Dream Epoch (adventure / rpg) by Adam Thompson

[raw]
made by Adam Thompson for LD30 (JAM)
This game began with me toying around with a basic top down RPG.

The dialogue system is a reworking of the one made for my previous game jam entry.

There's no real objective, just walk and explore. It's just a little demo made in 48 hours for KiwiJam 14 and Ludum Dare 30.

I want to make a world with other NPCs, implement a full dialogue and cutscene system, inventories, party members, a journal, and a map system. Your typical RPG, minus the combat. Using the engine, I'd like to create an engaging world with characters, colors, and atmosphere, and fill it with beautiful little tales the player can immerse themselves in.

This demo is just a precursor to that lofty vision.

Remember to play it in fullscreen!

Cheers!

Credits:
Game and programming by Adam Thompson (me!)
Music by Eva Li
Graphics sourced from the Asset Store
Sound sourced from the interwebs

Ratings

Coolness 58% 3
Overall(Jam) 2.92 587
Audio(Jam) 3.58 144
Fun(Jam) 2.18 729
Graphics(Jam) 4.21 88
Humor(Jam) 2.26 448
Innovation(Jam) 2.34 679
Mood(Jam) 3.55 163
Theme(Jam) 1.97 723

Feedback

enderargent
26. Aug 2014 · 09:34 UTC
Nice game dude!
I have a sugestion for you, maybe you can disable the props colliders (or if you need them convert them to triggers) while they're coming down since the feel can be a little buggy! ^^
r0x0r
26. Aug 2014 · 09:35 UTC
would you mind on making a linux build? the screenshots look pretty good :)
sneeuwpopsneeuw
26. Aug 2014 · 09:36 UTC
Tip: Change the defualt coler of the camera to somthing not blue .And try the next time to make a game from scratch
John Drury
26. Aug 2014 · 09:39 UTC
Stunning! Loved the world. Created strong atmosphere with the beautiful piano. Can see a lot of potential.
Simon@LD
26. Aug 2014 · 09:40 UTC
Really nice graphics, great atmosphere and superb music! I'm very interested to see how you will take it from here ;)
JonathanG
26. Aug 2014 · 09:53 UTC
Looks very nice, but it's hard to tell what's from the Asset store and what you did yourself. Also the controls are a bit strange - WSAD doesn't always make you walk relative to the camera, and you don't always walk towards the mouse cursor when clicking either. It is however certainly full of atmosphere, and a good starting point for something bigger :)
🎤 Adam Thompson
26. Aug 2014 · 09:56 UTC
Thanks for your comments!
The game is a little buggy in regards to the triggers / colliders when coming down (they can land on your head and do weird things!). Second is when moving past multiple camera changes - the movement can be off. You can fix that by going back to an area that changes the camera.
As you guys know, 48 hours isn't too long to make a game, and I did my best! Hopefully a post-jam demo will fix these issues and add more "game" :)
🎤 Adam Thompson
26. Aug 2014 · 10:00 UTC
@sneeuwpopsneeuw: I meant to have it black, and not blue, but must have missed it. Also, I'm sure I didn't break any jam rules.
@JonathanG: The environment and the character art are from the Asset Store. I did all the programming, design, lighting, camera, character controls, interactions, and so on. Eva is somebody I met over the weekend and composed a song based on some suggestions I gave her - I think she did a really beautiful job!
PinkNinja
26. Aug 2014 · 10:04 UTC
Really nice game. I would appreciate more history and interactions, but i can see the hard work on do this as fast as you did.

Congratulations!
bob_fish
26. Aug 2014 · 10:06 UTC
Love the look of the world, aren't you supposed to make your own art? Anyway, looks like it could be expanded into a big fun game!
GreaseMonkey
26. Aug 2014 · 10:15 UTC
Hey, mind doing an .exe build? Not all not-Windows/Mac users are Linux users, and the .exe files run through Wine tend to be more likely to work than the Linux binaries (and in my case the Linux binaries don't work due to an outdated glibc).
🎤 Adam Thompson
26. Aug 2014 · 10:19 UTC
I don't have any experience building for Linux (presumably you'd need to be running Linux to build for it?) but I can try to make an .exe build and a mac build.
Keep an eye out for an update! Sorry if this has inconvenienced anybody or made them unable to play!
Kyoutashan
26. Aug 2014 · 10:27 UTC
As a game demo, you did a good job on the atmosphere and interactions.
As a Ludum Dare jam entry, it's not really what we can expect (or I didn't see the relation with the theme)

Anyway, you're planning big for your project. It's a good start, and I wish you good luck :)
Phaix
26. Aug 2014 · 10:36 UTC
It really looks great. Would love to see a game made out of it!
OrangeeZ
26. Aug 2014 · 10:37 UTC
Wow, it's reminded me about Rachel town from Ragnarok online. Fabulous atmosphere.
🎤 Adam Thompson
26. Aug 2014 · 10:38 UTC
Update: Windows, Mac, and Linux builds now up!

@Kyoutashan: Thanks! I spent too much time on the demo to fully implement the theme. I should have explained it better, but my idea was going to be this: as you click on and read different notes in the house, it would tell you a little story and go "back to another time". That's where the effect comes in - objects fall into place, night turns into day. It's like transporting to another world, in real time. The two worlds are connected and tell a single coherent story.
Unfortunately I didn't get far enough :(
Thank you for your response!
oakus
26. Aug 2014 · 13:11 UTC
It looks promising.
r0x0r
26. Aug 2014 · 17:29 UTC
really nice graphics, camera, and style =)
r0x0r
26. Aug 2014 · 17:30 UTC
also, thanks for the linux build! it works perfect
skiddings
26. Aug 2014 · 18:42 UTC
Doesn't really match the theme. But I like the camera setup and interaction. The animation is nice too.
Hyoga-3D
27. Aug 2014 · 13:23 UTC
Nice visual, really interresting, I would like to see a full version of it and with some gameplay too, nice!
Rage Paint
29. Aug 2014 · 04:44 UTC
Amazing visuals and audio. Would have been really interesting to go out the door in the back and have a whole new room come down to keep going. I definitely wanted more.
🎤 Adam Thompson
29. Aug 2014 · 21:26 UTC
Thanks Rage Paint. I'd definitely like to create more. Feel free to follow me to keep up with post-jam development!
Jacic
30. Aug 2014 · 19:02 UTC
The graphics and style look cool. I'm interested in what this will become.
Moosefly
30. Aug 2014 · 22:39 UTC
It's been a while since I played a game with fixed cameras like this. Too bad the controls couldn't keep up to the camera (but it seems you already knew of this bug). Not much to do at the moment, but the world has a nice feel to it.

Since it's a jam entry I don't think it matters where the assets are from, as the developer still has to use them to put a game together. When a lot of the assets used are premade I think that for example the Graphics score displays how well the developer has been able to use those available assets in combination with code to create a visually pleasing experience.

Anssi@MooseflyGames
dook
31. Aug 2014 · 00:38 UTC
Not bad. Seems like a pretty solid foundation for a larger game. I liked the Bastion-like effect of stuff falling into place.

The full screen button on your site doesn't work right, though, I could click through the Unity window and it loaded one of the pictures, stopping the game. Right clicking and choosing full screen instead worked fine, though.
sP0CkEr2
31. Aug 2014 · 00:55 UTC
Nice jam entry. I love the assets falling from the sky, cool effect.
andrewkennedy
31. Aug 2014 · 01:24 UTC
I can definitely tell you've played Bastion ;). The world building was nice, the environment has a nice cozy feeling to it. The dialogue system seems solid too.

For moving forward, having the movement based on the relative position of the player and camera would be nice. When it went into some of the hallways it became kind of hard to figure out which direction to press.
Birke
31. Aug 2014 · 08:16 UTC
Looks good. It managed to create a good amount of atmosphere and mood. Reminded me of To The Moon with the text based dialogue and really nice piano music. Some feedback, the second camera angle is zoomed in too much so it is hard to navigate around. It is also quite confusing in general when the camera changes viewpoint. Maybe interpolating between the old and new position would be beneficial? The SmoothDamp functions in Unity would be good for that. In general the WASD control scheme seemed to work better than the mouse since it did not change direction after a camera shift.
Lokarunith
31. Aug 2014 · 10:23 UTC
Really pretty graphics, but It doesn't reflect very well the theme.
Partially Exciting
31. Aug 2014 · 20:43 UTC
This looks very good. Lot's of potential here. Please to be continuing to make this game.
spotco
01. Sep 2014 · 22:29 UTC
Really impressive graphics, but no gameplay.
MerlijnVH
12. Sep 2014 · 20:40 UTC
I liked the concept of rooms being populated as you walked in, though it made my character fly up in the air sometimes when physics hit. Also, shame you left in some debug text on collision hits. Good job, though. Keep it up!
egor-idiot
15. Sep 2014 · 18:46 UTC
Nice graphics.