Gangs Bash by D'Andrew Box
Would be nice to be able to choose the gang. I mean, Red Gang is best gang, obviously, but still. Also, the game doesn't finish after all 8 pizza pieces are allocated; it just keeps going on and on. Seems like the winning mechanic was broken somewhere, because I saw the ending somewhere in the devlog.
The minigames could really use some explanations, when it comes to controls at least.
The snails minigame is just button mashing, and it takes quite a lot of effort to beat the AI. If not competing against other players, I would prefer if all that took to win was press Z repeatedly with moderate-to-fast speed using only a single finger; button-mashing games already are bad enough as is, no need to make them extra difficult.
The car racing minigame is somewhat fun
if someone actually explains how to drive the cars (note: I didn't get any explanation at first, and I only knew Z can be used for driving forward; after I knew about controls, I beat the game effortlessly).
The pong minigame was pretty cool. I like how - if one player gets eliminated - the balls just bounce off that player's arc.
The floor-falling minigame is so trivial Evan could complete it even without moving. Maybe if falling floors were more focused around players? Also, the AI could probably be a little less silly.
The tank minigame is a bit of a drag, especially with how easy it is to get stuck on some box or something (AI can confirm, as it gets stuck too).
The presentation is good, both in terms of graphics (neat scanlines effect) and varied minigames music. I really like how the overworld music changes when 5 levels are completed, giving off the sense of finality. Too bad the game never actually ends.
Pretty neat overall, though AI is janky a lot (especially in the floor-falling and tanks minigame). Also, please, don't do button-mashing minigames.
get to the party by Wabb, sequential
A nice attempt at a Lemmings-style game, though the logic needed to solve these levels isn't particularly advanced (just 4 tutorial levels and 2 more "complex" ones). On what seemed like the last level, some party crashers started appearing as the level just kept repeating over and over again; I have no idea what it was supposed to be.
The graphics are... simple. The audio is nonexistent. Overall, while I appreciate the concept, the game needs a lot more polish to shine.
GMC Fruit Salad Surfer by Yal
A simple endless-runner-with-upgrades game. The main gameplay loop is pretty cool, with the wave-surfing mechanic interacting nicely with spike-towers of varying height and piranhas staying underwater (most of the time, at least). The upgrades introduce some additional and welcome complexity, allowing to avoid specific obstacles more easily or gain money more efficiently. However - unlike many other upgrades-based games - this one limits player to single item per run. Personally, I'd prefer if all items were applied at once (or you could toggle them individually); this way the player could gradually become more and more powerful before eventually obtaining all the upgrades there are. As it is now - with only one item usable per run - I'm not really motivated to buy various items, if I won't use most of them either way. Not only that, there is barely any feeling of becoming more powerful and getting coins more quickly to keep me playing until the next upgrade. If I could use all items at once, I might have as well keep playing until I maxed out every item and bought all skins available in the game.
Aside from that, the game features trademark Yal's psychedelic graphics and music (though I'm certain the main menu music appeared in Killer Shark '77 before). I particularly liked this colourful wave effect, and it was even better seeing how on EvanSki's stream this wave was somehow semi-transparent to the point of Jam Player interface being visible behind the wave! I also appreciate the variety of different character skins, and general upgrades descriptions.
Nice endless runner with upgrades overall, but I really would prefer if I could equip all items at once.
GMC Party Adventure by Imagine Galaxy
These platformic mechanics take me back to the times of The Games Factory and its janky ceiling-grabbing platforming mechanics. Was it an inspiration?
Unfortunately, these mechanics turned out to be pretty annoying - especially when navigating the large cave - where I couldn't fall as freely as I would have liked. Add to that swarms of angry teletubbies, which made me restart over and over again. Still, I made it to the end, and that was a pretty adorable end (seems like
the main character was trolled ).
Music was cool. Voice acting wasn't professional, but otherwise it was mostly clear what was being spoken, which isn't always the case for Jam games voice acting (though text might have helped here, too). I wonder who did it (family?) because there were multiple people involved. I just wish the intermission screen (the one with lots of white circles appearing) was shorter.
The graphics weren't as good as music, and at least some of them were likely taken from elsewhere given the varying level of detail (e.g. the troll).
Overall, pretty silly and janky platformer, yet charming in its own way.
Goin' All Nite by Dadio
At first I thought it was another jokey entry devoid of any interactivity, but I must admit, I was mistaken - you can actually feed the pills to the lemon.
Still, I miss the likes of the DA NUMSKULZ or Cthonimon thing that had a proper gameplay at least... u_u'
GreymoorHall by Ninety
During my first two attempts I tried to immediately flee from the crime scene, which got me caught. Only on third attempt it turned out that after killing and waiting for a few seconds I proceed to questioning.
Also, on my second and third attempt the host was very social, being left somewhere alone only around the last hour of the party. It's pretty frustrating, having to wait for the opportunity after already speaking with all guests and finding the key item, but still risking the round being botched because people just won't let go of the host. Or are there some systems that prevent the host from being busy around the last hour?
That aside, the game has a nice amount of polish, when it comes to the graphics, the custom-made music and some of the writing (though there was some conspiciously repeating patterns among the party guests, usually with some guests sharing very similar dialogue lines). Nice job with varied character portraits. The conclusion... with mostly text on the black background, it feels pretty underwhelming, but I guess it's sufficient? I wonder how the game would turn out with more varied dialogue, guests personalities and items that appeal to them (right now it seems the items mostly appeal to greedy personality).
Overall, a nice starting point for a detective game, but needs some more variety for better complexity and replayability.
happy birthday by Yal
This game - together with One Big Party I played just before - made me all the more appreciate the "Potato" graphics settings in 3 Mice In A Trenchcoat.
The game is a walking simulator with more focus on overall atmosphere, but I don't mind games like that; that game for EVERYBODY IS DEAD Jam worked pretty well, too. That said, this game... it could use some improvements. First, the fog - it obscured so much of the view, it was hard to tell where I was supposed to be going, since it obscured too much of the view. Maybe it would work better if its effective radius was doubled or something? Second, the overall performance - the game lagged a lot on my GPU-less laptop. Also, maybe the game could put less emphasis on platforming challenges sometimes (like jumping on a sequence of trees to get a balloon) in favour of pure exploration (or maybe I just found it difficult because of lagging)? The ending... I get a vague sense of what it's hinting at, though I personally prefer more concrete stories (not necessarily upfront).
Aside from that, the intro could be more skippable (it seems to last a dozen seconds at least, which gives me enough time to read it many times over) and I'd pick a mouse-controlled camera over WSAD-controlled camera anytime.
The graphics and audio serve well enough to build up the atmosphere, and the overall layout was varied. The player character model felt very... off proportion, and very unlike the shadowy figure seen in the menu.
Overall, I find this entry interesting and kinda wish this was the one you most focused on, since I'm always up for atmospheric jumpscare-less horror/surreal games. Now I kinda want to create a horror game myself, and make it wholesome.
HealthBar by Fanatrick
I'm not a great fan of current gameplay mechanics. As it is now, having requests in sub-units amounts is troublesome, and it's very hard to get hues other than primary and secondary; maybe there's some overeager colour interpolation going on or something? I think combining this gameplay with mechanics of
RPG Potion Brewer by
@eimie would have worked better for this game. As in, pressing A/S/D would add one unit's worth of red/green/blue, and requested drinks could be combined by using a combination of full units of colour (e.g. 3 units of red and 3 units of blue). Also, maybe don't have the drink requests appear so quickly, at least at the start? I think slowing down the game a little and focusing more on precision would work quite nicely.
The general background graphics are nice. The crazy dancing people are a little funny, not in a very bad way, though. I like the music, but it's pretty silent compared to SFX; at first I didn't even know there's music in the first place.
Overall, a decent drinks serving game, but I'd have preferred stricter game mechanics coupled with a little more time to prepare the drinks in right proportions.
Hero Horde by PinesOfChaos
The game is quite difficult, took me several attempts to figure out the winning strategy.
Generally, it turned out it's better to buy lots of units from early levels - preferably those that actually aim at the main opponent as opposed to e.g. blue mages whose bullets go everywhere + priests - and level them up on early opponents. The units bought later on turned out to add greater cost per second and also died easily before being able to level up enough.
Eventually, my massive party of a knight, lots of rangers, priests and warriors managed to slay the demon lord, though not without losses near the latest phases. I reached the Demon Lord several times before, but ran out of time back then.
There could be some indication for the party state, e.g. little player icons, HP/EXP bars and current level. It should be perfectly possible to fit multiple units in a single row of such HUD display (e.g. 3-5 per row), so that party doesn't grow so large its HUD becomes taller than the game window. This HP/EXP/LVL would be especially important for making sure there are no near-dying people in the party. Also, it would be nice if instead/alongside the one-time coins cost there was also per-second cost displayed for units about to be bought.
Aside from that, graphics are good enough, music is chosen well. Pretty neat entry overall, but could use more forgiving difficulty and/or better party state indication.
Hero Huddle by ThinGinger
I completed the game with the final part size of 105!
The crowd mechanics worked really nice, and it was really fun to see them going around. The graphics were working pretty well, too, especially with red/green/yellow teams. The game isn't particularly difficult or strategic, but it was still fun going around with the army of destruction, and boss battle was pretty fun, too. Overall, nice and varied short entry.
Add some background music, and maybe some extra SFX e.g. for freeing the prisoners, and it would be great.
Jaguar Pogo Party by TotallyAverageGamez
Pretty cool pogo-jumping mechanics, goofy enough to stand out yet not so gimmicky they're annoying. Maybe the collected gifts could appear semi-transparent, to indicate that yes, they were there and yes, the player already collected them. It seems the game doesn't save progress of collected gifts (between different playthroughs, that is); would be nice if it did.
The graphics are pretty nice, but there needs to be a better distinction between the foreground (interactible elements) and the background. Nice choice of music. Fun platforming concept overall.
Jam Defenders by Kepons
I defended the Jam. In general, it seems like Team Red is the most effective - as it should be - though I'm afraid because of that other units aren't used that much (except for pears at the start). Thus, the gameplay turns out to have little variety overall.
The graphics are simple, but functional; I would have liked something more varied as a background than plain gray (maybe at least some checkered tablecloth pattern?). Sounds are alright. No music, unfortunately.
Overall, nice little tower defense, but Reds are very much OP and the game could use some music.
Jenka Dungeon by dosto, Reaktori, Riuku
I enjoy the concept of gathering the opponents, though this kind of party gathering isn't exactly uncommon this Jam.
I feel the units attack are too uncontrollable, especially when it comes to monsters like this swampy thing (leaving two puddles in some direction) or the demon thing (sending a fireball in some direction). In the end, I've found the knights attacking left and right were about the best fit against the boss, especially once I caught up to the boss enough to easily avoid the explosive balloons while still dealing damage.
Other than that, the presentation is really cool, the game introduces the concepts really well and there's a good variety of enemies, as well as proper completion. The attacks unpredictability is my main issue here, though it's a serious one.
Keyboard Hero by tadashibashi
Made it!
Out of all the rhythm games this Jam, this one felt the best to play. The mechanics were very straightforward - just press specific keys at the correct time - as opposed to more platform-y Need For Beats. Also, it had better feedback about Good/Excellent notes, and also had more varied rhythm as opposed to Demon Dance (who used constant interval between subsequent notes). During my initial attempts I did pretty bad, but that's to be expected from a game with so many keys available and no experience on my part. The more I played, I felt I was improving gradually, and the game kept me hooked enough to actually get the perfect score (no bad notes). Once again - as far as core rhythm game mechanics go, this one was absolute best.
The interface and the music could use some improvement. The real-life keyboard usually has two rows of keys (white and black), and it could be reflected perfectly here if not for that B button somewhere in the middle. Had it been replaced with something else (H?), all notes would use only top and middle row of letters. With that, you could omit bottom letters from the interface, and place the rest higher or lower depending on whether they are in the top or middle row. This, I think, would greatly improve the overall visuals-to-keyboard mapping, making the game more intuitive to play.
The game seems to aim for early GameBoy aesthetics, which is a little ironic for a game that uses a broad range of keyboard letters (which clearly weren't available in original GameBoy). The music was a joy to play, and seeing the people dance on the stage was quite rewarding. Very no-nonsense and charming rhythm entry overall!
Life Party by Cat
It seems someone forgot to call randomize().
(on my first playthrough after starting the game I keep getting the same layout)
Got 220 on my third proper playthrough. I enjoy the idea of gathering the gifts and giving them to ghosts, and the gift stacking mechanic somewhat limits the potential annoyance of walking into gifts I don't yet intend to collect. Also, it seems the ghost speed as well as max gift stack size increases as the game progresses? Not sure if it depends on gifts given or the timer.
The silly paint-y ghost graphics seem a little inconsistent with higher-detail gifts? The music is fine, but there's no SFX. I like the idea of ghosts party aesthetics, though - undeads need their parties, too (vide Party Animal).
matoset by Poizen
Game crashes even when I added globalstatsio.dat to matoparty local appdata...
After I downloaded the fixed version and removed apparently broken globalstatsio.dat file the game started working properly. It's a nice concept, but it requires tweaking. For example, worms turn way too fast, and the game has no minimap or zoomed out view which would make it easier to decide which fruit to jump to next. Also, the worms make it seem like there's some rivalry for resources going on, when in fact these worms seem to be ghosts of earlier scorers? Would be nice if they were semi-transparent so that they wouldn't take too much focus.
I like the character customisation options, but it would be really nice if I didn't have to type out the name every time.
Ranking it last, because the original Jam version crashes, whether with or without provided globalstatsio file.
Me pARRty by ghandpivot
Alright, I *think* I explored everything there was to this game. There was little content, but I liked these (often darkly humorous) bits the game provided.
I guess if it was a game with an actual content and goal, I'd have preferred if the food didn't go down so quickly. Also, I think I'd prefer mouse controlled camera as opposed to arrow keys controlled one. Other than that, the concept seems pretty fun - though I'm not sure how to make a remotely balanced resource management game out of it, if it was the original intent. I think it works well enough as it is, with goofiness being the main selling point. Would be nice if there was some winning/completion condition, though.
The graphics are neat overall; I might be tired of the widespread pixel art, but I don't see voxel art as often, so that's a nice variation. Music is quite fitting, too. Fun entry overall.
Need For Beats by Matharoo, BlaineTanuki, _aeternumgames
Okay, yeah, no, I'm not completing that last level. It's basically "developer difficulty level", i.e. when developer plays their game for the Nth time and thinks "Yeah, that's entertainingly challenging now, it actually takes me a few tries to complete it."
The game is too unforgiving and yet demanding, in that every note-taking is handled by this cursor thing and the delays in cursor movement affect the gameplay too much. Together with very narrow intervals between note-bits you have very little leeway between ending one note and beginning the next one. Had the game used more independent controls - e.g. glitch destruction doesn't move a cursor but instead e.g. sends some explosion from it - I think the overall responsiveness and by extension gameplay would improve a lot. As it is now, I don't feel like I'm improving in the last level at all - especially compared to keyboard hero, where I was missing keys a lot at first, but gradually got a better grasp of what to press when.
Also, in a game with such frequent restarts, is it too much to ask for a keyboard-controlled restarting? Or entirely keyboard-controlled menu, for that matter? Having to move a hand to mouse and back breaks the flow considerably.
I wish the gameplay was more responsive and not so ridiculously fast-paced, because otherwise the game presentation is very slick and the music doesn't fall behind, either. Seeing people dancing in the background is pretty entertaining; seeing them despairing yet another time because the game is too hard.
Overall, entry looks and sounds great, but the gameplay is too fast and overcomplicated compared to other games of rhythm genre (largely the fact that note-actions aren't independent from one another).
One Big Party by Gizmo199, shortbread
Alright, I played and won all party games. I won't massacre my GPU-less laptop any longer.
Punch Funk is very much like Wham Bam Dan Jam Slam I just played. So I guess in a way this entry already does that and some more?
Pushy Pool is nice, though I found there's much more relevance to avoiding balls rather than pushing other players into them; maybe if there was some kind of shove attack, the interactions between players would be more meaningful?
Chook Chase felt a little slow - possibly because of tiring my laptop. It might have made the chicken chasing experience a little more troublesome than it was already.
Feud Court was probably the most fun of all, with different players bumping into each other and at the same time not ending as quickly as Punch Funk.
The visuals are great, both in terms of general looks and animation. One little thing that could be fixed: the chosen team could be indicated with something more than bold text; with letters already being pretty thick in the first place, it's hard to notice.
One Big Political Party by Terminator_Pony
I was just kinda trying to stay close to average, tilting one way or another towards the "How they want it". I think it worked? I won the election, at least.
I've found the gameplay a tad too repetitive, and while having some indicator bars is nice, it would be even nicer if the trust in particular had at least middle of the bar marked, if not show the numeric value altogether.
The graphics are pretty simplistic, maybe too much even. The visualisations of the values balances was pretty cool, though. No audio whatsoever, sadly.
Overall, a good general idea to use the theme, but I'd have much preferred if the concept had more to it than going around, doing speeches and micro-manipulating overly specific gauges. Maybe some kind of TV or Internet campaigns too, or something?
Party Animal by TehPilot, TheFugue
That's an interesting premise, but the game in its current shape has mostly simple logic. The cat movements were hard to predict, especially at later levels. It sort of made sense in terms of enforcing the correct kind of solution, but there were seemingly some unwritten rules that didn't come up before.
I liked the whole black-and-white film setup, in terms of presentation the game is great. My main issue would be that it's not clear the orange area cannot be crossed by possessed people. I overlooked the area in the first possession level, so I didn't recognise it as "no entry" area in the level with the door (I just thought that's what area behind opened doors looks like, for some reason). The music fits overall mood perfectly.
Overall, a nice and not too complex puzzle game.
Party Animals by ScaryPotato, Kalzme
Unfortunately, it's a local multiplayer game, so I can't really judge the competitive factor.
Not a fan of these button-mashing games like the racing or twisty ball thing. I'd rather spare my keyboard and my hand health, thank you very much.
Finding letters was the most interesting of the games I saw; nice mixing of memorisation elements with same-computer multiplayer controls.
I am pretty sure I heard this track elsewhere for this Jam...
Party Detective by Mercyssh
This is the kind of concept that can easily become overcomplicated with splitting one's attention between maintenance work and listening on guests dialogue, but this game strikes the right balance. The fact that the detective zooms crazy fast across the halls also helps and actually feels pretty good (compared to many other games with rather modest movement speed). At the same time, there is lots and lots of guests so they overlap frequently; maybe halving their numbers would help? Also, I noticed guests dialogue would go offscreen sometimes.
The graphics are simple, but functional, and the running detective animation looks nice. The sound effects are nice, but I would also have liked some music to boot. Pretty cool entry, overall, I like how well the maintenance part and deduction part work together.
Party Guardians by StarDreamIX
Not much to say about the gameplay - defending the cake, with either archer or the melee fighter and just beating skeletons for two levels. Not much to it, but at least it was short.
The melee fighter attack uses Windows error sound for some reason. It does feel pretty appropriate with all that art mismatch the game has, though.
I'd generally recommend some basic drawing learning. It doesn't have to be good, it might be something like Party Parade stickmans for start, but once you can make the art of your own you can make it consistent.
Hopefully, you'll improve by the next Jam. ^^
Party Mountain by AJTheApple
Pretty standard, sweet and short platformer. Reminds me of Celeste a lot, especially with the mountain-climbing theme. The controls are responsive and precise, and at no point I felt like I struggle against poorly implemented mechanics (with my platforming experience, I completed the game quite quickly).
The graphics are nice; maybe the background could be desaturated and/or darkened and/or semi-transparent, so that it doesn't get mixed with the foreground too easily. The collapsing platforms were pretty tricky to tell apart from the background in particular; it's not like I couldn't see they are there, but they're still not very noticeable. I liked the icy caves area, wish there were more area types as well (maybe with different kinds of obstacles?). The animations and graphics effects add some more life to the game, and all that is accompanied by nice sounds and music.
Well-made platformer, overall, with solid mechanics and neat presentation alike.
Party Paddles by Fusai
Rather than having to hit the ball at the opposite area, I'd have preferred if the scoring was based around how few balls I let through (like in a similar paddle game in Gangs Bash). As it is now, with the chaos around the board and 8 areas total (which leaves very little spot for me to hit), my success seems less reliant on my skill and more on how other opponents play and whether the general chaos won't set my ball off-track.
Aside from that, the sprites remind me very much of Final Fantasy. Were they made by yourself, or did you get them from elsewhere? The rest of the graphics are alright, though maybe one section of the disco lights (?) could be a little slower, so as not to make the player too dizzy? The music is kinda fitting for this epic battle of all these parties, even if it's something as trivial as pong; I just wish the gameplay held up as well. Aside from a little fanfare thing at the beginning, I don't recall any sound effects here.
Party Parade by Tristan
Well, I've seen better rhythm games this Jam. ^^'
There's not much to that entry. Mechanics allow just spamming A/L for a massive combo. Graphics are pretty crude - though I do appreciate the parade getting bigger and more varied. The music is fine.
After a while, the game just keeps going indefinitely; it could be pretty nice if the game had limited scope - about as long as the music lasts - but over that time the parade would pass by a variety of places, with no repetition.
Which is to say, with more time and effort this concept could turn out really well, but I guess there was not much time here?
Party Pooper by Lukan
So, um, it took me a while to notice that "target" indicator in the top-left, and meanwhile I've found another way to distinguish the party pooper.
They were always darker.
It has some unfortunate implications.
Other than that, it seems that clicking on overlapping people results in either clicking both of them or a random person of them. Rather, it should be made it so that the person displayed in the front is always clicked.
There is a slew of improvements that could be made here (the aforementioned mouse input, some audio, adding a time limit or something, have the party pooper with the same range of colours as the rest of people), but then it's probably not the game that's meant to be developed further.
(I think Mr Magnus entry does a much better job at "spot the person" type of mechanic, at any rate)
Party Puker by Ben Stitt
I made it through safely. Wasn't too hard, though these idle chit-chatters sometimes get in the way. Also, I noticed that you can complete the game by entering the door from menu.
The game could use some kind of audio... or graphics other than rectangles, for that matter. Still, I appreciate the effort to enter the Jam, and the gameplay isn't *entirely* trivial.
Plague Rats by Nocturne
I kept getting reliable freezing bug in level 3. Then, in my next run, I was extra careful when crossing over between one side of the opened barrier to the other. Don't know if this is the thing that helped, but after that I managed to complete the game.
I like the crowding mechanics, though it can be tricky to execute attacks in the most efficient way (i.e. attacking from all sides available once the zombie is aware of the rats). Well, I was still successful enough to complete the game with 31 rats. The splitting and joining mechanic might open up some interesting possibilities, but in practice I found it's simpler to just go with one big crowd, and only used splitting when "press multiple buttons at once" puzzle required it.
The graphics and music are really cool, but most of these were made before the Jam, so no extra points for these.
Queen by Toque
I had to go through quite a literal poopstorm to earn that party.
Other than that, it's unmistakably a game by Toque; pixel art graphics, Jam references, specific sense of humour...
The gameplay was simple, but functional; one complaint would be how you have to press arrow buttons *after* the Queen stop shooting, or else the controls won't respond. Also, the peas being slightly off in relation to the queen made aiming slightly difficult at the start, but it's something one can learn over time so it's not much of a complaint.
Managed to complete the whole thing. Nice game overall.
Quickly! Dispensegifts by Allison James
Functionally, the gameplay is pretty simple, but the rotation controls make it more complex than it needs to be. I'd rather have a single button for switching direction, rather than one button to turn clockwise and other to turn anti-clockwise. Otherwise, there is a little bit variety to the enemies (especially those that fly freely around instead of just coming closer and closer), but not too much. I just wish I could outstretch the gift towards the guy in the bottom-left, so that he would shut up with his often very foul verbal abuse.
The graphics are very neat, and it's always nice to see a game that uses vector pictures rather than pixel art for its 2D graphics for a change. The music is fine, I guess?
Generally, nice and simple gameplay, but the rotation could be handled better and I'd much prefer if all that verbal abuse was left out. Life Party was more wholesome in that regard, especially since people who were given gifts were already dead anyway.
Roborazzi by Kultisti, Sulo
The game is too unforgiving. The battery goes down extra fast in the third room, yet when you restart you go back all the way to the beginning. Rather than increasing energy consumption (or at least that's what I think is happening), I'd rather increase difficulty in later levels by making the party busier (more people, more decorations) so that it's harder to spot the person/decoration player is looking for. Too bad, because otherwise it was pretty fun to spot different elements present at the party and making sneaky photos of them (even if it mostly meant mashing photo button 5+ times and keeping minimal social distance as soon as the target was found). The chat generally would be a nice additional as well, but with all this energy consumption and no way to stop the main character from moving wastefully I had to time to see what they're talking about at all.
The graphics are pretty great; I like the variety of characters and decorations there, and the overall colour scheme works pretty well. The music and sound effects complete the presentation nicely. It's a pretty cool and well-presented concept overall, but having to restart from the beginning combined with the overly difficult third room make it somewhat frustrating (especially since now I don't know if there's some properly rewarding ending or not).
Robot Surprise Party by samspade
That's some really cute premise, and nice gameplay mechanics to boot. It was pretty fun - if sometimes time-consuming (vide level 3) - to sneak on the birthday bot so as not to spoil the surprise. It would be nice if the trees behind which a surprise bot is hiding would be shown as semi-transparent; I had to do quite a robot-hunting after hiding some bots behind nearby trees. Also, in the last level some bugs started being noticeable, like weird pathfinding making the robot go completely off route, or ability to stack robots one on another and hide all together in the same bush. Also, it seems no matter whether I achieve complete surprise or not, I still get the party at the end - which is very fitting, because no matter whether there is complete surprise or not, there's a reason for the party - but kind of breaks the general "you need to actually win to progress" convention. ^^'
The audiovisuals are cute; especially the level winning music is pretty rad. Adorable entry overall, a little spoiled by tricky hiding behind trees and pathfinding problems (especially in the last level; just what is happening there?).
R-pg-ING by Micah_DS
Damn, things are really serious if Micah_DS doesn't have time to make music.
Otherwise it's a nice prototype, though hard to tell how well this idea would expand for a larger project. Would be nice if each level was designed in a way it could be completed with no losses, unlike the last level before congratulations screen. Maybe add some focused mode which halves the ring radius but doesn't allow player units to attack?
Also, make the player character white or black rather than desaturated bluish, so that it really stands out as the one with no colour.
The graphics are alright (if maybe there's not much of them). The audio is sadly missing. :<
Snake Dance by Greenblizzard
That's a pretty great concept and executed quite well, too; I enjoyed wiggling the snake into designed spots. Got Snake God on my second playthrough (thank goodness there were no more ranks, lest I would need to keep playing even more) and a Highscore of 213915. It's the kind of game where I would like to see online leaderboards, especially with how largely skill-based it is.
The graphics are minimalistic, but serve their purpose well enough; though it would be nice if there was some indication how the snake goes along or at least where its head is. The chill music is pretty fitting, though I feel it would be even better with something more upbeat and with snake "snapshots" being taken to the rhythm, making it feel even more like a dance (the increase of difficulty could be handled by gradually increasing pitch of the music, I guess). A fun concept executed well, overall.
Survival Party by HayManMarc
Good concept, and very in tune with the theme (as opposed to many other entries which focus on the "party" aspect and not as much the "one big" aspect).
I did pretty well - reaching as far as level 4 (which is apparently where the balancing breaks down?) - but that's also because I read ahead HayManMarc's post about how the Fun Factor mechanic works. Once you're made aware that you need to balance party favors vs party size, the gameplay is pretty straightforward, but still has some nice tactical aspect to it with the route you're taking.
I'd have preferred if the main character speed was faster, maybe having the timer shorter and party favours more frequent in exchange? As it is now, it often takes several seconds between deciding on the next destination and reaching it. Speaking of the timer, I'd have preferred a plain countdown rather than an analog clock, especially since it's not obvious what time is actually the deadline.
The audiovisuals are pretty nice and charming. Pretty fun entry, overall, though it might rely a bit much on mechanics that aren't explained in the game or readme (especially the slower depletion of party favours the higher the fun factor is).
Survive the Party by Nejc Podlipnik
A basic top-down fighter thing, involving some melee attacks, magic attacks and also dashing (the last one I didn't use, because I didn't know I can and it wasn't really needed).
After 3 waves I got the treasure chest that I could interact with repeatedly. It didn't matter much, though, because it seems the game doesn't progress past that (interacting with wizard didn't do anything). Could be fun to play more challenging waves of that.
The artstyle reminds me a lot of
eddynadro games, especially with this knight and orc. There are some basic sound effects, but apparently no background music. Nice base for a top-down fighter overall, but lacks conclusion and variety for now.
The Annual GMC Party by O_stogden
Yay, Initial D Deja vu reference!
A nice, simple murder mystery game; I managed to be successful on each level on the first try. Also, the time loop plot was an interesting twist as well.
At the same time, I'm somewhat dissatisfied that there were no women there. No wonder EvanSki left the party...
Graphics are very GMC. Music is very Kevin MacLeod. But we all know the main appeal is the mystery plot, and that's done pretty nicely.
The Golden Balloon by Little Penguin Studios
Simple, nice, pleasant, very much complete.
Revealing the PARTY at the end with acorn cannon was nice.
Still, I'd like to see the actual party in question, even if it's just a bunch of spheres bouncing to the music from speakers. It would work especially well with the colour-lagging-behind-outline effect as seen in the game.
The golden balloon mechanic is nice, though very hard to be strategic about with coin collectibles never reappearing and carrying over to next levels. I feel the mechanic would feel more significant if in some levels there were enough coins for golden balloon (reappearing on restart), and the player had to use the golden balloon to pass through barrages of acorns.
As it is now, the mechanic is very much optional, to the point I completed the goldless% run of the game (never get a golden balloon, just barely staying at 11/12 coins).
The Matchmaker (HTML5 ONLY, OPEN FOLDER) by eimie
Too bad it's HTML5 only, but since you couldn't export to Windows, I understand. I just hope you'll figure out how to get the Windows export working for the next Jam...?
(are you perhaps using GM:S for Mac? That's the only reason I can think of why you could export to HTML5, but not to Windows)
Putting that aside, the game is actually pretty rad. I like mixing rhythmic movement with pushing people to meet their special someones, and the dancing moves of the main character fit perfectly. Neat little game overall, and the one I didn't mind playing again. Online scoreboard would make it even better.
The Party Must Go On by GVmG
I generally like the concept of collecting stuff from the shop, especially with this silly trolley drifting. However, the difficulty is really low at the beginning - to the point where I need to wait several seconds for the next request. Following that, it increases so slowly that after a while of uneventful shopping I just ended up failing the game on purpose with way above $1000 spent. Also, I didn't see my name on the phone list, either. :<
The audiovisuals are nice, I particularly like the trolley drifting effect. The music is fine, but a little silent on default settings. With all this drifting I'd have preferred the traditional Italian music that is Eurobeat.
Nice entry overall, but the difficulty progression is too slow for the game to be engaging.
The Retrieval by Dr Wolf
Sorry, couldn't figure out how to move things even with manual, and the game crashed after I progressed through several turns.
I'm pretty sure it's possible to cover the same gameplay mechanics using more approachable UI (tutorial would be the best, but also time-consuming). Maybe opting for 4-colour palette - black, white, cyan and magenta - could keep the retro feel of the game, while allowing more options to provide feedback (e.g. highlighting the UI/map elements the current action relates to). On closer inspection, I've also found there are tooltips appearing next to specific commands (in a similar way to basic browser/Windows tooltips), so that's nice.
Other than that, the graphics are neat and the cursor effect is nice. Maybe text could have disabled anti-aliasing (or a pixel font could be used instead), since right now it kinda stands out among the sharp black-or-white pixels. I quite like the music as well.
The Scattered Army by Sirham
The gameplay relies too much on trial-and-error knowledge, some of which I'm still not quite certain about. For example:
- does greater army contribute only health, or also a bit of attack or something?
- what are the conditions to remove the boulders in the mountain (it seems having sufficiently large army, but the game doesn't state it, and it takes some weird movement around to remove the boulder in the first place)
- apparently there's that bard character that randomly appears around the town or smithery and gives you the OP Songshirt of Healing (which is extremely useful to completing the game on Medium+ difficulty, yet relies on a random encounter)?
- what are the enemies stats, so that I won't get myself accidentally killed?
- what is the purpose of specific spells?
If the game provided this information, it would be easier to develop a strategy involving the order of actions (when to attack which monster and perform which quest). As it is know, there's lots of information that only developers knows upfront, and others need to figure out all these (often pretty obscure) secret.
Aside from that, the exploration felt somewhat clunky, especially the boulder moving part. I feel it would be nicer and more efficient if I could just point and click at specific locations/elements, instead of walking around. The graphics were pretty underwhelming, and music... I appreciate the attempt, but there are still ways to go; it would also be nice if there were different tracks for different situations (e.g. battle). It's still more fitting than "dawg the party animal", though.
Overall, a nice attempt at RPG-like entry, but it still has ways to go in terms of smoothness of mechanics and audiovisual polish.
The Way Back To The Party by Noodlehead
I don't mind text adventures, but this game mostly consists of navigating through the labyrinthine city and seemingly not many interactions aside from that. The previous Jam samspade made a similar text adventure "Distress Signal Found", but that at least didn't rely on commands like "North/West/East/South", but rather "go to sea/go to jungle" etc. which made the exploration so much less taxing compared to indistinct streets and alleys.
I think with descriptive area names like in Distress Signal Found and with
varied illustrations similar to those in this game, it could make for a nice area exploration experience. Add to that variety of interactions involving ingame content, and we got some neat adventure game.
(though I personally prefer the point-and-click format)
Graphics are alright, though I wish there was some background to the bodyguard or some image of the casino at the end. No audio I could hear, unfortunately.
Wastoid Rodney by Cloaked Games, JosephEllis, BlakeNorth
Nice top-down shooter, with a good variety of enemies, obstacles and upgrades. I'm very aware I'm not speaking for everyone here, but navigating through the bullet hell and figuring out how to defeat specific enemies was quite enjoyable. One suggestion for the final battle: it would really help if there was some indication that a hostile robot/sheriff will spawn at a given point a little bit before that actually happens, so the player can get out of the way in time.
Other than that, the aesthetics are pretty great, with all these neon colours and such, and I enjoy the musicians designs as well. Music was rad. I liked these little and varied sound effects when dealing damage to the enemy. Would be nice to have a separate sound effect for when a bullet hits the purple barrier, so that I would realise when I'm hitting that off-screen. Well-made top-down shooter overall.
Wham Bam Dan Jam Slam by GameDevDan
Neat entry. The gameplay is pretty basic and not unlike many other "kick other people out of the ring" games, but still well-presented. I kept playing Jam Slam to get a perfect victory (no hearts lost), and eventually got one on a third try.
Other than that, the audiovisuals are always up to the game and seeing all these characters from previous Jam games sure is impressive. Maybe not as astonishing, though, considering Dan has a long history of both including GMC members and earlier entries cameos. Well done, overall.
Your Brain On Party by thijsmie
I reached wave 105 in the end, before losing on purpose with no apparent increase in difficulty.
The tutorial incorrectly highlighted energy bar as a source of hydration towers, and hydration meter as a source of energy fix. This led to lots of confusion for me at the start, since the energy didn't seem to do anything while hydration seemed to place towers, but I thought maybe these are repairing towers. Also, when the game is played again, I cannot place towers on locations where towers were before losing.
At first I thought going for mostly social towers was the way to go, especially since it's possible to vibe and socialise at the same time. However, with hydration being very quickly recovered and staying near energy drink, at later point I just switched between fully restoring vibing and energy, occasionally restoring hydration along the way. That way I didn't need to worry about staying social while not getting out of speakers range.
Alright graphics of the main game, though room navigation graphics are somewhat inconsistent. Music is cool. Nice tower defense and cool concept of mixing it with party activities, though it could use some balancing (and tutorial without swapped items).