Wow, thank you for making this game. This has been the funnest game I've played so far in this Ludum Dare.The theme is great and the execution of the gameplay feels very smooth. My original thought was that it was too easy to defeat enemies if you were above them because they only shoot left and right, but then when I got hit by the rocket launcher I realised that there was more mechanics involved than first met the eye.
Great work guys, I had lots of fun playing it.

This is perhaps the best LD game I've ever played. The game is cohesive, and fits the theme very well. I think the graphics and the audio are perfect, and it gave me a few laughs. The game could definitely become something greater if work was continued past LD41.

I didn't actually get to play the game since I don't have a PC. But the cover image was so intriguing I had to watch the demo, which in turn was so cute I had to give good ratings anyway :) The whole texting thing makes me so happy and the main character's design and animation is so perfect! It seems like a really well-made game for a jam and I wish I could've actually played it.

This is an excellent entry all around, visually, genre-merging, and the controls feel really good. The music and the setting is done great! Your team did a wonderful job, congratulations!

I spent my entire childhood playing computer games and yes my childhood includes my entire 35-year-long life up to this point. Legitimately had fun sniping and jumping around baddies while pewing them from 3 different angles. And the texts from Marge made for the coolest multitasking feeling since throwing a mnt dew at a finger painted portrait of my ex while splintering open a second mnt dew with my replica gravity hammer. And I'd like to know where I can buy the song that plays at the end. It reminds me of Hidden Houses

Very polished entry! Gameplay feels great, graphics are great. Idea was also very funny! =)

Thanks for the reviews people

:trophy: :100:

Wow! This is fantastic. So polished! Everything about it feels great and on top of that it's a great idea! Really funny. Love the music as well.

Thanks everyone for the great comments!

Definitely one of the best games I've seen so far, it was so much fun to play! Absolutely love the artstyle and it feels very smooth to play. Reminded me a bit of broforce in terms of gameplay. Great music as well. Really loved playing this!

Great game, really enjoyed it.

Very smooth and fun! Wish the enemies would shoot at you rather than just straight forwards but alas! I liked the quirky combo of dating sim and shoot-em-up! It worked very well with the mood you were trying to portray.

you got a nice game here, i love the art. nice job!!

Wow! This is just hands down, the best game I've played from LD41. I absolutely love the creative use of the theme. This is the type of happy surprise when you combine two incompatible genres and actually come up with something that isn't just superficially challenging because of a mish-mash of incompatible genres, but it''s challenging in a fresh way because secretly, the two genres do work together if done right, like your talented team has shown here. Great art, great sound design, great animation, great coding! Feels so tight! Great writing! Omg I love it!

Good job guys. Awesome music. :heart: Good graphics. Pretty challenging at times.

Incredible game and really well polished. Minor tweaks and this is essentially in line with quality commercial games.

Very impressive game. The shooting platformer was fun, and I liked getting new weapons. Very clever getting hearts from the text messages!

@son-of-ja wait, do i know you? Lol

Probably the best game I have played from the Jam! Congrats!

This is hands down one of the best games I've played in all my ldjams! Nothing but praise from me. If I have to nitpick (minor spoiler) I was kind of expecting some kind of a boss fight after getting all the guns. Thank you for this fine piece of quality entertainment! ^_^

To the top with you! :D

@Mashas thank you for the kind words! We definitely considered having a boss of some sort. I thought it would have been pretty cool to have the boss interact with your phone, like jam it up or hack into it and send a ridiculous message or something. But alas, that was wayyyyy out of scope :D Thanks for playing!

This is a very interesting and fun game to play. The graphics and the music are so good. I most especially enjoyed the music for the first level which I think fit the game very well.

The dating sim aspect of the game was an amusing addition; though, it didn't quite feel to give some important impact aside from the flirting element. Still, it did give the game an adorable romantic side, much like how the James Bond films showed it.

All in all, it's a fun and amusing game. Really good job on this one!

very fun to play, had to keep going! really enjoyed this one!

Very polished game, visually, music and felt really good to play - tight controls. Good humour and genuinely enjoyable to play. The dating thing became more of way to regain health and distract, I guess it would have been nicer to have more influence on the dating side of things, for example - your responses lead to different endings when you get to meet you girlfriend. Really impressive overall!

It was pretty fun to play!
The inclusion of the theme was nice!
Too bad the phone waves so much and barely lets you get the time to read. The conversations are almost interesting and I initially wanted to take the time to read and answer. So it only feels like you have to reply at random just to avoid taking damage, which I think is not necessary. (i mean, the damage is okay, but you can't "enjoy" the conversation)

It's great! Not much more to say really, completed it and would play more.

This game is so polish! OMG i loved it so much!!!I made a fishing/racing game for this game jam. if you want take a look: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/41/super-bass-racing hahhah

Great entry!

The idea is clever and the game itself is well polished, as everyone seems to be saying. haha.
My only suggestion would be to find a way to merge the two concepts more. The "boyfriend" part only required randomly answering questions before the timer ran out, as far as I could figure. I don't have any good ideas of HOW you could have done that for these two concepts though.

Either way, I thought the game was charming! Well done!

This is certainly an excellent game! I kinda feel bad that I wasn't paying that much attention to poor Harper, and was just hitting whatever option was at the top. :confused: But, the platforming and shooting gameplay is fantastic, and feel great to control as you run around and shoot people. While some of the enemy AI could have used some work, the shape of the levels made up for it, as they were quite fun to traverse.

Congratulations on a fantastic entry!

10/10 , what a brilliant game, super fun to play. really enjoyed that.Music , art , controls everything is brilliant ,well done!
If you get a chance https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/41/spacescape

Really good polish! The music and audio design are really well done, the game feel is great, the mechanics all work well, animation is done well, good all around.

Would've liked to see the text messages repeat less often, and it felt kind of easy to find a safe spot to send them, but those are small problems. Great game!

Wonderful game, it feels very complete and polished. Can't think of any suggestions to improve, it's solid all the way through! Great work!

The amount of polish on this game is so impressive for a jam. I am honestly blown away. Loved it.

If a tower defense rhythm game sounds fun to you, check out my game "Music Make Me Shoot My Gun"
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/41/music-make-me-shoot-my-gun

This is a very polished game with great art, music and smooth gameplay. Fantastic presentation all around, congrats to everyone involved. I think other people have said enough about the good stuff.

I think neither side of the gameplay (action and texting) are doing very much though. The enemies could do more than stand and shoot, there is no ammo or hidden weapons and very little urgency. The texting aspect was very simple and didn't do much to affect the action/platforming or the ending (there could've been interrogation sections where a text would affect outcome, or something like that). It feels more like you are answering random questions than playing a dating sim with consequences.

Sorry for the long criticism, but only singing praises doesn't help anyone. Still a very impressive game with satisfying shooting/movement. Great job.

Fantastic game! :)

@cassio-eduardo Thanks for the feedback! We definitely wanted to keep the gameplay pretty light and accessible, which is why the enemy patterns are pretty predictable. It get's a little more hairy towards the end of course where enemies are dropping down and rockets are flying at you. We only expected players to put in 5-10 minutes of gameplay though, so being able to get in and do stuff at any skill level was pretty important. There are mechanics like the dodge-roll and platforming that let players more familiar with the genre do some fun things even if the enemies aren't super challenging.

As far as the dating-sim side, our vision was a more modern dating scene. We didn't want it to be so much about relationship building and creating complex backstories but more about the initial text conversation trying to find a match. After all the main character is a Spy, constantly called on to complete missions. Not so ideal for a steady relationship. You may have noticed that the girl you're texting is different each time. We felt it was a good way to keep things light and fun, but also tie in the gameplay elements of healing/taking heart damage based on responses in a funny metaphorical way.

Anyways, there is always more we wish we could do in a jam! But 72 hours goes by pretty quick. Thanks for playing!

Cheers!

Super awesome! I wish answering phone's prompts were more meaningful rather than just pressing a button. Maybe you all were to improve on the game, you'd have to keep your facts straight. Like if you contradict yourself across prompts by saying "I don't like pets" and "I have a dog", then maybe the person behind the phone might grow suspicious or distant.

But apart from that, the game played super well. You all put in a lot of effort and it payed off. I am a fan of all the polish. From the way the phone bounces back and forth to the way the enemy's blood drops bounce. Really good game feel! You should be proud!

Such an amazing job! I gave most of my feedback on stream. Thanks so much for sharing it!

Normally I try to complete every LD game before I rate it. Let's just say that in this case, I didn't have to try - I got sucked into the experience and was actually a bit disappointed when I saw the ending screen. Tremendous job guy! Super fun and polished entry.

Wow! This is the most polished and well developed game I've played in the jam. Great job!
The action felt very good, my favorite gun was the rocket launcher! It had so much weight to every fire you made.
I loved everything up to the cute ending with the credit song, what a great way to wrap the game up.
My favorite question was the one about the queen in alice and wonderland, trying to remember what she was shaped like messed me up so bad mentally.

__Fun__
The amount of of polish is great. There is also a ton of content (besides the limited responses the lover interest seems to have). The game feels really well. The only problem is my multi-tasking skills.

__Innovation__
The platforming gameplay is pretty basic, and the dialogue is rather repeating. So alone it's not really innovative. However the fact that I have to multitask between these two things is. Besides real life, of course. But that's not a game, is it?

__Theme__
Clearly incompatible. The government even warns us not to text while we're shooting bad guys.

__Graphics__
Really great graphics. The aesthetic is also very well, and it fits perfectly.

__Audio__
Same for as for the graphics. Well made, and fits the aesthetic perfectly.

__Humor__
The concept itself is fun enough, we add some silly responses and it LOLs will be lolled.

__Mood__
Well developed. I could echo what I said in theme and graphics but I won't.

__Overall__
The only real downside is the lack of interesting responses on the phone. Otherwise it's pretty close to a perfect score. Very well done.

really interesting game with nice juicy polish - i did not like the dating sim part but still found the overall game enjoyable - great effort

I loved the presentation, this is super well polished... only, I can't get the cell phone to register my keystrokes most of the time. It's hit or miss and mostly miss. So I can't get very far with my SO. You'll have to look into that. Otherwise, the platforming and action is really good!

One suggestion, when you bring up the pause menu, you should recap the controls for the player. Showing them only at the beginning of the game is nice, but there's a lot to remember, and being able to bring it up in the pause menu and refresh myself would have been appreciated.

Graphics, sound, and gameplay are excellent, the cellphone input issue notwithstanding.

**The perfect game doesn't exi...**
No, seriously,** this game is a 5 star in each category**. Whoever came with this idea was a genius! The music was perfect and the graphics amazing. Everything is working so fine and the controls are excelent. The gameplay is extremely satisfying and rewarding and even the way you approached the theme was very creative and unique. Congrats for this masterpiece!

The game is very fun and very well done. Level design is very good. The idea was very well executed. Congratulations!

I left my rating of your game, if you can leave your feedback in our game, Witch's Escape.

I hope you continue with the project.

https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/41/witchs-escape

Nice graphics great idea! I included it in my Ludum Dare 41 compilation video series, if you’d like to take a look. :) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aUzNw0b6qtc

Congrats on 4th place!
Great Entry!