Selkie by nickavv

[raw]
made by nickavv for LD35 (JAM)
In this game you play as a Selkie mother trying to find fish to feed her pups. When you enter the water you become a seal, and when you go back to land you become a human.
The main concept that I wanted to get done in time for the game jam is seducing a mortal man and then stealing his fish, which I thankfully was able to accomplish.

CONTROLS

ON LAND:
- Left and Right arrow keys: walk
- Space bar: flirt

IN WATER:
- Hold space bar: swim
- Left and Right arrow keys (while swimming): aim swimming

To transform into a seal, just jump into the water. To transform back into a human, jump out of the water and land on land (this may take a few attempts...)!

Ratings

Coolness 69% 3
Overall(Jam) 2.80 938
Audio(Jam) 3.15 396
Fun(Jam) 2.82 777
Graphics(Jam) 3.20 609
Humor(Jam) 2.80 352
Innovation(Jam) 2.74 798
Mood(Jam) 3.00 611
Theme(Jam) 3.32 574

Feedback

Jamie Guillemette
18. Apr 2016 · 02:54 UTC
i literally LOL'ed when she went wohoo..
Broken Matrix
18. Apr 2016 · 02:56 UTC
Movement is terrible but all else is good
Dooskington
18. Apr 2016 · 03:00 UTC
Movement was really slow and clunky, but an interesting concept. It just needs alot of polishing up.
QuexD
18. Apr 2016 · 03:05 UTC
Movement could be better, felt a bit off center when rotating. But that water, very nice. Music is enjoyable as well.
jcmonkey
18. Apr 2016 · 03:43 UTC
Pretty good game. i like how he does his flips
brinkhousegames
18. Apr 2016 · 05:57 UTC
As others have said, I had a hard time with the movement, but the music and water graphics were really enjoyable!

I'd love your thoughts on my game Titos Revenge:
http://ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-35/?action=preview&uid=65699
lanestp
19. Apr 2016 · 02:07 UTC
Movement was really difficult. If the seal controlled a bit better I think it would be a lot of fun!
ramza
19. Apr 2016 · 02:07 UTC
Difficult to play, but it had a really great atmosphere. Wish I could do more in this world.
thegoofromspace
19. Apr 2016 · 04:09 UTC
Physics were wacky, which I could forgive if the movement weren't so slow.

I'll be specific, since I see other people complaining: your top swimming speed as a seal is fine, but you need to walk faster, turn faster, and accelerate faster. It would also be nice if you could turn without holding the swim key down, and if your swimming didn't level off when you let go of the swim key.

I love the way the music changes when you're under water though! That was perfect, and I didn't even know I wanted it. 5 for mood.

One last note: the fish you pick up seem a lot better-made than everything else, which is kinda weird. Graphic detail doesn't have to be high, but it *does* have to be consistent. It just seems like there's something off about the whole thing, with that in the picture. I probably would've liked the graphics more if the fish looked worse. Kind of ironic, but there it is.
ocarson
19. Apr 2016 · 12:55 UTC
I like it, but the movement was too slow for me. I love the concept in general though.
Ironhead
20. Apr 2016 · 01:07 UTC
Really cool idea and beautiful and could be fun. The controls were really slow and that took a lot away from this. the music was good too and I like how when the camera went under water, the music sounded "watery".
Nolocality
20. Apr 2016 · 01:12 UTC
A day in the life of a selkie, start out in search for swedish fish candy in the slowest possible manor, attempt to seduce the local fisherman with my coconut boobs and saucy whistling, realize he is probably Jesus as he moonwalks across the surface of the water, realize there are in fact 43 fish, get teleported to meal time at the 42 mark...

Selkies have the oddest lives.

That's quite a bit of modeling for three days...good job.
🎤 nickavv
20. Apr 2016 · 01:22 UTC
@all: thanks for all the feedback, I'll definitely sink more of my effort into.. you know.. playability next time around :)

@Nolocality: I'm really curious how you got him to go onto the water, I did model the fish after swedish fish, I did undercount how many fish there were but then 42 is a nice number so I decided to leave it, and it is quite a bit of modeling and I probably should have spent more of my time elsewhere haha
RafaSKB
20. Apr 2016 · 01:58 UTC
Interesting idea but it's super hard to control the character... Nice music.
Raptorij
20. Apr 2016 · 12:27 UTC
8\10
DSSiege11
20. Apr 2016 · 19:04 UTC
The idea is really nice, it reminded me a bit of Ecco the Dolphin. The movement is way too slow and shaky though... You could try and fix that for a post LD version.
Nolocality
20. Apr 2016 · 22:36 UTC
@nickavv yeah I did the same lol...put the majority of my time into modeling and had to cut quite a bit.

I'm not 100% sure how I got the fisherman to walk backwards across the surface of the water but it may be due how I went under the fishing raft and got on-board from the far end, I walked up to him collecting the fish and when I got close I whistled at him, he then moved back towards my selkie nest across the water surface while doing a forward walking animation.

It cracked me up :) ...hopefully that helps you being able to reproduce this if it was a glitch/bug.
rahulparihar
21. Apr 2016 · 01:33 UTC
Nice game, difficult to play though. I too made an underwater game, its monochrome pixel art though, check it out.
Wefiends
21. Apr 2016 · 03:16 UTC
Not sure if it was just running slow, but moving around was really difficult. Love the concept, and you definitely got a couple laughs from me.
Idkfawin32
22. Apr 2016 · 08:36 UTC
Takes a while to get used to but was good :D
Ibzy
02. May 2016 · 10:22 UTC
Slow/sluggish movement and the seal has an awful turning circle.

Other than that, its great. Nice fun little concept, good use of the theme, and the textures are amazing. The water and the sea bed look ace.