Looking forward to it!

Bookmarked it!

Let us know if you submit the game, please.

@dis0rder @edgeboyo @kuro
Thanks so much for taking an interest, it's finally done!
I look forward to playing all your games very soon!

Congrats on finishing even though you didn't get close during the jam! With the obvious disclaimer you included, I think this is commendable - LD always encourages post-jam versions, which this basically is.

Was there a playable version (no matter how broken) when the jam finished? It would be cool if you could also share that, so that people can rate based on that - and it would be also interesting to see your progress. Don't worry about any low ratings, the game itself is your reward :)

@ditam Thanks, glad you think that way! I wish I did have an on-deadline version, but firstly I just didn't save one at that state, and secondly while most of the art and gameplay was complete, none of it was linked together in a playable build and there was none of the narrative scenes to connect them.

The titlecards alone took me a couple days due to how perfectionist I was about the "handwritten" font. A mistake for the jam, but I am pleased with the result. The music was the big rush job, and I'm only ok with it because I have next to no musical experience (or talent).

@jam373 fair enough! Perfectionism and deadlines rarely mix, and these jams are a great way to learn and practice prioritization. But if, as you say, you're pleased with the result, that's much more important than hitting the jam deadline anyway.

This is a really interesting entry!

I really like the macabre tone of it all, and the demented look of the characters/environment. I'd almost say there's a hint of early Tim Burton there somewhere (pointing more towards his illustrations/concept art)

Once again, you've done a good job establishing a certain immersive atmosphere.

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I somehow like the fact that you mainly have control in the dream-sequences via a variety of mini-games.

Although, the scenes that shows your main-character in the bedroom makes you wish you could move around the apartment. Was that perhaps your intention in the beginning?

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On a technical side the game would need some tweaking. I really like the font you've made(?) for the dialogue, but I'd make the text show on-screen at the same time as the speaking-animations. The way they are presented now feels somewhat cumbersome. (Although it has a certain "silent-film" charm to it)

Also, I keep getting stuck in the dark hallway -segment of the game. The Scumlord attacks so fast that I've only managed to hit him only once by accident.

I've also lost control of the game and needed to restart on two occasions due to a bug. (I think it happens if you take a turn to another corridor and slap at the same time, or something like that...)

I'll probably try beating it once again, but if you provide a bug-fix or a debug-command to get past the scene I'll be glad!

@jam373 I'm glad to see you finished it in the end. It was a very bizarre experience to say the least. You did something unique with a lot of style - you don't see games like this every day. I'm not sure if you went for dark, horror, bizarre, or funny, but the "boss battle" sent a few chills down my spine, and the rest was creepy as hell. I'd say bizarre dark horror? Anyway, well done. I appreciate the disclaimer, and gave you one star less for each category, except for mood, since IMO that really deserved a rating in upper echelon. Well done!

@dis0rder Thanks for the feedback! Can't say Burton was an influence, but as a fan I take the comparison as high-praise.

Yea mini-games as a way to explore narrative is something I've been developing for a while now, this is my test-run of it. My main project I've been formulating for a couple years now is going to take that even further. You're right the initial plan was to have light interaction in the flat to progress the story, but didn't have time/ didn't think it was all that important.

The font was scribbled out in paint and then tediously copy and pasted into the titlecards. As mentioned above, took me a ridiculous amount of time in the end. I understand the cumbersome complaint especially seeing as you had to replay a few times it seems (apologies for the bug :sob:) and the timings could definitely be tweaked, but the big inspiration for the narrative style was german expressionist films like The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari. Arguably it didn't work, but as a nod to those films I'd like to keep that dialogue style in.

Really sorry about the bug. Just did some testing and discovered it happens when you click both a side-passage and a "forward"-passage shortly between each other.

A new version has been released with the bug-fix and a slightly slower speed for the landlord. There isn't much left after that though, so don't feel any pressure to play again. Just a short ending scene.

@kuro Thanks for playing! I would say all those adjectives are appropriate, I like blending horror and comedy with the surreal and grotesque. Glad the boss battle was scary, after play-testing it to death I sort of became numb to it and was worried it wasn't any good.

Thank you so much for the rating and staying fair to all the other contestants. Mood is definitely my favourite catagory so I'm so pleased you said that!

I wouldn't have submitted, personally. Atleast you have the disclaimer.. Good Luck, Friend!

Great art and atmosphere.

Your game seems to be quite different, the graphics are strange, but I like it. The experience in general is interesting. Good job.

I played v1.1, as I'm not taking part in LD47 (failed to submit my game in time, it is linked in my LD profile text).

Loved this. There are lots of details to like so I can't really list them. You know them all anyway, having worked hard on this.

My only complaint is you made the player finish the hallways part before continuing, I spent 30 minutes there and couldn't find a way to proceed, which is pity as I really just wanted the game to continue and see the rest of the story, so please avoid such sequences if you intend on making games like this in the future.

@kr4ft3r hey thanks for playing, I'll be sure to check out your game.
Really appreciate your feedback! Sorry you got stuck in the corridor, its honestly not that hard, it obviously just needed more tutorialisation, so again major apologies, thats fully my bad. Didn't intend anyone to have to sit through that for 30mins...

Just for clarification, the spacebar is an attack and you must hit the landlord 3 times as he is flying towards you, but before he hits you first! Doing so 3 times will progress the game to the final scene. The corridor maze is endless (and therefore pointless) but walking down it gives a chance for him to spawn.

I really didn't intend anyone to get stuck there and will definitely keep that in mind for any future projects.

Ah, finally did it, though I must say the sequence made me rage again, as getting the timing right is not easy, though bigger problem is that the chances of landlord appearing are not very high. Eventually I learned that I should spam click the corridor and hit space only at the moment when his size is just about to fill the center shadow area. If chances of him appearing were higher, it would be less of annoyance, but I guess it takes time and playtesting to polish little details like that. Once again, great atmosphere, I hope you continue creating.

Hi, great entry, innovative! Minigames are fun. I found the controls a little bit unresponsive at times. Interesting graphic style, although not my cup of tea. Don't worry about the entry, I saw you have already participated in four LDs. Good luck!

I am confusion

This Gives Me Feelings Of PTSD and Nostalgia at the same time. 11/10 would shit tooth out of my ass.

Wow, that is the first game made with Game Maker that i played in this Jam, well done for that! Even that it's not my style, i really enjoy the graphics and the idea. Just a few tips here: try to make the dialogue (into cutscenes) in the game, with a dialogue box or something else, it should make this game more dynamic. Another thing is that a missed an UI, there is no way to see what's my score. That said, it's a really nice game, and i'll be waiting for an update haha. Well Done! :)

Dude, this game. I really can see that you put 4 more days in it. I really love the art style and the weird dark fantasie story <3. An amazing game!

Oh this is so weird I love it!! The multiple artstyles fit so well together! Good game!

Nice game!

Good job.

This is not just a game, this is modern art game :D

Hi there! I thought this was very unique and charming (as well as super grim). I enjoyed it a lot, but I had some trouble with interaction. I appreciated having input tips (like when the game tells you to use the arrow keys or press space), but the rules/goals weren't always clear. I had to stop at the maze, I couldn't figure it out, I thought I would have to pick the right corridors using the bloodstains or the framed pictures, but I couldn't manage to complete that part. Again, I thought this had a very cool and unique personality. I wish I could have finished it. Good job on implementing all these things with such a tight deadline!

Awesome job! I feel like I gotta rate you 1-stars just to be fair to people who finished on time, so don't be discouraged by your ratings. No hard feelings, I hope. Everyone has their own opinion on whether or not to submit if you don't finish by the deadline but I personally feel that you made the game for the jam, so you might as well submit it to the jam (of course with the caveat that you make it clear you didn't finish, which is what you've done).

I loved the art style and the mood. The music was good too. The quirky gameplay and dream-sequence minigames really lent themselves well to the overall surreal nature of the game.

You remind me a lot of myself as I also struggle to finish on time and have done exactly the same thing in the past: finished my game late and just have a disclaimer saying I want feedback and I'm not worried about ratings. I'm not sure if I should give you advice or not, since finishing by the deadline is not something I'm good at, but I will tell you what worked for me this time around and you can take it or leave it.

This LD was the first time I felt like I really "Finished" by the deadline. By finished, I mean I submitted a "complete" game, with artwork, player interaction, and audio. There were only two ways I was able to do this: working on code, graphics, sound, and gameplay in a round-robin style. I'd spend two or three hours on each of those categories then force myself to move on to the next. That guaranteed that I had some of each element done by the deadline. Also, I had to be brutal when it came to narrowing my scope and cutting content. The scope kept getting smaller and smaller, which is sad in a way but it really felt good to "finish" something by the deadline.

Like I said, I'm not sure if I'm the best one to take advice from because my game still wasn't "finished" by the standards of what I wanted to get done, but using that process I was able to submit in time for the jam deadline. Maybe this will help you.

Overall, you did finish your game and share it with the community and I appreciate that. It was a very quirky and cool experience to play your game. I hope to see more games like this in the future. Good job!

@somogy @vphyre @jose-bonilla @apfel @whynotyt @leon-oost @vrerabek @pedrocoden @mary @usenrame Thank you all for playing <3

@lrvstudios Thanks for playing and your feedback! I agree the dialogue style is slow and clunky, but it's a homage to expressionist silent films. UI wasn't really necessary as there is no score! But the final scene has your jaws as a kind of UI as they show your hp as teeth.

@ludipe Hey thanks for playing. I recognise you from twitter, your feedback means a lot! Apologies that the "goal" of interaction wasn't made very clear, short instructions were intended but scrapped for time (turns out they were far more required than I thought!). The maze itself is actually endless and just there for atmosphere. The real objective there is to hit the landlord (spacebar) 3 times before you lose all your teeth. You get a tiny ending scene after that so you didn't miss much.

@codertrevor Thanks for playing. I don't at all mind about the rating, as long as people are playing and leaving feedback I couldn't be happier so really thanks a lot! To be honest, I've managed to submit under deadline before, and I don't think scope is my issue in particular (though it was interesting and appreciated to hear about your own experience). I had already spent a good several years getting my scope down to something managable for a first game release (back for my first LD jam!) and learning to love tiny games and ideas (A love I still, and always will, have!).

I think I'm now instead at a stage where my (small amount of) experience is allowing me to expand on scope and start making longer and longer games that are more true to my ideas. It's a very exciting time for me! And because of this I currently have quite a limited interest in going backwards and making smaller games again. In the end I think I've outgrown 48-72 hour jams for my narrative games, and will be instead looking to longer jams for the future (though I think I'll start using LD jam to instead experiment on short mechanics-focused games!).

As I've said previously I really have no regrets about spending the extra time here, as my goal was to fully create the story I wanted to make, and it just so happens to have taken a week rather than 2-3 days. I would much rather the initial idea I had be complete than be forced to cut it to pieces in order to make a deadline.

The only issue with that is I still love taking part in the community we have for these jams. I guess I want to have my cake and eat it too. But I think unofficially opting-out of the ratings in favour of straight feedback is a fair compromise for everyone.

Well this was an entry! haha.
really twisted, loved it, was the landlord(slumlord) a vampire???
The dialogue could be done clearer, i would have the text appear as the characters where talking, i might have a script for you in GML if you want to give it a go, it should be compatible with your game, and should be pretty easy to implement.

I played the latest version 1.2 with the sound fix, haven't tried the first version, but i found the volume to be quite low

Also I'm super curious how you did the various cutscenes i was planning on doing something similar with my game to emphasize some things but i did not have time to squeeze it in properly.

to bad you missed the deadline, but i had a blast with this one.

@kekkodude thanks for playing. Yes he was a kind of vampire (I tried to not go for too many clichés, so a tooth-stealing vampire)! I actually totally forgot that I didn't make that obvious, so well done for being the first person to mention it!

Thanks for the offer, I'm sure it would work really well but honestly while the dialogue style could definitely be tweaked with better timings and such, I did it like this as homage to films like "The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari" and would like to keep it like this for personal reasons. I do understand the frustration. But can I ask, what do you exactly mean by "clearer"?

I will definitely raise volume if I do another patch so thanks for the feedback.

Hmm not sure what advice to give for cutscenes, I do it very inefficiently. New room for each camera angle, and a lot of fiddly numbers to get right so everything aligns correctly with the proper timing too. I think I have a bit of a talent for correctly fudging numbers like that though, so I tend to get things feeling right within 1-2 tries. I wish I knew of a separate program for creating cutscenes using animated sprites, would be such a help.

well this was completely horrifying! i really like your art style and animation, the blend of pixel art and scribbly traditionally drawn pieces was awesome.

i liked the silent film dialogue style, but it felt a bit slow to me, pressing space to advance through quicker would have been nice.

i liked the gear puzzle, but i actually got stuck at the part where he goes to confront the landlord, where you press space and the hand slaps or something. i just couldn't figure out what to do there.

nice work over all!

That was an interesting game! I like the overall theme and art direction of it. Very intensely horrifying and mysterious! As for the gameplay, the maze level did confuse me, and I felt that the enemy jumped at you too quickly to swat it away. I recommend some more reaction time when it comes. Otherwise, I want to say it's a very surreal title.

Loved this. I've been playing your entries since the Giving Thing and I'm really enjoying seeing how your style is evolving. I think there definitely might be some La La Land influence (old GameMaker game series) with the idea of lots of little minigames and the atmosphere/surrealness. I personally love those games and yours definitely remind me of them a lot (check'em out if you haven't played)! I hope you continue to work on your project you mentioned, I'm really intrigued to see what you can do with more time than just 6ish days. Keep up the great work!

Also I would definitely be interested in talking about your games or even potentially collaborating on a project in the future. You can see my personal stuff here (https://curtis-lacey.itch.io/).

I played the latest version, but the game is really cool! I absolutely adore the art-style and how intentionally weird it is. The minigames were all pretty fun too! My favorite is definitely the last one, though I'll admit it did feel a bit slow. It certainly gave me a sense of horror though, which I enjoyed. The cutscenes were fun to watch too, but it did feel slow until it got to the first minigame. Overall, great job on the game!

@sakura-magika Thanks so much for the lovely feedback. Space to skip dialogue is a really good idea I didn't think about, might add it to the next patch! Seems many people got stuck at the landlord part, my bad. Had to slap him 3 times to proceed. That was basically the end though so you didn't miss much.

@twistedhawk Thanks so much! Latest patch reduces the landlord's speed somewhat so thanks for the feedback.

@gamechoy Aaah that's so amazing to hear, thanks! Ya know what's crazy, your team's game Meat Mountain was one of my favourite entries for that first ever LD jam I did (felt like it really shared my style!) and this LD jam I've been scratching my head trying to remember what it was called/find it!

Embarrassingly I haven't even heard of that game series (not so knowledgable about that era of indie games), but I've just downloaded them and they look exactly up my street, thanks for the recommendation.

That project is still in early stages but I'm really flattered at the interest. I'm currenty working on a couple of smallish, more traditional, mechanics-focussed games as a bit of a 2020 palate cleanser (projects that don't require the same kind of artistic energy that this year seems good at sucking me dry of lol).

I'd love to keep in contact and collaboration sounds awesome (though I'm still relatively new to all this so I'd hate to be a burden)!

I'll be sure to play your itch games, they look great (sinew's thumbnail reminds me a lot of that Lynch short film from a few years back, love it!).

@essarrgee Thanks for the feedback! I'm really glad you liked the last one, it has problems but I'm quite proud of it. Sorry about the slowness, I'll work on better timings for all that, but glad you could enjoy anyway!

Hahaha glad you remember! Burden? Nah. Here's my twitter (https://twitter.com/curtislacey01) if you wanna follow it and DM for my email or whatever (I would give an email or something initially but uhhhhhh this is public lol). Huh now that I look at it, it does resemble Ant Head hahaha (assuming what you're referencing). Cheers!

So creepy >~< I loved this so much! Immaculate flavor you got going on with your style. Very original :) I’m sorry you weren’t able to finish, but I’m definitely looking forward for what you’re going to be creating in any future entries!

@angiekatneko Thanks so much for playing! You're far too kind, especially when I see what a talented artist you are. Here's to many more Ludum Dares!

@gamechoy Cool! I must say I stopped with twitter a few months back but I'll dust off my old account and give you a follow for sure. https://twitter.com/EeArthWelcome

Yea Ant Head, that's the one lol!

wow! What! Yes! love the mood and like the grotesk "story". It's really takes you to some other dimenssion world where you don't really feel safe: thumbs up for that! At some point there moment when my focus almost got carried away. Love the music and love the style. Great one!

@ankea Thanks so much, means a lot that you enjoyed it! Really loved your game too.