Really fun game. The pogo comboing was super satisfying, controls generally felt pretty much perfect. The single life felt a bit over-punishing, would have liked to have perhaps seen the souls you harvested slowly build up a shield to allow you to take even one extra hit. Was an absolute joy to play!

Whoa, that hit the spot! The game is super fun, I can't tell how much time I spent trying to perfect my combos. Super solid entry! Congratulations!

Good stuff! Pretty fun and feels kinda complete and whole.

**I like:**

- Smooth animations with a lot of frames. Smoothness of action
- Sounds and music
- Gameplay
- Controller support
- Some humor parts
- Pumpkins

**I don't like:**

- Keyboard mapping on zxc + arrows (I used to play with WASD). I found
- Feedbback mechanics, that throw you backwards after attack is pretty annoying, although can be used for some master moves. Still a little bit annoying.
- Sprites are pretty basic, although it's understandable for 2-day-jam with fully completed game :)

**Fun fact:**

If you leave Game Over for long enough, it will become a bullethell for a few minutes. And then evertyhing calms (probably some protection from overflowing?)

@lex
Thank you so much! <3

@HypernoodleJon
That's a really great idea! I wanted the game to be short so I didn't bother with health but I really like your suggestion!

@danmerey
Thank you for the in depth feedback! Sorry, the keyboard controls are a bit of a last resort. The game really is meant to be played with a controller!

Solid controls and gameplay! Had a lot of fun playing :D

This is super fun, it feels really great when you get a combo going. I don't have a controller with me right now so I played on keyboard, and honestly it felt fine after I got used to it - though I can see how being able to enter directions with a stick instead of multiple arrow keys would be a bit easier. Stringing together combos by slashing down in the air reminded me a lot of hollow knight :smile:

The art is really lovely and the sound effects add a lot to how satisfying the combat feels - I had a great time playing!

I love the bouncing. Please give me a mode where I just bounce forever. Thank you. xD Solid controls, awesome graphics, great sound, points all around~

This game is great, the on hit death is a bit punishing, but pogoing and getting combos feels so good. A one time shield or something might make the game even more enjoyable. Either way this is super impressive and feels really good. Well done!

Attacking feels *great*, and I love how you can influence the direction. Very nice animation and movement. Knockback on hit felt a little punishing especially when there's so much on screen trying to hit you already :triumph: it's also possible I just suck. I gave this one a few tries, the highest I got was 8.

As everyone's acknowledging, this has got really good game feel. Movement/attacking gets intuitive and is overall satisfying, on top of really cute pixel art. :D Great work!

I love the art and mood and style and it is fun to play. It makes me think of ghosts and goblins and seems like it could be expanded someday to scratch a similar itch. I just figured out that I can slash vertically or diagonally. The tips after dying are a nice touch and I've learned a few things from them already. Thank you its a great entry!

Update: I just now figured out what happens if you slash down and all of a sudden am getting huge combos. what great controls you have here!


** My Scores from around my first hour of play: **

_Souls/Combo/Score_
```
18/1/980 FabDynamic 10:50 1/12/23
25/2/1395 FabDynamic 10:56 1/12/23
12/11/1715 FabDynamic 11:05 1/12/23
14/16/2480 FabDynamic 11:18 1/12/23
14/15/2500 FabDynamic 11:26 1/12/23
23/9/3280 FabDynamic 11:30 1/12/23
23/14/3540 FabDynamic 11:32 1/12/23
```

Whoa I got 980 and 18 souls as my top score. I bet none of you gamerz can beat that! (that was me taunting others for friendly competition :) )

Update: I have improved my score by quite a bit

Update: This game is incredibly fun. I've been playing for 45 minutes!

Update: several days later: I have been playing every day and tonight I beat my previous high score ... by a lot. it was 23/14/3540 but now its ... 22/33/8440 (and yeah I took a screenshot) :grimacing: :cool:

### Unofficial Running High Score list:
_Souls/Combo/Score_
```
22/33/8440 @FabDynamic 22:09 1/15/23
23/14/3540 @FabDynamic 11:32 1/12/23
21/13/3515 @Yaen 23:00 1/14/23
14/6/1225 @Frogman 14:14 1/12/23
```


Really nice game! I loved the Vaulting Gasp Attack, it was very satisfying! The graphics were pretty nice too. As someone without a controller, it was a bit hard for me - I find that adding a way to aim with the mouse instead of the arrow keys really helps in these sort of games, although I understand that you designed it around a controller. Also, it took me a long while to realize that I could aim the Vaulting Gasp Attack - perhaps showing a cross-hair or something in the direction would help? Still, I managed to get a score of 14/6/1225 (in @fabdynamic's format) in the end! Overall, great entry!

I like it, really tight controls and a fast paced game loop. I like how quickly you're back in the game when you die. The knockback sometimes was a bit weird, but overall everything feels well thought out and polished. Well done!

a very nice death, but at the same time the gameplay is quite dynamic, I played with pleasure

Really fun entry! I thoroughly enjoyed the mechanics allowing me to sling and launch myself around. Had a great time playing it on stream! By the way, this was the cute death character I was thinking of: https://twitter.com/ichigogoooooooo/status/1373831806290644995?s=20

I like the overall flow of the gameplay! Doing long combos in midair is incredibly satisfying.

I wish there was a way to have runs lasting longer and the character being less fragile. I also wish there was some more leniency with hit accuracy, invuln time, hit timing with enemy spawns etc. That would make it even more enjoyable but the fun-factor in this game is already really high. The animations also look fantastic and juicy. Catchy music completes the package for a great game feel :)


@yaen Holy cow thats an incredible score! I had to read very carefully to see if you had beat mine, it looks like you are in second place but only by 25pts lol. I hope you don't get a few points more and take first :) seriously nice work and you are right this game is satisfying.

@fabdynamic well... seems like you cemented your high score lol. GG man!

@yaen it was all 1,2k runs until that happened lol :) your score is seriously great too though

@yaen @fabdynamic Nice Scores! Once you really learn how to keep a combo going your score can shoot WAY up.

I wonder who the first person to break 10,000 will be? ;)

/me suddenly has the urge to try to break 10,000 :smiling_imp:

@ghostbomb what is your high score and when is the first lil-death esports comp?

@fabdynamic I don't remember my highest point score but my highest combo I think was 69 (no jokes please). The first competition started when you guys started keeping track of your scores in the comments lol.

Very fun arcade game


Music and art worked well (I especially like the moving fog). Only thing I felt was missing was the double jump resetting on a hit. Tends to make it very easy to accidentally break your streak and makes it more rng of if you have a zombie that spawned to where you accidentally side hit yourself to. (I notice the double jump resetting sometimes but I have no idea how and it tends to not be consistent)

Overall feels really good to play though

@ategon Oh wow, you just smashed everyone else's scores like nothing lol. Thanks for playing <3

There's a random tip from Mama Death that says you refresh your jump every 5th combo you hit. I'm surprised you might have never seen it. There's no visual and audio feedback though which is obviously a necessary feature I just didn't have time for. I thought that refreshing the double jump on every single hit would make made comboing a bit too easy but I want to know other's thoughts on it.

@ghostbomb Ah yeah I never saw that tip text (or paid attention to it when it did show up). That could work but it depends what you want to go for in terms of the optimal strategy. Pogoing and pogo camping tends to be highly favored over the grasp currently due to how consistent it is and it giving you lots of time to react in the falling time + being able to easily reposition yourself afterwards due to no additional momentum in one direction. Buffing the double jump would make the grasp be able to be on an equal use level since it would give people more time to think + allow people to set it up better since currently you can miss time it due to your falling velocity

Very fun and overall cool ! I play with an controller and the only true default is (for me) the air control that should be more permissive.
But it's a really good entry, good job !

So cool! My first experience was constantly always dying very quickly and being super-awkward. You were very right to so strongly recommend the gamepad... I could feel that the game had a lot to offer that I was not getting, so I went into a box in the other room and unfurled my gamepad, and the whole experience changed.

Then it changed again when I realized that the direction I push while I press attack actually changes the direction of the attack!

So I went from the earthbound fragile fretter to a soaring demonslayer that never touched the ground.

A wild ride, very well done! Art is effective - both clear about gameplay and also striking a nice mood. Music is jammin and the escalation track kicked the game up a gear nicely. But the real heart of this game is the feel of the complex movement that both opens and closes options and always leaves you a way out, and challenges you to attempt mastery.

@pixelstuff @pkenney

Thank you for such lovely comments!!💙💙💙

I think my controller was a little off as it went faster right than it did to the left for some reason . Could not get close with the high score haha. Like others have said, invunerable time etc would be a bonus

I can definitely see how a controller would make this a little easier to control, I'm useless when it comes to z-x-c keys (spoiled by too much WASD I suppose). That being said, the visuals are incredible, the sound is incredibly satisfying, and the gameplay makes you want to keep trying again and again! I would agree that a health bar/counter would be more enjoyable than insta-death, but super impressive compo work!

Forgot to mention this before.
The scores I got were from playing with the keyboard controls. I personally really enjoyed the control layout you made and just wanted to mention that since a lot of other comments you have seem to be disliking the keyboard control scheme