GRAPPLE the Abyss! by lectvs
Why don't your legs work? Who knows... At least you have your grappling hook to get around! Can you make it to the bottom and face your ████?
Tested with Chrome and Firefox. Please report bugs to https://twitter.com/lectvs
Controls:
WASD/Arrows - Grapple
ESC - Pause
F - Fullscreen
Tools Used:
- pixi.js
- WebAudio API
- Paint.NET
- PyxelEdit
- sfxia
- SFXR
- Renoise


| Web + Source | https://lectvs.itch.io/grapple-the-abyss |
| Original URL | https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/48/grapple-the-abyss |
Ratings
| Overall | 10th | 4.278⭐ | 74🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 3th | 4.486⭐ | 74🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 67th | 4.069⭐ | 74🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 290th | 3.826⭐ | 74🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 151th | 3.972⭐ | 74🧑⚖️ |
| Audio | 141th | 3.746⭐ | 73🧑⚖️ |
| Humor | 81th | 3.667⭐ | 68🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 95th | 3.929⭐ | 72🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 34🗳️ | 61🗨️ |
I think that the gravity was a little high and everything moved just a little too fast. It made some parts of the game a little frustrating. I am not sure that I would get much better at this game than I am now because I think I've hit the limits of my reaction time and not skill. I thought about quitting with the two bats but I eventually got through them and I'm glad I did.
You are correct that the final boss is very easy. And you included just the right amount of lore... :smile:
I got a crash on the controls menu. Here it is.

But then I remembered I disabled hardware acceleration a while back. When I re-enabled that, it worked fine!
I liked the mechanic here, nice work! I could see polishing it up and making the grappling a little more forgiving- some of those corners were really tough! But overall this was a really solid entry, so great work!
I love how timing all of the grappling hooks makes it so you must do very precise moves! Making the lava break the grappling hook is a nice touch.
Another fantastic submission from you. I'm really glad I got to play, thanks for making it!
https://imgur.com/KbFAJ7V
Happy to come back if there's something obvious I missed!
I love the boss fight at the end.
Good job!
- Mechanics are solid and clearly readable and understandable;
- Visuals are hella smooth and fit very well together;
- The controls screen is very smartly implemented;
- The lore was completely unnecessary and totally appreciated.
I don't see much of the theme here (though I'm not one to speak myself either :sweat_smile:)
I do agree that the grapple could be a bit more interesting, the lava area was nice for the restrictions but also maybe some physics would be interesting? I don't entirely know of course.
The game is hard, but not punishing. It is super fun to try again and again, until you pass that level.
Gameplay is super fluid!
Great work!
Cheers matey!!!
I had a lot of fun with it. Great work.
If you'd like to watch again the highlight is at https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1005053862
In terms of constructive criticism, I really only have a few minor nitpicks. I had a hard time at the beginning of the boss fight figuring out that I could only hit them while they were grappeling, especially because of the free hit you're given to start the fight - For my first couple of attempts, I felt like my attacks were randomly phasing through the boss, but I pretty quickly realized that they could only be hit mid-grapple. The risk/reward of sending yourself diving at the boss if you missed an attack was a lot of fun though, and really heightened the tension of the fight.
I also had a strangely hard time getting through this underwater section, which was the only time the game bordered on being frustrating - Between the very tight gaps between the moving blocks, the delay between launching your grapple and getting pulled forward, and the inability to precisely reset yourself to a fixed distance away from the blocks, it felt awkwardly fiddly to pass. Even when I got the timing down on the first block, it took me several attempts to be consistent enough to do it twice in a row.

That said, the rest of the game more than made up for that minor hiccup. All in all, I had a lot of fun. When even just moving around in the controls screen felt great, I had a good feeling that the rest of the game would be a good time and I was not let down.
It's hard but not too much (please, in a game like this, let the music loop instead of restarting it on every death !), and the level design is enjoyable.
The graphics and sound are minimalistic but work very well here : simple and effective.
The last line "maybe I'll be harder in the post-jam version" just made my day :D
Loved it :heart:
Overall it's good, but music doesn't get me into the mood :(
Anyways, it's a really cool game, good job!
This didn't really detract from the game, but especially after using the grapple as a weapon for the boss, it seemed odd that it couldn't be used to fight the bats- instead you had to maneuver around them. I think it would be fun to allow for some of these smaller grapple fights should you flesh it out in a post-compo version. :)
This one is minor, but I was fangirling over it last night in my stream: I liked how you communicated that you couldn't grapple the lava by putting it straight ahead of the player where they would obviously try xD
Well done! this has a lot potential in case you plan on working on it more <3
The grapple movement felt good and the quick reset was nice. Music fit well and the graphics were minimal but conveyed the information needed.
Overall, a pretty solid little game!
https://ghdsportsapk.xyz/