One way out by lennaert

[raw]
made by lennaert for LD28 (JAM)
There is, One way out, try ande find your way and stay alive.
Avoid traps and dangers.

Be quick .. your light dims ...

Watch for ghosly encounters ... you only live once and there is only one way out.

You only have one life, and we mean it.
If you die ... and restart, you will die again.

If you want to play another "life" use another browser :D

The ghost is a multiplayer haunting function, it automatically hunts a living players level upon death.

Each time you restart the game you end up in another players who is alive his or her level and they will see you in ghost form. Where as you as a ghost see them as living beings.

Sadly, there wasnt enough time fully implement the multiplayer feature where you are able to haunt and taunt other living players physcially (like pushing them in a trap).


There is one way out .... go figure ;)



~~

We worked in a team of 4 ... and a couple hours before the end our host (private) his svn server died on us .. so we had to work real hard with what we had left to get it back together.

In the last hours the exports to webpage took forever right before the deadline (was 2:40 for me and I even fell asleep)
This was some of our team members first time joining ludum.

Ratings

Coolness 94% 2
Overall(Jam) 3.14 239
Audio(Jam) 2.98 239
Fun(Jam) 2.20 478
Graphics(Jam) 4.27 54
Humor(Jam) 1.92 385
Innovation(Jam) 3.04 203
Mood(Jam) 3.38 117
Theme(Jam) 2.98 204

Feedback

Strangelander
17. Dec 2013 · 09:53 UTC
Good atmosphere, but music loop too short. Not much to go on where to pick up more light and stuff, so doesn't feel like I have many decisions to make.
Ryusui
18. Dec 2013 · 18:04 UTC
Well, this is frustrating. After my first playthrough (which is to say I died after running afoul of a few traps), the game seems to have glitched: on subsequent playthroughs, I die instantly shortly after the game begins.
jdpalmer
18. Dec 2013 · 18:05 UTC
Very cool graphic style.
ColeSlawGames
18. Dec 2013 · 18:08 UTC
I died randomly for some reason, multiple times. Then, when I was the ghost, I wasn't really sure what to do. I found a living version of my character standing around as I was flying around, but I wasn't really sure what to do. :\

I like the art style, though. And the lighting effects are very nice!
Nelien
18. Dec 2013 · 18:09 UTC
You really meant one life, huh? You die and if you retry you stay dead, pretty damn cool if you ask me. The graphics are really cool as well -- you have some issues with the controls they're a bit slide-y if you get what I mean, but overall a very solid entry.
TeamFlare
18. Dec 2013 · 18:10 UTC
Really interesting and good looking. But I wasn´t able to do anything after I turned into a ghost. Even restarting the game didn´t fix this.
Snail_Man
18. Dec 2013 · 18:19 UTC
Beautiful art. It could have used a bit more context, but it was very nice all the same.
Warzone
18. Dec 2013 · 18:32 UTC
Pretty interesting
whiteknife
18. Dec 2013 · 18:40 UTC
Cool looking, and I guess you were going for "only one life"? But it was really unclear what to do after that, other than fly around pointlessly.
🎤 lennaert
18. Dec 2013 · 18:50 UTC
If thee are living players playing, you will run into them and they will see you in their game :D
Hyoga-3D
18. Dec 2013 · 18:51 UTC
Very nice art and animations, but I think I got a bug when I died, that my ghost did not flip to the side I was walking.
raisedmedia
18. Dec 2013 · 18:55 UTC
Great concept, would love to see this fully finished.
evilindiegames
18. Dec 2013 · 19:20 UTC
Interesting art style and good concept!
jomomomo
18. Dec 2013 · 19:20 UTC
Had some glitches second time playing, very very promising game...
atombrot
18. Dec 2013 · 19:21 UTC
Haha, I played the game and got crushed by a rock. Now I'm a ghost :) Let's read the description of the game... Maybe I should start reading the descriptions of the game before I play, but I like to dive just in... Very sad you didn't have time to complete the multiplayer haunting. This would have been a lot of fun ;) Nice idea for this theme...
Danman9914
18. Dec 2013 · 19:23 UTC
The graphics are among the best in the jam but the moving and jumping felt very wonky. I died to a boulder and then floated around the map as a spirit. I saw a cool looking bear but I could not interact with it.
AlexVsCoding
18. Dec 2013 · 19:46 UTC
1. Whilst I wanted to keep trying to play this one, I died from attempting to jump over a static boulder which killed my player. Felt very unsatisfying for a game that I really wanted to explore as a human. It may have been worth making it clear to the player in game that you only had one life. Something as simple as a speech bubble saying "If I die, I'm not going to get a second chance!
2. To have one life forever for a game is not a familiar thing for many players (whilst I do think its a really neat idea).
3. What would be a fair way to counter the permadeath would be if you cause the death of someone e.g. push someone as a ghost into a pit you can claim their body and give yourself another chance at getting a shot of escape. On the other hand, maybe even more interesting if you had to help them escape by lowering things out of their reach and flicking switches in a poltergeist-like way.
4. I definitely think that spawning players as ghosts next to a dead body would be far less distressing for the player (e.g. thinking you're still playing as the explorer when actually you're guaranteed to die.
5. I find the character quite lovable by the way. The smile on his face despite the circumstances and his googly eyes are full of life, obviously contrasted by the cold, shakey image of his dead state. Real good job with that one.
6. Potentially an opening stage of your character entering the cave to introduce the controls followed by a long fall/cave collapse to get them where they need to be to start the game.
7. Loved the art style - had definite vibes of the Mr Skops levels from the original Rayman.

Thanks for the contribution and I'll be paying attention to what you lot produce in the future, real good stuff!
SimianLogic
18. Dec 2013 · 22:59 UTC
Great art, great sfx... I just didn't get the mechanics. After I died the first time (not sure from what), there was another player right there? Can the ghost do anything?
floorman
19. Dec 2013 · 00:48 UTC
Really nice graphics and audio making for a really nice atmosphere.
Lissar
19. Dec 2013 · 01:27 UTC
Great art style and atmosphere! Though I think I enjoyed floating around as a ghost more than anything else.
porglezomp
19. Dec 2013 · 01:44 UTC
There's a typo in your controls, it says that q is jump but w actually jumps.
Quite a nice artstyle, it's a shame that I don't get to beat it.
LexGarza
19. Dec 2013 · 01:49 UTC
Good theme and concept of the game but it is very difficult to move the character and there isn´t much options about how you can defend yourself. It is so so so easy to die...
30dogs
19. Dec 2013 · 03:05 UTC
While I respect that you are serious about the one life idea, it unfortunately means that I didn't get to experience very much of the game. I died on the boulder apparently like many others. I did float around most of the cave and I must say the art is really good. Sorry you guys had technical difficulties.
Diptoman
19. Dec 2013 · 03:34 UTC
Graphical style is very cool, though one complaint is the direction changing was kind of abrupt (maybe the direction of the light changing so fast was the reason).
The gameplay is pretty standard, nevertheless pretty good. Thumbs up!
dsoft20
19. Dec 2013 · 09:04 UTC
Nice entry, I love the art style :D
ResonantCraft
19. Dec 2013 · 09:21 UTC
The game looks lovely. Too bad there's this glitch where you die upon restarting the game.
It seems rather hard without some sort of health indicator, and the controls lack a bit of snap to my taste. The mood feels great though.
Moist
19. Dec 2013 · 21:15 UTC
The artwork is amazing, fantastic work!
JaymeeMak
19. Dec 2013 · 21:37 UTC
This reaaaally slowed my browser in the long time it took to load.

Perhaps post a warning about that?

GUI feedback would also be good - it was hard to tell where exactly to click.

Then as soon as I got in the game, I got the rainbow wheel of death (on mac) and I couldn't move my character or do anything in game.
zatyka
19. Dec 2013 · 21:39 UTC
Great visuals and mood. Had a cool Prince of Persia like feel for me. Holding people to one life definitely goes with the theme, but it's a bit harsh for the player. The multilayer functionality you mentioned would have been pretty cool.

Overall, a very nice job!
HellBlazer
19. Dec 2013 · 21:43 UTC
Nice art style, and the ghost mechanics could be interesting if further developed. As it stands now though, it's pretty broken if you can't even start a new game... :P
lotusgame
19. Dec 2013 · 22:02 UTC
I really like the graphics. There is a good cave mood. Too bad there are some glitches. It's a very good start. You have to continue working on it ;)
Kyatric
24. Dec 2013 · 03:58 UTC
Nice graphics and sound effects that made the mood work.

On the design aspect though, one single life is just crazy.
The player is thrown into a level he doesn't know with almost nothing then a little candle, barely knowing the controls and hardly seeing around its character.

Death is unavoidable in those circumstances.
And it comes quick, and the fact of starting the game again and die directly without any kind of feedback (other than the one in the description on this page, but I shouldn't have had to read this here to be able to understand what was happening; I should have been notified some way in the game, BEFORE getting killed).
I thought it was a bug (added to the fact that the ghost's sprite does not flip).

It's a nice idea/mechanic on an intellectual level, but to play, it's not fun.
It sounds like you've dedicated a massive amount of work into something that was designed to not let the player take advantage of it anyway.

Probably the project was too ambitious, despite being a "big team".

Congratulations, though, on delivering the project you set on delivering in the jam time and especially considering all the obstacles you've had to go through (as read on C2 forum) !
I hope next time you guys will set to focus on making a game that is as attractive for the players as for its makers, and this will be a great game ;)
Kyatric
24. Dec 2013 · 04:34 UTC
My previous comment may sound a bit harsh so I've developed it a bit further on C2 forum : http://www.scirra.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=82657&PID=485364&title=anyone-up-for-ludum-dare#485364
van noctar
29. Dec 2013 · 22:10 UTC
Amazing graphics! :D
kbake
06. Jan 2014 · 21:09 UTC
My life was a short one, but I enjoyed the art and floating around as a ghost! I didn't see anyone else running through it but I think that's a really cool feature!