Dark Points by anstabo

Horror game based on the mechanics of scanner sombre
Scan the environment every 10 seconds.
Find all 12 upgrades, 6 keycards and confront your worst nightmare at the end of this journey.
This game requires patience, do not attempt it if you don't have 15-30 minutes.

Use your broken scanner to guide you through the environment.



Monsters are lurking in the shadows of your scanner.


How to play
Keyboard
WASD / ZQSD: Move
E: Interact
Space: Jump
Mouse
Left Click: Scan
Please prefer downloading the game instead of playing the webGl version, it is a better and more immersive experience!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fkGdj5spk-M
| Link | https://anstabo.itch.io/dark-points |
| Link | https://anstabo.itch.io/dark-points |
| Original URL | https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/51/dark-points |
Ratings
| Overall | 1th | 4.583⭐ | 26🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 9th | 4.396⭐ | 26🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 4th | 4.583⭐ | 26🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 57th | 4.313⭐ | 26🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 24th | 4.604⭐ | 26🧑⚖️ |
| Audio | 1th | 4.729⭐ | 26🧑⚖️ |
| Humor | 509th | 2.976⭐ | 23🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 2th | 4.854⭐ | 26🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 25🗳️ | 22🗨️ |
The game is so long and rich of upgrades, impressive for a jam !
Congrats for this great game !
This is the first time I see a Horror game that works that well in a jam. The concept is so good, the theme is really well implemented and it fit perfectly in the genre.
The only problems I had were some lags while watching the levels previously discovered, but they were not too annoying (I was playing on the html version, maybe the build would have been more stable).
Otherwise you did a truly good job! The atmosphere is really oppressing, the sounds are spooky, and the character controller feels really smooth ! 5/5
I'm also super curious to know the technical setup behind the scanning effect shader. How did you keep that performant? (even in WebGL it played decently well!)
Hopefully I'll get back to it again and finish it, but fantastic job.
This game is really impressive, the creepy mood is perfect and the main mechanic is brilliant!
The level design is uncompromising and makes no prisonners (platformer puzzle in a game where you're almost blind? seriously?) but with some effort it's definitely doable. And it's big, really. ( The good thing is, you didn't have to spend too much time doing UV mapping :D BTW, what editor did you use? )
I'm also really curious about how the rendering works, e.g how you store the scanned parts of each wall.
(If I had to guess, I'd say: a giant texture map, where all the walls are unwrapped, that gets written to when scanning, and read from during rendering.)
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/51/waves
Must have missed something at the beginning.
Really well done mood and tone in general! Keep up the great work.
@amythyst @ace17 I originally went the real-time texture way but that was not optimized enough to let me draw a full level worth of texture. So instead I did the most intuitive thing and used custom particle systems. Everytime you scan you generate only 1 particle system that will batch with the nearest other particle systems. If a particle detects a moving object then it becomes another particle system that will attach itself to the moving object. And finally the water moving particle are simply the same ones but with shader trickery inside them.
@juss Haha we even had the same idea with batteries! Your entry was very masterfully done and it made me really think about the choices I made in mine about the scan.
And the audio is frightening(in a good sense)!
Also, I just found out that you are the developer of "Crumble", I've been following you on Twitter during the development. You made a great game!
I didnt expect a horrorgame could work in a game jam but goddamn it did. I didnt get all the rewards/keycards and the monster got kinda repetetive after like 5 encounters but it still gave me goosebumps. The scanner mechanic with unlocking your field of vision also worked really well with the mood and the movemnt/vision upgrades gave the player a nice feeling of progress. I am amazed that someone ddi this in a weekend and I am aware of how some poeple prepare things and just adjust it to the theme but I dont even see how this could have been done here since it fits so well. Great job mate.
10/10.
The faraway terrain is a little distracting since it's brighter than nearby terrain, and that makes it hard to navigate sometimes.
Also, what engine did you use for this? Looks really good! Audio is great as well.
@mr-rice Yes it was heavily inspired by that game. I used Unity.
Also thanks a lot to the players who experienced my game!
[edit]
I was stuck here, shortly after dropping from the long fall. Door in front of me is 03 after 00.

I was stuck in other areas too, most often after falling between pillars. Those managed to unstick itself after a few minutes of wiggling, but not this wall :(.
@jusw85 Yea unfortunately some walls are glitched if you force them, I realised that specific bug right after the end of the jam :[
I remember seeing something like this in a video about a Garry's Mod mod (edit: it's called the LIDAR mod). Love the story/gameplay take though, and the upgrades (especially good choice with the battery upgrade thing, waiting 10 seconds every time you scan would be a nightmare).