Howdy! I run a small little podcast where I interview indie developers, would you be interested in coming on? I had blast completing you little game and would love to ask you some questions. My contact info is on my itch page.
I love the art style and music! Switching from portal to zapper, or grapple to portal felt a bit fiddly in a few situations, especially when missing means you fall a long way and have to go around to try again, but overall the game was clever and fun. It took a couple of plays to find everything, especially that hidden fish room. O.o This little robot needs to go on another odyssey! :)
The art for this game is really pretty! Well done! That said, the gameplay has a few things you should consider:
1. Why do you need to switch to different types of ammo? The shot only goes out a very short distance, and there are no enemies/portals/hooks near one another, so there is no chance of performing an action you don't intend if you just have one shot that does all 3 things
2. The gameplay itself doesn't really feel any different from anything else I've seen in the metroidvania genre. The shoot and grapple mechanics are straight out of metroid, and the portals leads me onto:
3. The portal layout is confusing. After playing with it for a bit the player can start to sort of get used to it, but without some kind of map having portals that aren't visually distinct from each other in any way makes it really hard for the player to build a strategy for how to progress through the level. I was just hitting random portals and hoping they would take me somewhere new, meaning I often looped through the same areas multiple times. Potential fixes for this are more assets for different parts of the level making them visually distinctive, having a map that shows how portals you've used before are connected, or color pairing the portals (or some other visual distinction for color blind folks)
As far as game jam games go this is super polished and well done. Be proud of what you've made here! One final piece of advice: before deciding anything else about your game (including the genre): always pick your core mechanic. Find something fun to do that you haven't seen before (or take something you've seen and put it in a new context), and then make a game out of it. Finding the gimmick first saves your game from feeling generic, which when there are a ton of indies out there to play, saves you from getting lost in the crowd.
its not that big of a change really, wasd and arrow keys are almost the same thing but WASD keys are mostly used for fps and third person games, if A and D were used instead of the arrow keys it would be bad controls because you have to use the Z and X keys which would be uncomfortable to use but the arrow keys work perfectly on this game because you use your left hand for the arrow keys and your right hand for the Z and X keys
Great game. Played through till the end and had a score of 1600. My only qualm is that the level design made using the portals a little confusing. Other than that though, great game
Amazing game, I am gifted and my brain was still hurting trying to figure out if I just went through the same portal or not.(10/10) I would love to contact you and maybe collaborate on future projects as soon as I finish "Ruins of void". Keep up the good work!
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Awesome, it reminds me of Magic Pockets!
Me too!!
this game is so fun im working on a video game console and im wondering if i can put this game on it
very goog very love
Absolutely beautiful game. Bravo!
Great game, congrats!
I finished with 1710. o/
This is such a fun, tight little game! I loved how you set up the ‘beam-switcher’ mechanic in such a restricted set of inputs!
love this game! :D
Great game, I love metroidvanias. Do you mind if I make a video on it?
sick game, keep it up!
pretty good
good game
very nice game
Very short, but very nice experience!
very cool, you should make this into a series
Man, what a nice little game. well done!
how do you progress after you got the zapper???
Wow
Howdy! I run a small little podcast where I interview indie developers, would you be interested in coming on? I had blast completing you little game and would love to ask you some questions. My contact info is on my itch page.
I love the art style and music! Switching from portal to zapper, or grapple to portal felt a bit fiddly in a few situations, especially when missing means you fall a long way and have to go around to try again, but overall the game was clever and fun. It took a couple of plays to find everything, especially that hidden fish room. O.o This little robot needs to go on another odyssey! :)
Hidden fish room where the rest of the coins are. The fish looks surprised that someone's here!
Ah, ze dopefish lives!
Wow! Good call! It was just luck that I caught the turning frame in the animation of the fish above, but is sure may be a Dopefish sighting!
Simple but fun metroidvania! I got a score of 1740 in the end.
amazing metroidvania, pushes the limits of what pico8 is capable of
The art for this game is really pretty! Well done! That said, the gameplay has a few things you should consider:
1. Why do you need to switch to different types of ammo? The shot only goes out a very short distance, and there are no enemies/portals/hooks near one another, so there is no chance of performing an action you don't intend if you just have one shot that does all 3 things
2. The gameplay itself doesn't really feel any different from anything else I've seen in the metroidvania genre. The shoot and grapple mechanics are straight out of metroid, and the portals leads me onto:
3. The portal layout is confusing. After playing with it for a bit the player can start to sort of get used to it, but without some kind of map having portals that aren't visually distinct from each other in any way makes it really hard for the player to build a strategy for how to progress through the level. I was just hitting random portals and hoping they would take me somewhere new, meaning I often looped through the same areas multiple times. Potential fixes for this are more assets for different parts of the level making them visually distinctive, having a map that shows how portals you've used before are connected, or color pairing the portals (or some other visual distinction for color blind folks)
As far as game jam games go this is super polished and well done. Be proud of what you've made here! One final piece of advice: before deciding anything else about your game (including the genre): always pick your core mechanic. Find something fun to do that you haven't seen before (or take something you've seen and put it in a new context), and then make a game out of it. Finding the gimmick first saves your game from feeling generic, which when there are a ton of indies out there to play, saves you from getting lost in the crowd.
Good luck on your next game!
controls are bad pls change.
how? they are just arrow keys and X and Z those are the simplest and most easy to understand controls I have ever used before
if you find them difficult to use then dats tuff
I prefer to use A to go left and D to go right.
its not that big of a change really, wasd and arrow keys are almost the same thing but WASD keys are mostly used for fps and third person games, if A and D were used instead of the arrow keys it would be bad controls because you have to use the Z and X keys which would be uncomfortable to use but the arrow keys work perfectly on this game because you use your left hand for the arrow keys and your right hand for the Z and X keys
Good game
is there a way to shoot?
Yes, but not directly in the beginning. You will get something when talking to the second alien you encounter.
I realized.
Really like the game design. The pixel art and colour chose in addition to the music suited the game.
Great game. Played through till the end and had a score of 1600. My only qualm is that the level design made using the portals a little confusing. Other than that though, great game
The grappling was the hardest part for me T^T bt otherwise gg
love it. action is well done! love the particles coming out of the pipes. very cool. bobbing in the water., and the water effect. all very well done!
Amazing game, I am gifted and my brain was still hurting trying to figure out if I just went through the same portal or not.(10/10) I would love to contact you and maybe collaborate on future projects as soon as I finish "Ruins of void". Keep up the good work!
Great game and great graphics! 1930/2000, so I almost 100%'d the game!
still missing coins, but very fun!
I won. I liked this game!
really fun game! Nice graphics and good controls. It was just a bit confusing on where to go sometimes, but otherwise great game!
Very good work !!! The pixel art is beautiful, the mecanical too. This is great ! Good game :)
This was a very interesting game, I enjoy the platforming aspect with the use of water which was a unique selling point in this game.
The map is great, the mechanics are great, the art is great.
Everything about this is great!
Veery chill game. Like the music, the gameplay, the pixelart... goood job, well done:)