Hello Darkness by jcmonkey
This game is a dungeon puzzler with two button controls.
The basic goal of the game is to find the switch, then the exit to the next level.
There are currently 10 levels
This is my first ludum dare, and im excited that i finished a game
that looks pretty good.
Everything that i did here was done by me from scratch.
Sorry, though i tried to get the game to work with WebGL, it just did not
work right. I had to use WebPlayer.
you can acces the game from my webpage, jcmcomics.com
Hope this isnt a issue for some. :/
Website: jcmcomics.com
Twitter: @JCMonkeyD3
GameEngine: Unity
Language: c#
Art: Inkscape, gimp
Music: LMMS
Sounds: BFXR
Edit Post #LDJAM:
Thank you to all of you for the great feedback.
So feedback summed up:
1) Music was horrible to most, it was too short, and didnt really fit the theme
2) Some didnt like the mines mechanic, in a new release i will change that
3) Some didnt like the loud sound effects. ill make them better, and quieter
4) Some didnt like the long levels. yeah i can make the long ones shorter
5) Some wanted notifications when spikes went up. yeah i can do that.
6) Some wanted more to the game. yeah i will add more stuff to do
7) Most mobs can be avoided. yes this was an oversight, will be changed.
8) Some wanted the walk to move to be at the feet. yes i agree, it will be changed.
9) Most wanted more mobs in the game. yeah i agree, i will put more.
10) Most wanted the mobs to do more. yes i agree, i will make this happen.
Again i really appreciate the feedback. No hard feelings for any feedback, all feedback is welcome. I wont be able to get better or grow as a game maker with out great honesty.
Sincerely,
Jamie C aka jcmonkey
EDIT: I have completed a post compo release of the game. please play the first one that was made during the competition. Then go ahead and try the second one and let me know what you think. :D
The basic goal of the game is to find the switch, then the exit to the next level.
There are currently 10 levels
This is my first ludum dare, and im excited that i finished a game
that looks pretty good.
Everything that i did here was done by me from scratch.
Sorry, though i tried to get the game to work with WebGL, it just did not
work right. I had to use WebPlayer.
you can acces the game from my webpage, jcmcomics.com
Hope this isnt a issue for some. :/
Website: jcmcomics.com
Twitter: @JCMonkeyD3
GameEngine: Unity
Language: c#
Art: Inkscape, gimp
Music: LMMS
Sounds: BFXR
Edit Post #LDJAM:
Thank you to all of you for the great feedback.
So feedback summed up:
1) Music was horrible to most, it was too short, and didnt really fit the theme
2) Some didnt like the mines mechanic, in a new release i will change that
3) Some didnt like the loud sound effects. ill make them better, and quieter
4) Some didnt like the long levels. yeah i can make the long ones shorter
5) Some wanted notifications when spikes went up. yeah i can do that.
6) Some wanted more to the game. yeah i will add more stuff to do
7) Most mobs can be avoided. yes this was an oversight, will be changed.
8) Some wanted the walk to move to be at the feet. yes i agree, it will be changed.
9) Most wanted more mobs in the game. yeah i agree, i will put more.
10) Most wanted the mobs to do more. yes i agree, i will make this happen.
Again i really appreciate the feedback. No hard feelings for any feedback, all feedback is welcome. I wont be able to get better or grow as a game maker with out great honesty.
Sincerely,
Jamie C aka jcmonkey
EDIT: I have completed a post compo release of the game. please play the first one that was made during the competition. Then go ahead and try the second one and let me know what you think. :D
Ratings
| Coolness | 100% | 1 |
| Overall | 2.93 | 742 |
| Audio | 2.41 | 577 |
| Fun | 2.68 | 776 |
| Graphics | 2.81 | 640 |
| Humor | 2.17 | 569 |
| Innovation | 2.47 | 836 |
| Mood | 3.09 | 384 |
| Theme | 3.09 | 850 |
But nice game! Music was kinda intense. :)
It would have also been nice if the spikes signaled their time to activation, as you again can only wait for them to pop to find out when they'll be up next.
Areas felt a bit unnecessarily large, but it fits with the mood of the game.
love the whole darkness only seeing a range of light and the enemy is great :)
well done :)
Otherwise a not-so-bad looking game with solid gameplay.
The music here is your biggest enemy, the levels were short but felt longer because of how short the BGM was.
I never thought smiling slimes could be scary before!
BTW the web version doesn't work on chrome
I enjoyed it
+ Intense.
+ Fun.
- Player doesn't get hurt by his mines.
- Levels feel almost identical.
The animations could use more frames per seconds, but I guess this is because of time shortage. The character moves nice, though!
Nice entry!
I wanted to comment on the summed up feed back.
1) Music was horrible to most, it was too short, and didnt really fit the theme
I do agree that it didn't fit the theme of the dungeon crawl but it wasn't horrible
2) Some didnt like the mines mechanic, in a new release i will change that
I thought the mine mechanic was really original. I also liked the fact that you only has a limited number of them.
3) Some didnt like the loud sound effects. ill make them better, and quieter
The sound effects were a little loud but they really fit the thing making the sound.
4) Some didnt like the long levels. yeah i can make the long ones shorter
There was really only one long level (level 8) in the game and it wasn't that bad. Then again I'm old school and used to mapping out a level ;)
5) Some wanted notifications when spikes went up. yeah i can do that.
I really don't get this one. there was a sound when they came up.
6) Some wanted more to the game. yeah i will add more stuff to do
For what it was it wasn't bad. Yeah perhaps some different types of traps and different types of monsters would have spiced it up a bit. But you can always do that for Hello Darkness 2 :D
7) Most mobs can be avoided. yes this was an oversight, will be changed.
I noticed I was able to avoid some of the monsters, but there are never more monsters than mines so I just killed them. besides this isn't a bug its a feature!
8) Some wanted the walk to move to be at the feet. yes i agree, it will be changed.
I have no comment on this. I didn't really notice.
9) Most wanted more mobs in the game. yeah i agree, i will put more.
see #6
10) Most wanted the mobs to do more. yes i agree, i will make this happen.
see #6
The best thing I liked about the game was the torch glow and the limited vision. These really added to the game.
To me it does feel a bit slow. I personally would have liked it if the character moved a bit faster or if the corridors were a bit shorter :)
Also, if I'm moving using only the mouse, why can't I place mines using the mouse as well? An extra option for placing mines (using e.g. right click) would have been cool. It's still a great game though! :)
The concept certainly has some potential, and I for one think that it was clever of you to approach the theme by controlling the character with the mouse. It is one button, after all!
As of now, it's a little repetitive. I think that stealth elements could be a fantastic addition to this game and liven up the atmosphere, especially since you don't seem to go after action gameplay.
Furthermore, as many have pointed out, the music need some working on, and sound effects could also be more consistently designed (why a "realistic" death scream, when you could have opted for something retro, as for the rest of the sounds?). That is obviously just an opinion. On a more technical side, you might want to consider lowering the trap's sound, which is way too loud.
Good job on getting this done, and I look forward to see your future Ludum Dare entries!
Grats on your first LD, keep it up!
The thing about it is I think you have too many mechanics here shoved into one game-- I wish it was more distilled. Theres darkness, a timer, lives, mines, buttons to press to open doors which is all fine but I feel like they didnt reinforce a central theme.
Also, dunno if I was missing something but there really needed to be aggro on the slimes and a chase code because if i run out of mines and a blob is pathing thru my only path I have no way to get past him because my mines didnt refill when I died.
Keep making games!
Instead of just lowering the volume of the sound effects, it would be better to make the sounds have a source and play them at a volume respective to how close the character is to the sound (distance attenuation).
For post-compo version, I feel that giving the player a boomerang is like giving the character from Amnesia a shotgun, it greatly reduces the tension of the game and monsters are now just cannon fodder that get in the way temporarily. The mines were slow but now that the monsters follow you you don't have wait for their walk-cycle to repeat anymore to continue.
Also, W + mouse aiming was very confusing to me as I instinctively starting pushing ASD as well to move relatively and they didn't do anything, causing me to be killed.
Finally, unless you are getting quarters from people per play, best to just omit "lives" entirely, esp. for a compo game where people are unlikely to restart.
And remember that just blindly following tips from testers like us will not yield a better game, as people often come up with a quick suggestion for what they think could improve something, but that doesn't mean it fits in the whole picture. :)
Nice entry, keep it up.
What I did, actually, was mute the game tab and then play listening to this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4zLfCnGVeL4
Fits perfectly hahahaha!
I managed to reach level 10 =)
Not a fan of how little you can see. I found having a very small viewable radius around the character to be unnecessary. If you wanted to denote darkness you could have the lit portion be 90% of the screen so there's still a small amount of darkness around the edges.
The visuals are a little rough and the music loops too quickly but overall a nice first entry.
I everything else about the game. The lighting irked me a little :)
It would be nice if the sound helped you understand your suroundings, e.g. monster sounds would get louder if they approach you.