ah, how fun. the gameplay style reminds me of the game Flight, and similar launcher/flight games. really, really sweet, even if it's short-lived. great job!
CookieJar
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yeah, great work. nice art and visuals. good sound effects and music; clean overall. i can tell that love has been put into this, but i just have a few comments:
some of the immediate things you can fix are:
- controls and movement feel a little unresponsive. too often did i feel like i wasn't turning around fast enough. after a while, i've figured out that it was because my character was only flipping horizontally when their x-velocity crosses the zero threshold, which is a really common mistake, so i understand. but ideally, you should make your character flip horizontally upon entering the opposite input direction so as to visually indicate to the player that they have successfully turned around.
- a mini-map would be a nice-to-have, especially with all the trash (or at the very least the books) indicated within it. don't know how easy that would be to implement, but you be the judge.
some of the more pertinent issues in my opinion are:
- the game is, i'm sorry to say, not really all that fun. i think it's really cute, but the tediousness of the task at hand, as well as the overall uninteresting world design, plus the floatiness and overall clunkiness of the player's movement, makes playing this game for an extended period of time a little difficult to imagine. to be fair: your game is pretty short, short enough not to overstay its welcome, and i have to give you credit for that. plus, i think the game is thematically strong, with all of the unique wizardry floating about. (love the cheat code mechanic, btw).
please don't get it misconstrued: i'm not saying the game is bad. i think it's good and has a lot of potential (there's a reason why i beat it and didn't drop it). i believe in your ability, and i think you have what it takes to make something really special. i'm not saying you should completely change this game, but maybe give it a bit more of an interesting twist, or a bit of that pzazz, that i feel is currently a bit lacking right now. because, right now, this is more-or-less a trash cleaning simulator but in a magic tower, and we already have unique versions of that concept out there. i really think you can make this unique too---more unique than it already is.
i love your work. i think a bit more needs to be done to fully realize this concept's potential, though. still, for a week's worth of effort, great job. i hope you continue making awesome stuff.
knowing that the theme was "Tower", i knew that, coming into it, there would be lots of Tower Defenses. i didn't expect many of them to be good, considering how hard it is to make a TD game. this one takes the cake for me though. classic, solid, polished, with lots of content to boot. my only criticism is that progression is a little slow. try adding a "speed up" feature like in many TD games (try Godot's "time_scale" feature maybe?). i also wish the game could run in the background, so i could AFK while doing other stuff.
this is still really good though. i don't know how you managed to do all this in a week. well done.
i already tried quitting league of legends man.... now i have to fight even more minions....
alright, jokes aside, this is pretty good. hard as hell though. should have some form of healing between waves, or auto-healing. the wizard guys' range should also be decreased slightly, because at the moment it feels like your range is the same as theirs, so it's nigh impossible to hit them without getting at least one hit yourself. looks clean otherwise. good job!
very original, surprisingly fun, and nice music too. a little better visuals would be nice. also, disallowing players from doing trial-and-error would be ideal as well, since at the moment they can just drag and drop any card until the most effective one is found.
it took me a little while to understand the scoring system, but as soon as i understood that it was [sum of left points] * [sum of right points] it wasn't so bad. explaining the scoring system would be much recommended, because it would allow players to plan which cards to use and which to keep.
good job! consider trying my game as well!
the car is unbelievably fun to drive, especially with its high speed tank controls. that was the main thing that kept me playing, to be honest. my only problem with it is the lack of audio, especially since the music doesn't loop (at least for me). i would also recommend that you stop the car's velocity as it reaches the tower, because it's very easy to come barreling off the edge at full speed as you enter the minigame.
good job. consider trying my game!
the 2D world wrapped in a 3D cylindrical tower is cool; it reminds me of the 2D sections in Mario Odyssey. the artwork and spritework is really nice, and the game overall is aesthetically pleasing. i'd recommend adding stuff to the background, though, apart from just a blank green field. for example, you could have trees in the background that slowly rotate along with the player, further selling the cylindrical illusion.
i also think the level design is a little lacking in creativity, featuring mostly long-winding corridors and such, making the game feel more-or-less like a glorified maze. still, good job on your first GWJ submission! consider trying my game as well!
from a visual standpoint, this mysterious, alluring game is simply one of the most well-executed CYOAs i've seen, even considering the ones i've played outside game jams. for all of this to have been made in a week is nothing short of impressive. incredibly well done all around.
in terms of the actual survival mechanics, i feel as though you're given a little too much resources to ever really have a chance of dying. i understand that you wish for the player to see the end, but the feeling of desperation that i feel you tried to convey is a little lost. with that said, the feeling of isolation, and slow insanity, is very well reflected here. well done.
Keeper's Curse is stylish. hooks you in like a damned fisherman, and takes its sweet time before releasing you from its grasp. incredibly, incredibly well done.
platformer games where you have to interact with your past self will never not be a banger. reminds me a lot of One Step Back, even if it's not exactly the same idea. i also find it fascinating how the last level doesn't require you to use the time warp feature at all. still really cool, good job! consider trying my game as well!
i often see the "ooga booga number go up" line-of-thinking used as a criticism against idle/incremental games, being that they often have the same sense of purposeless existence, apart from players garnering artificial and addictive stimulation. i have never seen that line-of-thinking be used for tower stacking, though. i like the bleakness and emptiness of the game, and while i question its effectiveness as a metaphor on capitalism, i like its uniqueness.
a little rough around the edges, but a fantastic submission through-and-through. really cute art, mixed with some unique platforming ideas, most of which landed quite well. i really, really like the puzzles and gameplay ideas relating to the yarn. the whole act of disconnecting and reconnecting threads of yarn reminded me a lot of the kind of puzzles present in Webbed, which is an indie game i particularly enjoy. controls were a little unclear, and there's no real reason that climbing should be tied to mouse click or E. it could just be mapped to the jump button as well. the physics were wonky, making the cat often be flung into the air as it releases the yarn with little-to-no control, and also making subtle, small movements difficult, since movement speed is so rigid and high, with little-to-no acceleration or friction.
for some minor critiques: (1) the air blows so fast that it's hard to tell which direction it's blowing in, and (2) let's stick to the tradition of making thin platforms semi-solid. other than that though, i loved your submission, and with a little extra polish and stronger platforming fundamentals, this could legitimately be a full-ass game. great job!! consider trying my game as well!
how does this only have 6 ratings so far?! this is so neat! really cool, old 3D film-esque aesthetic, plus the concept itself is quite nice. having a quick overview of the controls would have been really helpful: i only realized you could tilt the box and burn it by checking the itch.io page description. i also encountered a bug where after i restarted the level, the level name didn't disappear in the middle of the screen. anywho, i really like this. a unique take on the tower theme for sure. great job! consider trying my game as well!
awesome! played it until the end. could've made the interactable elements clearer, like making it clear which ones can be dragged and what not. would've also loved some accessibility settings as well. still, really good game! i liked it!
consider trying my game as well, which funnily enough has a similar (albeit darker) premise. thanks!
in terms of gaming tropes, "Flappy Bird Clone" is about as overdone as it gets, but i do like the teleport mechanic. my issue with it is that you cannot control how long you will be invisible, so oftentimes you'll immediately hit a wall upon regaining control. likewise, the witch starts falling before their "exiting portal" animation even finishes, so all-in-all you'd likely just die when teleporting. i also don't like how the pipes were just retextured as towers as a way to fit the theme; feels a bit too much like an afterthought.
still, the assets and art look great! the fact that this is your first game and that you managed to put it out is nothing short of an accomplishment. great job! i hope you had fun, and learned a lot about development in Godot! (or in general)
consider trying my game as well!
never got that far. having to redo every question after dying made this one a lot more tedious than it probably needed to be. also, an indicator for which floor the player is in would help. i think the game looks decent, and the questions were actually rather interesting. i learned a thing or two. if i were you, though, i would avoid reusing the exact same room texture and layout every time. maintaining player interest is a big deal when it comes to these kinds of not-so-gameplay heavy games, and having to look at the same tower floor every time doesn't sell the illusion of climbing anything, at least not for me.
still, though, good job! definitely a solid trivia game. consider trying my game as well!