ØJE by Gaming Night

Yøu play as a character in a cøld, distant and desertic land. But sømething seems to look at yøu...
For this Ludum Dare entry, we propose a 2D platførmer. We interpreted the theme "Start with nøthing" in terms of level design: at first, the level seems empty, making yøu cross the entire scene with nøthing else than a distant wind sound. Yøu can even finish the game just like this! But if you pick up the first coin, the level progressively reveals itself to yøur eye(s), allowing you to explore the same level again and again, each time with new features and an increasing difficulty.


Made by: Julian & Thibaud & Julien & Leønaaard
Music credits: Cellulous by Ben Lukas Boysen & Sebastian Plano

| Youtube | https://gamingnight.itch.io/oje |
| Youtube | https://gamingnight.itch.io/oje |
| Youtube | https://gamingnight.itch.io/oje |
| Original URL | https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/oje |
Ratings
| Overall | 143th | 3.93⭐ | 131🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 354th | 3.527⭐ | 131🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 431th | 3.377⭐ | 128🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 119th | 4⭐ | 131🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 82th | 4.326⭐ | 131🧑⚖️ |
| Audio | 120th | 3.885⭐ | 124🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 127th | 3.942⭐ | 131🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 13🗳️ | 11🗨️ |
@tohubohu Thank you too, just for your information, some areas require a precise timing, but everything is doable :)

I didn't complete it, but almost :v:
Thanks for all your comments! The difficulty of the game has been a recurrent subject in our team during the jam. Some wanted it more accessible, and given some of your feedbacks, we should probably have listened to them...
Personally, I felt that the gameplay was sufficiently refined to offer some challenge, and provide a kind of speedrunnable replay value. Maybe we failed on this side. Level design is particularly hard to balance...
P.S. The music fits perfectly, but if you haven't composed it I don't think you should get audio ratings because of it right? Should I just rate the death sound?
P.P.S After your response I realized how much audio I had missed when first playing your game, so I upped your rating, I especially liked the sound made when new objects appear!
@atraxgames thanks, next time we'll reduce the hitboxes ;)
@navrcl thanks you!
@bramreth thanks! Actually we implemented some forgiveness for jumping. Not forgiving enough maybe?
There were subtle touches that just made this extra cool: the wildlife eyes following & blinking at the player. The breathing motion of the spikes. The character design was really memorable.
I also loved the ambient audio, very easy to listen to even after some time and frustration (from dying to spikes :P)
For a wI was struggling with the controls and wasn't sure why ... then it hit me ... I struggled to reliably trigger a "short jump". I can do a "high jump" every time I hold down jump for long enough ... but the short jump doesn't always work (even if I quickly smash and release the jump buttom). That made some areas tricky but still doable. In some places it feels like hit boxes are just a _liiiitle_ bit off. For example I'd jump and visually seem to miss a spike but it would still kill me.
I thought the saving system is quite smart and innovative. It let me control points where I wanted to return.
Lovely atmospheric experience, congrats!
Pretty cool visuals. Sound design weird. Dissonance with dark ambient and funny sounds. Beat the game anyway. The hardest place is at right top corner///
Thank you for making this game. I really enjoyed playing it!
Still, it's a lovely game!
Congratulations on a successful submission!
On the control side, I was a bit frustrated and stopped after a couple of tries because of the character deceleration that wasn't fast enough to my taste for platform challenges.
Good entry, congrats for making a game :)
Congrats! Here my top ratings
I liked the idea and enjoyed playing.
Could you add a while in game orb count?
There is a bug where you glitch through the wall after respawning.

[edit] Was also hoping for some special ending for getting 20/20 on all colours
I would have liked the save points to be a bit more visible, and I'm not sure what I think about the fact that you have to gather the coins again if you die before saving. It still works, but I think I would have liked the save points to only act as respawn points, and all coins collected are always kept, it might help the flow.
My other grievence is the character controls, it's just on the slippery side to feel frustrating for a game with precision platforming.
I still had a great time, didn't 100% it, but I bet that would be a fun experience! Great job on the submission!
Art, music is just excellent. This is one of the best games I've seen on the Ludum Dare.
It's fantastic to see that you made layered level design and it would have been more awesome with layered music that pops out one by one as we get more plateforms and ennmies.
I discover restart with something option in the late ;)
Maybe add in echap option menu , very usefull when you fall down after a checkpoint
Solid entry anyway
On the design side, I guess the player can use a little more context for exploration... E.g. when I'm standing on the high platform on the left and deciding should I move forward (maybe I can't get back where I came from - how do I know?) or get back to the right and explore more (maybe I missed something there?). However, I'm struggling to understand how that can be done within that particular design (should it be some notion of progress on directions? Or some kind of map?)
Also..I'm not sure what the orange(yellow?) eye did aside from bringing more coins.
Only thing that I find a bit "annoying" .. you push and push marketing for your own game... But only did 13 ratings yourself - impressive that you've gotten a 100+ ratings despite that
This is our game:
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/soundscapes