The Eversoul by Substain

[raw]
made by Substain for Ludum Dare 52 (JAM)

Description

You‘re a dark sorcerer who harvests the souls of the dead as their source of magic. Your goal is to find the legendary eversoul – A single, magical soul, rumored to be endlessly powerful. Finally, you located it in a well protected castle swarming with armed knights. This must be it!

Attack and kill enemies, then harvest their soul energy. Spend it to summon dark knights to fight for you. Destroy the castle gate and get yourself that infinite power!

#

Notes: - You can't damage the castle gate yourself. Utilize your dark knights. - You need to hold the right mouse button and target a dead body to harvest its soul. - Can't attack because you are low on mana? Focus to gain mana faster. - You need 4 souls to spawn a dark knight.

  • If you have a controller connected, keyboard input might be buggy.
  • The windows build works slightly better than the web build, due to mouse capturing and shaders.

  • You can find an updated Post-Jam Version (V1.1) on itch, which fixes many bugs and adds a bit of session-based progression.

Credits

  • Coralduck - UX/UI
  • Edro - Development
  • Samurai_jovani - Music, SFX
  • Someoneman - Development
  • Substain - Development
  • Travh98 - Development
  • Xandruher - 3D Art & Animations

Made with Godot

Ratings

Overall 646th 3.114⭐ 72🧑‍⚖️
Fun 644th 2.9⭐ 72🧑‍⚖️
Innovation 584th 2.993⭐ 70🧑‍⚖️
Theme 638th 3.25⭐ 72🧑‍⚖️
Graphics 457th 3.507⭐ 71🧑‍⚖️
Audio 417th 2.949⭐ 71🧑‍⚖️
Humor 607th 2.319⭐ 60🧑‍⚖️
Mood 628th 3.038⭐ 68🧑‍⚖️
Given 147🗳️ 115🗨️

Feedback

craigalancarroll
10. Jan 2023 · 02:25 UTC
This was a good effort, team! It is cool to see a large group come together for this.
LDJam user 267095
10. Jan 2023 · 02:27 UTC
Very low framerate on web and itch.io versions.
daitli
10. Jan 2023 · 02:28 UTC
I love how many people went for harvesting souls. Good job on doing a 3d game- this takes a lot of time and effort. I had my fun playing around with my scythe, thanks for sharing I had a blast :)

Only problem I found is that it was very taxing on my PC for a web build.
Bloodfin
10. Jan 2023 · 02:28 UTC
Not bad, had some glitch where the music kept looping and adding over itself so it got a little overwhelming. I think the gameplay idea of harvest and than spawning knights to attack the castle is fun, took me a little bit to figure out what I was doing, but once I got there it's a fun little combat loop to get into!
Luftwafflesnsyrup
10. Jan 2023 · 02:30 UTC
May just be different settings having difficulties seeing things very dark; but could be the theme! Cool knights!
megalukes
10. Jan 2023 · 02:31 UTC
Loved the graphic style, very well done. It was hard at the start but I managed to to kill a lot of soldiers. Music and sfx were good too. Always great to see Godot entries in Ludum Dare. Congrats!
animatrix1490
10. Jan 2023 · 02:34 UTC
I liked the character designs and the concept. I felt like I might have been hearing too many sounds layered over one another at certain points during the game, but it was a neat reverse-tower-defense thing! I liked the enemy being a resource you could use, too!
T C
10. Jan 2023 · 02:35 UTC
Fun game! Super satisfying using your enemies as minions, I really liked the model for your summons. Broke through the gate multiple times, but kept getting the message saying the only way to find out is to try again. I wonder if I missed anything? Tried exploring the whole area but couldn't find anything special. Nice submission
Cornflowerblue
10. Jan 2023 · 03:37 UTC
I like the little dudes, kind of a reverse tower defense thing which I liked.
LDJam user 312238
10. Jan 2023 · 11:17 UTC
The art really attracts me!I love this game very much.
A little problem is the introduction is too long.I spent much time reading it.
Cheers!
Enver Arco
10. Jan 2023 · 15:25 UTC
Well done, cool that you managed to get AI working and fighting eachother for a game jam
Itzemii
10. Jan 2023 · 19:46 UTC
I love the way the "dark soul knights" look like, spiky cool! The music drives well the action.
Nice idea with the indirect attack of the castle.
Great you did this with a team, I assume it is challenging to coordinate!
hmrpf
10. Jan 2023 · 22:58 UTC
Great idea and execution ! I had a bit of troubles at first understanding when I could summon but finally got it. Maybe a little visual feedback so I don't have to check everytimes the pictogram to get the info. Really fun and nice entry for the jam good job !
TildeCat
11. Jan 2023 · 07:55 UTC
Good game. Maybe visual is too bright.
Merin Car Trunk Key
11. Jan 2023 · 07:56 UTC
It looks nice and plays well. I like the modeling and animation. The music and sound effects are cool too.
beardywombat
11. Jan 2023 · 08:07 UTC
Decent little game, I was not able to storm the castle unfortunately :) Struggled a bit with the mana economy, would probably like a second ability to deal with the groups of enemies
Efilheim
11. Jan 2023 · 14:12 UTC
Harvesting corpse to summon creatures is always a good concept. It's nice to see a big team participating in a game jam!
Duncan 3
12. Jan 2023 · 05:27 UTC
i like the fact that when you kill an enemy in a horde, you aren't immediately able to harvest it and have to navigate around
Tomate_Salat
12. Jan 2023 · 09:56 UTC
I like the idea of the game. But I'm missing a reason why I should summon the knights. Because it is very risky harvesting the souls and in the end my knights don't survive that long and have nearly no impact.

May to share here some ideas. I could imagine something like that: the own knights are dealing the main damage, the summoner does not damage at all. But he could heal the own knights. Then harvesting is unavoidable.

I also found a small bug. The **overall**-Volume-slider isn't doing anything.

But good work on art and mood. I like the models of the knights very much and also well done on displaying the controls in the menu (many players don't read descriptions. So its always good to have such information also in the game itself).
VictorRypl
12. Jan 2023 · 14:53 UTC
Very fun and impressive for such a short ammount of time, but I wish the summons lasted a bit longer.
WitchGF
12. Jan 2023 · 15:31 UTC
Game is actually confusing at first, couldn't get it, how am I supposed to spawn more of my minions and how to get back my mana.
And music... What a horrifying glitch.
DeathBySnail
12. Jan 2023 · 18:13 UTC
Fun design, hit points and damage needs rebalancing as the enemies where too bulky. Crazy impressive 3d modelling for a jam game. Well done.
AdamsMcCall
12. Jan 2023 · 22:37 UTC
Awesome game, I loved kiting the knights and stacking dark knights :D Sad that the level is so short though, more ennemy types with some variations in the attack pattern would have been perfect. But in just 3 days this result is still very impressing, well done :)
Makhan
13. Jan 2023 · 00:10 UTC
Nice game here, the cover art for the page grabbed me immediately as it looked intriguing. I liked the art and the animations as they looked pleasing. For me the game was a little unclear as to how harvest or what the ui means as it was ambiguous. Overall I had fun and the game didn't try and drag out the experience. Good job!
GoldenMagnus
13. Jan 2023 · 01:47 UTC
The premise of the design was fun, however the overall volume slider did not seem to work for me. If this was expanded and more levels were added this could be a great larger game later.
Tappioca
13. Jan 2023 · 04:06 UTC
Very impressive, good-looking game. Not sure if I was missing something, but I was never really able to come close to overtaking the enemies.
🎤 Substain
13. Jan 2023 · 08:59 UTC
Thank you everyone for your feedback! :heart:

@bloodfin @animatrix1490 @tildecat @tomate-salat @witchgf Thank you for pointing out the bugs (i.e. Music Layering, Web-Renderer, Volume-Slider,..) . We did not get to fix these during the jam, but there is a Post-Jam version on itch that covers these issues.

@craigalancarroll @itzemii having a bigger team did require some coordination, but we somehow managed it :)

@poietic-ruby What do you mean with introduction? The ~5 sentences in the description? ;)

@hmrpf Yes, the spawning was a bit buggy, we improved this in the Post-Jam version though

@tomate-salat I appreciate your input. Our approach was that you can't attack the gate yourself, but only your knights. Enemy knights and summons do have the same stats (I think), but the larger group usually wins.

@witchgf We did not get to do a tutorial ingame, but there are some Hints mentioned in the description. Holding E lets you recharge mana faster, for example
StarboiHooch
13. Jan 2023 · 11:31 UTC
I thought this was a really strong concept. The core idea of having to harvest souls to summon knights that can attack the castle is very smart and I think it has a lot of potential. I think the game was lacking difficulty though. If you just summon 1 knight and then distract the enemies you can win very quickly. I think if you expand this game you should add some kind of ranged enemy and maybe also a boss enemy that you can't outrun so you have to stall it using the summoned guards in order to kill it. Overall though a very solid entry. Good job finding time to make menus and options.
SmelJey
13. Jan 2023 · 14:46 UTC
Nice concept! I like the idea, but the gameplay is a bit dull and needs some adjustments, maybe more mechanics, but overall is fine. And you can win very easily, if you will distract enemies, while your knights will break the gate. But I enjoyed the game!
sevenzik
13. Jan 2023 · 20:03 UTC
so laggy in web-version, also looking around wuth mouse is limited with cursor's movement outside the game screen (the cursor was present on the screen during game session).

A little better with a controller.
Seagoingmanatee
14. Jan 2023 · 01:32 UTC
Really enjoyable. Like others have said a bit of lag on first startup and I had to turn the sound off because the song just kept compounding
Aune
14. Jan 2023 · 11:49 UTC
Very solid entry.
No lag on my side with the web LD hosting (using firefox).

Good idea ! I did not succeed (and I tried a lot) to destroy the door with my few black knights.
In a way it reminds me that kind of mount and blade games where you are on the battlefield with your men, feels good.

An ounce of additional feedbacks would have projected the game into something even greater. But it's a jam and juicy a game is hard of course :)

Well done !
Mololo
14. Jan 2023 · 13:06 UTC
A fun and good looking game, I like the idea a lot. The assets are great and I like the particles.

I fount it a bit too easy to win, just kill the first for enemies and spawn 2 knight at the game and game over, but you can do it even faster with just 1.

Overall a great game. God job guys!
blobo
14. Jan 2023 · 15:25 UTC
The models and animations are well made! I beat the game, but while that was happening I was still being attacked, so I also got a game over? you might want to make everything stop moving / make the player invulnerable when in a "you win state".

All around, cool stuff.
🎤 Substain
14. Jan 2023 · 15:45 UTC
@starboihooch @smeljey @mololo you are right, if you ignore the knights after collecting your first souls, you can skip killing the knights. The postjam version tries to address this by adding a hint of progression over the course of multiple games in one session, as well as more defensive spawning behaviour.

@sevenzik glad to get feedback from someone who used the controller (we did not put a lot of effort in this since we tried to make the game work)

@100th-coin yes, you can die after you already won the game. This is also fixed in the post-jam version :wink:
Sarah Alexa
14. Jan 2023 · 15:59 UTC
I like the theme of this and the loop of summoning and harvesting is pretty fun but I did have a few issues with things like aiming and a lack of feedback in game. I think with tightening up the controls and feedback you could have a very fun little game about summoning and invading!

Very nice 3d models and the castle looked great! The music was nice to have too, not too loud and fits the theme. Great job!
Butterflan
14. Jan 2023 · 16:49 UTC
It looks nice, but, I'm sorry, I didn't understand how to play and use the souls of enemies. It's really sad because It looks great.
Xandruher
14. Jan 2023 · 17:22 UTC
First of all Thanks for Playing, Rating and Commenting our Game! Highly appreciate it.

@megalukes
@animatrix1490
@t-c
@poietic-ruby
@itzemii
@merin-car-trunk-key
@tomate-salat
@deathbysnail
@makhan
@tappioca
@100th-coin
@sarah-alexa

Secondly, I wanted to thank all of you for your kind words and very happy that you liked the 3d models and animations. Just for the little extra info as reference, it took me around 15hours to make all of these and you can also find a little showcase of the assets on Youtube if your interested.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4d6W9CmY2y8

@Aune
M&B is one of my favorite games and even if we had not M&B in mind when making the game I am glad that you got some M&B vibes. :)
PoshDan
14. Jan 2023 · 18:29 UTC
Cool idea, i felt like it was missing a bit of extra depth as I found myself just farming up souls in a slog to prepare for the actual assault. It didn't seem worth to summon until i would have overwhelming forces ready to deploy, and even then I figured out it's best to summon them at the gate and just distract the enemy knights myself, seeing that I can endlessly outrun them. With that knowledge, the second time around i won in about 2 minutes.
Good effort, though!
LDJam user 251967
14. Jan 2023 · 18:48 UTC
Great game!
Hadik
14. Jan 2023 · 19:08 UTC
I had a lot of fun playing this game, but it didn't quite live up to my expectations. The atmosphere of the game was great and really made the experience enjoyable. However, there were some areas where the game could be improved. The theme was partly matched, but I think it could be executed better in the future. The audio quality was average, it was not bad but not good either. I hope to see more effort put into audio in future updates. The artwork was decent, but I believe it has the potential to be even better. Overall, I enjoyed the game but there is room for improvement. But I am looking forward to the next version, and I hope it will be better.
Xandruher
14. Jan 2023 · 19:31 UTC
@Hadik thanks for playing our game. We hope to do better in future.
ditam
15. Jan 2023 · 13:58 UTC
I had a lot of issues with the web version, sadly. My cursor seemed to sometimes detach from my in-game pointer, which was very confusing, and I didn't seem to be able to complete a 360 degree turn, my rotation seemed to be locked in at something like a 120 degree arc? I'm not sure if these two issues were related. I also had a lot of glitchy audio and freezes, that got better over time, maybe that was related to some resources still loading.

Otherwise the game was fun, and the harvest-and-summon loop worked well enough. Very nice visuals too!
VoidN7
15. Jan 2023 · 14:51 UTC
Very nice UI (only the text is too small), as well as a picture for a jam seems very attractive. The idea also seemed interesting.
Of the minuses is that the music is overlapping, and the game limits the left-right turns (I just can not turn around to shoot).
If you finalize the postjam version, the game will come out very cool. Good luck to you :)
someone
15. Jan 2023 · 19:36 UTC
The idea is great and I like the atmosphere.
The knight models were great, it could do with some clanging combat sound effects from the knights though.
The dark knights died far too quickly, and since you can only store enough souls to summon two of them at a time they can never get the upper hand. It could be interesting with more balancing.
I eventually managed to win by luring the guards as far away from the keep as possible, running back and summoning knights right on the gate. You can also get the game over screen even after winning since the game continues.
Web version worked fine for me at first (firefox) but started to chug after a while needing a page refresh.
Nikolaj
15. Jan 2023 · 21:32 UTC
Cool idea, and pretty good execution! I wish i had a couple more attacks, but it was fun! Mouse speed was also a bit frustrating on HTML5 version, both in ldjam.com and itch
mr_lazy
16. Jan 2023 · 00:11 UTC
good work team!...game need to be optimized..i scared while it glitched...after seeing, the comments I felt better...art and your way of game is good keep updating ...cool
asfdfdfd
16. Jan 2023 · 18:15 UTC
OPEN THOSE GODDAMN GATES
Artyom Volkov
16. Jan 2023 · 18:28 UTC
The game feels too short and it doesn't bring a lot of challenge. Movement is good. Overall, I would recommend to work a little bit more on gameplay loop next time to make sure that the player will keep playing your game more. E.g. you could create more levels with different enemies and castles to attack. Anyway, congratulations with a first Ludum Dare game, great job. And yeah, great to see Godot engine!
cybek
17. Jan 2023 · 00:01 UTC
Quite nice game, the graphics and models are nice, making it a comfy theme. Took me a while to understand what the "focus" is doing. It shouldn't probably work while using the attack. Also I don't know how to summon the other people, little tutorial would be nice. But after all, nice entry for the jam!
Manan
21. Jan 2023 · 20:44 UTC
The graphics and models were really nice. The UI was polished. I still felt like the gameplay was lacking and did not have much tactility, just not the most engaging. But great entry overall.
Manan
21. Jan 2023 · 20:44 UTC
The graphics and models were really nice. The UI was polished. I still felt like the gameplay was lacking and did not have much tactility, just not the most engaging. But great entry overall.
Manan
21. Jan 2023 · 20:44 UTC
The graphics and models were really nice. The UI was polished. I still felt like the gameplay was lacking and did not have much tactility, just not the most engaging. But great entry overall.
HayriCakir
23. Jan 2023 · 09:03 UTC
I loved the art style!
DGSpitzer
27. Jan 2023 · 05:23 UTC
Nice game! Really willing to summon more knights!