this is top 10 material, however, i found a bug where you get stuck jittering inside the ground in certain circumstances

Very hard and very fun. Loved the artwork. This is something that I will keep playing for quite sometime. Loved the game.

Great game, tons of fun and very challenging. Love the shaking of the rocket!

Very interesting. Though it is too hard for me, I still love the control and the idea.

It is also a bit hard to use hover button. I prefer launching at full speed then press the opposite direction to hover in mid air.

@RatoGodoy Thanks! Thought I found all the small issues... I tried to patch some of them in a post jam update as well as adding a reset button!

@dobryn Thanks, I suspected this would be a tad difficult game, I made some section more fair in a post jam update, but it will still be challenging!

@cirno Thanks! I have already tweaked it a bit (not released though), but yeah this is a difficult game, glad you liked it anyways.

@scottgoldsmith Thank you, I tried to make the game as polished as I could so it is nice that you appreciate it!

It's very cute. Note that on QWERTZ keyboards, Z and X are nowhere near each other, which makes the controls a lot harder!

@zarkonnen Yeah, not perfect. In pico8 you cannot pick keys, but it also works with a controller

This is great, I like the fluidity of the movement and visuals. I really like the space cat overlord.

@exmxpx Got inspired by "Pettson och Findus" a great swedish children book, so nice that you like it! :)

Pretty cool game! Although, as many people have said, I find the game very difficult, mainly because of the unusual controls. I think it would have helped if there were a few more easy levels to get used to it, especially the hover. The hover feels extremely sensitive, if I move just a little bit I fly halfway across the screen. Another thing that makes the controls tricky is the wall bounces. I was finally able to slowly fly down into a shaft with the hover on, but then I lightly touched the wall and again I was pushed very strongly straight into some water. Maybe this is what you want it to be like, but at least to me this felt a bit unfair :) (This might also be because I dont have a complete grasp of the controls yet, which makes me unable to react to such occurances.)
Besides the difficulty I thought it was an amazingly polished and complete game! That you made this in 48 hours is amazing, and that you made it in pico8 is even cooler! I have tried pico8 a few times myself, but I have no idea how I would even start making this. Do you have some way to keep your code organized? Because for me the pico8 code quickly becomes a big mess XD
The art was also amazing, and the sounds fit perfectly. Really well done! :D

The game is pretty difficult, but I prefer games that are a little challenging ngl. I absolutely just love the art and the platforming gameplay is really good. I'd love to see this expanded on

@Wuppos Cool with so much feedback! Its a diffucult game, I will make a post jam update to make it a bit more fair, but overall I think it will stay tricky :D

With pico-8 I use visual studio code for doing the actual coding, but yeah you need to scope right at the beginning, and try to make everything in smaller functions. Overall a pico8 is great for jams, you get everything in one place!

@slimmerburger Thanks, it was fun to make a weird platformer so to say! With the theme "Unstable", it came apparent early on to make a somewhat difficult game!

The spaceship lives up the theme. It's so unstable that single bump into obstacle could send the ship away erratically.

@bloodbane Yeah, it is might not be the best to send cats into space with those spaceships :D

Cool! I like the charge mechanic! I like any game made with PICO-8!

I agree with everyone saying it's very hard!

The movement is unique and interesting. I find you have to do little "S-shaped" movements, where you launch vertically, then turn and turn back in the air so you're vertical again before landing. So I'd do that in a few little hops, and when there was a big jump to be made, just blast off full speed in that direction, and probably hit a wall, lol. It would have been nice if the hover was more generous, or if the game was a bit more forgiving overall, but at least it didn't feel unfair. Like, whenever I died, it was because I legitimately failed -- the game is just hard, and that's okay.

I appreciated the retro sound effects and pixel art, and the little touches of polish like the weepy cat when you die.

First PICO-8 I tested in this jam, and I liked it ! The idea is simple but clever, very funny !

The design and the effects are very polished, it's an amazing result for a game made in 48hours. :clap:

As many people said, I find the game very difficult, BUT I think it's what it make interesting. I would like a mobile version of this game.

Overall, amazing work !

Very cool charging mechanic! It's like piloting a bottle rocket. :D
I didn't quite grasp what makes you just bounce, and what makes you die. But the checkpoints are a literal life saver.

This feels fun and juicy, I agree with the high difficulty but it didn't feel frustrating at all, thanks to the juice/playfulness of the mechanic.

The 1 bit art is really excellent. I love the auditory feedback on the charging, checkpoints, and explosions. I am pretty terrible at it, but it feels like a Lunar Lander type game sped up x100, with short sections and fast respawns after many deaths. Well done!

@rogual Thank you, yeah as everyone here say it is a bit difficult, but as you say I try to give as much control as possible to the user! And the post jam update will update some of the layout and tweak the movement a bit to make it even more fair!

@duck-reaction Aww thank you! The game is actually playable on your phone, pico8 automatically adds mobile controls to the web build! (But it is even more hard to play on the phone)

@martin-magni Thanks, that is a good description :D
If you hit the top of the ship on the ground or the floor you will get destroyed. Yeah, even if I played the game a lot of times, I usually at least dies one time on a run so checkpoint is needed!

@cagibi Thanks, I am happy that you like the challenge!

@jonah-srg Thank you! Yeah, that is also a good comparison, take Lunar Lander and make it a platformer!

Completed with 50 crashes! Very nice game, respect for rocking PICO-8!

Finished it with 46 deaths. Super polished, awesome art style, controls are very tight and the difficulty is just right. 5 Stars for me.

reminds me of celeste. This is a must-have for any speedrunner

Such a good entry! I don't think I ever really fully got the hang of the hovering mechanic, but I eventually got to the end! The checkpoints were a huge blessing lol. Great job!

Amazing submission! The controls were a little confusing at first, however I got it quickly and it was a lot of fun to play :D Challenging at times but always with great feedback. Superb!

The art is great and makes amazing use of PICO-8's limitations, and the controls are really nice and satisfying. I generally found the difficulty to be pretty good, except for one really bad section in the middle where there's a really big difficulty spike that I only managed to get through due to pure luck. The collision detection was also pretty inconsistent, I often got inside of or sometimes just went through walls, but overall amazing game and easily my favourite one from the jam so far.

Difficult game, but a lot of fun, and the art and graphics were great! I'd just request an easier tutorial area for learning the controls!

Love the style. Fun little game. Good job!

Really interesting mechanic, pretty fun. Tuned very difficult, made it to about where the jump boosters are introduced and felt a bit too intense at that point. Also got stuck in the wall once and had to restart the game. Other than that issue, really polished. I like the look and animation. Nice gamefell. Overall, very cool!

It's challenging, but I like the graphics and story behind the game. Maybe having a slightly gentler early section to allow users to get more used to the controls would be nice, but overall nice work!

Man I'm horrible at this game, but I still love it! Super polished game and always fun to see Pico8 games :)

Really cute but super hard as you know lol

Nice game, I love the artstyle and animations.

It took me quite a while to realize I could only stand on certain blocks, and I'm still not sure on how some of the death mechanics work, but this was wildly cool! I'm always a sucker for a good pico8 game.

I wasn't able to beat it (I got to the bomb star field) unfortunately, I had to give up after a failed attempt ended with me jammed into a wall with no way to get out haha

Solid game, beat it, thanks!
Love the visuals. It is better for me than most of games if this genre.

Very fun game! Some new feeling to platform jumping

Great game! Very fun and satisfying but maybe a bit too difficult :D

Tough as nails, but very fun to play! I really love how polished this game is and feels. Controls are great and "jumping" is very fluid and satisfying. Great job!

So tough and so polished, this is a great entry and overall easily a top 5 game in this jam, gz! :D

This was really cool for what it is. I was able to blaze past the game till the second checkpoint,unfortunately once I got to the point where I had to drop onto a bomb like in the gif you have on this page, the rocket would just never take off from it. Along with that I got stuck in the wall at that point and could not continue. It's still a great concept and idea which has been executed well

It's a really nice modern take on the classic arcade game Moonlander with really nice sounds and 1-bit graphics.

The game is addictive, but unfortunately too difficult especially at the beginning due to the way that the player's ship controls. Even just lightly tapping the movement keys, I found my ship suddenly slamming into a bouncy wall and too my doom. There's a few section in the game where the hover stops working and you free-fall through large drops filled with hazards that you have barely enough time to react to.

It could definitely do with more checkpoints, especially after that pit you have to fall down near the end of the game.

Great entry ... was actually expecting something like good old Turbo Raketti... but a rather different mechanics :thumbsup_tone1:

The gfx and sounds goes really great together :thumbsup_tone1:

:purple_heart: :dart: :frog:

Very fun entry, I loved the crunchy aesthetic of the chargeup. Hard but fair platforming. Managed to reach the end a couple of times, first with 49 deaths then 20. Easy to pick up and challenging to master which is perfect for a LD game.

Beat it! 22 crashes. Lots of fun! It was definitely challenging, but it was short enough so that's ok. Nicely done!

Challenging but very enjoyable experience! The controls are on point, so that you get annoyed at yourself rather than the game for failing :D The game glitched out on the platform above the second checkpoint a few times, the last time even so hard it wouldn't reload the level, but other than that very polished game!

I finished the game! In the beginning I had to reset several times because of a bug where you get stuck inbetween tiles, it would be nice if there was a way to respawn at the last checkpoint (maybe by just pressing X, as that's already the respawn button?) for whenever that happens, but also in general! I liked the visuals, sometimes it was a bit hard knowing what was dangerous for me to touch and what was a solid block to stand on. I feel like the game had a really good balance between difficult and what felt fair for the player. Overall it was a really fun game! :D

Challenging, but very addictive game. In the beginning, I didn't realise that there were checkpoints, but after accidently flying on one of them, everything became clear.
There was also one moment in one of the first sections, where I got stuck in a tile. I wish there was a reset on demand button.
Anyway, good game!

@veka @korfi @trexxak @pbg @dunk @purpledartfrog @littlew00d @badpiggy @ccglp @dzejpi @pnkvrt
@khaoz-fang @saintheiser @mathemagician @thegamerasd @monkeyfox @alec @kalevrk @pdotjpg @roelosaurus
@wbertrand @alice-02 @ethankessler @lonewookie @minidavid

Thank you all for your feedback and nice comments! I can't keep up answering every comments anymore, but I read all and I hope to fix some of the issues you are having in a post-jam update!

Thanks again for playing <3

Very cool and fun game!
I think I accidentally got stuck in a wall or something though, the screen kept shaking back and fourth, noises were playing continously, and I couldn't go back to the save point. At first I thought it was some animation/sound for my ship crashing, so I waited but nothing happened.

@hanna404 Yeah, some bugs exist, as you can see multiple people have gotten similar problem as you! Hope you still had fun, the game will be patched after the jam was over to fix some of them!

great idea and execution! unfortunately i ran into the bug that everyone else has and got stuck in a wall. maybe a workaround could have been allowing the restart button to be pressed any time?

anyways, i really enjoyed it. wonderful work!

So difficult! Fun, though! I love the cute pixel art, and the game mechanic—once you get the hang of it—is kind of addictive. I was thrown off at first because I expected it to play more like the old Lunar Lander game.

Oh god I love those pico8 games! Thank you for checkoints! Great entry

Beat it! man, I can't believe I missed this at first. Great stuff, i love pico-8. Brutally difficult and very cute—i like the sound effects too. regrettably there were a few instances where I got stuck in the wall and had to restart... otherwise, great stuff :)

That was a real joy to play!

I beat it with like 125 deaths! it was pretty hard, I found it a bit inconsistent in how i would explode sometimes from the hitting the side wall, but overall pretty good. I had the hardest time with where the bombs where introduced, I ended up very carefully hovering to the next flag and didn't even use the midpoint bomb.

I feel sympathy for using PICO-8, limiting the number of colors, and a difficult 2D platformer.
Love simple 1-bit art and difficult game play!
Nice job!!

Did you play the "unstable stick" entry? It's kiiiiinda similar to this! I love the visuals and audio and the movement is very satisfying!

This game looks great, but it was painful to play for me. It took me at least five minutes to get past the "Hold Z to hover" part, and then the checkpoint didn't trigger properly, so I spent another three minutes trying to get to the checkpoint. Then I kind of just gave up. I would love the game if there was no wall / ceiling bouncing or nose-diving, but I suppose it wouldn't really cut the theme then, would it?

Still, I don't want this to be all negative, and I can really see the effort you put into this game, it's just the difficulty really ruined the game for me.

As many have said, this is a very difficult game though the art style and overall polish is great. I was unable to make it to the first flag, but difficulty is not easy to tune in only 48 hours.

I loved your game! 1 bit art, precision game and pico-8. A dangerous and delicious mix. Unfortunately I got stuck in parts of the map every time I played. I hope you can fix it because I'm really looking forward to getting to the end of this game!


Управлять ракетой - это не хухры-мухры. Или это торпеда? А может быть, снаряд? Как бы то ни было, пилоту явно не повезло. Если только это не автоматическая ракета.

I liked the style and sound! I understood the mechanic pretty fast (though I did not realize I can "push" the shuttle forward while in the until later in the game). I got stuck pretty early though, same spot as euler-moises above.

Edit: Looking at the gif above, I see that I have been playing it wrong... So now I got a bit further.
(checkpoints are a bit easy to miss)

Really enjoy seeing fresh, polished Pico-8 games! The mechanic is also simple yet challenging, so it feels great to launch yourself around once you get a good feel for it.

Love the black-and-white art, but I might be a bit biased.

The game was too difficult for me, but I can totally see why other people like it.


*«Stop the screeching!» — Catdet down.*

I enjoyed this game a lot, even though I found it a bit too difficult. Loved the black and white graphics, it has a polished look.

This game is a 10/10 for me. The physics are so tight, the precise movement, the insane bounciness, the floating, plus the crunchy sounds - *perfect*(chefs kiss). Also - I think this would make an incredible mobile game with tilt-controls

a bit difficult at first but fun.

While the movement is precise, I found it a bit on the difficult side. The game overall is pretty good though and has a really good presentation.

We had a similar base idea (hard to control ship), but went in totally different directions. Nice to see a pico-8 game on LD, you did a great job.