'd be nice if there were an easy mode to get you used to the required mechanics / strategy. Best ofs: Best use of THEME: Find the Cure! by UnEarthly Ethan Best Concept: King Of Deals by joh Best Presentation: Eel Lady Cat Constest by TinyGamesLab Best Story: Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc, Toque Best Devlog: n/a Full ranking: Spoiler Lock and Key by Relic Rise by The M PHAGE by FrostyCat Liquid Bacon by Acr515, Ralucipe Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc, Toque Eel Lady Cat Constest by TinyGamesLab Gambrawl by Siolfor the Jackal Find the Cure! by UnEarthly Ethan Snowball in Hell by AndrewN Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu Against All Odd by Yal King Of Deals by joh Duality2 by Matharoo Overcome all Aliens by Micnasr, Dengar Overcome by Sam Spade My Gold by NazGhuL Zombie Assault: Against All Odds by Misty Johnny's Escape by Bart ROYal RUMble by Misu, Yal Black and ****e by Ghandpivot I Wanna Get To School In One Piece by sp202 Woodcutter by darijs1 Reel Fruit Slots by Oyakiiv Au Début Ça Va by Team Vive Le France juegOS HD Early Access by Alice, Mercerenies Comments: Spoiler Against All Odd by Yal I'm not usually a fan of typing games, this one started out alright it was an interesting concept. The main problem I have with the format is it starts reaaaally easy (so much so that it feels like you're going through the motions) and then BAM suddenly gets very hard. I lost no lives until a few minutes in and then lost all 3 in the space of 20 seconds Nice entry though. Au Début Ça Va by Team Vive Le France Frustratingly fast-paced and mind boggling. Can't really concentrate on anything that's going on without getting a headache. Black and ****e by Ghandpivot I'm afraid you've been slightly screwed over by the fact that I've already played two other IWBTG-esque entries at this point and I'm sorta fed up with them. Like I've already said in a couple of other reviews - I don't like the difficulty in games being based on hazards that you can't see coming first time. The engine is alright, a commendable entry for fans of this genre probably. Duality2 by Matharoo I got to Ehsan, accidentally flung him out of view by hitting him near the doorway, and the game just sorta broke. (the boss music stopped but I was unable to escape the boss room). What I managed to play of it was alright. I liked the presentation and there was good humour in the story, the controls were a bit funky. Hurting enemies was harder than it should have been. EDIT: Replayed the game with instructions from the creator and got all the way to the end. More funny stuff and a neat little mini game happens. nice work. Eel Lady Cat Constest by TinyGamesLab A cute game. Nice concept and a really good presentation, I love the graphics and sound effects. Pretty standard "sliding puzzle" game play, each puzzle is well crafted. I like the names given to each cat Find the Cure! by UnEarthly Ethan A promising start to my jam playthrough! I really liked this one. I wasn't expecting that sort of gameplay for this jam. It was interesting mixing the colours together (although some of them I could swear I had spot on but had to skip them!) The animation at the end was real neat. Obviously fits the theme perfectly. Nice Work. Gambrawl by Siolfor the Jackal Really really promising concept, I like the picking of the cards, the rolling the dice and betting. Gambling on whether you're going to win or lose is such a unique idea big thumbs up for that. I'd prefer the game play to be a bit quicker & snappier, if you roll a 6 on a powerful group of enemies you're gonna be fighting them for a loooooong time. Animations are fluid and the graphics are top notch. I Wanna Get To School In One Piece by sp202 Seems like a fun concept, I always like the idea of games with a rewind mechanic (just feels so cool). However, I have very little patience for games whose difficulty rely on you not initially knowing what's about to pop up or just sorta repeating really difficult sections over and over (like IWBTG), so I didn't get far into it. Johnny's Escape by Bart I can see there was a fundamentally good idea behind this game. I like the changing body parts mechanic, even though it wasn't really put to use. I couldn't do anything other than walk around, though. Right-clicking on the pills, dynamite, CCTV cameras and doors in the first room didn't seem to do anything. Good idea, just not finished enough. juegOS HD Early Access by Alice, Mercerenies Really nice graphics, but that seems to be all there is to it? I could be missing something but even after reading the readme file I don't know what I'm mean to be doing. I walked over to the W module and installed all the powers. Pushed a few blocks about, lifted them up and put them down. Tried putting them in holes, in the warp square or moving them into a pattern. Nothing seemed to progress the game. King Of Deals by joh I really like the concept of this one (I think) but in practice I can't quite wrap my head around the strategy required to beat the opponents. The most sensible thing to do seems to be to hold on to all of your cards at the start of the game unless you have a reaaally bad hand, in which case just offer up everything you can to the enemy and hope they take one? I'd like to see this developed with a more in depth as-you-play tutorial. Liquid Bacon by Acr515, Ralucipe I was playing for a good while, probably longer than any entry so far (and I only have 2 left to play) and I really had no clue what I was doing. I mixed together a whole bunch of different ingredients, most of which made me sick, and never found the key to making bouncy potion or liquid bacon. I like the graphics, the music, the humour, even the combat to an extent. But if you don't find the stuff you need to progress it's sorta disheartening. Little Lost Hero by GameDevDan My Game. Lock and Key by Relic Nice concept and really neatly executed. The small intestine stage lags for me but that actually makes it easier to get more points as you have more thinking time haha. Online highscores are a really cool feature, not just because I can compete with the other jammers but YOU can also tell who really played your game for long enough to rate it and who didn't My Gold by NazGhuL Fit the theme well and I like that it went in its own direction with story/concept. I prefer my top down shooters a bit more shooty. Throwing vials of exploding stuff at the zombies was often quite ineffective so you feel a bit powerless as a player. Overcome by Sam Spade I really like the art style and the music. A lot of the time it's kinda hard to tell what's going on, especially when the screen gets covered with goop. Overcome all Aliens by Micnasr, Dengar A fairly basic top-down shooter. The difficulty curve was nice, the number of aliens increases at just the right amount (not too boring, doesn't get too hard too quick). Would have preferred more player upgrades though - the first time I saw one (Speed Boost) I was already on 1 health and died shortly after. Solid entry. PHAGE by FrostyCat I really like the idea of these new board gamey things. I like this one, particularly as I'm fascinated by phages and have used them in a few games of my own (Antibody Blast springs to mind). My only problem with it is, the CPU seems borderline invincible. Like it's programmed to always make the best move without flaws? I'm probably just bad at the game but it'd be nice if there were an easy mode to get you used to the required mechanics / strategy. Reel Fruit Slots by Oyakiiv Don't really understand what's going on here, or how I can affect the outcome of the game. I know the theme is overcome all odds, so gambling fits in a way, but the play needs some way of controlling the situation or else they can't overcome anything. Rise by The M Unique idea, I really like the concept. It's a little slow-paced, I know the character is going through a great struggle but I feel like they should be able to drag faster for the purposes of speeding up jam reviews lol. I really do like this entry though. I wanted to see more of it but it crashes after the first boss. BUGS: Fatal error when collecting the green cube on the left of the first level (after you get the hook). Fatal error when beating the first boss and continuing to the grassy level (which I see briefly before it crashes). ROYal RUMble by Misu, Yal When was the last time the real Roy even commented in a jam topic? Shares the same problem as another IWBTG-esque entry in that some hazards' difficulty lies only in your inability to predict what's coming. Snowball in Hell by AndrewN Quite a funny concept. Solid vertical platformer engine with decent controls. Nothing is more against the odds than hell freezing over! A little bit repetitive, I always feel sorta angry when I die and have to restart especially if I was quite high up the level. Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu A decent idea, I like the effect of travelling through the tunnel. The controls aren't the best. I'd prefer if the player moved faster (I can often see collectables coming a mile off but then don't have time to move across to them). Solid entry though. Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc, Toque Great sense of humour running through this game. Not much actual game to it since there are only ever 2 obstacles between the start and the love diner but I enjoyed playing it through to the end just to see the various jokes I actually think, in terms of the amount of fun, this is right up near the top of my list. Woodcutter by darijs1 Takes far too long to cut down trees and collect wood and then, despite following the instructions, I couldn't figure out how to use the wood? (Holding tab and then clicking the wood doesn't seem to do anything, nor does pressing E next to the fire). Some positives: The wood chopping animation was nice & fluid, the snow effect was cool. Zombie Assault: Against All Odds by Misty Standard Zombie FPS. You get stuck on the enemies as soon as you get touched once, which gives you a 50/50 chance of getting OHKO'd even though there's a health meter. Decent appearance once you get into the game play.
Just started playing the games and I'm excited! I'll probably be able to play 2-3 games a day during the week and 5-10 games during weekends. If all goes well I'll record a short video review of each game to post on my YouTube channel. For now, my brief ranking and review (I'm tinkering with a quantitative voting system but will not post is as of now): Games evaluated 25/25 Top 3: Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu A great take on adaptation! I loved the retro 3d style and the gameplay was a blast (once I got the hang of it! Really enjoyed playing the game! PHAGE by FrostyCat Took me a while to get the game rules, but once i did i enjoyed it a lot! It was a great game, definately about adaptation! Snowball in Hell by AndrewN Awesome gameplay! Fun to play and the great graphics and acompaning sound effects and music were so pleasing! I liked how you have to keep getting snow so you wont diminish. A simple game that gets the job of entertaining done! Best ofs: Best use of THEME: Against All Odd by Yal Best Concept: Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu Best Presentation: Au Début Ça Va by Team Vive Le France Best Story: Duality2 by Matharoo Best Devlog: ... Full ranking: Spoiler Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu PHAGE by FrostyCat Snowball in Hell by AndrewN Little Lost Hero by GameDevDan Duality2 by Matharoo Liquid Bacon by Acr515, Ralucipe Lock and Key by Relic Against All Odd by Yal Au Début Ça Va by Team Vive Le France King Of Deals by joh Gambrawl by Siolfor the Jackal Rise by The M Black and ****e by Ghandpivot Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc, Toque Find the Cure! by UnEarthly Ethan Overcoming all Aliens by Micnasr Zombie Assault: Against All Odds by Misty My Gold by NazGhuL ROYal RUMble by Misu, Yal Overcome by Sam Spade Woodcutter by darijs1 I Wanna Get To School In One Piece by sp202 juegOS HD Early Access by Alice, Mercerenies Reel Fruit Slots by Oyakiiv Johnny's Escape by Bart First of the video reviews: I'm sorry but i was not able to record any video of the following games (Tried 3 different programs and all I got were white screens): Woodcutter by darijs1 I Wanna Get To School In One Piece by sp202 Rgds
Here is my first votes. (these might be edited as I play them again.) Lots of great games and difficult to decide. 1) Overcome by Sam Spade Reminds me of chemicals reacting together. Wonderful music and visually great. I think the visuals and sounds are are enough to blur the odd game play. I don’t want to place this top spot but finding a game to take it down..... 2) Snowball in hell by Andrew N Nice pixels and music. Clean and thought out. Its fun. I kept coming back to play it. Of course I wanted more upgrades and enemies. Scoring system. 3)My Gold by NazGhul Maze shooter. Art and music/sounds were good. I like the alchemist changing rocks to gold theme. Good controls. I had fun playing it so it gets my vote. 4) Rise by the M. I like the rope mechanic. The slowness adds a puzzle feel. Different. 5) lock and key. Relic. Studied a lot of immunology. It’s a interesting game. 6) Black and ****e. Ghandpivot. Fun plat former. I love the simple black and white art. So my nod is to the design and art. Gameplay isn't new but I appreciate the work done. It was fun. Kind of safe entry. Otherwise it’s top three. 7) Duality Mantharoo I like the attack in it. Good story. 8) Lost little hero. Neat pixel art puzzler. GameDevDan and Nal. 9) Royal Rumble Misu and Yal 10) Against all odds. Yal. It has a different attack twist to it. So I give it a nod. 11) phage FrostyCat. This probably isn't fair. Its really well done but not my style of game. So tormented where to put it. I might bump this up? Its a better than 11 game. 12) King of deals. This is another tough one. It has some neat things to it but again I don't have any passion for card style games. 13)Zombie Assault Misty. Its okay. Nothing new or risk taken here. 14) Au Début Ça Va by Team Vive Le France quite good. Theme was strong here. Decent shooter. 15) Johnys escape. I like the theme. The time I put into it I couldn't accomplish much. 16). Real fruit slots. I like that you made it different. Respect that. Still a few games I am undecided about. So these winners might get bumped. Best use of theme Find a cure earthly Ethan best presentation overcome by sam spade best concept Royal al Rumble misu Best Story Duality Best devlog. : Smiechu Best reviewer. Tinygameslab Find a cure really deserves a nod for theme idea. Some games I couldn't get to run. So have to go back and see If I can get them to go. A lot of selections were my own bias. You might have a great game so don't be offended. Its harder to pick the winners than making them!!! Some games I will have to try again to see if I can get them to run now.
I couldn't be a part of this game jam but I still wanted to play all the entries. Reviews Top 3: 1 - Liquid Bacon by Acr515, Ralucipe I feel like this is the most complete game on the list. While there are others that are better on individual things this game is the whole package. 2 - Rise by The M Despite the bugs it's still a great idea for a game and I think it has potential. I just could place it in first place knowing it has those bugs. 3 - Au Début Ça Va by Team Vive Le France I love the artwork and handling of the game. If it had levels instead of playing to get a highscore it would be higher on the list, but in its current state I feel it's more of a minigame. Best ofs: Best use of THEME: Rise by The M Best Concept: King Of Deals by joh Best Presentation: Au Début Ça Va by Team Vive Le France Best Story: Liquid Bacon by Acr515, Ralucipe Comments: Spoiler Against All Odd by Yal Against all odd, I see what you did there Au Début Ça Va by Team Vive Le France Cool game. I'm guessing the theme was adaptation. The whole up is down thing makes the game really challenging. I like having the letters be used for the explosion since you can't be moving the ship, firing, and pressing the letter at the same time so it's a compromise when you try to use it. My highscore is 10226. Black and ****e by Ghandpivot Not my kind of game. It gets boring really fast. I guess it goes well with the overcome all odds theme. Duality2 by Matharoo Bought the DLC, worth every penny! Eel Lady Cat Constest by TinyGamesLab Cool puzzle game about cats. Nice presentation. Find the Cure! by UnEarthly Ethan I couldn't get any of the colors after the 4th one. It's too hard Gambrawl by Siolfor the Jackal Loved the fact that it's gamepad compatible, a gamepad goes great with this type of game. Would have liked more moves and something to spend my money on like you said in your afterword. Fighting the wandering spirits is pretty much a guaranteed loss unless you're fighting 1 or 2. Once you get the 2 dice you won't be beating them. I Wanna Get To School In One Piece by sp202 Cool concept, not sure if copied from Braid or not. Would be nice if it were longer. Johnny's Escape by Bart I don't know how to get past the part that says I need some wings. I don't really understand all the text on the screen or how to get the glucose or the tnt. The path finding goes kinda crazy when getting too close to walls. I seriously need a tutorial for this. juegOS HD Early Access by Alice, Mercerenies I'm not sure what I'm supposed to do. How do I install modules? While moving around I got this error: ___________________________________________ ############################################################################################ ERROR in action number 1 of Draw Event for object ctrl_Shell: Trying to use non-existing surface. at gml_Object_ctrl_Shell_Draw_73 ############################################################################################ -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- stack frame is gml_Object_ctrl_Shell_Draw_73 (line -1) Ok, figured out how to install modules. I can move stuff around and jump over pits but I'm still not sure what I'm meant to be doing. I got the same error, seems to happen after 5 or 10 minutes playing. King Of Deals by joh Really cool game. Takes a few matches to understand how to play but it's really fun afterwards. Don't know if the game already exists or if the concept is yours. I could totally see this being a real card game. Play it with the maximum amount of players (5) for maximum fun. Liquid Bacon by Acr515, Ralucipe Great game with good presentation and story. Never found the ingredient under water to the left of grease. I didn't need it to finish the game. Little Lost Hero by GameDevDan Nice retro looking puzzle game. I like the pacing, it slowly introduces you to the new items and enemies. Lock and Key by Relic This is one of the weirdest games I've played xD. You're enzymes and you have to join with the other puzzle pieces to digest food (I'm not very sciency). My Gold by NazGhuL I don't know what any of the vials do besides the water. Some instructions would be nice. There's also something I don't like about the crosshair. It's hard to control, it sort of moves by itself when you get too close to it. Overcome by Sam Spade Got and error while going through the menu. ___________________________________________ ############################################################################################ FATAL ERROR in action number 1 of Step Event2 for object obj_keyboard_handler: Unable to find any instance for object index '8' name 'menu_parent' at gml_Object_obj_keyboard_handler_Step_2 ############################################################################################ -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- stack frame is gml_Object_obj_keyboard_handler_Step_2 (line -1) The animations look great, but I have no idea what I'm supposed to do. How do I know if I'm winning? PHAGE by FrostyCat I got an error after the first round, during the shuffle of the board: ___________________________________________ ############################################################################################ FATAL ERROR in action number 1 of Other Event: User Defined 15 for object obj_board_manager: Push :: Execution Error - Variable Index [21,1] out of range [21,-1] - -5.__built_in_maps__(100024,672001) at gml_Object_obj_board_manager_Other_25 ############################################################################################ -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- stack frame is gml_Object_obj_board_manager_Other_25 (line -1) called from - gml_Script_notify (line -1) - <unknown source line> gml_Object_seq_shuffle_Alarm_0 The AI is too smart for me. Reel Fruit Slots by Oyakiiv It took me a while to figure out what's going on. The yellow number is your earning and the blue one is your health. The multiplier gives you a higher payout but also spawns more fruit. The number on your character is like extra health for that round. You only get paid when you roll three of the same fruit. The payout is written in the how to play. Rise by The M The first time I played I got an error when colliding with the green square to the left of the tree. ___________________________________________ ############################################################################################ FATAL ERROR in action number 1 of Step Event0 for object obj_bonus: Variable <unknown_object>.bonus(100044, -2147483648) not set before reading it. at gml_Object_obj_bonus_Step_0 ############################################################################################ -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- stack frame is gml_Object_obj_bonus_Step_0 (line -1) The second time I went to the right and after using the hook and swinging to get up the platform I went through the wall and disappeared. The third time worked. Didn't get any of the green squares just in case. Defeated the boss and then got an error. ___________________________________________ ############################################################################################ FATAL ERROR in action number 1 of Step Eventobj_level_change for object obj_player: Variable obj_player.level(100034, -2147483648) not set before reading it. at gml_Object_obj_player_Collision_23 ############################################################################################ -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- stack frame is gml_Object_obj_player_Collision_23 (line -1) Cool concept. Needs some serious testing to get rid of the bugs. ROYal RUMble by Misu, Yal I used to play games like these back when I was a kid. Snowball in Hell by AndrewN No point in getting snow to become bigger, it actually makes it harder because it's easier to collide with the spikes. Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu Good use of theme and presentation. It's kind of hard choosing shape and size since you have to circle through the four options. This game would be pretty cool on mobile devices, you'd play in landscape mode and have four onscreen buttons on each side. That way you could just tap the shape or color you want and you would control the spaceship by tilting the device. Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc, Toque In the end, Wizzy finds love. Woodcutter by darijs1 Some things I think would make the game more fun: - Less hits to destroy a tree (on average it was taking 8 to 10 hits to knock down the tree and another 5 to get the wood) it makes getting resources very boring - Less hits to hunt animals or smaller animals that drop fewer resources. It takes 5 hits to kill a moose and between each hit it runs away. - Have something to know which direction the fire and bed are at, if you get lost you have no way of getting back. Another option would be to allow the player to start a new fire wherever they wanted. - Something that highlights where your axe is when you throw it. Sometimes it lands under a tree and if you don't have enough wood for another one you basically lost unless you can find it. Zombie Assault: Against All Odds by Misty FPS zombie survival. Would have liked some more locations and variety in weapons and enemies.
Reviews Top 3: Gambrawl by Siolfor the Jackal Wow! Super impressed. I love the tie to the theme. Great tutorial screen and menu. Smooth room transitions. Graphics and sound hold up well too. I liked the range of enemy types that all had unique behaviours. Only down sides: 1) Combat is lackluster. Until number of enemies increase, the block then punch mechanic meant I didn't get hit. If this was turned into a fully fledged fighting game with this gambling element, that could be quite interesting 2) is there an end? I got a little tired after a while and so just bet the full amount until I was overwhelmed by a large number of giant blue blobs who would jump me 3 at a time. I don't think blocking them all was possible any more? Also, when I got knocked down a few times in quick succession by the blue giants I glicthed to the bottom right of the screen. Only got out by getting hit again. King Of Deals by joh My gold was banned by a Rule card, but the AI opponnet's gold was not!?!? Unfair! I guess you got a bug or two to iron out regarding point tallies. This was a fun game to play. Good job fitting to the theme "adaptation". Presentation was nice - cards were simple which made them easy to identify, but maybe too simple. The card transitions were smooth but some effects were too fast- Players stealing or being forced to discard happened in a blink of an eye and I could not recall what I had lost. No audio or nice ambient music was a let down. Great work on programming quite a complicated set of interactions and competent AI in the Jam time. PHAGE by FrostyCat By game board 2 I thought I knew what was going on and good strategies to win - but nope. That AI was brutal! Nice art, loved the title screen with the "swimming" viruses. Solid mechanics - probably funner if I had a fellow noob human for the first play throughs or if the AI skill was dumbed down. Not sure if you had this option using your pre jam asset or not. A good connection to the adaptation theme as well. Story was meh - but chess doesn't need a story - should yours? I'm more lenient when the game doesn't lend itself to stories as is the case with yours. As the first game I've played that had good polish and also had strong mechanics that could not just be ignored to win/do well (unlike other polished entries so far), you've got rank 1 with half the reviews to go. Just make the AI easier for new players! Best ofs: Best use of THEME: My Gold by NazGhuL Best Concept: Gambrawl by Siolfor the Jackal Best Presentation: Overcome by Sam Spade Best Story: Liquid Bacon by Acr515, Ralucipe Best Devlog: ... Full ranking: Spoiler Gambrawl by Siolfor the Jackal King Of Deals by joh PHAGE by FrostyCat Liquid Bacon by Acr515, Ralucipe My Gold by NazGhuL Little Lost Hero by GameDevDan Duality2 by Matharoo Au Début Ça Va by Team Vive Le France Snowball in Hell by AndrewN Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu Find the Cure! by UnEarthly Ethan Eel Lady Cat Constest by TinyGamesLab Woodcutter by darijs1 I Wanna Get To School In One Piece by sp202 Against All Odd by Yal Zombie Assault: Against All Odds by Misty Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc, Toque Overcome by Sam Spade Rise by The M juegOS HD Early Access by Alice, Mercerenies ROYal RUMble by Misu, Yal Reel Fruit Slots by Oyakiiv Johnny's Escape by Bart Black and ****e by Ghandpivot Comments: Spoiler Against All Odd by Yal Know you did this in short time, but feedback is not considering this. Quirky intepretation of theme. Suitable music and sound. A typing challenge game isn't to my taste so you had an uphill battle to win me over but the concept of numbered zombies didn't cut it for me. Fair effort for limited time though. Au Début Ça Va by Team Vive Le France Alt-f4 to quit! How long did it take to program that? Getting serious, great art style and good quality sound. The idea is novel - after starting to play I recall reading your forum post about rotating the keyboard to gain the advantage. Didn't work for me though, - the runs where I just pushed myself to the far right and focused on shooting were better than trying to adpat the controls. This was probably because moving was not all that important. Since all enemies come from the left and there is no way to anticipate and dodge vehicles (nor any disadadvantage to getting hit I could see) coming from the right there was no need to move around. Just kept firing to win (do better). I'd suggest having danger coming from all sides, like a twin stick shooter. No ties to any theme I could see. Black and ****e by Ghandpivot Yikes! I think I read on the forum you had an issue with your final build not being playable because of a last minute change to check something. You would have only have had to play the game yourself for a second to realise the gravity of your mistake. No matter how many times you have tested a game, gotta play through the whole thing one final time to be sure. Lesson learned I hope! Your music seemed cool and the art style was a fine choice to work with under a strict schedule. Edit: Was informed by Ghandpivot that I had an issue with my controller causing the player to auto run to the right. Deadzone is too small - I could not get the player to stay still as the slightest touch to the left made him run left. I had to resort to keyboard controls. The platforming is too clunky for my liking. A good example is climbing the wall via jumping, with a small platform to stand on at the top (where vertical train appears). I got to this spot a dozen times and most of them I died because I overshot the platform, falling into the train (even after I knew the train was coming). This is probably just me, precision platforming is not my thing. Its hard to describe exactly why the platforming felt clunky, maybe too high a horizontal speed, not enough acceleration (as in i want a smoother start/end. This sort of game just isn't my jam (ha! pun intended). Screw that train/arrow/falling block/spike that comes out of no where. I want full clarity in my games so I make the decision that results in my success/failure, not the dev. Duality2 by Matharoo Very well presented - I'm sure those inside GMC jokes were HOT but I didn't understand them. The attack move was unique which made the combat enjoyable compared to the average Jam entry - but wouldn't be able to stay fress over a longer game. Attachment to theme was weak - just another entry where having enemies was the "odds" to "overcome". No credits for plagiarised sound effects? Your rank would probably be higher if I got more enjoyment out of the dialogue. Eel Lady Cat Constest by TinyGamesLab Great presentation with great music and audio to match. Great level select room and I liked knocking off the otherworldy cats from the league table as a countdown to completion. This was all excellent wrapping around a fairly standard puzzle mechanic that has been around since the dawn of video games - not every game has to break ground with mechanics, but if you are going to do a puzzle game, I think you had better. Not sure of the theme tie in, if any. Overcome all odds? Unfortunatley challenge comes in most games so something has to really jump out for me to connect to this theme. Grammar and spellng mistakes on the instruction page. Not everyone has english as a first language and you may be disadvantaged here, but of course this is important for any game. A few levels seemed out of place difficulty wise. For example I would swap 14 and 15. Having dangerous blocks is a good puzzle element, the lasers less so. If the challenge is "work out the order of the moves to beat this arrangement" it's cheap when I lose because I was excited I had the solution and ran into the laser. My point is I did not like the twitch/timing lasers in the way of the puzzle game. I also could not replay any levels once I completed them all - I wanted another look at select levels but would have had to start again. This game was one of the hardest to rank. It has amazing presentation but just can't score well on concept because of the basic puzzle mechanic. Find the Cure! by UnEarthly Ethan Loved the twist at the end - good little story. Good music and audio to match. Was the first tutorial screen meant to flicker? It was annoying to read. If you want to make a "computer glitch" effect, try something with the background - not make it hard for people to focus on reading and interpreting the info. Colour mixing was a nice idea but found it a little tedious to get the exact combinations. What I saw as "light pink" on my screen turned out to be "light purple" in terms of the actual colours I ended up mixing. Gambrawl by Siolfor the Jackal Wow! Super impressed. I love the tie to the theme. Great tutorial screen and menu. Smooth room transitions. Graphics and sound hold up well too. I liked the range of enemy types that all had unique behaviours. Only down sides: 1) Combat is lackluster. Until number of enemies increase, the block then punch mechanic meant I didn't get hit. If this was turned into a fully fledged fighting game with this gambling element, that could be quite interesting 2) is there an end? I got a little tired after a while and so just bet the full amount until I was overwhelmed by a large number of giant blue blobs who would jump me 3 at a time. I don't think blocking them all was possible any more? Also, when I got knocked down a few times in quick succession by the blue giants I glicthed to the bottom right of the screen. Only got out by getting hit again. I Wanna Get To School In One Piece by sp202 I loved the idea. Time reversal is not all that unique these days but implementing it for the Jam was impressive. However the platforming was lackluster. Crazy jump height and gravity felt awkward. Time reversal could have been used to do a lot more- leaving it as just a way to reverse either 1) my screw up or 2) an unexpected event I would have no way to anticipate was jus the tip of the iceburg. Maybe some items would be immune to time, or the player was immune but you had to reverse everything else. Something to make it more puzzly and less a use as a simple checkpoint save system. Johnny's Escape by Bart Cute art style for main character but did not blend well with background/room art. There is the beginnings of a story which is always nice in a jam game. Could have been an excellent tie in to the theme "chemical reactions" but without any interactables couldn't give points for this. For the same reason I can only guess what eyes/ears/arms and legs changing size would have meant gameplay wise. You know you did not manage to implement the grand plan so not much more I can add. juegOS HD Early Access by Alice, Mercerenies Simplistic but nice looking art. A lot to read through in the Readme but I persevered, finally working out that I had to interact with the W to install modules (which I thought would be limited but was not) and then finally could get on with the game... then realised there was nothing to do. Liked the idea of the mechanics of warping and can see some potential regarding pushing blocks to make bridges and such... but alas there was nothing to play, as you are probably aware (unless I still misunderstood any goals to this demo). Couldn't make a connection to any theme and no sound. King Of Deals by joh My gold was banned by a Rule card, but the AI opponnet's gold was not!?!? Unfair! I guess you got a bug or two to iron out regarding point tallies. This was a fun game to play. Good job fitting to the theme "adaptation". Presentation was nice - cards were simple which made them easy to identify, but maybe too simple. The card transitions were smooth but some effects were too fast- Players stealing or being forced to discard happened in a blink of an eye and I could not recall what I had lost. No audio or nice ambient music was a let down. Great work on programming quite a complicated set of interactions and competent AI in the Jam time. Liquid Bacon by Acr515, Ralucipe Just all around great, except for gameplay itself. Funny, suitable music that matched art and presentation. Didn't finish because it was becoming a game of guess and check. Get the reaction wrong, go back to bins, water, bears and repeat. Was probably missing a key ingredient as nothing I made was 'bouncy' to get to the next part but couldn't be bothered exploring any more as I felt I had been everywhere but had just chosen the wrong dialogue line to get one more ingredient out. Least I knew I did not need rubber to make liquid bacon. Some indication of the reactions I had tried (and what they produced) would have been good - I think I made the same poor health item 3 times trying to work out the bouncy reaction. Little Lost Hero by GameDevDan Great presentation, both audio and visuals. Ok story - but hey, Mario/Zelda stories are basically the same as well - gameplay is king! The gameplay is pretty standard - but generally well executed. Your choice of enemy appearance was great - I had a fair idea how each of them would behave the moment I saw them - even before moving! Random moving insects were annoying. In a movement puzzle game I want perfect clarity how everything will move - other wise RNG is killing me, not my lack of skill. Not all rooms were puzzles or tutorials. 8F could not be failed but I also had pushed multiple buttons on a floor before. Restarting back up to 5 floors was too harsh. I've solved your puzzles before, why must I do the last 3 again because I have not yet mastered this one! I want to keep attempting the new puzzle! Even more frustrating when paired with a level like 18F - even if i stay 1 square away from all bugs, leaving nothing to chance, I get boxed in and have to pray I don't make a poor choice. Especially when two bugs are next to each other - i think if one tries to move into another, it fails the movement but still hurts me, like one of the yellow stationary guys. Boss fight was a great end puzzle, but perhaps requiring too many hits. I lost count, but after 3 I had the rythm down and was a little chore just to complete the cycle. The theme was not strong (even after I considered your "subtle" meme). If you did not have the "I'll take your armour" intro, this game would have no tie to "overcoming all odds" at all. My Gold by NazGhuL It was tough and I did not succeed but I like the potential this game has. Now it wasn't clearly indicated in any way but I got a sense there were "reactions" occuring when different vials interacted. Water and Ice made an ice block. Something else made ice shard shoot out? Were these going to hurt zombies? Was the red stuff fire? Sorry, graphics were not clear enough. Green was slime/poison? I'm not 100% sure but some of the interactions between zobies and vials seemed off. I tried killing my first zombies with red vial, nothing happened. Other times in the game I threw red vials around and the fire effect lasted a looooong time so I was free to collect gold as any zombie that walked into my stash died real easy. You were going for a balance between collecting gold and defending the stash. A few improvements I can suggest: 1) Slow the character and zombies down. It was annoying that I ran almost faster than the vials, so collecting gold feeling was run - throw vial- stop and wait for vial to land - collect gold. The stopping to wait was annoying. If zombies were slower then more of the chemical interactions could be investigated/utlised. Could the ice blocks be used to block off access to the zombies? Didn't have time to check because zombies were ALWAYS on my stash and throwing fire seemed the best choice. This game could be more like an active tower defence. Set up obstacles and dangers using the chemical reactions then you feel safe for a while to collect some gold. Maybe this was possible if I learned the interactions better but I just tried a 3rd time with the intention of keeping my stash safe and could not consistently put up ice blocks (some broke, some didn't). 2) more clues/tutorial as to what the reactions produce. Or improve the graphics a lot! I still don't know how the green stuff behaves. (3rd play through and figured out its some sort of oil? Helps fire?) 3) The aiming was cumbersome. Particularly near the edges of the room - when the view was clamped to the room boundaries the aim reticule moves on its own. - probably based on how you decide on the direction but it felt weird when I did not move my mouse and the direction of the reticule changed. Your concept and theme execution ranks you high, but not too high because of the nit picking of the feel of the game's controls. Overcome by Sam Spade A very interesting entry. The visual style is impressively unique but you went too far. I had no idea where any enemies were after my first "death" (?)- the screen was just too cluttered and blurry. I couldn't figure out the attack and block mechanism. The sound indicated I was blocking I guess - but does it last forever? Whatever the white splashes were (my death?) seemed to occur no matter if I held block or not. Was it timing based, like a parry? Enemy types were hard to distinguish - so a ranged type was "aimiing" at me for a while and I seemed to be able to block the attack if I timed it - then shoot stuff back. Wasn't sure how to deal with the melee orientated guys that seemed to eat/surround me. Between the difficulties establishing what I was meant to do and the apparent lack of an overall goal or end leaves me with not much more to say than, impressive shader work! Even if your game is great somehow - not know what is going on or how to play it limits its potential. PHAGE by FrostyCat By game board 2 I thought I knew what was going on and good strategies to win - but nope. That AI was brutal! Nice art, loved the title screen with the "swimming" viruses. Solid mechanics - probably funner if I had a fellow noob human for the first play throughs or if the AI skill was dumbed down. Not sure if you had this option using your pre jam asset or not. A good connection to the adaptation theme as well. Story was meh - but chess doesn't need a story - should yours? I'm more lenient when the game doesn't lend itself to stories as is the case with yours. As the first game I've played that had good polish and also had strong mechanics that could not just be ignored to win/do well (unlike other polished entries so far), you've got rank 1 with half the reviews to go. Just make the AI easier for new players! Reel Fruit Slots by Oyakiiv The fruit was drawn fine. The visual elements of "being hit" were good. The man and flat buttons were a let down. Audio was fine. Gambling matches the theme "against all odds". Sid Meier says "Games are a series of interesting choices". This submission is the exact opposite of this. There are no choices to be made. Well technically I can bet "1" or bet "3" but due to bugs it was not clear if betting "3" also reduced my health by 3 - so I was left with just spinning time and time again with no choices to be made (not even uninteresting choices). Other issues: I was allowed to go below zero health. I bet "3" each time, sometimes my health dropped 1, sometimes 2, sometimes 3. Was odd I was betting "health" but the payout/winnings was some other value. I might as well have been told I could spin 50 times - since my winnings (or losings) would not change my time with the game. The winnings and health are drawn to the GUI layer, but when resizing the window the GUI layer remains unchanged so I lost these values for a while. Rise by The M Saw the potential but it crashed after getting the first green block. Liked that the music kicked in at a pivital point. Struggled for a while to work out where to navigate to at first. Of course I want to go right at first - kept trying to find a button that would do something. You could teach the mechanics while allowing the player to "fall" to the right instead of the left. While individual catagories I can place as Good or OK, overall has to be poor because I did not experience much of the game to get a good sense. ROYal RUMble by Misu, Yal Well done making a 3D game in the timeframe. This is my first 3D game in game maker so I do not know its limitations, but all the physics worked and you had a completed game. However, this may also let you down. I see some amazing art that I wished I could pull off in these Jam games but your visuals look dated. It must be harder to prodcue quality 3D visuals than 2D sprites, but I am assessing how good it looks, not how hard it is to make it look good. Camera was poor. After jumping, it wanted to look straight down at the floor. This was procnounced in level 1, but calmed down after that. Not sure why. Also I get the sense that pushing forward does not always make me move directly away from the camera, I feel like i veer to the left. Testing further indicates it is going straight, maybe this is just an illusion due to the perspective or field of view. How do you get past the spikes of level 3? Can't go under, can't go over? I only solved it because the spikes don't reset on death, so I had time to make it past most of them, then jump diagonally to the end. The cannons could have been implemented better - no indication of when they would shoot made timing my runs impossible. They may have been on a timer, but between "fixed" and "auto aiming" cannons, I could not pick up a pattern. The only strategy that worked was to go as fast as I can and hope for the best. I quit on the level where you must go down, with cannons on each platform. I could not see where all the chemicals were from my safe spot up top and I could not spend more than a second on any one platform before being shot. I felt the game was not fair in allowing me to predict my timings in advance. Not to say all games must, but those games are not for me. No real tie to a theme other than "this game has challenges, overcome these odds". Snowball in Hell by AndrewN Points for the narrative of the game hitting the Jam theme. Great art style, every sprite and font choice worked together nicely. Jumping up as fast/high as one can is a standard game but your snow rolling to pick up extra snow makes for a unique additional mechanic.... if it mattered? I never failed for being too small nor even saw myself get smaller - perhaps I got up each level too quickly? I died when touching spikes, fire or the lava below. Ended up ignoring trying to get snow and just jumped up in the end. Instead of R to restart, make it space. My hand was already on space and I wanted to get back into the action quick! Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu Nice idea. Not sure of the theme though - adaptation? Good that there was a choice of controls for this one - I think I would be turned off by the first default scheme. Great presentation and I have no idea how you implemented the curving tracks - great looking game. Too many colour/shape combinations for me. Maybe I was tired but I could barely hit any correct combinations, even for the first few blocks in my second run when I knew what I was doing. Trying to control changing the shape AND colour based on keybaord inputs was too abstract for my brain to lock in any patterns. Perhaps if the icons were somehow related to up/down/left and right I could have controlled my movement and adapted to raising my score on the fly. Just no way I could cycle to the correct shape and colour in the two seconds or less once the block was close enough to identify. Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc, Toque Love is a chemical reaction? Only link I can think of to theme. Good presentation, sounds are great, with variety of music to match each part of the game and audio cues like the diner door openeing. Wonderful. But unless you are REALLY into the story, this isn't much of a game. There was no progression in difficulty and the only challenge was to jump twice each stage? A simple , one button to overcome challenge game can work (Mario run on mobile for instance) but has to be more than jump twice! Even the failed to load google chrome browser game (the dinosaur running) has more gameplay than this - sorry! Woodcutter by darijs1 Nice execution of a survival game. The difficulty ramping up each day is a nice challenge and eases the player into the game. Sounds were good - the sprite and particle effects didn't gel very well - but srpite assets were fine on their own. I don't think wood collection is scaled well with fuel consumption of fire. I found I may have been short 2-3 pieces of fuel (no real way to know exactly how much) so I went to collect some more from a fairly close tree, but by the time I got back to the fire, it had reduced by more than what I had collected. Since getting warmth back was fairly quick - what was the point of the fuel levels at all? Just make me collect enough fuel to last the night. Can still have fuel consumption so I can add two pieces to get some warmth in an emergency. So maybe just an option 2 wood for a quick burst of warmth, 10 wood to go to sleep. Do I need to sleep? It went real dark, but then got light again. Was this day 3? It didn't say so I don't know. I also could not figure out how to cook food. Or maybe I was doing it? The icon in the camp fire didnt seem to respond. But I chose meet (raw) from the tab menu and I was fed. Bit confusing. On day 2 I decided my first job was to get food. I went up until no more trees started to spawn. Nothing. Went around and down below my camp - nothing. Found ONE just as it was getting too dark to see. Though maybe zombies were eating them? Day 3 - found 5 food sources close to camp. So overall, fine idea, ok visuals. Just needed work on being more intuitive about mechanics. Zombie Assault: Against All Odds by Misty Nice work having a 3d game done within the jam time. Good music and sounds. However, its just a bare bones FPS. Graphics are ok - no doubt having good looking 3d art is harder that 2d, but still makes the game look dated. Did not limit player speed when holding W and A or D at same time - diagonal movement was faster. I would have liked to get a sense where I was getting attacked from. Once my screen went red it was pretty much game over because I wasn't sure where to look. Theme in title, but didn't make a strong link - all games have "odds" to "overcome". Were the art and sounds yours? I am suspicious because you have a full orchestral set going on! If not, please give credit where credit is due.
My Reviews First Place: Snowball in Hell Impressive presentation. A full, if short game. Would be fun on mobile. I'm admittedly biased towards these types of games. Amusing use of theme. Downsides, jump control is only okay and gaining snow seemed mostly useless. Second Place: PHAGE Most impressive presentation. Really a full game. Also, code wise the AI is impressive. While I won every game I felt like the AI was really thinking and planning. Could have used a difficulty slider to make either harder or easier. Good use of theme. Downsides are game itself is only okay. Fun but limited and once understood doesn't offer much depth, and I did have a couple out of bounds array errors; however, for a game jam game I don't hold either of these things against it. Third Place: Find the Cure! Great story, great credit music. Good concept if basic once you understand it. Was fun to mess around with. Good use of theme. Spoiler: Downsides You don't actually need the right answer but this was not major detractions for me personally in a game jam game Best Ofs Best Use of Theme: Lock and Key (runner up: Snowball in Hell) Best Concept: Little Lost Hero (runner up: Stream of Adaptation and Rise) Best Presentation: PHAGE (runner up: Snowball in Hell) Best Story: Find the Cure! (runner up: Rise) Best Devlog: Smiechu (runner up: Frostycat) Spoiler: Partial Rankings I did play every game. But some games I either had game breaking bugs or didn't feel strongly enough one way or the other to rank. Also in many ways these are kind of snap judgments and greatly influenced by the mood I was currently in and inherent biases for or against certain types of games and genres. Ultimately, I enjoyed playing all of the games but I've got to rank some of them, so here they are: Snowball in Hell (see above) PHAGE (see above) Find the Cure! (see above) Little Lost Hero (my favorite concept, and also my favorite music, just not developed enough to make it into the top three) Lock and Key (nice mechanic, and the leader board was a great touch. Concept was great, best use of theme, third level did have frame rate issues) Eel Lady Cat Contest (fun, amusing, nice art) Duality2 (favorite joke - Heartbeast's opening line. The boss intros were cool and the mini game was maybe my favorite part. I also really liked the sword spin attack and art style.) Woodcutter (I was surprised at how much I got into this. The controls were a little clunky, and there wasn't much to do, but even so I tried really hard to be good and made it to day 4-5.) Stream of Adaptation (cool game. I liked the idea. with better visuals, better music, and a slightly streamlined gameplay, I think it would be a fun timewaster/scoreattack type game for mobile) Rise (I liked the concept and story. The reason it didn't get higher was I experienced too many game breaking bugs and the gameplay itself was just slightly to slow and missing the right feel) Gambrawl (overall setup was cool and interesting. Combat was too repetitive for me to rank it higher) Against All Odd (most amusing) Spoiler: My Own Unofficial Best Ofs Most Amusing Concept: Against all Odd Best Joke: Heartbeast's opening lines in Duality2 Code I wish I could write: All 3D games and both PHAGE's and King of Deals' AI Best (only) Mini-Game: Duality2 Best (only) Boss-Intros: Duality2
#1: Snowball in Hell by AndrewN #2: Little Lost Hero by GameDevDan #3: Lock and Key by Relic Real close: Duality2 by Matharoo PHAGE by FrostyCat Best Use of Theme: Lock and Key by Relic Best Concept: Little Lost Hero by GameDevDan Best Presentation: Wizzy Gizzard Speed Date by HayManMarc, Toque Reviews: (The most important thing when I play/rate a game: FUN!) Spoiler Against All Odd by Yal It was a good english course of typing number. Very simple game. Not the kind I would play for more than 5 minutes. An interesting idea for a game for kids. 5/10 Au Debut Ca Va by Team Vive Le France My eyes are burning! It was hard to see what the hell happens in there! I takes me 4 attemps to play it correctly. The idea is good. Did not go that far. I was crush by...still don't know what! 6/10 Black and ****e by Ghandpivot ehhh... I start in air and I fall...again and again... A joke? A bug? 1/10 Duality2 by Matharoo Well made, funny quotes and cameo, boss battle(with phases). 'Maze', lights. All was there. Good entry! 8/10 Eel Lady Cat Constest by TinyGamesLab Well made puzzle game. Small animation. No saving? I hit 'R' and lose my progress... A good start for bigger casual game. 7/10 Find the Cure! by UnEarthly Ethan Chemistry at 100%!!! Lol. Good idea. Not super fun but it's well made. Sound and music. 6/10 Gambrawl by Siolfor the Jackal It was like a dark version of double dragon! I had fun. Menu, sounds and animations. Good one. 7/10 I Wanna Get To School In One Piece by sp202 Funny and interesting. Short, lack of sounds. 6/10 Johnny's Escape by Bart I didn't get the goal. I tried a few things and I quit. 3/10 juegOS HD Early Access by Alice, Mercerenies I feel uncomfortable when I need to rate something like this because it looks like there is a lot of content, but it looks like I can't do anything. No treat, and I see 'All clear!' in green. :/ 3/10 King Of Deals by joh Looks like it could be complex. Not sure I understand all of it but it's well made. 6/10 Liquid Bacon by Acr515, Ralucipe The guy under the bridge is creepy!! Nice one! Good job! Lots of thing to do. Beside the fact that it's not my type of game, I enjoy it. 7/10 Little Lost Hero by GameDevDan A good puzzle game. I had fun and went far. Will play it again to complete it. 8/10 Lock and Key by Relic Wow! Menu, controller, online score table. The game itself is simple but challenging. Did you record that sound with your mouth? lol 8/10 My Gold by NazGhuL Yep I rate my game! The first idea was to throw grenades, that's why the reticle can't move closer. I should have fixed this. I should also add a sound when the zombies eat your gold. Also a couple of popping advices. I know it's not perfect but when there is a lot of zombies and the green toxic spread. Throw a fire in it and whatch the reactions! I lose a lot of time messing with ART. Tile from up, perspective, etc... Will work on that. Top-down movement and collision too. See you next jam for sure! 50/10 Overcome by Sam Spade A beautifull, well made....mess... There is a lot of black and white things happening and in 3 attemps i'm not sure if I won or not... I can't move. Attack or defends, not sure of the result. But the technical side is great. Just need a cleaver gameplay. 5/10 PHAGE by FrostyCat Nice strategy game. I would have like more distinctive color for each player and an option to play with a buddy! Will play it again. 8/10 Reel Fruit Slots by Oyakiiv Pretty basic and repetitive. Dodging the fruits add to the challenge. 4/10 Rise by The M That slide.... tss... I fall a lot! That's an ok challenge and a good idea. I disapear 1 time near the white tree. Restart. beat the boss but a collision error occurs. 6/10 ROYal RUMble by Misu, Yal Toing! Toing! Moami? Hahaha! I had fun. For a short time. Nice entry. 7/10 Snowball in Hell by AndrewN This game has one major flaw. It's too short. Seriously! Give us more! Fun and well made. Action, reaction, jump and fall. Thx! 9/10 Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu Beautifull! But we should have less forms and colors at the start. It's very difficult and we die quickly!(well, in my case!) 7/10 Wizzy Gizzard Speed Date by HayManMarc, Toque "Will he find love? Play it to find out!" hahaha! It's the less catchy quote ever for a game! (I can't play for now, I can't stop laughing!) ... "Hey kids, buy this game! You play an old man who go to a speed dating dinner!" ... Ok I play... ...1 minutes later... Hahaha! "Press anything to jump!" I choose cap-lock. I never played with that one! ... Ok I play... ...2 minutes later... "Do you have hobbies? I enjoy taking the green pills" .... hahahahah You guys are funny! The gameplay is not really fun but all those jokes! Thumbs up! 7/10 Woodcutter by darijs1 Looks good. It was simple and buggy. I throw my axe and could not reach it. Got stuck in trees. 4/10 Zombie Assault by Misty It's the last one that I played. It felt like a mix of serious sam and blood! It released my anger of the week. Killing zombies! I would have like more ammo. :/ Good job. 7/10
Matharoo's Non-Mathematical Reviews Top 3: ROYal RUMble by @Misu, @Yal LOVE this game haha. BOING. No fullscreen option though, and such a small screen... And I accidentally hit Escape and the game closed. That should not happen. Snowball in Hell by @AndrewN Loved it. Want more. Eel Lady Cat Constest by @TinyGamesLab I really like it. Cute and fun little game. Also, bad attempt at making cat sounds from a human vocal cord. Full ranking: Spoiler ROYal RUMble by Misu, Yal Snowball in Hell by AndrewN Eel Lady Cat Constest by TinyGamesLab Liquid Bacon by Acr515, Ralucipe I Wanna Get To School In One Piece by sp202 Gambrawl by Siolfor the Jackal Rise by The M Au Début Ça Va by Team Vive Le France Little Lost Hero by GameDevDan Woodcutter by darijs1 My Gold by NazGhuL PHAGE by FrostyCat Zombie Assault: Against All Odds by Misty Black and ****e by Ghandpivot Against All Odd by Yal Lock and Key by Relic King Of Deals by joh Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu juegOS HD Early Access by Alice, Mercerenies Overcome by Sam Spade Find the Cure! by UnEarthly Ethan Johnny's Escape by Bart Comments: Spoiler Against All Odd by Yal Interesting. Au Début Ça Va by Team Vive Le France Good one, but the controls are bad. Black and ****e by Ghandpivot I like it. Controls could have been better. I don't like games that make me play the same thing again and again and again just 'cause, so I quit early. Duality2 by Matharoo Who made this game Eel Lady Cat Constest by TinyGamesLab I really like it. Cute and fun little game. Also, bad attempt at making cat sounds from a human vocal cord. Find the Cure! by UnEarthly Ethan It's cool. Gambrawl by Siolfor the Jackal Nice one. I Wanna Get To School In One Piece by sp202 Really short, I like the idea. Johnny's Escape by Bart Cool. juegOS HD Early Access by Alice, Mercerenies Nice. Liquid Bacon by Acr515, Ralucipe Lovely entry. Little Lost Hero by GameDevDan Good one. Love the art and audio. Lock and Key by Relic Too much science. My Gold by NazGhuL Can you not kill the zombies? It gets harder around 800. Overcome by Sam Spade Love the look of it. You must be a shader expert! Didn't get what was going on though, and it got repetitive. PHAGE by FrostyCat Looks good. Rise by The M First time the game bugged out and I disappeared; second time I got a fatal error. All because of that green box at the end. Played it after that, just avoided the green box. A pretty cool entry. ROYal RUMble by Misu, Yal LOVE this game haha. BOING. No fullscreen option though, and such a small screen... And I accidentally hit Escape and the game closed. That should not happen. Snowball in Hell by AndrewN Loved it. Want more. Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu Don't like how it is supposed to be played. Would have been better if it were simpler - like one button for one specific shape, not a list of shapes and colors to select one from. Takes too much time. Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc, Toque No idea what's going on. I jump twice, then I'm on a date, then repeat. What's the "gameplay"? Woodcutter by darijs1 A fine entry. Zombie Assault: Against All Odds by Misty It's fine.
My short reviews!First place My Gold by @NazGhuL Second place Lock and Key by @Relic Third place Phage by @FrostyCat Best ofs: Best Use of THEME: Against all Odd by @Yal Best Concept: Phage by @FrostyCat Best Presentation: Eel Lady Cat Constest by @TinyGamesLab Best Story: Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by @HayManMarc, @Toque Best Devlog: in progress... Best graphics: Overcome by @samspade Full ranking: Spoiler: Full ranking Score table in PDF format Comments: Spoiler: Score calculation Every category can get from 0 to 10 points. End-score is a weighted average of sub-scores from 7 categories. Theme is weighted 2x, Concept and Presentation is weighted 1,5x, the rest is weighted 1x. I would like to congratulate to all the participants and thank all reviewers and voters for the effort of playing all the games! Little summary: I think that the jam entries are overall a little bit flat this time. I mainly blame here a set of "non-creative" themes. The "Against all odds" is something what almost every video game can be described. A lot of users simply overused it instead of making use of it. Because of that it was hard form me to decide if the game is really following one of the themes or not. In the end it's not a coincidence that the best 3 games in my ranking don't use the "Against all odds" theme...
Alice's Highly Delayed Reviews (25/25) Top 3: Liquid Bacon by Acr515, Ralucipe In terms of overall gameplay, I generally found it enjoyable. It has the classic RPG mechanics in place, with various interactions and battles and such. Aside from that, the adventure is proper, doesn't get diluted in too large of a scope (though I'd have preferred to have a little better mobility) and has a clear progression. Also, I liked that foreshadowing in form of that cardio meter element; seeing that gave me a general idea about what was going to happen, while not giving away the specifics. Lost Little Hero by GameDevDan That was a fun little game, though the 18th floor was super-mean with all these bugs I couldn't read. The audiovisuals were pretty neat. I liked the tracks, and the graphics worked pretty well, too. Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc, Toque The gameplay is simple, but enjoyable and complements the story nicely. However, the obstacle collision system seems way too overeager, especially on the dog + hydrant obstacle. The game is quite rich in content, filled with references when it comes to both obstacles and the dates themselves, and I love it. Best ofs: Best use of THEME: Lock and Key by Relic Best Concept: I Wanna Get To School In One Piece by sp202 Best Presentation: Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc, Toque Best Story: Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc, Toque Full ranking: Spoiler Liquid Bacon by Acr515, Ralucipe Lost Little Hero by GameDevDan Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc, Toque Lock and Key by Relic Eel Lady Cat Contest by TinyGamesLab ROYal RUMble by Misu, Yal Gambrawl by Siolfor the Jackal Duality2 by Matharoo Rise by The M I Wanna Get To School In One Piece by sp202 Against All Odd by Yal Snowball in Hell by AndrewN Overcome by Sam Spade Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu PHAGE by FrostyCat Woodcutter by darijs1 King Of Deals by joh Black and ****e by Ghandpivot Au Début Ça Va by Team Vive Le France My Gold by NazGhuL Zombie Assault: Against All Odds by Misty Find the Cure! by UnEarthly Ethan Johnny's Escape by Bart Reel Fruit Slots by Oyakiiv Overcoming All Aliens by Dengar, Micnasr Comments: First of all, some observations. Among the 8 first games, 7 seemed to use mostly OVERCOME ALL ODDS, and with one exception that usage was pretty plain. So if I seem exasperated about that theme in my reviews, that's why. Also, while I don't have exact statistics, I feel like the games this Jam generally seem longer (with more content?) compared to the usual 3 day Jams. Which I suppose would be a good thing in general for a game, though it's not quite a good thing for a reviewer who needs to play through them in rapid succession, especially if the gameplay/content isn't particularly varied. Please keep in mind that more content doesn't always mean more fun, and that once a certain minimal content is reached (clearly, my game didn't reach the minimal content stage by Jam deadline...), it might be better to focus on perfecting what you have. Spoiler Against All Odd by Yal Probably the most original use of OVERCOME ALL ODDS. I've found it enjoyable for a bit, though the game seems to have this wall phenomenon when difficulty at first is pretty swell, and then it suddenly ramps up so much that the player is swiftly defeated. It seems to happen a lot with zombie-themed games this Jam... On that note, I guess the difficulty may have something to do with stacking two sources of difficulty - first, more complex words, and second, more zombies rushing in. If it was one of these at a time, the pace would change more gradually. Still, the general concept was pretty enjoyable and it played nicely for that short while of my playthrough - and at this point of reviewing I really appreciate short whiles. The graphics are appropriate for the game, and I particularly liked the health hearts. The zombies were fine, too, though I'd have liked more variety among them. Oh well. The audio worked well with the game, too (if maybe the soundtrack wasn't particularly memorable; guess that's what happens with these intimidating scary-sounding atmospheric tracks...). One technicality - I would have liked to see the final score on the game over screen. I can only see the hi-score on the menu instead. Au Début Ça Va by Team Vive Le France This game is like the definition of overloading and I almost love it! First, there is the fact that there are three controlling areas to take care of - the keyboard letters, the arrows and the mouse. Second, there are all these control alterations, with keys being swapped nilly-willy. Third, there are all these enemies that should be taken down, and these incoming walls. And finally, there are these super-colourful to the point of trippiness backgrounds and chaotic sounds. I feel like the strongest point of the game is its aesthetics and happy chaos that occurs in this game. However, I can hardly appreciate it when I have to deal with all these walls while keeping the incoming missiles at bay, not to mention these controls. I guess the switching control schemes were probably the greatest problem here. I mean, I know the theme was OVERCOME ALL ODDS, but isn't it taking it a bit far...? On second thought, maybe it was also an aspect of ADAPTATION? ^^' (also, on closer inspection it seems that when the game tells "UP IS <DIRECTION>", it means "UP IS <DIRECTION> ARROW KEY", not "UP ARROW KEY IS <DIRECTION>"; it got me quite confused at start) Still, the trippy visuals are awesome. Are they supposed to show what happens when someone reacts with too many chemicals? Because it kinda looks like it's the case here. Or maybe I'm giving too much credit...? ^^' (for the record, I eventually managed to get the score of ~16k or so) Black and ****e by Ghandpivot I'm blaming TehPilot for all the rage games we're getting this Jam. Also, trains.* The theme wasn't explicitly stated, but given the general difficulty I'm going to assume it's OVERCOME ALL ODDS. Also, I suppose the trophy at the end was the actual end of the game. This was quite a difficult game, which I'm not in a mood for; I'm already tired of difficult games for this Jam. This one is particularly heavy on trial-and-error, too. One thing I've got to admit, though, that all the ways the player can be taken down are quite creative. Kudos for that, at least. Also, for the choice of music. The graphics don't have particularly rich colour palette, but they've worked fine for the most part. Mechanically the game seemed mostly fine, though I felt like sometimes it was too eager to declare me dead, especially on falling platforms. I also seem to have experienced a bug (or was it a trap) where the second checkpoint appeared on a platform below instead of its proper place. Also, one thing I really didn't like was forcing me to use WSAD, where arrow keys would be perfectly applicable as well. I played the post-Jam version, but the positive impressions from the game having more content are balanced out by the additional rage I had to go through, so I guess it wouldn't really change my ranking, anyway. *TehPilot was the one to choose OVERCOME ALL ODDS theme this time, and the one who picked the handicap from GMC Jam 12: "Trains or locomotives must appear in the game at some time, and must affect the gameplay in some form" Duality2 by Matharoo You know, this game reminded me of a certain song... Pretty fun to play for a bit, involves quite a lot GMC references. The audiovisuals are pretty good (especially the graphics; the music didn't really stand out) and there's a good variety of content and mechanics. I particularly liked that spinning attack. I just still don't know what I'm supposed to do with souls and gems... The dialogue boxes could have been better. You can either wait for the message to appear or skip it altogether; there's no that good ol' mechanic of "press to show all, press to proceed". Also, there's this weird white thread which seems like it's supposed to be a speech buble tail pointing to the speaker, but it looks nothing like tail at all; and the dialogue box shows speaker's sprite, anyway. Finally, the height of the "scrolled" area involves fractions of the line height, which means when the text is scrolled to the bottom as the dialogue progresses, there's only a bottom part of a previous line visible, and it looks weird. From other minor annoyances - the battle with GMWolf taking place on snow field means that Nocturne and bottles are barely visible. I dunno, maybe making the snow a little bit darker and maybe slightly more blue (so that it's more of a stylish blue than dirty gray) would have made things clearer? The theme usage was somewhat plain, though I guess OVERCOME ALL ODDS has this tendency to result in easy usages? ^^' Good entry overall. Eel Lady Cat Contest by TinyGamesLab To think that there are cats that can't afford to participate in GMC Jam... The game is generally aesthetically pleasing; it has all the necessary audiovisuals. I would have liked more cat designs, but those that were present were quite unique (or maybe because they're so unique I would have liked to see more of them?). The gameplay is simple, but makes for quite a few interesting puzzles. I would have preferred if there were no timing elements like the laser beam - it only distracts from the main appeal of the game, which is clearly puzzles. There were a few design decision I wasn't quite fond of. First is having R do the full game restart, with progress cleared and everything. I once got caught on that when trying to restart a failed level and then had to replay all the earlier ones (I kinda have an instinct to press R when I want to restart a level, regardless of the game). Second is the choice to have level selection mouse-controlled in otherwise fully keyboard-controlled game; from a cat-themed game I would have expected no mice around. Finally, in the first level the exit is placed right next to the cat, so when I first played it and scratched the competitor from the exit tile, I didn't even see there was some explanation on that, and on the second level I got confused when I took down all cats and I still didn't proceed. These things were pretty minor and more of annoyances, but they're worth keeping in mind. Especially requiring different controller for menu than the main gameplay is a pet peeve of mine. The theme uses felt pretty unoriginal; I saw no element of particularly adapting (i.e. choosing a qualitatively different strategy depending on the obstacle) and overcoming all odds was used in a pretty plain way, though I admit having the leaderboard displayed contributed well towards that. Quite solid and enjoyable entry. Find the Cure! by UnEarthly Ethan (playing this as the second-last game) Huh, it seems CHEMICAL REACTIONS was a more popular theme that I expected. Maybe it's even more used than ADAPTATION, after all...? The gameplay is pretty basic, with mixing up the colour to make the proper mixture. It's mostly functional and pretty straightforward; it works for a simple game with 10 levels, though probably would get pretty stale after 100 (then again, lots of things become stale after 100 levels). That said, the gameplay portion could be significantly improved. First, the lower alpha is pretty much indistinguishable from higher brightness, unless you pay really close attention to the chemical stream poured and checking if it overlaps. I'd suggest showing both 100% alpha and semi-transparent versions instead, to have a clear reference for the main colour as well as how much it's heated up. Having some non-solid background behind the semi-transparent colour would help telling apart the brightness from the transparency as well. Second, it would be nice if there were combined vials (yellow, cyan, magenta) for easier applying the equal amounts of colours. Though it's more of a small convenience feature than anything, really; determining the alpha is more relevant. ^^' The thing I really appreciate is the feedback of the mixture being ready (I mean, the boiling-like animation). Using that was a good call. Other thing I appreciated was the ability to skip levels; it's invaluable in Jam games when a reviewer wants to check out the content quickly. The audio worked fine within the game. The graphics individually wouldn't have been bad, but mixing photorealistic vials and utensils with plain background and simplistic graphics doesn't quite blend well. Probably the best looking part of the game was the ending; too bad I didn't know how to proceed from there. Gambrawl by Siolfor the Jackal I guess the game has no winning conditions, because I got ~50 billion money before losing. The premise is somewhat interesting for a few first fights, but after a while it becomes very schematic. It's particularly true for zombies, which I multiple times defeated simply by standing in place and constantly attacking. Shadow clones aren't particularly difficult, either, once you get in the block-attack rhythm. Wandering spirits on the other hand are big meanies and you don't want to encounter them in larger numbers... or preferably not at all. Then again, I kept playing to confront them at least once, because somehow I kept getting the zombies/jellies/clones with not a single spirit until the 3rd die came along. One thing I particularly enjoyed was how different enemies have different personalities which are reflected in their AIs - be it single-minded zombies, inattentive jellies, honourable shadows or treacherous spirits. Though after fighting the same enemy for several rounds that freshness wears off, sadly. Still, pretty good job with that. The animation wasn't too shabby, either - the game had generally pretty good visual quality, and audio complimented it nicely (bonus points for music being custom-made). While the theme used here was overdone all odds, here at least the odds are taken not as generic obstacles, but actual gambling chances, making this game about 5 times or so more original than a typical Jam entry here (Reel Fruit Slots used similar take on the odds). Pretty nice at start, wears out somewhat quickly at the later point. I Wanna Get To School In One Piece by sp202 ... ...oh. ...Oh no. That title. Please let it not be a rage platformer. --- 2 minutes later --- Thank goodness, it was not a rage platformer. This was a pretty cool entry, and I appreciate the replay/rewind mechanic. Had I not been on a tight schedule, I'd appreciate getting even more levels of that (unlike some entries that had way too many levels). The whole narrative and the remarks on game over were pretty nice, too. (also, hugs are meant to be warm, not cool; they aren't lame, though :<) Sadly, this game had no audio, and the graphics in there weren't particularly great, either, though at least they were varied. The concept was pretty great. The choice of theme was not (if it's the theme I think it is), but still, I enjoyed it. Johnny's Escape by Bart Is this soundtrack the remix of the fan favourite soundtrack from Undertale? Uh, alright, I see lots of chemicals, but I have no idea what happens there. I guess it was not implemented? Though maybe it's for the better, because all these chemicals to balance looked very hard to keep track of... Also, there are these eyes and ears and legs and hands, but I don't see what good they'd do. There was some remark that the wings would have been useful, but neither organ expansion worked and I couldn't get past that part. Sorry. One technical aspect that was very annoying was that setting a target point on a wall or something resulted in the character ceaselessly go around that point instead of standing in place. Maybe it's some aspect of mp_potential_step or whatnot? Either way, the gameplay felt very clunky, not only because of the movement, but also because of interactions that felt somewhat unresponsive... Too bad, because the setup for the story seemed cool, especially with the letter at the beginning. Also, the graphics looked pretty nice, though the narrow field of vision (even with eyes maxed out) didn't really allow me to appreciate it; or have a general what happens in that spaceship for that matter. Would the organs change depending on the chemical balance, I wonder...? Maybe better luck next time? ^^' King Of Deals by joh Played two games, lost one, won the other. I don't mind the general idea, but I'm not quite sure what should I go by when making decisions; I mean, all cards are concealed, and when I play my cards, it's a common sense to discard the bad cards and obtain the good ones. Well, there are also these modifier cards that change worth depending on the setup, but otherwise I don't see much to base a strategy on. Maybe if I could preview exactly one card from each bid for my offer and the other player's offer when I make the bid, the decision making would have been more compelling. The graphics were simple, but appropriate, though some aspects could have been improved; in particular, the alignment of cards counts in the card list menu. Also, the "hover to show description" could have been executed better, e.g. by a dedicated text-box displaying "hover to show card description" when none card is hovered over, and the card description when the mouse is over that card. Sadly, there was no audio at all. Also, I'm not sure what's the connection to either of the themes. Is it that theme? Maybe it's the adaptation, because different cards work well with different setups (e.g. gold boost is of no use if there's no gold in the first place). Liquid Bacon by Acr515, Ralucipe I have a distinct feeling I've heard that music before, but I'm not sure where. Maybe it was upon the test running of Jam games before uploading the ZIP...? Either way, I completed the game, though I kinda spoiled myself with the appropriate solution (both puzzle solution and chemical solution), because I've got other games to play. One thing I very much appreciate is focusing on probably the most difficult theme of those available that is CHEMICAL REACTIONS. It's like a breath of fresh air after most of these OVERCOME ALL ODDS games. This game is generally pretty well made in terms of mechanics. Having played Duality 2 (and some other Jam games before), I appreciate the classic text box with "press to show all, press to advance" mechanic. Also, the user interface as well as visible gameplay area adapts to the display size - good job with implementing it properly, though I'd have liked for interface element sizes to scale up when the viewport becomes bigger; at first I couldn't notice the inventory area, because it was so far from the area I was focused on. I didn't notice any glaring bugs; apparently there was one related to audio, but I couldn't experience it. In terms of overall gameplay, I generally found it enjoyable. It has the classic RPG mechanics in place, with various interactions and battles and such. One thing I'd have changed is how the necessary ingredients are collected - some of these require specifically initiating a battle that could be avoided, with a randomly encountered opponent, at that. In general, I'd keep the necessary items to basic interactions (like collecting stuff from trash cans), repeatable peaceful interactions (like with Him Who Lives Under The Bridge; you can exhaust all dialogue paths and - when you have an appropriate item - collect the needed item) and unavoidable battle (like with that burger person). Drops from random encounters - especially those that can be avoided with choosing proper dialogue - are not a good place for that, maybe unless there's some clear hint from someone that I can collect that item from that enemy. Come to think of it, I'd have liked to see less of trial-and-error, and more hints in general. Aside from that, the adventure is proper, doesn't get diluted in too large of a scope (though I'd have preferred to have a little better mobility) and has a clear progression. Also, I liked that foreshadowing in form of that cardio meter element; seeing that gave me a general idea about what was going to happen, while not giving away the specifics. The graphics were simple, but proper; I got some Cyanide & Happiness vibes from it, which might actually fit the overall tone. Also, there were some nice little details, like the player portrait appearing progressively beat up while taking more damage. The music and sound effects were appropriate. Overall, probably one of the most well-made and unique (*cough* *overcomeallodds* *cough*) entries this Jam. Lost Little Hero by GameDevDan This game made me look up some game from many, many Jams ago. And then I found out that game from many, many Jams ago had a dadio credits cameo. Huh. That was a fun little game, though the 18th floor was super-mean with all these bugs I couldn't read (is their gimmick "move to the random tile next"? Because it kinda seemed non-deterministic). In a puzzle game like that I'd rather have movements perfectly predictable. Also, the boss gimmick, once figured out, was pretty easy to replicate, and thus I felt anything past 5 lives was completely unnecessary; it's really more than enough to show the player figured out how to defeat the boss. The audiovisuals were pretty neat. I liked the tracks, and the graphics worked pretty well, too. Aside from the earlier bugs indeterminism, I don't remember many specific nitpicks. One thing I didn't like was how long the level setup and completion lasted. Usually I wouldn't mind, but after getting back to the level 15th for the Nth time I was kinda annoyed by these transitions stopping my momentum. The theme usage seems like a plain OVERCOME ALL ODDS. Maybe there's more to it, since Dan is the one who posted that "putting theme in game title vs subtle use of theme" meme; though I suppose a good use of theme isn't subtle. It's so obvious you can see it even without it being put in the title. ^^' Also, I watched through the entirety of the last scene. Then again, with words "there's nothing to see here, go away" it's usually pretty clear there's still something. Lock and Key by Relic Tried out all three levels. The general gameplay mechanics are pretty cool, and I really like this take on CHEMICAL REACTION; it also has a hint of ADAPTATION in it, and strangely no OVERCOME ALL ODDS - it's like the optimal combination of themes! That said, I feel the game mechanics could use some simplification. Right now, there are several factors player has to take care of. First, the shape of the component. It's actually pretty easy to deal with since there are only two shapes, and this aspect could be more emphasized with giving three or four shapes per level instead. Second, the orientation of the component. Having to make a precise alignment is somewhat time-consuming. Maybe it could have been dumbed down to four directions or having player rotate between 8 directions or so? The fact that components change their orientation over time doesn't help. Third, somewhat rapidly changing temperature levels and pH levels - about half if not more of the gameplay is spent moving between regulation points and setting the right levels. I'd suggest dropping it altogether, picking only a single factor and/or have the conditions dependent on gradually changing spatial setup instead of manual regulation. Maybe have pH change depending on Y position and temperature on X position, and slowly shift the optimal point around, making the player pick the best position to take? This would also make this aspect not feel like a frustrating, unproductive chore, I think, since no time would be wasted floating between regulation points and setting the levels. Actually, I think this gameplay idea could be reworked as such: - increase the number of available shapes to 3 or 4 - keep the somewhat precise orientation, but... - make the conditions position-based rather than charging-based, and make it so that the better the conditions, the higher the leeway when matching the orientation (up to 45 degrees in both directions for optimal conditions or so) From other things, I appreciate having different levels with various gimmicks (like inhibitors) and the online hi-scores. Good calls with these. I still don't know what that green cloud was supposed to be, though. The graphics felt a little crude, but otherwise worked fine with the game. Audio was pretty good, too. Pretty solid entry, with a good use of themes provided. My Gold by NazGhuL A general suggestion: if you cannot win your game in 9 of 10 tries, then you need to nerf its difficulty. I'm not exaggerating. Well, maybe it's not as important for short-term challenge games, but in a game extended over more a dozen of seconds or so - let alone more than a minute - it's better not to overdo the challenge. Remember that as a developer you have much more knowledge and experience with your game. After a second try I decided not to play more, as at some point the game spawns so many zombies that I can't possibly catch up with them, let alone go on a gold collecting spree. With all that, I can't hope to complete the game. It feels less about being unskilled and more about facing a metaphorical wall from some point. The audiovisuals were adequate, though not remarkable. I didn't find a particular inconsistency between the characters and the backgrounds, at least. I played around with various potion variations, but generally found the second one to work best; so either it's unbalanced, or the purpose of other potions isn't sufficiently shown/explained. One thing that annoyed me about mechanics was how mouse cursor was shown - it aligned itself to the actual range (minimum or maximum) of the potion throw. This actually should be a good thing, but I didn't see a physical location of a mouse, and thus got confused about how the mouse was working; I feel having an actual mouse cursor displayed aside from the target mark for the throw would make things much clearer and more readable. Also, sometimes it seemed like the fire throws didn't affect the zombie at all. I don't know why... Good call with using CHEMICAL REACTIONS at least; I also appreciate the nod to the classic goal of alchemy. Having played the Woodcutter and Zombie Assault, I officially hate zombies when it comes to this Jam games. I'd rather confront Manga Hitler again than try to break through these cheap overspawning fu...nmakers. Well, I guess the undead in Lost Little Hero were predictable and easy to avoid and didn't spawn at insane rates, so I guess they're acceptable there. Overcome by Sam Spade I survived the music! Though I admit, I had to refer to samspade's post in the Discussion Topic to actually have any idea what's going on, because it wasn't clear at all. The fact that the game quickly filled itself with some kind of debris (?) or fallen enemies (???) which looked like a tear in the fabric of reality into another dimension (I'm not even kidding)... well, it didn't help. Either way, once I read detailed explanations about the mechanics used and restarted the game to clear up the screen I managed to complete the game. Probably putting all these detailed instructions either in the game itself, or in the readme file would help the reviewers, don't you think? ^^' The mechanics were unusual, and the feedback was somewhat blurry and trippy, but I could get some general idea by hearing when something like enemy attack comes along and I can retaliate, or when I was using up my stamina to the point of wavy vision. The graphics were simple, but decorated a lot with some crazy mix of shaders; if only help/credits descriptions used some more stylish fonts. The music was good and fit well, but somehow I didn't feel sad when it finally ended. The sound worked well and provided invaluable feedback during the game. Aside from the general lack of clarity about what happens in this game, I'd also point out the particles gathering to form descriptions in the main menu. The effect iself is pretty cool, but it lasts a tad too long. Maybe speed up the particles, or just have them gather up from a closer area, but also make them gradually go from complete transaprency to complete opaquity? I'm not sure. Aparently the theme was ADAPTATION, because the enemies adapt to player strategies; I feel it's a tad too subtle for most people. If I were to assume, I'd sooner expect another incarnation of OVERCOME ALL ODDS; then again, you can pick any game at random and there's a good chance it'll match that theme somehow (it's way too broad indeed). Pretty unique if maybe underexplained entry. Overcoming All Aliens by Dengar, Micnasr Not much here, just shooting alien spaceships or, if a ship manages to drop an alien, shooting the aliens. I didn't feel a particular difficulty progression and there seemed to be only the saucers with aliens inside; no other enemies aside from that. About 500 points into the game I just decided to collect as many aliens as I can (which was 4). The graphics were functional, but aside from that they weren't really good. The sounds were alright, but sadly there was no background music. The theme usage... I think you can get the general idea by reading preliminary remark and other reviews (it's the last entry I write the review for, by the way). Hopefully you will improve by the next Jam. ^^' PHAGE by FrostyCat This took way longer than I would've liked it to. Please, please don't underestimate raw computational powers. Even naively picking the option giving the highest score after a given turn is often something most humans - especially new to a specific kind of game - have hard time keeping up with. I write this after being once defeated by supposedly the easiest AI in the post-Jam version and then barely winning the next round. I don't know what kind of strategy it follows, but it's clearly enough to stand on par with a human newbie. Speaking of humans, AI probably doesn't care, but I have found the phage designs to be way too similar in terms of colouration. I couldn't easily tell my units and enemy units apart; I mean, it's easy to see the difference if you have two units to compare, but it's hard to get the grasp of a very important big picture. If the cores were more saturated, the game would have been much easier to follow. Excluding these way too similar designs, I've found the graphics to be mostly functional and the music appropriate. I would probably have liked a bit more of an eye candy in the background or something, but it's something secondary. The music was adequate as well. I'm not even sure if it's OVERCOME ALL ODDS or maybe ADAPTATION anymore; that's probably because - let's face it - you will likely end up with an OVERCOME ALL ODDS game without even aiming for it. On second thought, I guess the fact that the boards change, along with the environment, is a strong ADAPTATION factor, so I'm actually count it as a good (if not immediately obvious) use of theme. Going to take down a few points for not having difficulty level and round number selection, and also having a board bug causing a crash, probable enough that I've encountered it. Reel Fruit Slots by Oyakiiv With 4 of 4 games so far using "OVERCOME ALL ODDS" theme simply by meaning "overcome whatever difficulties dev came up with", I welcome the use of theme that at least factors the "ODDS" as literal "chances". That said, however, I've found the gameplay to be somewhat mediocre and clunky. At first I didn't even know that it's only the explosions that deal damage. Also, I had to re-read the instructions to find out what are the payoffs, as they seemed to make no sense during the game; eventually, I've found that only cherries were guaranteed to give a payoff, while all the other fruits (and a seven) needed to come in triples. Would be really nice to get some reel-time feedback about what sort of prize is on the table. Also, maybe some kind of difficulty progression instead of slowly wearing down the health? (also, personally I'd enjoy this game more if instead of moving left/right and jumping it involved full-fledged bullet hell with fruits making fancy patterns; but maybe it's just me) The graphics weren't particularly great, but at least they were functional. The music was fitting, I suppose. The idea is pretty cool, and I appreciate some effort put into the use of theme, but the execution still needs work. Keep going. ^^' Rise by The M "They see me crawlin', they hatin'" For what it's worth, this game at least makes it clear that the protagonist is overcoming some severe difficulty, though I'm pretty sure the grappling hook makes the hardships easier to get through than a simple jump would. ^^' The gameplay mechanics were somewhat original, with the use of grappling hook being particularly prominent. At the same time, I've found it to be somewhat monotonous - eventually, it boiled down to crawling segments, grappling and swinging back and forth and sometimes rising to avoid a boulder or something, with some boss battles mixed in. The graphics were nice, especially in the later parts of the game (which coincidentally have been locked out in the original Jam entry, oh well); I particularly liked the growth-themed area. The audio was appropriate, too. The mechanics were mostly functional, though felt kinda buggy at times. One noteworthy thing was the segment in the final area, where moving forward ended up with the main character rolling around just enough to fall of to own doom; some serious level design issue, here... A pretty game with a nice general concept, but the execution ended up somewhat monotonous. ROYal RUMble by Misu, Yal Finally... after like an hour of uninterrupted playing and 337 deaths I completed this. What kind of hellspawn it was? If you had the time to make all these levels and these extremely annoying unlimited range player-aiming turrets and that deaths counter, couldn't you have spent it on something as simple as saving system? Having an option to resume the game later would have been far more welcome to me than this quite a large, but somewhat unnecessary amount of content. Speaking of the content - there are quite many levels, but they provide little variety of challenges (to the point where one of levels seems to have been repeated). What's worse, there are these relentless player-aiming turrets that simple won't give me a rest, even at a respawn point. Quite a shame, because from what I've noticed the game seems to have some nice level design progression in terms of decoration (going from a sea-like to cave-like and finally volcano-like location) and I would have liked some clear breather points to appreciate it more. In particular, one thing that caught my attention after n-th attempt was the background surrounding the final boss area. Pretty good job here. Nonetheless, I feel like the game could do with some levels removed (and the aiming turrets eradicated because they're mean :<) - the experience isn't varied enough, and after a while these levels become stale (a special kind of stale where you have to jump around like mad because of certain turrets). Instead of stuffing the game with generic content I'd suggest emphasizing The music in this game was pretty fine; I found the last boss track particularly fitting. The jump sound effect was glorious. There were also other sound effects, but jump trumps them all. One thing I noticed is that the chemicals collection sound often wouldn't play upon collecting. I don't know why would that be. One thing I really appreciate is the ability to see through wall if camera ends up behind one; even if I moved the camera to some tricky angle, I was still able to make out the situation. On the other hand, I kinda missed an ability to look high upwards - it would have been particularly useful against the last boss. Other thing I appreciate is that the chemicals (yes, apparently the game was meant to address CHEMICAL REACTIONS, too, aside from Jammers' favourite OVERCOME ALL ODDS...) didn't respawn after death; if I had to collect them all in one go and then get back to the exit, I probably wouldn't make it through this game. >.< (I don't know if that lack of respawning is a deliberate design choice or just overlooking a mistake, but it turned out well in the end) For what it's worth, it's not really a bad game. It's just that it happens to be a rage game, submitted for a Jam with lots of other entries played around late night. And I'd rather not play rage games around Jams, because I tend not to give up before I complete them and I end up losing lots of time because of that. So yeah, please keep your game content in moderate amounts, and make sure to build upon the aspects that make the game stand out instead of adding filler. ^^' Snowball in Hell by AndrewN So, is hell exothermic or endothermic? That was a nice short little game. I like nice short games these days. So, the idea of a sentient snowball being sent to hell for a crime it didn't do is lovely (well, maybe not being sent to hell, but the sentient snowball and what sort of things it can do). Now I'm torn between this and Wizzy Gizzard for the Best Story award, and that's saying something. The gameplay was alright, though I don't like the hold-to-jump design choice; I feel in this game press-to-jump gives a better control and precision to the player's actions and prevents unwanted jumps in a somewhat hectic game. I'm not sure whether snowball getting bigger was meant to be a good thing (because if it gets too small it'll melt quicker) or a bad thing (because it becomes a bigger target). If it's the former, then I'd really suggest getting a more compelling reason to roll around in snow than the melting speed, because fireballs one-hit-kill me anyway, and getting bigger just increases chances of being hit; maybe a certain amount of snow would give enough protection to allow withstanding one more hit from the obstacles? The graphics and music worked well for this game; the artwork was a good use of what seems to be the classic 16-colour palette, and the audio enhanced the experience as well. I believe there's nothing more I can said about the theme that was used here. Overall, quite a decent and fun entry, it could have been expanded upon (I mean, the very idea of sentient snowball mixed with divine judgment is endearing). Well done. Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu The first game (7th played so far) that seems to actually use a theme without OVERDONE ALL ODDS. Thank goodness. The mechanics are somewhat simple, yet the game is anything but. On the one hand I need to coordinate the shapes and colours with the incoming objects, on the other hand I need to steer the player shape to actually grab or avoid these objects. And by hands I mean literal hands, because the control scheme uses both WSAD and arrow keys; not exactly a fan of this design choice, I don't like multiple directional controls in general, but maybe it's just me. It was somewhat fun at start, but then around level 2 the game picked up so much speed that I could barely keep up, just kinda going with the flow and trying to grab various objects I wanted. At that point, the adaptation mechanic became kinda useless, because before I could change my setup properly, I was already passing through another object. So I guess that's a balance issue here; I'd rather have more emphasis on the adaptation aspect rather than the spatial alignment one. The audiovisuals worked pretty great in this game. They aren't particularly complex, but the 3D-like tunnel with all these twists and turns, the starry background (maybe there could have been some more particle effects, though I guess they aren't that necessary) When I tried to leave the game with F12, it kinda broke and I had to use Ctrl + Alt + Delete to actually close it. Pretty solid entry, overall. I appreciate that it didn't use the seemingly most overdone theme this Jam, and that it didn't drag on for too long, either... Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc, Toque I can always count on cultural references in HayMan's games, but this time he's outdone himself. ^^ So, I tried out the post-Jam version, but I couldn't make it all the way to the end on my two attempts (I died on week 9 on my first run >.<), and then I played the Jam version which is essentially super-easy mode, and finally made it. Having played both together, I could finally appreciate the game for what it was. The gameplay is simple, but enjoyable and complements the story nicely. However, the obstacle collision system seems way too overeager, especially on the dog + hydrant obstacle. What's more, there seem to be no invincibility frames in place, which is pretty much why I couldn't make it to the end in the first place - I died by hitting the same obstacle twice. It's quite a severe bug, especially in a game that restarts all the way to the beginning instead of letting the player replay the level. In a story-driven game like that, with a definite ending, I strongly recommend giving an option to continue from the last level, maybe with all the score zeroed out. That way those who would want to get high score would replay the game, while those who simply want to enjoy the story (like me, especially as a reviewer) will be able to do just that. The game is quite rich in content, filled with references when it comes to both obstacles and the dates themselves, and I love it. My favourite part was the interactible Ghost Busters signboard, kinda wish there were more fun elements like that. The dates were also pretty well made and fun (nice effect with this date close-up and that comment), and I enjoyed the ending (it's simple, but quite a few games nowadays have this tendency to end up on a bad note). All that in the sauce of stylish retro graphics (with sprite rotation, but whatever) and a fitting music. A game well done. I'm gonna jot down a few virtual points for having no level progression system in the Jam game version, but at least it let me complete the game in the first place... ^^' Woodcutter by darijs1 So, after a while I started wondering what soundtrack should I use in place of the missing BGM in this game. Eventually, I settled for a certain hit from the Lumberzacks. This was hard at start, then it picked up the pace, then it eventually became impossibly hard with zombies getting nearly as fast as my diagonal speed. The midgame was the most fun part, probably because I had a reasonable chopping speed and the zombies didn't quite go from tortoises to hares yet. Even so, at that point the zombies were already something to kill with fire, with any attempt to defeat them with axe resulting in swift death. They should be seriously nerfed, and they shouldn't gain speed when the player character doesn't. >.< Aside from these balance issues, I found the artwork working pretty well with the game, though I'd have liked some more variety. The sounds were adequate, too. One pretty cool design choice was this halo of light pointing towards the campfire during night - it was pretty nice and extremely useful touch. On a more technical note, I greatly appreciate the fact that the game saves progress. If not for that, I'd probably quit pretty quickly. It's a sixth game of six games I tried so far that seems to be using OVERCOME ALL ODDS theme, and it's one of the more basic ones, too. This theme is way too broad... Zombie Assault: Against All Odds by Misty The helicopter model is probably the most adorable thing I've seen this day. Completed the 1 minute melee. Attempted 5 minute melee to unlock the other map, but gave up after being surrounded by all these zombies and quickly taken down. I've already had plenty of difficult games, and I've got many more to play. ^^' Mechanically, the game is pretty functional. I also appreciate making a first-person shooter here, which is not a usual genre chosen by Jammers. The theme choice, however, was painfully usual, but I'm pretty sure anyone who's read all the previous reviews knows my stance on it already. Also, I haven't found the gameplay to be particularly varied, with apparently one kind of enemy, two kinds of weapons and a bunch of collectibles. The helicopter was a nice addition, though I'd have preferred a clearer indication about what I'm supposed to do with the helicopter. One thing I've found quite annoying is when sometimes zombies seemed to appear out of nowhere and attack me from the back or something. How am I supposed to watch out for zombies spawning behind me (if it's what happens, which it seems like)? >.< The graphics are alright (the helicopter is a class of its own). The music works properly with the game, too. Overall, a nice entry to play, though not particularly remarkable.
ReviewsTop 3: PHAGE by FrostyCat A well thought out board game The gameplay actually has a lot more depth to it than it appeared at first, it's got me playing for quite some time Nice board designs that seem to be inspired by all kinds of mathematical and physical shapes Nice introduction screen Music and sound effects fit the whole I did encounter the bug, unfortunately, although not every time, will download the post-jam version later Lock and Key by Relic A very nice use of the theme, also a great concept Nice presentation, music and sfx It was very hard to control the enzyme using keyboard controls While still quite doable in the tutorial, it was really near impossible to bind in the actual levels Using a gamepad worked very well, though I got a fatal error in the highscore controller Duality2 by Matharoo A solid entry and very nicely presented I like the humour in the dialogues It feels like the connection to the theme is missing a bit, though Best ofs: Best use of THEME: Lock and Key by Relic Best Concept: PHAGE by FrostyCat Best Presentation: Duality2 by Matharoo Best Story: Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc, Toque Best Devlog: PHAGE by FrostyCat Full ranking: Spoiler PHAGE by FrostyCat Lock and Key by Relic Duality2 by Matharoo Liquid Bacon by Acr515, Ralucipe Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc, Toque Rise by The M Au Début Ça Va by Team Vive Le France Little Lost Hero by GameDevDan Gambrawl by Siolfor the Jackal Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu Overcome by Sam Spade My Gold by NazGhuL ROYal RUMble by Misu, Yal Snowball in Hell by AndrewN Black and ****e by Ghandpivot I Wanna Get To School In One Piece by sp202 Zombie Assault: Against All Odds by Misty Woodcutter by darijs1 King Of Deals by joh Against All Odd by Yal Eel Lady Cat Constest by TinyGamesLab juegOS HD Early Access by Alice, Mercerenies Find the Cure! by UnEarthly Ethan Reel Fruit Slots by Oyakiiv Comments: Spoiler Against All Odd by Yal A test of typist skill This game kept me entertained for longer than I initially expected Graphics are basic, but work A good, but simple mechanic The link to the theme is rather simple Au Début Ça Va by Team Vive Le France Very nice presentation, although really busy Black and ****e by Ghandpivot Not sure where the theme was in this game Simple, yet nice and clean presentation The music fits the mood of this game well Good platformer mechanics, but very hard to advance (but challenging!) Duality2 by Matharoo A solid entry and very nicely presented I like the humour in the dialogues It feels like the connection to the theme is missing a bit, though Eel Lady Cat Constest by TinyGamesLab The game is fun for a short while, but gets a bit too repetitive after that many levels, without more variation in gameplay Nice graphics and music Great cat sounds! Find the Cure! by UnEarthly Ethan As simple as it is, I really like the concept behind this game Fits the theme well Graphics are basic, yet fit the purpose Gambrawl by Siolfor the Jackal A nice game Graphically very nice, the attack animations look really good Fitting audio The pace feels a bit slow and also, transitions between screens are a bit slow I Wanna Get To School In One Piece by sp202 Very short game, but a really neat mechanic Graphics are a bit too simple, no audio unfortunately The story is simple but it's nice that there is one juegOS HD Early Access by Alice, Mercerenies Couldn't really figure out what I am supposed to do here The graphics are basic No audio, unfortunately Liquid Bacon by Acr515, Ralucipe A great sense of humour in this entry The game was a bit slow at times Graphics are basic, but good Really like the background music in this one Little Lost Hero by GameDevDan A nice little game, the concept of this sets it apart One thing, however, is that it becomes hard to figure out the movement patterns at a certain point Good consistent look and sound Lock and Key by Relic A very nice use of the theme, also a great concept Nice presentation, music and sfx It was very hard to control the enzyme using keyboard controls While still quite doable in the tutorial, it was really near impossible to bind in the actual levels Using a gamepad worked very well, though I got a fatal error in the highscore controller My Gold by NazGhuL Fun to play for a while Graphics are okay The mechanic is simple, but fun Overcome by Sam Spade A very unique presentation Although the menus are very nice, it becomes a bit annoying to wait a few seconds before you get the menu Doesn't seem to fit aspect ratios other than 16/9 The gameplay felt unique, although I had no idea what I was doing PHAGE by FrostyCat A well thought out board game The gameplay actually has a lot more depth to it than it appears at first, it's got me intrigued for quite some time Nice board designs that seem to be inspired by all kinds of mathematical and physical shapes Nice introduction screen Music and sound effects fit the whole I did encounter the bug, unfortunately, although not every time Reel Fruit Slots by Oyakiiv This game is fun to play for a moment I like the idea of combining platformer mechanics with the slots game But it's a bit too basic Graphics could be better Rise by The M The hook mechanic is really nice Graphics and music are fitting well Overall, a good entry Unfortunately, the bonus item appeared to be a fatal error ROYal RUMble by Misu, Yal A fun game to play for a short while Gameplay felt a bit too basic Simple graphics, yet a few nice 3D effects, such as the rolling ball and shadows Music and sfx are okay Snowball in Hell by AndrewN A very nice little entry, although it's basically a platform game Everything fits together very well Quite simple graphics and good audio that fits the game I really like the attention that has gone into the details: the melting blocks, the snow, the snowball increasing in size I did get a fatal error, unfortunately Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu Nice looking game Good gameplay It was quite a challenge to get the shapes right Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc, Toque Great humour in this game Everything fits together well, graphics and sound The sound effect for scoring points seems to date from the pre-GM5 era The actual game mechanic is a bit simple. It would've been nice if the levels got longer Woodcutter by darijs1 I really like the work that seems to have gone in all the little details in this entry The woodcutting animation is nice, the fact that it takes some time to cut down a tree makes it a bit more realistic, the particle effects also contribute to the overall presentation It would be nice if there were some indication of the camp spot, since it's easy to get lost Zombie Assault: Against All Odds by Misty A nice little 3D game Graphics are basic, but that didn't really hinder the actual gameplay It felt a bit odd for a 3d game to not be able to rotate the camera up and down using the mouse
So... I missed the Jam, but I've played through the games. I apologise in advance for my lack of comments outside the top three... not that there is much of that either >.> Top 3: Liquid Bacon by Acr515, Ralucipe I liked the style, there was plenty of amusing characters as well. Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc, Toque The humour is good, I ended up not being able to finish it due to stuff spawning in front of the diner. PHAGE by FrostyCat I ended up playing this one for quite a bit. The music and sound fit well. Full ranking: Spoiler Liquid Bacon by Acr515, Ralucipe Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc, Toque PHAGE by FrostyCat Little Lost Hero by GameDevDan Au Début Ça Va by Team Vive Le France Duality2 by Matharoo Eel Lady Cat Constest by TinyGamesLab Snowball in Hell by AndrewN Rise by The M Overcome by Sam Spade I Wanna Get To School In One Piece by sp202 Zombie Assault: Against All Odds by Misty Lock and Key by Relic King Of Deals by joh ROYal RUMble by Misu, Yal Find the Cure! by UnEarthly Ethan Against All Odd by Yal Gambrawl by Siolfor the Jackal My Gold by NazGhuL Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu Woodcutter by darijs1 Johnny's Escape by Bart Black and ****e by Ghandpivot juegOS HD Early Access by Alice, Mercerenies Reel Fruit Slots by Oyakiiv
~ Micah's Reviews ~ Top 3: Little Lost Hero by @GameDevDan Spoiler: video playthrough & comments Only bad thing I can say is the cyan dudes put too much luck into the mix, and perhaps the boss could've used a HP bar or slightly less HP, since, once you figure out how to beat him, it's just rinse and repeat. Aside from the gripes, I love the 1-bit graphics (well, 1-bit per tile, I guess; dunno if that's still considered 1-bit). For 1-bit, they are nice. The humor is great, the difficulty curve isn't without flaws, but it's still pretty good. The variation in gameplay and puzzle solving kept things interesting throughout. Well done. And the ending is awesome. King Of Deals by @Joh Spoiler: video playthrough & comments Exceptional use of the adaptation theme, with the middle cards modifying the deck values, causing players to rethink what they want in hand. I really wish I was more in tune with games like this, but alas, it's not my forte, so I struggled a bit to understand all of what was going on. At least I got enough understanding to feel somewhat comfortable with the mechanics. It could've used some card movement sounds, but it's not a huge Deal. The game feels pretty complete and polished. Well done. Duality2 by @matharoo Spoiler: video playthrough & comments YASSS BOIS!! We started from Duality now we here. I just realized I collected souls and gems for nothing, right? Aw well, it was still fun. A worthy sequel, mr senpai. Smash rocks, get gems. Best ofs: Best use of Theme: King Of Deals by @Joh Best Concept: PHAGE by @FrostyCat Best Presentation: Eel Lady Cat Constest by @TinyGamesLab Best Story: Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by @HayManMarc, @Toque Best Devlog: Overcome by @samspade Full ranking: Spoiler Little Lost Hero by GameDevDan King Of Deals by joh Duality2 by Matharoo Gambrawl by Siolfor the Jackal PHAGE by FrostyCat Snowball in Hell by AndrewN Eel Lady Cat Constest by TinyGamesLab ROYal RUMble by Misu, Yal Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu Woodcutter by darijs1 Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc, Toque Liquid Bacon by Acr515, Ralucipe Against All Odd by Yal Rise by The M Au Début Ça Va by Team Vive Le France My Gold by NazGhuL Lock and Key by Relic Black and shìte by Ghandpivot Johnny's Escape by Bart I Wanna Get To School In One Piece by sp202 Zombie Assault: Against All Odds by Misty Overcoming All Aliens by Dengar, Micnasr juegOS HD Early Access by Alice, Mercerenies Reel Fruit Slots by Oyakiiv Overcome by Sam Spade Find the Cure! by UnEarthly Ethan Playthrough Videos & Comments: Spoiler Against All Odd by Yal Playthrough Video w Comments It's not like typing to kill things is new, but I do like how you used the theme to be odd and even numbers. I actually had a minesweeper/lights out-ish concept I wanted to do which also had a similar take on the theme with even numbers being good and having to take out all the odd numbered things, so I obviously approve. I'm a bit sad to see it's zombies, but at least it's not a very typical use of zombies, I guess. Overall, the gameplay was fun enough to keep me entertained for a while, and I think the theme usage was good. Au Début Ça Va by Team Vive Le France Playthrough Video w Comments The tiny flying car thing you control can be hard to see at times and easy to lose track of. Didn't find the gameplay all that fun, tbh. Vibrant and cool graphics. Solid use of the adaptation theme. I guess overcoming all odds is being used too? All in all, not a bad game, just not enjoyable enough to me. Black and shìte by Ghandpivot Playthrough Video w Comments So difficult (for me) that I couldn't bring myself to suffer through the whole thing, or hardly any of it, tbh. I really want to play a game fully if I can, but it was just too painful for me. I hope you understand. I will say that - from what I saw - there's a pretty good variation in traps and situations, so well done on that. Eel Lady Cat Constest by TinyGamesLab Playthrough Video w Comments Very nice and cute art. The difficulty curve wasn't bad, but it certainly wasn't great either. Thankfully most every level was super easy, so it didn't matter. A few buttons like the home and restart didn't seem to work as intended? I was also sad it didn't save progress, though it's not hard to do it all in one go. Overall I thought this was a really charming game, and I'm a dog person (gasp!). Find the Cure! by UnEarthly Ethan Playthrough Video w Comments Seems like you focused too much on the theme instead of good gameplay. The ending animation part is cool though. Gambrawl by Siolfor the Jackal Playthrough Video w Comments Experienced a bit of lag at times, though not severe by any stretch, though it really shouldn't happen on my rig. I haven't messed with Spine, but I assume your game uses that and that's what does it? Not sure. The only other downside is no winning point. Aside from that, I really enjoyed it. Awesome work. And, man, love the music. Your art is always good too. I love pixel art, but it's nice to see this stuff too. I Wanna Get To School In One Piece by sp202 Playthrough Video w Comments Got a little laugh out of it. Thankful for the rewind feature and that it's super short. Seems to me a success in making a game in the vein of I Wanna Be The Guy. If this was longer, I would probably hate it, so keeping it short is perfect, lol. Johnny's Escape by Bart Playthrough Video w Comments I was a little confused on what to do, but that might be largely due to my lack of really looking at the HUD elements that much. It seemed like I needed to combine things, but I wasn't sure how to pick stuff up or what was wrong. I like that you can modify the character's body parts. I realized later that I could make the eyes bigger and increase my vision, so that's cool. juegOS HD Early Access by Alice, Mercerenies Playthrough Video w Comments Really only ranked this so low because there is no gameplay in the jam version. Very sad, because I played your 0.2 version and very much enjoyed it (as you'll see in the above video). Lots of potential to be a great puzzle game. I hope you'll continue with it. Liquid Bacon by Acr515, Ralucipe Playthrough Video w Comments No idea how to get a bouncy potion, so I was unable to finish, even with the help in the afterword. It felt like a bit of a drag, just running around collecting things. At least the humor is great and the graphics have some character. Lock and Key by Relic Playthrough Video w Comments One of the most imaginative and in-depth uses of the theme of chemical reactions. Very good use of the theme as far as that goes. That said, I didn't find the gameplay all that fun though, so I'm a bit torn on the theme usage truly being great. It's definitely good, for sure. In the end, I like that you tried something more unique, even if it isn't super fun for me; it was entertaining enough for a jam game. My Gold by NazGhuL Playthrough Video w Comments Suffers from lack of explaining a number of things and the difficulty balancing seems off, making it quite hard. Sad to say that I didn't find the gameplay all that enjoyable. Overall an interesting concept and a pretty good use of the themes. I think you actually went for all 3 themes? Chemical reactions are obviously a thing and it appears you're overcoming all odds as well, but I'd consider adaptation being in here too, though slightly. So that's cool. Graphics are pretty good too. Overcome by Sam Spade Playthrough Video w Comments The choice to make things blurry wasn't great, imo. I couldn't even tell what was really going on, or even how to win, if possible. Overcoming All Aliens by Dengar, Micnasr Playthrough Video w Comments It'd be nice if it saved my high score, since the goal of the game is simply to get as high a score as possible. Overall, pretty simple game, but it's very functional and complete enough for a good play. It's your first jam game, right? You did far better than I did. Even though I didn't rank it all that high, I still think it's something you should be proud of. PHAGE by FrostyCat Playthrough Video w Comments Awesome game that reminded me of a Dos game I used to play a lot back in the day called Hexxagon (from 1993). Not sure if your game was inspired by that or not, but I love how your game is similar but also has deeper gameplay due to expanded elements of tiles having meaning in terms of score and even having safe zones. Very cool. The graphics are nice enough. Since this is all about the gameplay, not much else matters to me. You did awesome. I thoroughly enjoyed the remastered version as well. The freeze isn't such a huge deal since it rarely happens with the less than 5% chance of occurring, so I didn't rank this much lower than I would have if that didn't exist. Reel Fruit Slots by Oyakiiv Playthrough Video w Comments Seems incomplete in some ways. A unique idea to combine slots with a simple dodge platformer thing, so that's cool. Theme use is okay. Rise by The M Playthrough Video w Comments Unfortunately, I didn't get far before the error: Spoiler ___________________________________________ ############################################################################################ FATAL ERROR in action number 1 of Step Eventobj_level_change for object obj_player: Variable obj_player.level(100034, -2147483648) not set before reading it. at gml_Object_obj_player_Collision_23 ############################################################################################ -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- stack frame is gml_Object_obj_player_Collision_23 (line -1) I assume this is what you were talking about in the discussion? Anyway, I did play the fixed version before this jam version, and it was pretty good, but sadly I must vote based on this version, in the spirit of fairness, so that's why it will rank a bit low. ROYal RUMble by Misu, Yal Playthrough Video w Comments WHY ? Why did you make this? Why did I force myself to play the whole game?? It would've been nice to give a grace period when jumping off the edges of platforms. It felt like I couldn't truly jump off the edge. The other main gripe is that I could rotate the camera to look down, which is great, but I couldn't rotate upward, which made a few situations a bit cheap and unfair, especially with the ending boss, since he flys up in the air and you can easily lose track of him and he has no shadow so you can get unlucky and have him go out of sight the rain bullets down on you. And the camera going inside of things made it a bit too hard to see at times. Lastly, the dark levels made shots very hard to see. It was kind of terrible, whether intentional or not. Overlooking the obscene difficulty and flaws, it was a decent 3D platformer game, and at the very least, you did make the potions remain collected, even after dying, so that made it FAR more bearable. The difficulty curve was a little shaky at points, spiking a bit, but it was okay. I think I rated this higher than I should have, because of the rum.... Snowball in Hell by AndrewN Playthrough Video w Comments Man, I love the graphics. The game felt good, the length made it short and sweet. A very solid little game. Really loved it. Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu Playthrough Video w Comments The tunnel effect is cool. Could've used difficulty levels which would limit shapes and colors used. I found it to be too challenging to nail all that many colors and shapes. I think I would've enjoyed it more if I could've had less colors and shapes to worry about. The tunnel traveling is quite cool. An interesting and good use of the adaptation theme. Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc, Toque Playthrough Video w Comments I almost prefer the quicker levels, lol! The fixed version is just a tad long, but not at all bad, but anyway, even with the short level problem, it's still pretty good. All that good humor is in there. I found both the jam version and fixed version to be quite enjoyable. Some of the jokes I didn't get until later though. Sorry for being a bit out of it while recording (if you watch the recorded playthrough). Woodcutter by darijs1 Playthrough Video w Comments Sadly, survival games generally aren't my thing. Still, it's a fair use of the overcoming all odds theme, and perhaps adaptation as well? I enjoyed the animations more than a normal person should. Aside from a few HUD elements, the graphics had a pretty nice look to them. Zombie Assault: Against All Odds by Misty Playthrough Video w Comments Zombies. Pretty unimaginative use of the theme., To be fair, you weren't the only one to go with zombies though. Still, you did zombies last time too. The gameplay is okay. It was entertaining enough to play for a little while.
FrostyCat's GMC Jam 31 Reviews Top 3: Lock and Key by Relic A top-down action game where the player is a digestive enzyme trying to bind to fat and sugar molecules. Good presentation, smooth learning curve and easy to pick up. An excellent Jam entry by any measure. Gambrawl by Siolfor the Jackal A simple fighting game in an apocalyptic setting combined with a betting mechanic. Excellent presentation on all fronts, great UX, just some minor issues with balance. Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu An fast-paced abstract 3D rail scroller game where the player adapts a crosshair's shape to suit incoming pickups of various colours and shapes. Pretty impressive for a 1-day entry. Best of: Best Use of THEME: Gambrawl by Siolfor the Jackal Best Concept: Lock and Key by Relic Best Presentation: Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu Best Story: Liquid Bacon by Acr515, Ralucipe Best Devlog: Overcome by Sam Spade Best Reviewer: Micah_DS Rubric: Spoiler Rubric: 15 for Concept and general execution (A) 10 for graphical presentation (B) 15 for supporting presentation (C) 10 for theme usage (D) Overall score: (A+B+C+D) Great: 42-50 Good: 32-41 OK: 25-31 Poor: <25 Theme score: (D) Great: 10 Good: 8-9 OK: 5-7 Poor: <5 Concept: (A) Great: 13-15 Good: 10-12 OK: 8-9 Poor: <8 Presentation score: (B+C) Great: 22-25 Good: 18-21 OK: 14-17 Poor: <14 Story: Rated on a case-by-case basis, if included. Full Ranking: Spoiler Lock and Key by Relic Gambrawl by Siolfor the Jackal Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu My Gold by NazGhuL Liquid Bacon by Acr515, Ralucipe Against All Odd by Yal Little Lost Hero by GameDevDan Snowball in Hell by AndrewN Duality2 by Matharoo Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc, Toque Find the Cure! by UnEarthly Ethan Zombie Assault: Against All Odds by Misty ROYal RUMble by Misu, Yal Rise by The M Woodcutter by darijs1 King Of Deals by joh Reel Fruit Slots by Oyakiiv Au Début Ça Va by Team Vive Le France Black and ****e by Ghandpivot Eel Lady Cat Constest by TinyGamesLab Overcome by Sam Spade Johnny's Escape by Bart I Wanna Get To School In One Piece by sp202 Comments: Spoiler Lock and Key by Relic Overall: Great Theme: Great Concept: Great Presentation: Great Story: N/A Overall (47/50) A top-down action game where the player is a digestive enzyme trying to bind to fat and sugar molecules. Good presentation, smooth learning curve and easy to pick up. An excellent Jam entry by any measure. Concept and Execution (14/15) The concept is an original mix of a resource management game and a top-down action game. The two-handed movement controls took a little while to get used to, but eventually it clicked thanks to the built-in tutorial. The temperature and pH meter mechanics added some variation, though with a tip after the stomach level I was able to game the system and minimize the number of manual adjustments. I was also unable to find any significant bugs during my session, which is a definite plus. My only complaint is that the tolerance for rotation is a little low, and the button presses for A were sometimes unresponsive. Graphical Presentation (8/10) The graphics are simple, but they made sense in context. The tweening effects were a nice touch and helped smooth over transitions. One minor issue is that the villi animation in the small intestine level caused the game to lag a little due to number of texture primitives. Supporting Presentation (15/15) The subtle background chewing and gurgling sound effects were effective in communicating the setting. The sound effects for fitting a substrate were a little exaggerated, but I see the point and they fit. The music had a slight "scientific" feel to it, helped communicate the main point of the game, and didn't distract from gameplay. Theme Usage (10/10) This is a fitting way to demonstrate the Chemical Reaction theme, and the temperature and pH mechanic also gives a hint of the Adaptation theme as well. When I first proposed the theme, I expected entries where things are simply gathered in scoring sets, but this is a step above. Additional notes: I played this entry in gamepad mode only. Gambrawl by Siolfor the Jackal Overall: Great Theme: Great Concept: Great Presentation: Great Story: Good Overall (46/50) A simple fighting game in an apocalyptic setting combined with a betting mechanic. Excellent presentation on all fronts, great UX, just some minor issues with balance. Concept and Execution (11/15) I like the idea of being both the better and the cage fighter in this entry. Except for the zombies, every other type of enemy is unique and have meaningful counter play. However, the apparent swarming limit got in the way of zombies and shadow men from ever becoming a genuine threat even at 3 dice. After a handful of zombie and shadow man all-ins (I even rerolled for a higher number on two occasions), I was already a millionaire. Without a set amount to work towards, it detracted from the authenticity of the story. My streak ended with a bug: if you get knocked down near the bottom-right corner, you would stand back up under the bottom border, unable to hit or be hit by anything. I had to quit from there, but I have enough to say that I'm impressed with this entry. -2 for "invincible ringout" bug (PM me for screenshot) Graphical Presentation (10/10) A solid, consistent vector style. Though there isn't much variety, everything that's there is done well and work together. I am particularly impressed with how smooth the animations are with the amount of time you've been given. Supporting Presentation (15/15) The music and sound effects were all spot-on. Definitely sounds like the underground on the betting screen and a boxing ring on the main game screen. Can't find fault with it. The menu system is by far the most comprehensive of all the entries I've seen thus far. The controls were well explained, as well as the rules of the game. I'm glad that you had the guts to abandon the glitz mentioned in the afterwords in favour of having a solid user experience, that is the strongest asset of this entry. Theme Usage (10/10) I like how this entry uses the "Against All Odds" theme two ways, one in the more figurative sense (fighting one's way out) and the other in the numerical sense (betting odds). Though I eventually learned to exploit the latter, it's still a solid fit and I couldn't have done it better. Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu Overall: Great Theme: Good Concept: Good Presentation: Great Story: N/A Overall (45/50) An fast-paced abstract 3D rail scroller game where the player adapts a crosshair's shape to suit incoming pickups of various colours and shapes. Concept and Execution (12/15) I can see the shadow of "infinite runner" games in this entry, but the addition of 3D graphics and the "adaptation" mechanic greatly enhances the originality and adds a new dimension of play. The engine ran smoothly, the tunnel generator created an excellent sense of depth and distance, and the speed scaling was gradual enough to make it fun for both beginners and experienced players. Changing between 4 different modes using only a previous-next key scheme became slightly unwieldy at higher speeds, however. Unfortunately, there is an on-exit crash on my Windows 7 system that just says the program has stopped working. A rough landing, but still not bad all-round. Penalties -2 on exit crash Graphical Presentation (10/10) Very consistent geometric graphics, and the 3D deserves some credit for the amount of time given to implement it. I like how the tunnel is wireframed to allow for planning in advance while giving a sense of dynamic movement. Supporting Presentation (14/15) The sound and music are a perfect fit for the genre, and at higher speeds, the sound is key in feedback for whether the player has passed through a pickup properly. The navigation was usable (though perhaps not for beginners who aren't used to Function keys), and the supporting documentation helped me pick up the game with sufficient ease. Unfortunately the HUD was a little basic and off-theme compared to the rest of the presentation. Theme Usage (8/10) A decent "Adaptation" entry. The thematic fit isn't exactly the best, but I can see clear effort in making it part of the design and what's there is a central part of the mechanics. Compared to the overdone "Against All Odds" entries, this is worth commending. My Gold by NazGhuL Overall: Great Theme: Great Concept: Great Presentation: Good Story: N/A Overall (42/50) A dual-themed maze game where the player throws bottles of chemicals to collect gold and destroy gold-stealing zombies. Original concept, clean execution, and there is an element of strategy to it once you figure out the reactions (especially the 1-4 ice reaction). A very enjoyable entry. Concept and Execution (14/15) This would have been a rather dull concept if naively copied from a top-down tutorial to be yet another stock "Against All Odds" entry, but there is clear evidence of effort to adapt it to the "Chemical Reactions" theme and make it more interesting. Changing the basic attack to 4 variations that cross-interact with each other adds a dimension of strategy --- building walls using 4-1 (1-4 creates blocks that break on their own for some reason), collecting pickups with 1, creating control zones with 3, etc. I find myself balancing blockoffs and collecting gold on a constant basis, and that greatly enhances the playability and challenge of the entry. The game overall runs well, with the only demerits I could reasonably give being a lack of explanation for the reactions and the spawn rate increasing too fast. Graphical Presentation (8/10) Pretty basic style, but it works. It's apparent that the main player and zombie weren't part of the same set as the background and collectible items, but they blend in reasonably well. Supporting Presentation (11/15) The sound and music were spot on and they set the "Against All Odds" theme needed for the game. The help screen was helpful in getting me started, although a better overview of the chemical reactions would have helped reduce the learning curve. While I like how everything came together, I would have liked it better if you were more specific with the sources in the credits. Theme Usage (10/10) Dual-theme entries always impress me on this front, and this entry makes great use of "Chemical Reaction" and "Against All Odds". The weapons react with each other and help gather resources, and the zombies provide the "Against All Odds" element. Liquid Bacon by Acr515, Ralucipe Overall: Good Theme: Good Concept: Good Presentation: Good Story: Good Overall (41/50) A short RPG about getting "liquid bacon" after being turned down at a grocery store. Cute, humorous, and easy to pick up, though a little too limited in scope. Well-executed while it lasts. Concept and Execution (11/15) The concept of collecting formulas in an RPG environment isn't bad, and the engine is programmed pretty well to suit. The parallel projection is intuitive, and the in-game controls were self-documenting. The battle and inventory systems were simple and more or less modal, but they are done correctly and work without obvious mistakes. For the time given, this is an impressive result. Unfortunately the balance in the field to the south leaves much to be desired for. The spawn rate was just ridiculous, I can't move more than a dozen steps without getting a random event. In no time flat, I had a dozen apples, sticks, shovels and plastic wrappers. This is one of several reasons why I never even considered doing an RPG entry for the GMC Jam --- balance always becomes the first casualty of the time limit and it always sticks out like a sore thumb. Graphical Presentation (9/10) A fun, clean vector-and-stickman style. The animations were smooth and seamless, and show a lot of personal character. However, the texture work (e.g. grass, wallpaper, etc.) could use some additional work to blend in better. Supporting Presentation (13/15) The music was quirky and helps set up the story well. Sound effects were rather sparse, but they made sense when they came up. The humour fits well in context and greatly enhances the tone of the story. The README file had everything I need to start playing the game, though I would have liked it better if there was a menu system in-game prefacing how to play the game and where the sounds actually came from. Theme Usage (8/10) Looks like a "Chemical Reactions" entry from the start. There is definitely mechanical tie-in with the theme, such as being able to create reactions for items/bonuses and the final goal of making "liquid bacon". But outside that one goal and miscellaneous item use, it is otherwise a stock RPG engine edit. It just isn't as central to the game as I would have liked. Against All Odd by Yal Overall: Good Theme: Great Concept: Good Presentation: Good Story: N/A Overall (41/50) A typing mini-game where the player shoots zombies by typing out numbers on their heads in text form. A bit short, but everything in it works on the most part and it is replayable. Concept and Execution (11/15) I love the concept of bringing back those "typing games" from when I was a child in the early 2000s. Though a bit simple, the coding is well done on the most part. The game over screen was a technical hit-and-miss (unwanted transparency, zombie attack sounds still playing), but it isn't a breaking concern. What might be considered a breaking concern is how often the text labels garble by overlapping. The challenge would make much more sense by increasing the speed of the zombies, rather than the number spawned at the same time. Graphical Presentation (7/10) Kind of blobby and run-of-the-mill, but everything works together. Supporting Presentation (13/15) There are only 2 soundtracks and 2 sound effects, but they set the right atmosphere and for a simple entry I wouldn't ask for much more. The documentation is short and effective, and the navigation is easy to use. Theme Usage (10/10) Another great double entendre of the "Against All Odds" theme (fighting one's way out + odd as in "odd number"). I'm starting to like the diversity of this particular theme among the entries using it. Little Lost Hero by GameDevDan Overall: Good Theme: Poor Concept: Great Presentation: Great Story: OK Overall (40/50) A 4-bit style basic turn-based maze game, mechanically similar to Nitrome's "Turnament". The levels are plentiful and varied enough, but a bit on the easy side. The thematic fit is a bit forced, but saved somewhat by a rough storyline. Concept and Execution (13/15) As a mechanically simple entry, I evaluated mostly on the variations offered by level design. There were 20 levels, which isn't bad for a jam-length entry, and the final boss show evidence of deliberate design (e.g. the hand is always in your way if you just walk up to the button without using the fast-forward pads). The variety in enemies is a welcome addition, though the 4-legged walkers were too unpredictable compared to others and made the solution less predictable on levels that have them. Graphical Presentation (10/10) Consistent 4-bit graphics that extends even to the font. A little simple, but I guess that's the point. Supporting Presentation (13/15) The sound and music were of the same style as the 4-/8-bit era, and that's always a good start. I can't find much fault with either. The navigation flow is a little simple, but it's usable. The README file provides enough information to understand the game right away, though it would have been better if it was part of the game. I would have also liked it better if I was warned ahead of time that I get hurt by being next to an enemy instead of being on an enemy, since the latter is the case for most other games of the genre. Theme Usage (4/10) This is another case of stretching the "Against All Odds" theme so thin that any game of the same genre would fit. The only saving grace is that the story helps convey the theme that's otherwise indeterminable from mechanics alone. Snowball in Hell by AndrewN Overall: Good Theme: OK Concept: Good Presentation: Great Story: OK Overall (40/50) A short bottom-up platformer game with excellent coordination of 8-bit aesthetics across graphics, sound and music. Definitely a good starter entry. Concept and Execution (10/15) A little short, but quick and bug-free while it lasts. The idea of having a small cold protagonist in a hot game world sets an effective contrast. The keyboard movement was a significant pain point for me on this entry. The left-to-right movement was a little too fast given the amount of room I have to move. The jump was particularly troublesome, and I had several unwanted double jumps on platforms that were placed closed together. I would have preferred if the jumps triggered on keyboard_check_pressed() instead of keyboard_check(). Graphical Presentation (10/10) This is uncompromised 8-bit graphics that isn't just regular MS Paint work with a pixelization filter. The palette is done to-spec, and so is the font and even the palette-shift flash when the level is finished. Definitely the strongest asset of this entry. Supporting Presentation (15/15) The sound effects and music made perfect sense together, especially with the 8-bit graphics. The music in particular is very fitting and has a "run for your life" feel to it. I would have deducted points for not giving credits to music and sound effects, but since it could have been made by the author within the time limit, I'll pass on this one. Theme Usage (5/10) I think the theme is "Overcome All Odds", but I can't see specific effort to fit the theme. Any bottom-up platformer could have done the same work. Duality2 by Matharoo Overall: Good Theme: Poor Concept: Good Presentation: Great Story: OK Overall (36/50) A neo-pixel dungeon RPG featuring the author, several other GM community figures and monsters to fight. The engine runs smoothly and the graphics were beautifully done, but the level design was more or less just enemy spam, and there was no specific attempt at suiting any of the three themes. Concept and Execution (12/15) Pretty generic concept with a basic spin attack. The engine ran smoothly and the controls were reasonably responsive, so that's a good start. The meter on the spin attack prevents the player from having it turned on constantly, so that adds some element of strategy and placement. The Ehsan boss makes pretty good specific use of the spin attack, but outside of that it's just spin-and-go-and-rest-and-repeat most of the time. The mini games in the overworld was a nice variation, though. Graphical Presentation (10/10) Beautifully done neo-pixel graphics with exact style match on all fronts. I love how even the shading is done well on this entry, while on most other entries in the same style it was done poorly and detracted from presentation. Supporting Presentation (13/15) The sound and music were more or less the right style for the genre, but the dungeon theme was a little short and gets repetitive quickly. The key hints at the beginning of the game was all I needed to start playing, so that is a bonus. Theme Usage (1/10) I don't see any real connection to any of the 3 themes, this just looks like a generic action RPG engine edit. If this is "Against All Odds", sorry, it's going to take much more than an elevated amount of enemies for me to pass an entry off as that. Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc, Toque Overall: Good Theme: Poor Concept: Poor Presentation: Great Story: Good Overall (33/50) A side-scrolling "dodge-the-obstacle" game with funny romance-themed cutscenes. Great example of neo-pixel style graphics and humour, but too simple and has a faulty level generator. Concept and Execution (8/15) The concept of running past obstacles to meet a girlfriend never gets old, but the execution for this one feels too simple for my liking. Unfortunately there seems to be a serious issue with the way levels are generated in this entry. The Love Cafe could show up after around 3 or 4 obstacles, well before the progress meter at the bottom fills up. There was also one level where an obstacle was spawned on the goal and I was forced to hit it as I finish, and the main character walked over it. Penalties: -2 for spawning the Love Cafe too early -2 for spawning obstacles on the goal Graphical Presentation (10/10) Nice neo-pixel graphic style, and a lot of variety in obstacles and people at the Love Cafe. Can't really give any less. Supporting Presentation (12/15) The sound and music in this entry are simple and few in number, but they work while they last. This is the first Jam entry I've ever rated that used humour effectively. But without adequate support from other elements, it just feels like decor rather than a central part of the game. Theme Usage (3/10) I'd understand that finding true love is genuinely a work "Against All Odds" and the cutscenes definitely show it, but the theme just fits too loosely for me to give a pass. Find the Cure! by UnEarthly Ethan Overall: Good Theme: Good Concept: OK Presentation: Good Story: OK Overall (33/50) A colour mixing game using RGB and alpha that tells a line-by-line story as you successfully create the target colour. Nice idea, but the implementation makes it excessively difficult to hit the target because of the low margin of error and inability to tell a white background from transparency. Concept and Execution (8/15) I like the concept of mixing colours towards a target. The controls were straight forward, and the game ran smoothly in general. Simple but workable on the most part. But one mistake in the implementation pretty much ruined most of the game for me --- the target colour box. Because the background is pure white, you cannot tell a light tinge of green from a highly transparent green, and that could invalidate an visually valid solution. Even when alpha is discounted, the margin of error is on the low side for non-technical audiences. Graphical Presentation (7/10) Basic and slightly clashy (it's easy to tell which ones you drew and which ones were photographs), but they're passable. Supporting Presentation (11/15) The sound and music are next to minimal, but they are effective and I don't see any need for more. Unfortunately the "screen tearing" effect on the opening help screen just didn't work at all aesthetically and distracted me from reading the instructions. Theme Usage (8/10) Definitely looks like a "Chemical Reactions" game. I like how you made the mixing of chemicals a central challenge for the theme. Zombie Assault: Against All Odds by Misty Overall: Good Theme: OK Concept: Good Presentation: OK Story: OK Overall (32/50) A standard 3D FPS shooter with a swarming mechanic, where the player must survive for a set amount of time and get away on a helicopter. Everything works as intended and the atmosphere is great, but it is pretty stock and almost reminiscent of a tutorial mod. Concept and Execution (10/15) I think everyone knows what the concept is and would agree that the implementation is as it says on the lid. It runs well, the controls are responsive, and I can't spot anything out of line execution-wise. But strategically there is almost nothing to it --- just run forward constantly, reload whenever you don't see anything to shoot, and run up to zombies and point-blank them. There's also next to nothing that makes the game's design its own. Subtract material that you can find stock in a 3D FPS tutorial, and there wouldn't be much left. Graphical Presentation (5/10) The graphical coding is decent, the textures are fine on the most part, but the selection of graphics on certain areas leaves a lot to be desired for. The menu buttons look clashy and out-of-place, and the menu font is an artistic kind not designed for more than a word or two. And then there are the zombies. They didn't look like zombies, they just look like those black paper targets at a shooting range. Supporting Presentation (12/15) The sound and music are on-theme and effective together, and the use of 3D sound makes for an immersive experience. The menu is a little off, but the in-game parts are well done. Theme Usage (5/10) Looks like an "Against All Odds" entry and definitely has the feel of it, but like many other entries, there is an "any other game of the same genre would do" problem. There is no just specific attenpt to adapt the game. ROYal RUMble by Misu, Yal Overall: Good Theme: Poor Concept: OK Presentation: Good Story: N/A Overall (32/50) A 3D platformer featuring a rolling RoyTheShort smiley. Nice engine, good presentation, but the simple enemy spam just wasn't all that fun in the long run. Concept and Execution (10/15) Though I can't say the concept ties in well with the theme, it does work reasonably and is in an area seldom covered by the GM mainstream, so I'll give credit for that. The 3D collisions are intuitive once you learn to rotate with the mouse (not documented), and the controls are responsive on the most part. Unfortunately I am not exactly a fan of the level design. Lots of kill-on-loads, lots of blind corners and the later levels pretty much all resorted to stockpiling cannons. Also, at around level 8-10 the screen got stuck on loading. Penalties -2 for stuck level loading screen Graphical Presentation (8/10) The textures aren't bad in general. However, combined with ambient lighting, the texture on the stone blocks makes it hard to tell solid ground from a hole lined by stone blocks. Supporting Presentation (12/15) The sound and music don't really make sense for a platformer game loaded with so many cannons shooting at the same time, but given the subject of the game I'll give it a pass. The menu and in-game HUD work and look good, but I would have preferred if there was in-game access to the options menu. Theme Usage (2/10) Making it across such a high volume of cannons and hidden traps is kind of "Against All Odds", but the thematic fit is too unspecific for me to accept. Rise by The M Overall: OK Theme: OK Concept: OK Presentation: OK Story: N/A Overall (30/50) A pretty standard platformer entry with a hook mechanic in place of jumping. Workable graphics and mechanics, fun while it lasts, but too much content has been cut off by an early crash. Concept and Execution (6/15) The concept of using a grappling hook instead of a jump is a cool concept and it was intuitive to pick up. However, much of the level design is basically just swapping out jumps for hookable spots. There weren't many examples making creative use of things otherwise not doable with simple jumping. Unfortunately, this entry contains two early errors, one when collecting a bonus and one after beating the red bug boss. I would love to re-review this at a later date, but for voting purposes I can't let this slip. Penalties -2 for error on collecting a bonus -5 for early impassible crash after red bug boss Graphical Presentation (7/10) The graphics are a basic vector style, which works but could use more consistent shading, especially the background. The glow had visible rings and didn't mesh well. The bonus was also left as a placeholder. Supporting Presentation (10/15) The in-game help was well-placed and helped me learn the game. It would have been better if the instructions in the README was part of the hints. The magic tree and boss themes worked wonderfully, but the music elsewhere leaves much to be desired for. The beginning of the game could have used some music to set the tone, and the Level 1 theme is too upbeat. Penalties -3 for no sound effects Theme Usage (7/10) This looks like a good use of the "Overcome all Odds" theme. The starting of the game reinforced the theme quite well, especially with the music at the magic tree. Unfortunately the music afterwards was too upbeat and detracted from the theme. Woodcutter by darijs1 Overall: OK Theme: OK Concept: Poor Presentation: OK Story: N/A Overall (30/50) A survival game where the player cuts down trees for fire and weapons, hunts animals for food and defends against zombies. Nice concept, but too monotonous for my liking. Concept and Execution (7/15) The concept is familar and well-intended, but the execution is too simple to hold my interest for long. With just 2 resources to manage and the distribution rather sparse (especially meat), once you learn to gather both there's nothing more to do other than to repeat them ad-infinitum. The control scheme was a little left-hand-heavy and awkward. It would also have been nice if there is an arrow pointing towards home base. Graphical Presentation (7/10) The graphics look well together with a simple vector style, and the particle effects definitely add to the atmosphere of the entry. However, the menu buttons look absolutely AWFUL. Supporting Presentation (10/15) The 3D audio, though limited in scope, does add to the authenticity of the experience. The help documentation was adequate and allowed me to pick up the game with little effort, though I had to poke around the right click to learn that it's a charged shot. Theme Usage (6/10) Wilderness survival definitely fits in the "Against All Odds" category, and the presence of zombies does reinforce that theme. However, the fit is rather generic and doesn't show much evidence of intentional design. King Of Deals by joh Overall: OK Theme: OK Concept: OK Presentation: OK Story: N/A Overall (29/50) A card game where players trade cards representing goods, defects, bonuses and actions. I like the idea and would love to see it expanded one day, but the current iteration is too dependent on the opening hand and liable to become stagnant to be genuinely enjoyable. Concept and Execution (9/15) It's nice to see a break from the overrepresented action fare, and I was looking forward to this entry when I knew it's in the running. It ran cleanly without crashing or lagging, so that's a good start. But unless I missed an important strategy or element, I'm disappointed in the execution. The concept is nice and I can see where it can continue to grow, but the current iteration just isn't enjoyable enough. The current rules of the game encourages both snowballing and passivity from the start. If you start with a superior hand containing few demerit cards, you have NO incentive to trade at all. If your hand starts poor, you wouldn't have much that others want to offer good cards for, and their hands would also likely contain too many good cards to care. If a game is about X, for it to be any good, its mechanics must be designed to force X to happen from any start. For example, if at the beginning of each round you have to draw an undealt card and offer a trade containing at least that card, that would give lagging players a chance back into the game, and also force the player to make varying decisions about how to best convince another player to take the deal or turn it down. One minor complaint is that when I put up an offer and no one takes it, I have to press cancel myself. It should bounce the cards back into my hand and say "No deal". Graphical Presentation (6/10) Basic and a little oversaturated, but unified and workable. One thing I didn't particularly appreciate is the default font in several places. Supporting Presentation (8/15) Though simple, the menu has a unified style, and the built-in help was somewhat effective. I still had to poke around a little in-game, but eventually I understood the game. The tallying screen was also well done. Penalties -6 for no sound or music when appropriate Theme Usage (6/10) I suppose the theme is "Adaptation" for following market conditions, but most of the market cards just don't make big enough of an impact on general play for me to score this any higher. Reel Fruit Slots by Oyakiiv Overall: OK Theme: Poor Concept: Great Presentation: OK Story: N/A Overall (29/50) A quick minigame where you play on a slot machine spewing out various exploding symbols that you must run from and avoid. Very original idea, but a little too basic and not enough use of the theme. Concept and Execution (13/15) I must say this is the most original idea of the lot, and it is the only entry thus far that gave me new inspirations. I would have loved to see more different kinds of symbols or machines to play against, but for a Jam entry this is a good start. The mechanics are smooth and problem-free on the most part, though there is no consequence for losing. Penalties -1 for no game over when I get 0 health Graphical Presentation (4/10) Workable, but too raw and could have been improved with some pretty basic measures. For starters, look up how to use draw_set_font() to show larger text without scaling artifacts or string() to tack numbers onto strings in the Manual. Supporting Presentation (10/15) I like the jazzy music in the background and the sound of the spinning slots, definitely sets the right atmosphere. The instructions are clear and straight-forward. However, the presentation of the instructions and the score HUD are a bit too hastily done, and detracts from the immersion. Theme Usage (2/10) I'm guessing this is for the "Against All Odds" theme (because slot machines are classified as fixed ODDS betting machines), but the fit is too loose for me to give it a pass. Au Début Ça Va by Team Vive Le France Overall: OK Theme: OK Concept: OK Presentation: OK Story: N/A Overall (28/50) A quick standard scrolling shooter where you must pay attention to shifting key arrangements and "dead man's switch" buttons to hit. Cool neon-geometric graphics, very hectic music, but has significant flaws in usability that compromises the result. Concept and Execution (9/15) The basic shooting mechanics work well and are easy to pick up, and I'm surprised at how fast it runs with the amount of graphical effects going on in the background. I am also unable to find any bugs at runtime. Unfortunately I'm not a huge fan of the way this entry plays out. It's a spray-and-pray game on the most part with little strategic interest, and the changing movement keys didn't have much significance when I could just stand still and shoot. The random warps give no prior warning or potential for counterplay, and I've had a number of instant 100-to-0 losses this way. Graphical Presentation (4/10) The graphics has a uniform neon-geometric theme and looks well-made, but it seems too carried away with style to have any care left for usability. The amount of visual noise and issues with contrast are major problems with this particular entry. Almost everything in the game blends too well with the background, and that's inevitable when virtually every colour in the spectrum is there. The text is hard to divert attention to, and there is no reminder of which key is which after it's gone. Also, when the player is near the top of the screen, the letter key popups disappear off the top of the screen. Supporting Presentation (10/15) The sound effects and music combined well to create a hectic atmosphere, and the main navigation flow works despite its simplicity. Penalties -3 for no documentation on how to play Theme Usage (5/10) I'm guessing this is for the "Against All Odds" theme, but the fit is too generic. Any scrolling shooter could have fit the bill the same way this entry did. Black and ****e by Ghandpivot Overall: OK Theme: OK Concept: OK Presentation: OK Story: N/A Overall (28/50) A black-and-white stickman platformer with an unusually high number of unexpected hazards. I understand the gimmick, but it just didn't appeal to me. Concept and Execution (8/15) I too would have thought this might be a good concept, but unfortunately the traps ended up being more frustrating than they were fun. The part up to the second flag were reasonable, almost a "fool-me-once-shame-on-you-fool-me-twice-shame-on-me" kind of experience. But then I noticed the bug that followed. I was able to jump into the block under which the stakes shoot out, but I never made it past there, so I quit there. Graphical Presentation (7/10) Basic black-and-white stickman graphics. Not much to comment on, but it's sometimes unclear what's dangerous and what isn't. Supporting Presentation (8/15) The sound effects get the job done, but the music doesn't feel like it fits into the game. There were also no credits given for the music, which doesn't sound like something produced within the 24 hours allotted. Penalties -1 for not stating how to play -3 for not showing credits for sounds and music Theme Usage (5/10) I guess the large number of unexpected hazards is a way to express "Against All Odds", but I didn't enjoy this particular rendition of it. Eel Lady Cat Constest by TinyGamesLab Overall: OK Theme: OK Concept: OK Presentation: OK Story: OK Overall (27/50) A maze game with a cat that can only charge in a straight line and stop only at other solid objects. The graphics are professional-quality and I applaud the effort, but the levels are too easy and the music just doesn't click at all. Concept and Execution (6/15) I like the mechanics of the puzzle and you've provided a decent amount of content, but the fit with the "eliminating the competition" part of the story feels rather forced. The level design is by far the biggest liability of this entry. Given the demographics of the GMC, you'd expect at least 16 years old, but the levels are quite frankly too easy for even a 6-year-old. Graphical Presentation (10/10) A solid, standard vector style. The main character looks cute and everything just fits together. Supporting Presentation (6/15) As predictable as the game gets, this is the part that really shocks me. With the perfectly done graphics, I would have expected the same kind of work supporting it. I'm wrong. There was a single generic meow for sound effects and that's it. I've never owned a cat, but I've been around cat lovers at work long enough to know that a cat being beaten up sounds VERY different from that. There was music in the game, but none of it sounds like a cat beating up other cats. The menu works well and I was able to readily learn the game from in-game hints, but that's the only thing I could really give any credit for in this category. Theme Usage (5/10) I think this is an "Against All Odds" entry? I could see the attempt to suit the theme, but the fit is a bit forced. Afternote: If you want to know what the same idea executed properly would look like, get Green Ninja Year of the Frog by Nitrome. Overcome by Sam Spade Overall: Poor Theme: Poor Concept: Poor Presentation: OK Story: N/A Overall (20/50) Some sort of abstract game where a white blob tries to overcome a variety of black blob enemies. It would have made sense if I could actually control the thing. Concept and Execution (2/15) The concept is nice and would have been better to play --- if only the movement actually worked! I was holding down WASD as instructed and I'm barely moving at all. The point of the "Against All Odds" theme is NOT to have absolutely no agency. End of story. Penalties: -10 for being unable to control the game (yes, I followed the instructions, WASD for moving, click to attack and defend) Graphical Presentation (6/10) The "blurry blob" theme is a unique and simple aesthetic, but having it in the menu poses a readability issue. Supporting Presentation (9/15) The sound and music set the right tone, but unfortunately for a part I have next to no input on. The menu system works, but is slightly hard to read and takes more time than I'd like to fade in. Theme Usage (3/10) I think this looks like an "Against All Odds" entry from the way it starts, but there just isn't enough material I can play to discern real relevance to this theme. Johnny's Escape by Bart Overall: Poor Theme: Poor Concept: Poor Presentation: Poor Story: Poor Overall (9/50) Some sort of RPG game that was supposed to be based on chemical reactions, but the entire theme failed to make its way in. Not much to see or evaluate here, unfortunately. Concept and Execution (1/15) Quite frankly there just isn't enough to even start fathoming what the concept is. The only point I'm giving for execution is for not crashing. Graphical Presentation (5/10) Simple geometric graphics, but little else. You could have used custom graphics for the part where the main character is being abducted, such that it is of the same simple style as the rest. Supporting Presentation (3/15) The background sound was the only thing I could rate in this category, and it sets the right tone relative to the story. The opening dialog is a nice touch, but with almost nothing to play after it, I think you made the same mistake I did with putting the cart before the horse. Penalties: -3 for no sound effects when appropriate Theme Usage (0/10) It's going to take much more than posting a few chemical formulas on the screen for me to accept this as a valid use of the "Chemical Reactions" theme. I Wanna Get To School In One Piece by sp202 Overall: Poor Theme: Poor Concept: Poor Presentation: Poor Story: Poor Overall (6/50) Some sort of platformer game with a time reversing mechanic for when things go wrong. The idea could have had potential, but it isn't meshing with the theme and there's way too little content from start to finish. I've dropped out of previous Jams with more playable material than this. Concept and Execution (3/15) Definitely a missed execution. The concept of rewinding time is kind of cool (and actually several GMC Jams too late), but it sees no practical use at all relative to a simple restart button. Everything just looks rushed. Quite frankly, the 3 points are for having a clean run. Graphical Presentation (0/10) It's just a mashup of completely disparate styles, and there aren't any credits given for what's there. Supporting Presentation (3/15) This part is weak as well. At least the text boxes and the sign showing instructions for how to play work, but that's all I can say about it. Penalties: -6 for no sounds or music Theme Usage (0/10) If this is what "Against All Odds" is supposed to be, I don't think the entry hit any of it. juegOS HD Early Access by Alice, Mercerenies Overall: Poor Theme: Poor Concept: Poor Presentation: Poor Story: N/A Ranking witheld on request.
VOTES Well done to everybody who managed to submit and also who finish their votes. I tried to stay on point this time and use a pro/con list to make things more clear and readable. I'm happy to discuss the feedback with anybody. I included a separate part at the bottom for the couple of post-jam games I tried out after I finished voting, I tried not to repeat myself in those ones though. Top 3: Lock and Key by Relic PROS Really simple and unique idea. Very enjoyable and hard to put down. The different levels had their own personality and difficulty. High score table definitely increases motivation to try again and keep playing(Got to beat those scores). Art was very consistent and pleasant to look at. Gamepad support was appreciated and felt great. Menus were well designed. Excellent use of theme. CONS Moving to the Ph and Temp circles was a bit of a hassle. A nitpick sure, but the font during the gameplay stood out as boring, especially on the circles. Additional comments: Uhhh, why does the small intestines have teeth in the background? XD Liquid Bacon by Acr515, Ralucipe PROS Nice clean art, I especially liked the book pages. Music was great. The different outcomes from the same options was a nice way to shake things up a bit and keep it a bit interesting. Battle system was super simple but quick and easy to understand. Mixing things was also a pretty easy process. CONS The choice of materials seemed weird and random, and didn't seem to inform the results all that much. The controls were too spread out. I and P seemed like slightly strange choices to me, having a button inbetween them that does nothing while the rest of the controls are on the left or the spacebar. Random encounters are rarely enjoyable nowadays, at least they were contained to the one area. The area to explore was too small. Seemed to be no point to the random people except to fill the scene. On one hand I think that's perfectly fine but everything else in the game had a point so this just stuck out to me. The ending was massively anticlimactic! Additional comments: Good effort on the polish and making a small functional sort of RPG. The battles could have potentially been more interesting(mechanically or visually, or both). Most of the dialogue was decent too, funny even. Little Lost Hero by GameDevDan PROS Presentation was one of the best, those text effects were great. Good variety of enemies. Dialogue was great. Good large number of different levels. The awesome boss fight. CONS The spider(?) enemy felt random, which seemed at odds with the concept introduced straight away of watching enemy movements. Or maybe I just took that too literally, but they were less of a challenge than they were just plain annoying. Too retro for me. Additional comments: As well made as this was, I didn't find it all that interesting to play through. What really saved it though was that boss fight at the end and the dialogue. Best ofs: Best use of THEME: My Gold by NazGhuL(Chemical reactions are hard, and I thought this nailed that theme) Best Concept: Reel Fruit Slots by Oyakiiv(I can't explain why I lied this so much, I just thought it was such a clever idea) Best Presentation: Snowball in Hell by AndrewN(This just oozed style) Best Story: Little Lost Hero by GameDevDan(Mostly because of the boss and ending, really enjoyed it) Best Devlog: ... Full ranking: Spoiler Lock and Key by Relic Liquid Bacon by Acr515, Ralucipe Little Lost Hero by GameDevDan Duality2 by Matharoo My Gold by NazGhuL Reel Fruit Slots by Oyakiiv Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc, Toque Eel Lady Cat Constest by TinyGamesLab PHAGE by FrostyCat Snowball in Hell by AndrewN King Of Deals by joh Find the Cure! by UnEarthly Ethan Au Début Ça Va by Team Vive Le France Rise by The M juegOS HD Early Access by Alice, Mercerenies Against All Odd by Yal Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu Woodcutter by darijs1 ROYal RUMble by Misu, Yal I Wanna Get To School In One Piece by sp202 Overcome by Sam Spade Black and ****e by Ghandpivot Johnny's Escape by Bart Zombie Assault: Against All Odds by Misty Comments: Spoiler Against All Odd by Yal PROS The game over screen looked great. An interesting take on the theme, I liked the focus on odd numbers. CONS Looked very slapped together last minute(and if I see you worked on another game as well so I won't hold it against you). I found the text a bit hard to read sometimes, especially when they overlapped. Sprites and background image were not very good. Additional comments: If Typing of the Dead didn't already exist, I'd probably find this idea way more interesting. Still an interesting entry though. Au Début Ça Va by Team Vive Le France PROS Art was pretty and colourful Menu looked great Use of theme was an interesting idea. CONS The background art did not contrast at all with the rest of the art which made it difficult to see anything. Car horns were annoying. While I liked the idea of random button presses, I don't think it works on the keyboard.* Additional comments: To elaborate on the point about random buttons, my issue was that I'm using the arrow keys to move and the mouse to aim/shoot, and now I not only have to move one of those hands, but I have to look down at my keyboard to locate the random key I need to press. The idea is neat but I just think you needed a different approach. Black and ****e by Ghandpivot PROS Music was chill. CONS Seems to have started me in the middle of a level. Switching to fullscreen seemed to break the first train(as well as mess with scaling of the restart prompt). Platforming was very average. Additional comments: It's very clear this was a bit rushed unfortunately. Duality2 by Matharoo PROS Very polished entry with great presentation. Sprites and art in general was very consistent and well animated. Music was mostly good. Sound effects were good too. GMC members as characters was a nice touch, the Nuts Goners was very amusing. The shooting minigame with the Rodericks was great. CONS The main gameplay was a bit boring, it controlled well but was just not that much fun after a minute. Still don't get the humour, so a lot of the dialogue was lost on me(fress water?). The shooting section with the Rodericks was fun but felt out of place. The boss fight with Fel666, the shurikens were pretty brutal. First two attempts I got hit once and bounced around until I died. Additional comments: At first I was annoyed when it opened up my browser, but the joke there gave me enough of a chuckle to be ok with it. Though, maybe ease up on the spelling mistakes, I get it but I feel like you're overdoing it. Also, adding the text skip was good especially after failing a boss fight. No one wants to read the same dialougue again. Eel Lady Cat Constest by TinyGamesLab PROS The gameplay was fun. The art was very clean and well done. Presentation was great, loved the menu. The laser traps were a nice addtion that added to the difficulty. CONS Mouse was only used for the menu, not a big deal but I prefer the mouse only used for menus if it's also used in gameplay. Theme usage wasn't obvious. The difficulty of the levels seemed to vary. Additional comments: A cute entry, well made. A clever variation of the classic ice-sliding puzzle. Find the Cure! by UnEarthly Ethan PROS What little art was there was pretty good. Interesting idea mixing colours. The bunsen burner added an interesting extra element. The vat animation looked great. Music was all good too. CONS Some better kind of indication you are at least close would be nice, a few times I just guessed. Sometimes my results looked perfect but they were wrong because I didn't use the burner(I have a very good eye for colours and shades so this really threw me). Additional comments: I remember seeing some really weird sprites from you but they didn't seem to appear in your game, that's a bit sad as I was excited to see what the hell they were for! I Wanna Get To School In One Piece by sp202 PROS Presentation was pretty good. The rewind mechanic was very well done. CONS Art was inconsistent and some of it looked like it was borrowed(without credit). Waaaaay too short. Controls weren't the best, but you sort of acknowledge that already. Theme? Your mother deserves a hug. Additional comments: The game was way too short to say much else about it. What was there wasn't too bad though. Johnny's Escape by Bart PROS The idea with the body parts looked interesting. Art was consistent. CONS There seemed to be very little you could actually do. The pathfinding was very annoying when it wouldn't stop on a spot. The range at which you could interact with things was waaaay too short. It became very frustrating trying to line up next to the buttons. Most of the buttons seemed to have no real function or purpose and I couldn't interact with the ingredients at all. Additional comments: I got up to a section that mentioned something about wings. I found no way to get past there. juegOS HD Early Access by Alice, Mercerenies PROS Great art, the animation of the player was smooth and pretty. The concept was very cool. CONS Sadly unfinished, only one test level. Additional comments: This looked like a cool, solid concept, but sadly no levels to show that. King Of Deals by joh PROS Presentation and art were nice and consistent. Gameplay was simple and easy to get the hang of. The idea of the middles cards changing the rules was clever, good way to keep things interesting. CONS Seemed too reliant on luck. No sound or music. Additional comments: The best strategy most of the time seemed to be to not play. 9 out of the 10 games I won were from only betting once or twice max. Seemed like an interesting attempt at two of the themes. Liquid Bacon by Acr515, Ralucipe PROS Nice clean art, I especially liked the book pages. Music was great. The different outcomes from the same options was a nice way to shake things up a bit and keep it a bit interesting. Battle system was super simple but quick and easy to understand. Mixing things was also a pretty easy process. CONS The choice of materials seemed weird and random, and didn't seem to inform the results all that much. The controls were too spread out. I and P seemed like slightly strange choices to me, having a button inbetween them that does nothing while the rest of the controls are on the left or the spacebar. Random encounters are rarely enjoyable nowadays, at least they were contained to the one area. The area to explore was too small. Seemed to be no point to the random people except to fill the scene. On one hand I think that's perfectly fine but everything else in the game had a point so this just stuck out to me. The ending was massively anticlimactic! Additional comments: Good effort on the polish and making a small functional sort of RPG. The battles could have potentially been more interesting(mechanically or visually, or both). Most of the dialogue was decent too, funny even. Little Lost Hero by GameDevDan PROS Presentation was one of the best, those text effects were great. Good variety of enemies. Dialogue was great. Good large number of different levels. The awesome boss fight. CONS The spider(?) enemy felt random, which seemed at odds with the concept introduced straight away of watching enemy movements. Or maybe I just took that too literally, but they were less of a challenge than they were just plain annoying. Too retro for me. Additional comments: As well made as this was, I didn't find it all that interesting to play through. What really saved it though was that boss fight at the end and the dialogue. Lock and Key by Relic PROS Really simple and unique idea. Very enjoyable and hard to put down. The different levels had their own personality and difficulty. High score table definitely increases motivation to try again and keep playing(Got to beat those scores). Art was very consistent and pleasant to look at. Gamepad support was appreciated and felt great. Menus were well designed. Excellent use of theme. CONS Moving to the Ph and Temp circles was a bit of a hassle. A nitpick sure, but the font during the gameplay stood out as boring, especially on the circles. Additional comments: Uhhh, why does the small intestines have teeth in the background? XD My Gold by NazGhuL PROS Despite the readme, the sprites looked good. Music was great too. Strong use of theme. Very unique idea, well implemented. CONS I didn't fully understand the reactions, sometimes results weren't what I expected. I feel like the gold collection was the weakest part of the gameplay. Additional comments: After a few tries I was only ever able to manage about half of the goal, but I still enjoyed the experience. I think a different reason for venturing away from your stash would have helped, maybe chemicals are finite and you need to get more. Overcome by Sam Spade PROS Effects were pretty. Gamepad support and pause funtionality are always welcome. CONS As cool as the effects were, the menu text was hard to read. Gameplay was very vague and unclear, there didn't seem to be any clear goals or indicator of how well I was doing. With the gameplay unclear, the use of theme also seems a bit unclear. Additional comments: It looks like a lot of work went into this, especially the presentation, but the gameplay needs to be more clearly defined, and or at least have some tutorial or something explaining what is happening. PHAGE by FrostyCat PROS Unique idea. Art was good. Strong use of theme. Rules were simple and well defined. CONS The AI seemed pretty brutal, no matter how many attempts I had, they always had the upper hand on me. I accidentally hit ESC mid game and it closed the whole application... Additional comments: I don't have much to say about this entry, it's a simple idea that seems to be executed quite well except that the AI is quite difficult. I still enjoyed trying. Reel Fruit Slots by Oyakiiv PROS A very interesting and unique take on a the slot machine. Simple and easy to get the hang of quickly. The different behaviours and hitbox sizes of all the fruit and 7s was great. Wagering your health was another good idea. The fruit sprites were well defined. Good use of theme. CONS Wagers were limited to 3, I would have liked to have risked more for bigger payouts. Winnings capped at 99! Could have used some better visual feedback when getting hit. The jumping didn't feel good, it was just a very basic floaty jump. Default font was used and it never looks very good unfortunately. Whilst the fruit were mostly pretty good, the player sprite and buttons were just basic shapes. The hitboxes/explosions got the job done but again just basic shapes. Menu and menu items were bare minimum. Additional comments: I think the underlying idea here is great, but I think it just needs to be reworked. Rise by The M PROS Cool rope swinging, felt good once you got some momentum. Great presentation, that tree and the effects in that scene were great. The font was very pretty too. Art was good. The idea of having the player forced to crawl around was an interesting idea. CONS That boss fight was very disappointing. Soooo many crashes. Crashed any time I tried to grab a bonus and then again after I beat the boss. Not really sure what the theme was here. Additional comments: A real shame about all the crashes. The idea looked interesting but it was a bit slow. ROYal RUMble by Misu, Yal PROS 3D games are always a little bit impressive. The bounce noise was amusing. ROY and RUM puns were clever. The textures and models looked good, the pillars were cool. CONS The movement had no weight to it, perhaps some acceleration/deceleration would have helped. Similarly, the jump had no good weight to it either, but I'm not sure what the issue was, possibly the decent was too quick and no curve to it(What I mean is generally you should linger a bit at the top of your jump). The spikes on one of the first levels, there was no way to pass them or trigger them without dying. I ended up just blindly mashing jump until I lucked my way around that one section. Once the cannons were introduced, most levels started with you getting killed instantly... You should really give the player a second or two to orient themselves. Most of the levels were just cannon spam. The music was weird and jarring. I think any attempts at the theme were a stretch here. Window was quite small and the lack of fullscreen was a bit frustrating. Additional comments: Swastikas suddenly started appearing and then I had to fight Hitler with no in-game explanation as to why. I tracked down your post on the forums and I have to say that the story was a mess and I didn't understand it. Also, I know Roy is a GMC member, but I do not understand why he keeps popping up in jam games, I don't even know if I've seen him participate or comment during jams at all for a while so this is very confusing. Snowball in Hell by AndrewN PROS Great overall presentation, really enjoyed the little effects like the snow particles and the lighting. The art was good too, nice and consistent. Very simple gameplay. CONS Gameplay was perhaps too simple, I could see myself getting bored if it was any longer. While it looked cool, I wasn't sure what the point of getting bigger was. Use of theme was not interesting. Jumping triggers from holding the spacebar, so sometimes I was jumping as I landed. Not sure if this was intentional but I find it a bit frustrating(but that's just because I have a habit of holding the jump button). Additional comments: Fun mini-game, I thought it was cute that you got your kids to playtest. Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu PROS Very pretty, the tunnel effect and the colours were great. The idea of changing shapes and colours was interesting. Music was great, I really enjoyed it. CONS Too many combinations of colours and shapes, most of my problems came from not being able to memorise the order. When the game speed gets faster, the player movement starts to feel sluggish and it becomes hard to manoeuvre. Theme usage was a bit on the nose. Additional comments: Nice idea, but I feel like the main mechanic was let down by the too many combinations. It looked great though. Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc, Toque PROS The art was great, good variety of sprites and backgrounds. The presentation was fantastic, I really enjoyed the subtle effects such as the slow rotate and zoom during the points tally. Using any key to jump was smart. The humour was good, I got a good chuckle at some of the dates. Music was well chosen, very fitting and chill. CONS Levels were too short(But I heard that was a mistake fixed in the post-jam version). The jumping itself felt too quick for my tastes, and I'm not overly a fan of fixed jumping heights. Additional comments: I will try out the post-jam version after I finish ranking the games. This seemed like a really solid entry, clearly a lot of work went into it, shame that you issues with the submitted version. Would have been great if there was more dialogue, I was enjoying what was there. Woodcutter by darijs1 PROS Sprites were animated well. Chopping and throwing the axe felt good. Effects like the blood and snow particles were nice. Sounds were good too. CONS Not really seeing the theme usage. There wasn't much to do besides chop wood(though I guess that's in the title) Suddenly, zombies? Menus and interfaces could have used some work. No music. Additional comments: It's a stretch but maybe you went with adaptation as in "adapting to nature" or something. Otherwise I can't see it at all. Not going to dock you for this, but you seemed to have some scaling issues with the HUD. Perhaps some issues using draw gui? I noticed in windowed mode that I can't even see the warmth and hunger bars, and in fullscreen there are noticable black bars on the sides. Zombie Assault: Against All Odds by Misty PROS That title logo fade together thing was great, very cool effect. Music seemed consistent and appropriate. The guns seemed to function fine. CONS That menu was a bit of a visual nightmare, with ugly buttons and they were weirdly flashing. Very uninspired and boring gameplay. All the menu options were just the same thing but longer time limit. Yet again no credits but almost everything seemed to be stolen from somewhere else, like the gun/hands looked like screengrabs from Counterstrike or something, and that music(as good as it was) was clearly taken from several different things. Additional comments: I'm not sure what happened here, maybe you couldn't come up with a good idea or maybe you got too hung up on doing something in 3D, but the end result was severely lacking. I know you can do better. Post-Jam comments Spoiler Black and ****e by ghandpivot PROS It was nice to have a bit better of a starting place. Didn't seem to have the same fullscreen issues. CONS Would have preferred a secondary jump button, never found Up to jump very comfortable. The game relies too much on replaying and memorising each section too much. Art left a lot to be desired, minimalist or not. Additional comments: These kinds of games are too frustrating to keep playing. I almost got up to the checkpoint from the jam version, but I had had enough long before that. The section with the boulder and upward spikes was especially annoying. Rise by The M PROS I was able to progress past the first boss! The spiky balls added a much needed urgency and challenge. CONS I think I may have skipped a bunch of the second chapter with some creative rope swinging... It wasn't clear how to damage the second boss, I tried swinging into and throwing myself at his butt in many different ways. Additional comments: On the second boss I somehow threw myself through the wall and could not do anything else. Maybe it's just because of how much I enjoyed games like Worms, but I would have liked to been able to use the hook mid-air, but I understand if that may not be ideal for the game you had in mind. Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc, Toque PROS The length of the levels was good, good sense of progression too as they get longer. Collisions with the obstacles felt fair. CONS The challenge didn't seem to escalate, maybe I expected it to go faster eventually. Additional comments: I think a greater variety in shapes for the obstacles would have been better, too many of them felt too similar and there weren't enough tall or long ones to present enough of a regular challenge. I enjoy all the little jokes(The Slimer easter egg was great), and if I'm not mistaken, was Tom Cruise stalking me on the ladders with the lightposts?? juegOS HD Early Access by Alice, Mercerenies PROS Loved the art and particle effects. The transitions were very nice. Puzzles were well made and balanced. The progression was great, starting with jump and repair, then shift was smart. That music was so good, very appropriate. The interface is very cool, I liked the memory and module details on the side. CONS Ended too soon! It felt a little like a chore going all the way back to some terminals to change modules(But I may just be a little impatient, not a big deal regardless). Additional comments: This was an excellent little game, I'd love to play the finished version one day. Such a shame you didn't have this version to submit during the jam!
Reviews Top 3: Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu Snowball in Hell by AndrewN Liquid Bacon by Acr515, Ralucipe Full ranking: Spoiler Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu Snowball in Hell by AndrewN Liquid Bacon by Acr515, Ralucipe PHAGE by FrostyCat Duality2 by Matharoo King Of Deals by joh Eel Lady Cat Constest by TinyGamesLab Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc, Toque Little Lost Hero by GameDevDan Au Début Ça Va by Team Vive Le France Black and ****e by Ghandpivot Lock and Key by Relic ROYal RUMble by Misu, Yal Overcome by Sam Spade Gambrawl by Siolfor the Jackal Against All Odd by Yal Woodcutter by darijs1 Find the Cure! by UnEarthly Ethan Zombie Assault: Against All Odds by Misty My Gold by NazGhuL I Wanna Get To School In One Piece by sp202 Reel Fruit Slots by Oyakiiv Overcoming All Aliens by Micnasr Johnny's Escape by Bart juegOS HD Early Access by Alice, Mercerenies Comments: Spoiler Against All Odd by Yal Somehow the odd mechanic actually worked pretty well and the game was entertaining to play. Because of the low resolution it was hard to read the numbers until the zombies got closer, which made it tricky to react in time, especially when there were several fast zombies coming. It was nice that the text was displayed in front of the zombies as the ones you had to keep alive cluttered the screen but when there was a lot of zombies at once the text still became hard to see (with the longer words, like twentyseven, being extra problematic). Like I said before, the pun is probably worthy of the best theme award by itself. Au Début Ça Va by Team Vive Le France I was impressed by the graphics as that art style was truly something special. The game was a bit confusing and it was hard to tell what was going on (in part also because of the art style) and I couldn't tell if the large vehicles were dangerous or if they just displaced you. It was neat to have to press a random key for a screen clear but I also found it a bit annoying to have to play with the arrow keys as they're a bit akward to combine with the mouse. All in all, a solid entry. Black and ****e by Ghandpivot There was more content than I had suspected and the game plays really well. I find it's about equally relaxing as frustrating and some of the obstacles are really hard! It's cool that you can see corpses from previous attempts, tough I'm torn about whether or not I like that they have physics because the obstacles change, sometimes drastically, when the corpses are there. I liked the art style and the small shadowing goes a long way to give depth to the character and environment. The ending was a bit anticlimactic though. Duality2 by Matharoo The game strikes a nice balance between being utterly ridiculous and having surprisingly solid gameplay. It looks great and the chiptunes were good. I would have liked a way to speed up the dialogue (I didn't try enter because I was afraid it wold skip past everything) because they were pretty slow. Collecting gems and souls was felt good but it's a shame there was no use for them. Eel Lady Cat Constest by TinyGamesLab I've always known cats were evil and this proves it. Ilike the theme and general presentation. It was fun to see competitors being removed from the ranking as you climbed to first place. The puzzles were fine, if a bit basic. There was enough variation that it didn't grow stale but it never really grew in complexity or challenge either. Finally, I really would prefer 'R' to restart the level and not the entire game. Since it's so associated with restarting, I pressed it without thinking and had to redo several levels as a result. After that I had to be careful not to touch it whenever I got stuck or hit by an obstacle. Find the Cure! by UnEarthly Ethan It's a pretty straightforward concept to mix colors together but the execution was done well enough that it was interesting for as long as it took to beat the game. Adding the burner for the alpha channel was a cool idea and gave some more depth to the puzzles. It was a bit hard to tell the difference between a bright and transparent potion though, especially since the background was just plain white. If the background had some interesting patterns or moving parts, it'd be easier to guage the requested transparancy of the potion. You could also take the idea further and add more parts to the potion creation, for example adding steps (first make the potion green, then yellow) or additional parts, like swirls, items on the bottom of the vial, etc. The second part was a surprise and really atmospheric, well done! It was a satisfying conclusion that you got to use the potions you created. On a final note, I think you should consider where to use text effects as the dialogue text seemed somewhat haphazard. I think you could get more impact if you kept a more uniform and consistent look to the text and only vary font, size and effects when the dialogue benefits from it. Gambrawl by Siolfor the Jackal The animations and graphics are all really well done and the game certainly uses the theme in a clever way. Unfortunately, I don't think it's very interesting because the game is just too slow and pointless. This is consistent throughout the whole game. The intro and menu have neat effects and transitions but it takes forever to get through them, especially if you want to check out the options and tutorial (the latter was a really good way to get used to the combat). In this case, I think the transitions have to be snappier and take frames rather than seconds to feel good (it's a game about punching stuff in the face, so that kind of intensity should be reflected here too). As for the gameplay, I'd have liked to have some more input into which battles I fought because while drawing a card and rolling a die is fun on its own, the result is completely random. My first battle was against six shadow men, my second against a single giglatinous, with pure randomness it just didn't scale very well. Betting then becomes a game of deciding if a foe is easy, in which case you bet a lot, or hard, where you bet a little and wait for the next round. It's a situation where it doesn't feel like dealing with odds but with a clearly superior choice and no risks. Finally, the combat was also too slow. It was satisfying to land a combo or a counter to knock the opponents off the ground and watching the other shadow men wait as they dueled me was cool. But when the enemies rose it quickly got monotonous and I ended up waiting for an enemy to come, beating it down, waiting for it to walk back to me, and repeat. I think if the enemies couldn't walk off the screen and if you could keep up the combos and quickly move between enemies it'd be much more interesting. It may sound like a lot of criticism but that's because the game itself isn't bad at all, the mechanics are solid, the audio is great (it packs a punch) and everything is smooth and free of bugs. It just needs some iterating to utilize those mechanics to its fullest. I Wanna Get To School In One Piece by sp202 It was a neat game with some cool mechanics, especially the time rewind. The screens were varied and felt clever, much better than your average super hard platformer. It's a shame it was so short though, because it barely started before it was over. Johnny's Escape by Bart I think the premise is fine but the game lacks a clear objective as it presents the player with a lot of different items and meters but doesn't explain how/if they can be used. Being able to modify your body to achieve different effects was really interesting and could have made for some very unique gameplay, for example if you had a limited amout of growth to split between your different body parts. An issue I had was with the lack of precision with the player movement where getting close enough to objects to be able to interact with them was really hard at times as the pathfinding wasn't up to the task unless you pressed on exactly the right spot. Honestly, it would probably be better to just use WASD of the arrow keys for this game. juegOS HD Early Access by Alice, Mercerenies Yes, the game looks really nice but without any goal there's little incentive to mess around in the example room. The concept of upgrading different parts is nice and as far as I can tell, there is more than enough content here to form some kind of game around it (even if it only uses some of the different upgrades available) so I can't help but think that maybe a three-level demo would have been better? As for the player controls, I would suggest adding diagonal movement (alternating vertical and horizontal movement is fine), because it feels a bit cumbersome as it is right now. That's just my opinion though. King Of Deals by joh The game was fun and strangely addicting. It took some time to understand how it worked but the mouseover tooltips helped a lot. I think the game would be more interesting if the players got more cards, either in the beginning or later on (say, a card each round) because I quickly ended up having cards I didn't want to trade and the AIs didn't seem very interesting in trading either. It would also be nice if the cards we were betting on were highlighted because highlighting the player's name was often not enough for me and I ended up trading for cards I didn't want for that reason. By the way, the gold ban card doesn't seem to work as gold is still counted normally in the end. Liquid Bacon by Acr515, Ralucipe I had a lot of fun with this entry and had to start it up again after completing it just to check out some more combinations and dialogue options. The writing is fantastic and the way the game keeps throwing absurd things at you is really humorous. The audio bug that kept the battle theme playing over everything was unfortunate, but since there weren't that much audio anyways it was manageable (because this was the first game I played, this was before the bug fix discussion. I didn't go back to replay the game because the fix felt too insignificant). I'm not sure I liked the sprint limit because your walking speed was so slow it got annoying to constantly hit the limit only to be forced to slow down. On the other hand, it made the ending more impactful which was nice. Combat could probably have been a bit more interesting as it was very straightforward and didn't reallt give you any options. Maybe using the harmful potions as offensive items could have added variety? All in all, it was a great and well-made game. Little Lost Hero by GameDevDan The game has a lot of personality and some of the floors were really creative. I did find the mechanic that sent you back floors pretty annoying, especially since enemies could easily eat all your health away if you made a single mistake because they would follow behind you and there was nothing to do about it (other than perhaps restarting the level, but I didn't try that). The blue enemies were particularly annoying because their movement seemed random to me which made them too unpredictabe. I liked the minimalist style and both the graphics and audio fit really well. I would have liked a way to skip the victory animation because when you had to redo floors it got annoying to have to wait for a floor you had already cleared. Lock and Key by Relic It's a clever game that plays smoothly. It was satisfying to pull off some chains where you could move from breaking down one thing to another with little pause in between. The tutorial was nice but despite that it was a bit hard to play, probably because there was no way to predict which way ph/temperature would move, making it hard to keep them within range. The areas were different enough to feel varied but having played through each area once, I didn't really feel compelled to go back and play them again (despite wanting to dominate the leaderboard). I think the game is just a bit too slow for an arcade style game where you compete for the highest score, maybe because of the unpredictable nature of the meters or becuase it's tough to line up perfectly, I don't know. It could also be that it just feels hard to improve upon your previous attempt because there's no "better" way to play. In the end I still enjoyed playing it, but once was enough. My Gold by NazGhuL It was an interesting challenge to balance collecting gold with fending off zombies but it was also really hard to do so. At first it felt fairly straightforward but as more and more zombie spawns appeared it was almost impossible to leave the gold stash without losing way more gold than you could collect and at that point the game was basically over (and watching your hard-earned gold dwindle away felt pretty bad). While I liked the inclusion of different elixirs, I never really understood what each vial did and ended up spamming the ice vial as it seemed to be the most effective one. I'd have liked some more information on the vials and a way to overlook the dungeon and tell where the zombies are. Overcome by Sam Spade The game is visually impressive and oppressive. You've got some cool effects going there. Unfortunately I think the visuals get in the way of learning the game as it is hard to understand what is what and your input have very little visual effect, to the point of me having to guess what was happening. As a result, the game felt buggy. You didn't seem to be able to move and what I believe was a counter-attack only worked unreliably. It's a shame, because the atmosphere the game shows is amazing. Overcoming All Aliens by Micnasr The game played fine and I liked how powerful the gun felt with the large, rapid-fire bullets. The problem was that the gun was so powerful the enemies couldn't keep up which made the game a breeze and eventually caused me to grow bored. Some more enemy variety and tougher/more enemies would make it a lot more interesting. I particularly liked the explosion effects, probably because they felt dynamic and added some animation to the game. Finally, the sound effect of the gun worked but got very tireing to listen to quickly but the vioce clips for the power-ups were a nice touch and made it immediately clear what the pickup did. PHAGE by FrostyCat Note: I tried the fixed version but couldn't click on anything in the menu so I had to go back to the jam version. The game was interesting, especially once I had gotten into it, which took a while becuase having to understand a somewhat complex puzzle game from reading a manual is pretty tough, a tutorial would have helped indeed. With that said, the indicators of how you could move were all very good and the UI was on a whole bothclean and informative, which made it easier to understand the game and plan moves. I enjoyed the game a lot and the AI performed fairly well most of the time, beating me one round but then losing badly another. The game didn't end after four rounds (I won the last on a knockout and it seemed like both players lost points as a result) so I quit manually. Reel Fruit Slots by Oyakiiv It's an interesting idea but the problem is I don't feel like there's a way to "overcome" the odds because player input barely matters. Any winnings come only from the slot which is pure chance and dodging the fruits doesn't feel that meaningful because I wont stick around a slot machine for long enough to lose all that health anyways. It also doesn't feel all that balanced as you get punished with the fruits no matter how good you score and the difference between 1 and 3 health worth of fruit is huge (at 1 health it's fairly easy to dodge but at 3 it's more or less impossible). I think if this game were to work it would have to be more satisfying to do the spins. Sure, you gain gold but it's only a small number in the corner, what you feel when you play is that you only get punished from spinning the weel as you have to avoid the fruits. If the score took center stage with a large, shiny font and there was an actual payout (for example, gems flowing out that you got to collect) it'd be much more satisfying. I would also change the health mechanic so that betting more health increased your odds of winning a large reward (eg. sevens) rather than the multiplying the prize pool. This way it would have more of a visual impact and would also mean you would risk facing harder fruit but not garuanteeing an impossible outcome no matter what you got. ROYal RUMble by Misu, Yal The game feels ambitious and plays pretty well. I like how some of the stuff, like Roy and the bricks, have depth to their textures (I assume those aren't modeled?) but the differnt kinds of graphics clashes a bit. The gameplay was solid and scaled well with the exception of the spike blocks that were downright unfair as both Roy and the spikes had way larger hitboxes than they seemingly should. It made for a lot of cheap deaths. The rest was fine until I got to the dark world where I soon had to give up. Having black turrets, black bullets and black spike blocks don't mix well with a black background (or rather, mixes all too well). Maybe my monitor's too dark but the platforming lost its fun when I could barely see the platforms. Also, I had some issues with the audio where sounds would not play at times, for example when picking up chemicals, or if I was killed by multiple spike blocks at once it would play overlapping sounds, raising the volume significantly. Snowball in Hell by AndrewN This game looked and sounded really nice and the concept of a snowball in a fiery hell is great! The controls work well, although it could be hard to pick up snow at times and your high agility made it easy to overshoot platforms if you weren't careful with your jumps (though that could be part of the challenge). The growth mechanic was interesting in theory but I feel the execution was somewhat flawed. Because you still died from one hit, being large was actually more deterimental than beneficial as you became a larger target for fireballs and spikes. Because the melting from fires were minimal and since you could easily outspeed the lava if you didn't care about growing, there was no point in gathering snow and the whole gimmic ended up being mostly avoided which was a shame. I would have liked to have had some options where jumping through fireballs or through spikes or lava, at the cost of some size, would have been a valid option. Stream of Adaptation by Smiechu The game was really impressive visually and it played well too. I did find it a bit hard to play at first because of how fast you moved and of many targets there were. When I realized that you don't have to hit EVERY target it got a lot easier. Because you lose only when you run out of points you're at a significant disadvantage in the beginning where you barely have any. Conversely, later on I couln't even though I actively tried to. I think the game could scale in more interesting ways than just making the turns tighter and the speed higher because the only result was that by level 7 or 8 I couldn't really move any more because the g-force constantly pressed me into the corners. Perhaps something like alternate paths, bonus rings to pass through (replacing the normal targets but forcing you to hit several in a row) or moving targets could be an alternative? Another way to gradually increase difficulty could be to introduce the different colours and shaped over time. The game would have benefitted from having some way to tell which button cycles to what shape/colour because at the end I still couldn't do it well enough that I would bother with it and just moved to hit similar colors or shapes without adjusting myself. Oh, and you should probably remove the large penalties you receive if you break a combo. Once I had a combo going it ended in a -2000 point hit because I hit a bad target, it probably ate up any good score I had gained from the combo and reduced the incentive of trying for more chains. Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc, Toque The game may be simple but the content and general quality is great and I love how varied the obstacles and the dates are. The music change when you enter the restaurant is also fantastic. I had some issues with the game, mostly how you don't regain any health between levels (I lost a life from the first obstacle and carried that penalty for the rest of the game). You can also chain collisions together where you are flipped from one obstacle into the next without any way to avoid it. As a side note, why does some of the obstacles have a different pixel scale? It seems a bit weird. Woodcutter by darijs1 The game has atmosphere and looks nice. Woodcutting and fighting was a bit slow for my taste which made upgrades unreasonable to craft given how expensive they were. On my first try I chased a badger (or whatever the small animals were) for the entirety of a day without being able to kill it, despise throwing the axe at it multiple times, until I was killed by a zombie. On my second attempt I learned how to fight the zombies and that elks grew weaker as they took damage, making them good targets. Unfortunately, chasing them around made me unable to relocate the campfire and I ended up freezing. I think the game could do with a little more balancing, a compass to tell you where home is and a goal to strive towards to "win". Zombie Assault: Against All Odds by Misty It was intense and cool but also somewhat akward to play. I loved the audio and the graphics were great overall. The guns felt pretty powerful and the terrain had some interesting variations. I couldn't handle the movement and aiming as it was too swift where I often ended up walking into zombies or missing my shots because I overshoot my input. The dark surroundings and darkness of the zombies also made it hard to see what was what. I think I would have needed some kind of bullet time to perform well in this one.
Cloaked Games Reviews: 1st Place: Liquid Bacon by Acr515 and Ralucipe 2nd Place: Duality 2 by Matharoo and nlolotte 3rd Place: Gambrawll by Siolfor the Jackal Best Use of Theme: Find the Cure! by UnEarthly Ethan Best Story: Liquid Bacon by Acr515 and Ralucipe Best Presentation: Gambrawll by Siolfor the Jackal Best Concept: My Gold by NazGhuL Spoiler: Full Rankings 1 - Liquid Bacon by Acr515 and Ralucipe 2 - Duality 2 by Matharoo and nlolotte 3 - Gambrawll by Siolfor the Jackal 4 - Lost Little Hero by GameDevDan (And Nal) 5 - Phage by FrostyCat 6 - Lock and Key by Relic 7 - My Gold by NazGhuL 8 - Find the Cure! by UnEartly Ethan 9 - Eel Lady Cat Contest by TinyGamesLab 10 - Snowball in Hell by AndrewN 11 - Au Debut Ca Va by Team Vive Le France 12 - Stream of Adaption by Smiechu 13 - Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc and Toque 14 - Black and ****e by ghandpivot 15 - Zombie Assault: Against All Odds by Misty 16 - Against All Odd by Yal 17 - ROYal Rumble by Misu and Yal 18 - Woodcutter by darijs1 19 - King of Deals by Joh 20 - Rise by The M 21 - Adapt All Reactions by Alice and Mercerenies 22 - I Wanna Get To School In One Piece by SP202 and Solistix 23 - Reel Fruit Slots by Oyakiiv 24 - Overcome by Sam Spade 25 - Overcoming All Aliens by Micnasr 26 - Johnny's Escape (Johnny x Marina) by Bart Spoiler: How I Score Games Games can receive points for eight categories, and are ranked based on their score out of 60 total points. Most games earn between 20 and 40 points. There is a 5 point bonus available for earning best presentation, story, concept or use of theme. Main Categories: Gameplay / 10: The central gameplay. This includes mechanics, controls, game feel, and ease of learning, as well as basically anything else that isn't the graphics and audio. Graphics / 10: The graphics and implementation of the graphics. Does the game look good? Is the style consistent? Is it easy to see what is going on? Audio/Music / 10: The sound effects and music. Especially how well it fits in the game, and if it isn't annoying or repetitive. Sounds play a critical role in game feel, if they're missing you hardly have a game at all. Fun Points / 10: This is probably the most important. It is in general, how fun the game is. It most reflects how I personally felt about the game, and so does include things like nostalgia bonus and genre bias. That is why I don't score on how fun something is to me alone. However, this is the tiebreaker for games with the same total points, and a good judge (if you're curious) of how much I enjoyed a game overall. Secondary Categories: Story / 5: How engaging and creative the story elements are. With no story at all, there are no points assigned. Any effort to have a story at all will earn at least one point. Counts towards best story. Concept / 5: How interesting it is conceptually. You can earn concept points for a totally unfinished, or un-fun game, if I can see where you wanted to go with it and I like it. You especially earn points for original or very creative mechanics. Counts towards best concept. Theme / 5: How well it used the theme or themes. I'm open to multiple interpretations of the theme, and I will try to explain why I scored the way I did in terms of theme. I'm especially looking for games where the theme is a truly central part of the game, where the game couldn't be made without using the theme the way you did. Counts towards best use of theme. Programming / 5: These points are earned by having a bug free game. You can also earn programming points for anything that demonstrates impressive programming skills. Note that a particularly low score in this category often leads to a low score in fun-points and game-play, because lots of bugs really make a game less fun to play. Check out the full written reviews here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1QSAXoX6gv9UIHl6uFTKKAiOHWSE1i2GxiBl_1FaBRf8/edit?usp=sharing Check out the video reviews here: Spoiler: Video Links Spoiler: Part 1 Against All Odd by Yal Au Debut Ca Va by Team Vive Le France Black and ****e by ghandpivot Duality 2 by Matharoo and nlolotte Eel Lady Cat Contest by TinyGamesLab Spoiler: Part 2 Find the Cure! by UnEarthly Ethan Gambrawll by Siolfor the Jackal I Wanna Get To School In One Piece by SP202 and Solistix Johnny's Escape (Johnny x Marina) by Bart Adapt All Reactions by Alice and Mercerenies King of Deals by Joh Spoiler: Part 3 Liquid Bacon by Acr515 and Ralucipe Little Lost Hero by GameDevDan (And Nal) Lock and Key by Relic My Gold by NazGhuL Spoiler: Part 4 Overcome by Sam Spade Overcoming All Aliens by Dengar and Micnasr PHAGE by FrostyCat Reel Fruit Slots by Oyakiiv Rise by The M Spoiler: Part 5 ROYal Rumble by Misu and Yal Snowball in Hell by AndrewN Stream of Adaption by Smiechu Wizzy Gizzard: Speed Date by HayManMarc and Toque Woodcutter by darijs1 Zombie Assault: Against All Odds by Misty
