GMC Jam Discussion The Thirsty 33rd GMC Jam - Discussion Topic

RE: complaints about full screen.

As long as developers haven't disabled it entirely you can just use the windows shortcut Alt+Enter to force the game to be fullscreen. This only ever presents a problem if they haven't set up their GUI layer properly.
That's what I meant by disabling fullscreen. Some games won't even let me use alt-enter. Otherwise there would be no problem.
 

Sk8dududu

Member
@Alice 52% is pretty good actually! I like your suggestion about making it a pure puzzle game designed by hand. It could exist besides the current "rogue" mode.
From someone who is obsessed with GR1D_0 (im still playing it every day to try and get 100%) a game like this screams rng. Set puzzles ruins the replay value. Like minesweeper wouldn't be very fun if you had unlimited chances and the mines never moves.
If you wanna make it less about "luck" and more skill based, instead of adding this 'Super Easy Baby Spoon Feeding Mode', you could have it show multiple upcoming pieces so you can plan further ahead. Or having the ability to hold a piece, like Tetris to use for when you need it.
More bombs could make the game go by faster; found my self taking nearly an hour to die.

TLDR: I f'n love GR1D_0. I'll cry if you destroy it.
 

var

Member
To everyone who liked the music in our game (Powerout), it was made by @let!

Unrelated fun fact: I didn't hardcode any maximums for the systems in Powerout, because I only put a limited number of pickups in the levels. However, I'd forgotten that you can do a NG+, so you can go above the max by getting a pickup for a system you already should have maxed. If you speedrun the whole thing 28 times in a row, you can get this:

:D
 

Alice

Darts addict
Forum Staff
Moderator
From someone who is obsessed with GR1D_0 (im still playing it every day to try and get 100%) a game like this screams rng. Set puzzles ruins the replay value. Like minesweeper wouldn't be very fun if you had unlimited chances and the mines never moves.
If you wanna make it less about "luck" and more skill based, instead of adding this 'Super Easy Baby Spoon Feeding Mode', you could have it show multiple upcoming pieces so you can plan further ahead. Or having the ability to hold a piece, like Tetris to use for when you need it.
More bombs could make the game go by faster; found my self taking nearly an hour to die.

TLDR: I f'n love GR1D_0. I'll cry if you destroy it.
Uh, I don't see the problem here? It's not like adding a new mode will ruin the existing one? Baukereg himself specifically mentioned adding the "pure puzzle" mode existing beside the existing "rogue" mode.

I also disagree that the "pure puzzle" mode would turn out to be "Super Easy Baby Spoon Feeding Mode". Rather, I think these would have a complementary kinds of difficulty. The "rogue" mode emphasizes adaptation, but also gives you a bunch of lives, so you aren't forced to seek the optimal 2-3 moves solution; with enough lives, 4-moves solution is perfectly viable, too.

The "pure puzzle" mode, on the other hand, has player working with a specific set of pieces to make a specific code out of specific initial layout - you can't just use up all 3 pieces and expect the 4th one will come along. Granted, it's not very replayable, unless there is an option to randomly generate "pure puzzle" maps. And that actually should be easy enough to implement (generate the destination layout, extract a region of it as the code, randomly put some shape-switching around the code region to reach the source layout); it's just that the quality of these puzzles might not be as good as the hand-designed ones (they could end up easier or have multiple valid solutions).

I just don't see why coexistence of two modes (one playing more like minesweeper, other like these "checkmate the king in X moves" puzzles) would be detrimental to either of them. If you can easily reuse the same underlying mechanic to make multiple kinds of challenges (which Baukereg seems to be planning), why not do that?
 

Sk8dududu

Member
It's not like adding a new mode will ruin the existing one.
I'd consider that a subjective position.
Adding content is not always a good thing; An example, Cuphead, while it does have a simple mode, does not allow you to complete the game if your playing on simple. I'm sure I'm not the only one who wouldn't have bought the game if it could be beaten on simple.
Difficuly aside(which I still believe that no matter how complex the hand made levels are, it would be possible for anyone at all to complete given enough tries), it being random is what makes it fun in the first place. Why would you want to settle for 4 move solutions when 2 move solutions are pretty much always possible?
I don't think either of us are right or wrong for having a preference in the type of game we want. I genuinely feel like I'm presenting an objective argument. And I'm sure you feel like you are as well. I think the miscommunication stems from that we are presenting two very different games.
I like GR1D_0, and you like a game that resembles it, that is more inclusive.
 

Micah_DS

Member
I was able to get what I needed done on my game project for Saturday, which leaves me a good chunk of time to play some games, finally!
I've only played 2 games and I've really been looking forward to playing more, but I just haven't had the time or energy, due to work, mostly.

Regarding the discussion about windowed and fullscreen for jams:
I really wish there was a way to natively switch between bordered windowed and borderless fullscreen.
I won't go into depth, but I've decided to go borderless fullscreen for jams. From my understanding, it's the easiest and least problematic.
I mainly want to avoid fullscreen because of wonky things that can happen when switching to desktop and back and because of how it causes me to switch my capture target in OBS when capturing video - none of which is an issue with borderless fullscreen.
 
M

Misu

Guest
compliment was sincere. Enjoyed your videos so far. It’s a lot of time to do those videos. They are raw. Your comments are insightful.

I like how you apologized for not drinking energy drinks before doing the last video. Funny.

Sometimes I play a game wonder if I’m an idiot because I can’t figure it out. Then I watch you and see you struggle as well. I’m not going insane.

I have not played your game yet.


I think your review of my game was accurate. The game reflects my current skills. I can make a simple game with cute pixels. That’s all I got. I make mobile games so I’m happy to give 30 seconds - 1 minute of entertainment. That’s success.
Your right. “Nothing wow there.” You got a couple laughs and “didn’t hate it. “. I think that’s pretty good for a jam game. I could not code the on and off part properly so left it out. Weak on theme.



Looking forward to your next video.
Thanks again, Toque! :)

Also, I'm gonna do a live stream for now on since my time is an occupant. I am about to live stream soon if anyone wants to hop in, go ahead. Otherwise, I will have my streams recorded into my profile on Twitch. Be sure to hop in if anyone can!

My live stream channel everyone!!!
 

FrostyCat

Redemption Seeker
@var @The M
Since the game for some reason decided to delete my 150k score for using illegal symbols I had to go in and at least steal #1 again.

(and on the first try too) :p
If the scoreboard is done over HTTP, URL-encoding your parameters before submitting them would make sure there's no such thing as an "illegal symbol". This is one of the most basic HTTP best practices that only people in GM user circles seem to violate with near-perfect regularity.
 
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wkaudio

Guest
I just want to thank everyone for the generally positive review of Elephants! When I was playing the final build of the game I was thinking "oh this is no good" but I'm glad some of you thought otherwise :)
My reviews should be finished later today!
 

The M

Member
If the scoreboard is done over HTTP, URL-encoding your parameters before submitting them would make sure there's no such thing as an "illegal symbol". This is one of the most basic HTTP best practices that only people in GM user circles seem to violate with near-perfect regularity.
Whelp, I might have to look into that then, thanks! Also seems like I might have to give it another go to challenge your scores. :)
 
W

wkaudio

Guest
I finally got 5 more written reviews done for games by @mimusic @woodsmoke @Cat @wkaudio @TehPilot .

Let me know what you think and feel free to explain a few things about the game that I missed out on. I am always opened into hearing your thoughts.

I'll continue to play more eventually. Trying my best to get these reviews done. : )
Thanks for your review! :) Sorry for misleading you thinking the game was a sequel - that tagline is for the game's "story" - everybody had been waiting for Cactus People 7 ;)
 

Cat

Member
Hey @Misu! I'm sorry you didn't enjoy our game. It's certainly not for everyone, and it definitely had its fair share of rough edges & room for improvement. We were initially planning on adding mouse support for powering / depowering systems (and still are, for the post-jam version!), but we didn't wind up having enough time to do so. The difficulty was another victim of the deadline; we didn't have much time to balance, as playthroughs were rather costly time-wise.

Please note that I'm not trying to affect your opinion of our game, rather, I want to explain why things panned out the way they did.

That said, your review of our entry was grossly inappropriate. I don't care if you don't like our game, Misu. Making threats such as "I'm gonna take this ax and slaughter both of you" is absolutely unacceptable, even """as a joke""".
 

Micah_DS

Member
This is weird. I'm half-reading all the comments because I want to keep up, but I also don't want to spoil any games before I play them. :p

On that note, I've still got 29 left to play. Some of these games have taken me a while to beat. ... I really, really appreciate the people who make short and sweet jam games.
Let's have more of that in the future, please. :D
 
M

Misu

Guest
Thanks for your review! :) Sorry for misleading you thinking the game was a sequel - that tagline is for the game's "story" - everybody had been waiting for Cactus People 7 ;)
Its no biggie. I have been misled by most every entry in this jam. It may be me but it felt like this jam lack clarification on their entries and it was quite confusing for me. However, your entry was good and I love it. Keep up the good work.

That said, your review of our entry was grossly inappropriate. I don't care if you don't like our game, Misu. Making threats such as "I'm gonna take this ax and slaughter both of you" is absolutely unacceptable, even """as a joke""".
My extreme apologies for the rough exaggerating joke I did. I guess I went too far on that depiction but I admit, I did not mean to offend you at all nor try to depress you. Believe me, it is small criticism for the entry only and you two are absolutely good people with many years of enthusiasm participating in this jam. I decided to remove that fragment from the review to keep it cool between you and me. I hope you are still not upset with me.
Also I completely understand about the short time on dedication to the entry however it seems your game was elaborated a lot so there was time to add the control schemes at some point during the jam. Hopefully a good post-jam entry would change things up.
 

Alice

Darts addict
Forum Staff
Moderator
Just for the record, in the game of @Silas the Dev, I think I got a way to reliably play a chosen level.

Basically advance the level selection bar by clicking around the arrow to the right, so that both arrows are visible. When both arrows are visible, you can click on the level button to play it. When one of arrows is not visible, the level buttons don't work.
(I think some reviewers, like maybe @Mercerenies, would like to know about that; I wonder what causes that specific behaviour...)

--- EDIT ---

Another batch of reviews, this time from 2 days. And now I'm way past the halfway mark. Hopefully I should be done by Wednesday or Thursday.
The victims of this mass slaughter are:
#18 - @curato
#19 - @Relic
#20 - @Bearman_18
#21 - @lazertrax
#22 - @Bart
#23 - @Silas the Dev
#24 - @Mercerenies
#25 - @The M
#26 - @Lukan (I even drew something)
#27 - @Lt. Farfetch'd, @DanielDochertyMusic
#28 - @Mercerenies (again)
 

Bearman_18

Fruit Stand Deadbeat
@Alice thanks a TON for the criticism. (No sarcasm intended XD.) My jam game was a mini version of a larger project I want to make someday, and your review actually helped a lot. The dropping the kid off on the left thing was definitely problematic. It's all too easy to leave things in that only you as the developer could know.
 
O

orSQUADstra

Guest
It's all too easy to leave things in that only you as the developer could know.
That's very true. Somehow before submitting my game I didn't think about how it might not be obvious you need to shoot the rope to drop the box. Especially where you can't otherwise interact with it and also seems to be a background element.
Definitely one of the things I'll have to do something in future version :D
 
M

Misu

Guest
I finally did 5 more written reviews from games by @TinyGamesLab @Bearman_18 @The M @MikeeyBikeey @Sk8dududu
Check them out and please let know what you think. I'm always opened from hearing your opinions. Does not matter if I suck at it, I love to know and learn from the creators as well as me providing knowledge too.

Don't forget that there is also a stream recording of those gameplays, I just didn't link it on the main post but I will later.
LINK TO RECORDINGS (I HOPE IT WORKS)

Eventually, I'm gonna start streaming in a few more minutes. If anyone is interested in checking it out, go ahead. I'll provide the link soon on this post and my status. : )

https://www.twitch.tv/misumeow <----Live streaming in here!
 
M

Misu

Guest
So, @Mercerenies @Misu and anyone else having trouble progressing in my game (Timer), here's a fast playthrough of the level:
<snip>
Excellent! Thank you very much. I guess I'm too dumb with these entries. I'm going to play your game again to give it another shot and then I could write a proper review for it. Hopefully, you'll do great in this jam. Keep up the good work and thanks for watching my stream. It means a lot to me since I worked really hard on making these reviews and playthroughs since I'm doing them for everyone within my short time. :)
 

Sk8dududu

Member
Check them out and please let know what you think. ]
Really appreciate both the written and the streamed review. It feels good seeing not everyone thinks it's trash. Lol.
And I totally agree with all of your criticisms. Especially seeing you play it, it helped see how a person naturally goes through it without any prior knowledge, and all of the things I should have improved on. I gave up 24 hours early and I really should have refined it a lot more.
 
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orSQUADstra

Guest
Excellent! Thank you very much. I guess I'm too dumb with these entries. I'm going to play your game again to give it another shot and then I could write a proper review for it. Hopefully, you'll do great in this jam. Keep up the good work and thanks for watching my stream. It means a lot to me since I worked really hard on making these reviews and playthroughs since I'm doing them for everyone within my short time. :)
Thank you! One thing I'd like to note is that this is the only level in the game (frankly I ran out of time) so the only thing left after that is just collecting all the ducks to get an achievement :D Also one of the top priority changes for future versions is the controls as that seems to be the most common problem, and at the very least I'll eliminate that Ctrl + Shift combination.
 

Micah_DS

Member
Whew! Played, ranked, and commented on all games and posted in the voting thread. Hopefully my feedback is useful.
I reported a few bugs too. It feels like there were more fatal bugs this time than usual. :eek:

I know there's still a lot of time left to vote, but I had to get it all done today, because my schedule is looking pretty full up till the deadline. So I stayed up pretty late, and now I need to go grocery shopping at 4 AM, lol. :p
 
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orSQUADstra

Guest
@Micah_DS Thanks for the review! :)
About the weird moving with the platform even though you're not on it thing is a bug I only noticed after the entries were closed, so there's that. I'll be sure to fix that later though!
Also,
Why does shooting the switch cause the platform to move, but only when it's frozen? And sometimes the switch repairs itself, but other times not. It seems like it's supposed to be recording time, then reversing time, just like with the player character, but it doesn't consistently and it feels like nonsense mechanics.
It doesn't have to be frozen to work, I just did it in my video to show it can also be rewinded and used later again. That is one part I'll also redesign though, those will be replaced with switches you activate/deactivate with F as I can see how annoying it could be if someone breaks it without using rewind and then get stuck with the broken power supply. Also, if the inconsistency you're talking about is that when rewinding the right box will always get repaired but the left only if that was the saved state - that's also something I only noticed after the deadline, and it's because that one still had the faulty code in it (accidentally I only changed one of them).
The checkpoint argument is also completely fair, and I will make sure to include checkpoints in future versions. Thanks again :D
 

dadio

Potato Overlord
GMC Elder
Anyone else get a (false) virus flag for ghandpivots entry?
Would love to nail down the root cause of those false positives once and for all and advise people not to do "x"...
(It may be connected with using GMS1 + a custom icon.)
 
M

Misty

Guest
Anyone else get a (false) virus flag for ghandpivots entry?
Would love to nail down the root cause of those false positives once and for all and advise people not to do "x"...
(It may be connected with using GMS1 + a custom icon.)
Yeah I scan everything on an antivirus called virustotal. I <3 my pc!

But it often gives false flags. They have this new Ai anti-virus that uses its "intelligence" to automatically false flag everything. The only way you can get your software to not be false-flagged is if you sign up for a subscription to the company then send them an email. State of the art technology.

The games ought to be scanned on virustotal before they are uploaded. Unfortunately, its a bit more work for Alice, but its best to be safe. False flags can be analyzed and discussed by each user individually.

I recommend everyone to use virustotal, if they have enough time. It is an anti-virus that simply combines 60 different anti-viruses together, that is why it gives false flags. I understand if its 15 minutes to deadline and you dont want to scan it in an antivirus though. Note that it is ran by Google so there is no privacy on it, dont put any private files on it.
 
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Relic

Member
Oh this is unusual? Norton quarantines all the games, every jam. I have to disable it before downloading, then playing otherwise I have to manually restore each game.exe one by one.
 

The M

Member
Oh this is unusual? Norton quarantines all the games, every jam. I have to disable it before downloading, then playing otherwise I have to manually restore each game.exe one by one.
You can add a folder as an exemption to Norton to keep it from assaulting the games. It still prevented me from launching one of the games and forced me to restart the computer afterwards but that doesn't normally happen.
 
M

Misu

Guest
I finally got 5 more written reviews and they are for @orSQUADstra @Roa @HayManMarc @Michael McMullen @ghandpivot

Check them out on my voting post. And feel free to let me know what you think about them. Oh and for those of you who don't know, I left a link there to the recorded stream of your games. It's in there somewhere so be sure to check them out.

I will continue to make more reviews tomorrow.
 

ghandpivot

Member
@Misu I'm very well aware of that and you're welcome to play it any way if you want (although fullscreen would be a bad idea). I wanted to program this game by increasing the level on the game_end tab, to sort of go full circle. Otherwise one easy fix to the issue would be to simply add level+=1 upon clicking the "X"-object instead, which is used on most levels. That would fully remove all cheats.
You wrote about extensions to track the mouse outside the window. There's no need for that, window_mouse_get_x/y does that just fine and I used that on the level where the window runs away from you. The one extension I did have to inject was to prevent the game from pausing while one is adjusting the borders, which you so happily skipped anyways :rolleyes:

Thanks for playing!
 

HayManMarc

Member
Thanks for the playthru, Misu. Fun to watch! Also, thanks for the suggestion to bypass that "no more levels" error. Wish I had thought of that.
 
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Alice

Darts addict
Forum Staff
Moderator
Another batch of four games today! This time, I exceeded the post character limit with my reviews, so I divided them into two posts. The new post with new reviews can be found here.

The ones whose reviews broke the character limit are:
#29 - @JacobV
#30 - @Misu, @Yal
#31 - @Roa
#32 - @mimusic (Paul & Sergio)

Only 8 entries remaining. Fingers crossed I'll get them done by Wednesday, because they're already time consuming as they are. ^^'
 

Mercerenies

Member
if maybe sometimes frustratingly difficult
That was sort of the idea. I didn't anticipate many people finishing it, but I left enough "easy" bugs in that people could make substantial progress. I may have been playing too much Mario Odyssey lately, which is why I went for an "easy to make progress but really hard to 100%" sort of game. Except in my case 100%ing the game is what it takes to beat it.

(and the ice blocks that accelerate the character seem a bit over the top; I'd usually imagine them to keep whatever speed the player has)
Interesting that you say that. That's how ice blocks originally were coded in this game. But I pretty quickly discovered a "glitch" with that. If you were standing on ice, you could jump straight up and land straight back down and then you have zero speed and thus the ice has no effect. So jumping broke ice blocks, and thus I changed it to the current exaggerated behavior.

In the area with this long firewall floor above the spikes I needed to make sure I have the right firewall setting before dropping down to the cell
Yeah, that area was designed really early (long before I put the firewall upgrade on the map) and was kind of modeled after a similar concept in IWBTG, hence why it probably seemed unfair.

(especially with the allusion to other Mercerenies' entry)
Yay! Someone noticed :p

Thanks, @Alice, for the review, as always :)
 

Bentley

Member
@Micah_DS thanks for the nice review, some have been brutal lol. I'm afraid to look. To answer your question about the gem in the middle: the idea was that it would be a switch lifts the gates around the octagon so that fireballs bounce around like crazy.

I was so crammed for time, and I so badly prioritized, that the thing that was most important to the theme didn't get done. I ended up just making it so that when you shoot the gem, enemies within its bbox get knocked back.

But anyway, yeah, thanks for the non-vicious review haha. I tell you, on some I had to cringe. I was scurred lol.
 

Micah_DS

Member
It doesn't have to be frozen to work, I just did it in my video to show it can also be rewinded and used later again.
Ah, I never actually watched your video. I purposefully went into the game blind to avoid spoiling things. I just never got it working unless it was frozen, so I assumed it only worked in that state. :p
 

Toque

Member
Isn’t there rules for multiple entries?
I oppose Mercerenies entering 2 good games. Come on. Maybe one mediocre and one crappy one. But two good ones .......sheesh.
 
M

Misu

Guest
I just finished some live streaming on 5 more entries although I lack any feedback and talking in general on this one since I was very tired from last night work. Hopefully, my mood doesn't turn down anyone. I actually enjoyed playing some of these entries tbh.

The video is right here
 

Alice

Darts addict
Forum Staff
Moderator
@Misu Thanks for the playthrough!

It did expose one important assumption I unknowingly made, probably because of my electrical engineering background. Specifically, I somehow assumed that people would recognize an electrical circuit and expect the behaviour of one. Like:
- if there's a circuit loop going through a power source, that loop is powered (there's more - like a distinction between a voltage source and current source, the resistances etc. but these weren't taken into account in my game)
- if circuit cables aren't a part of any loop, they aren't powered, period (the circuit isn't "closed")
- switches are used to break or connect a part of a circuit loop

It seems I forgot to include this important information in the game instructions, so unless someone intuitively recognises the electrical circuit and its loop-based powering, they might have a hard time figuring out how the powering/depowering works in the first place.
 

Alice

Darts addict
Forum Staff
Moderator

Toque

Member
@Misu Thanks for the playthrough!

It did expose one important assumption I unknowingly made, probably because of my electrical engineering background. Specifically, I somehow assumed that people would recognize an electrical circuit and expect the behaviour of one. Like:
- if there's a circuit loop going through a power source, that loop is powered (there's more - like a distinction between a voltage source and current source, the resistances etc. but these weren't taken into account in my game)
- if circuit cables aren't a part of any loop, they aren't powered, period (the circuit isn't "closed")
- switches are used to break or connect a part of a circuit loop

It seems I forgot to include this important information in the game instructions, so unless someone intuitively recognises the electrical circuit and its loop-based powering, they might have a hard time figuring out how the powering/depowering works in the first place.

Yeah it outsmarted me. I like the concept though.
 

Relic

Member
I'm finally done with my reviews and rankings! I am free now! :squirrel:

Congratulations to @Relic, @Cat, @var, @let and @HayManMarc for their great entries, and for all other participants too!
Thanks Alice! Was feeling a bit down yesterday as I was being poorly reviewed for both this Jam and some work I did for my job. Knowing Motti resonated with at least one person into a top 3 spot has picked me up.
 

Alice

Darts addict
Forum Staff
Moderator
Thanks Alice! Was feeling a bit down yesterday as I was being poorly reviewed for both this Jam and some work I did for my job. Knowing Motti resonated with at least one person into a top 3 spot has picked me up.
Glad my review helped you. ^^
(I seem to have a thing for buggy games, because the previous Jam I ranked the ants game high, too...)

By the way, have you seen the fanart made with the greatest graphics editor of all time?
 

Relic

Member
Glad my review helped you. ^^
(I seem to have a thing for buggy games, because the previous Jam I ranked the ants game high, too...)

By the way, have you seen the fanart made with the greatest graphics editor of all time?
Oh, wow! No I missed this piece. That's a lot better than the moths in game.
They were two frames - open triangles and closed. I might have drawn some antennae.
 

Micah_DS

Member
Thanks Alice! Was feeling a bit down yesterday as I was being poorly reviewed for both this Jam and some work I did for my job. Knowing Motti resonated with at least one person into a top 3 spot has picked me up.
I ranked yours 8th and I had a fair amount to say about it. Did you read my comments? It's mostly positive. Well, it 'should' read positively, that is.
One important detail I neglected to mention is that I played on the jam difficulty; I didn't even try the intended difficulty.
Plus I kept the moths visible at all times, so yeah, I went about as casual as anyone could. It was really nice to get the option to take it easy, especially since there's always a few jam games that are tough as nails, and a few of those games is more than enough challenge for me to want for a single jam, lol.
 
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