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A jam submission

Aleph-NullView game page

Synthwave inspired bullet hell
Submitted by Arcy (@arcywastooshort) — 2 minutes, 20 seconds before the deadline
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Aleph-Null's itch.io page

Results

CriteriaRankScore*Raw Score
OVERALL#24.4654.465
FUN#24.4884.488
AUDIO#34.5584.558
VISUALS#44.7214.721
THEME#74.3264.326
EASY TO GET INTO#114.4654.465
CREATIVE#723.6983.698

Ranked from 43 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.

Do you have any bullet or projectile in your game?

Yes

You added some projectile or bullet in your game

How does your game implement the theme? (If your game doesn't use the theme ignore this field)
10 seconds per room

What was the size of your team?
1

Please credit the resources that you used during the jam (if you used any)
Player model - https://skfb.ly/6QWKn by Charles Cloutier

Bullet system - https://wayfarergames.itch.io/bulletfury by WayfarerGames

Powered with FMOD Studio by Firelight Technologies Pty Ltd.

Credit all team-members that worked on this project (you can link itch.io/twitter/youtube/twitch)
https://qer24.itch.io/

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Comments

Viewing comments 29 to 10 of 29 · Next page · Last page
Submitted( 1)

I like the game. The audio is very satisfying and the visuals are super polished. I didn't really think it was worth a 2nd playthrough on lunatic mode due to it feeling super samey and simple, but for what it is, it's pretty good. 

I was really expecting to unlock more than just a dash mechanic though. If it had more mechanics, I'd love the game more. If you make it a full game, focus on that next.

Submitted( 1)

Since I forgot giving feedback when I was rating it, here I am now! ^^;

This game really feels like a whole experience - with a beginning, an ending and settings. A pretty straight-forward and well-executed implementation of the theme. The difficulty was well-balanced, and lunatic mode really does feel like lunatic mode! xD

The visuals are simple but look great as a whole. And the effect for dying is especially good!

A very polished, really well-made game, and had a lot of fun playing through it!

Submitted( 1)

Simple but well polished, a recipe for a good jam game! Pretty fun to play, although it confused me a little bit at the beginning that clicking with the mouse will bring me back to the main menu. Other than that, I don't think there's a lot that need to be said. Great job!

Submitted( 1)

Super fun and polished! the game design looks awesome, the music really adds to the effect of the game, I really like how the music becomes bombastic (I think it's the right word?) when you start a room. The 10 seconds theme fits really well into this game, and also each room is challenging but the learning curve feels just right. I really liked the flower shoot pattern, for me it was an 'aha!' moment when I tried to get into the flower and dodge from there, maybe there was a different way but I like mine.

Awesome game!

Submitted( 1)

Hahaha okay, I made it! (At least on normal mode)
Don't make me admit how many corners I had to hug to out-cheese the more complicated patterns, though :D
In it's purity and visual integrity, my favorite game in this jam so far.
Great work! Stay funky,
Dez

Submitted( 1)

“…and so they left, with everything but their sanity”.

Amazing entry for this JAM, hands-down one of the best ones I’ve tried. The patterns were very cool, varied, fun to learn to avoid, and the dash mechanic was extremely fun to use and well incorporated. The graphics are flashy and satisfying, and the adaptive music works really well with the theme.

As my only suggestion, I think it would have been a very nice touch to implement a small grace period where you can dash and save yourself after being hit (like 0.1 seconds). It would make hard challenges like Lunatic Mode feel much better to the player imo.

Very good job, keep it up!

Developer( 1)

Nice job on conquering lunatic mode! You're one of the small amount of people that actually did it :P Refering to the dash grace, it's actually there, your collider enables 0.2s after the dash ends :) Probably making it a tiny weeny bit longer wouldn't hurt, thanks for the feedback!

Submitted( 1)

Oh, I was referring to a small grace period after getting hit. As in, a bullet hits you, then you have a small amount of time to dash and avoid the hit. Touhou for example implements this, where you can use a bomb very shortly after getting hit and avoid losing a live. I think it’d be a nice addition besides the post-dash grace period :)

Developer( 2)

Ah alright I get it now, this is actually a very nice idea, thank you!

Submitted( 1)

For sure the best one I player out of those 40 games I tried, very well done and the most impressive part is how the 10 second theme made it a lot better - you don't have to be awesome in dodging stuff all the time, you only need 10 seconds and this particular one is DONE. Some rooms were very difficult for me while others were a bit easy, but that's not something that is the game's fault most likely.

One way of fighting this one would be to give a "special" goal in each room, like a button you press before to make it harder, but get something in return (like a powerup that shortens the current room by 1s) - that can be used later.

Overall, this feels like a commercial release, awesome work!

Submitted( 1)

I did love this game, the audio especially.  Introducing a new layer of audio with each wave was great for the feeling of progression.  Also using the lowpass filter was nice to distinguish between the sections.  Minimal visuals were really complementry too.  Fantastic work!

Submitted( 1)

Absolutely stunning game! Visuals, audio, gameplay, everything is just fantastic. Inner mathematician in me will give you bonus points for the title of your game :)
Really great job, one of the best games of the jam, for sure!

Submitted( 1)

I think we have a winner :P -kale

Submitted( 1)

Awesome art style, gameplay, sound and music.
Your game is just SO good.
I hope a complete game !!

Submitted( 1)

This is fantastic. My favorite game of the jam. Great sounds, great design, I was hooked through the end. Amazing you pulled this off in a week. My only incredibly small gripe is that I think the bullet spawners should be a different color than the background and player lol. Great fun and great job, keep it up! Love the risk of rain reference at the end as well btw lol. I would love to hear your thoughts on my game as its also a 3D game made in a week but polar opposite from your own in my opinion.

Submitted( 1)

A great-looking and very polished game with some very clear visuals and pleasing bullet patterns. I like this. :)

Submitted( 1)

Wow. It's hard to believe you made this in just one week, it just feels so polished. I feel like you could release this right now and release more content over time, this is awesome. If your game doesn't end up at least top 10, I'll be mad. Honestly, one of the best ones so far.

Mind telling me how you created the look for this game? Absoluetly in love with the artstyle.

Developer( 1)

Thank you! I'm using this method to create the outlines, and just unlit materials. Sticking to a solid color palette is also very important. I basically just used 4 colors in this game: dark purple, pink, light blue and white. After that, just drown the game with post processing and there you have a pretty art style :P

Submitted( 1)

Thanks! I was thinking you used an outline shader (it does look pretty obvious), but since I never really dipped my toes into shaders, I have no idea how to properly use them. The site you linked does look really informative, I'll definitely check that out :) Oh, and the color palette works wonders, you're right.

Personally, I always focus waaaaayy too much on the programming part and leave the visual stuff for the last few hours, which I really need to improve on as I never have enough time to achieve the look I have in my head.

Thanks for your answer! :)

Submitted

Hey, I really wanted to play your game (even from the thumbnail & name alone!), but the download doesn't seem to be working for me on Mac. Any idea what could be causing this?

Developer (1 edit) ( 1)

Hey, something like that happened to someone else, can you try the command I put on the bottom of game's page? (like the main page not the submission one)

Submitted (1 edit)

I was able to get it working with your instructions, and wow, I'm so glad it worked.

There's a lot of great run and dodge bullet hell games in the jam, but I think this is the one that did it for me the most. I really loved so many things about the vibe: the visual aesthetic is great; the way the game stays in a single camera continuous camera shot even when you die makes it so immersive; the way you can see the sides of a platform when you go up to the edge of it... and I really love what you did with filtering the audio.

I wanted to try doing something similar with the audio for the slow motion effect in my game, but I wasn't sure how to set that up, so I'm curious as to how you did it!

The levels and bullet variety were also really great. Even though the use of the theme was pretty straightforward, I thought you did a great job with it. Compared to having endless waves that spawn every ten seconds, I thought having distinct levels where you need to survive make you  really feel the timer all the more.

The only level I really had something critical to mention about was the one with the huge, slow moving balls. I liked the design overall, but I thought the visual effect (I think it was bloom?) on it was just put on too much, and I had trouble seeing the smaller bullets that were interspersed between them.

I eventually got stuck for long enough on a level that I stopped, but this is definitely one that I'm going to come back to because I want to play it all the way through. I loved the game! Thanks for helping me get it to work :)

Developer( 1)

Hey no idea how I missed this comment, but thank you for playing! I did the audio effect on death using FMOD. I'm basically controlling a 0-1 parameter that controlls how loud each audio layer is (base, melody, drums), and also the low pass filter on higher layers that opens up the higher the parameter is.  I completely agree that bloom could've been turned down a bit on those big bullets, and also like 2 rooms are pretty unbalanced in terms of difficulty, that's why you got stuck probably, sorry :P

Thanks again, and sorry for a late reply :)

Submitted( 1)

And so I left, with everything but my sanity. I like the Risk of Rain nod there lol.

Excellent game, I love the visual aesthetic and how the music fades when the bullets spawn. I also really like how you incorporated different room sizes, which makes the gameplay and the dodging a lot more varied. The visual feedback and sound design is also really good, I can really feel the oomph behind those attacks. Having two difficulty modes is also really nice.

I would make the giant bullets a different color and put them under the smaller bullets. Especially in the tiny corridor room, it's really easy to get blindsided by a small bullet because it was covered up by the giant ones.

Overall, excellent job. I managed to beat lunatic mode, it was really hard but I had fun.

Developer

Oh really nice, I have seen only one other person beat lunatic mode before, so very nice job :P

Thank you so much, I'm glad you enjoyed it. You are totally right that big bullets should be behind small ones, I just didn't notice that was an issue at all, thanks for pointing it out!

Submitted( 1)

Damn I am blown away - from all the Games I played today this is my favourite so far and for me personally a Top contender in this jam.
The Sounddesign together with the Controlls and Visuals create something that put you in the flow immediatly and hook you to go further.
Whished I could finish that game on Stream - but it was allready so late today - definitly gonna play it all the through tomorrow.
All the best to you - hope you place high!
Only gripe: The Dash Powerup appeared like a world decoration and I didn't pick it up - highlighting it as something to be picked up might have helped me xD!

Submitted (2 edits) ( 1)

Wow I am into this immediately, this is so cool! 

The post process, the music swelling with the action, the slight fisheye effect during action, the WIREFRAME GLOW. The geometry wars vibes. Dude I am so into this 

Edit: OH THAT WAS JUST THE TUTORIAL, and you've got a dodge? 

Edit: Wow, huge difficulty spike after the dash is unlocked. I got about.. 7 levels in until I couldn't make it any further. This is really fun. The difficulty may be down to me being bad at video games, but huge praise from me. I love it. 

Developer

Heh I'm vary glad you're enjoying it! Sorry that you couldn't finish it all :P

Submitted( 1)

I'm really annoyed honestly, because I can't really fault this. I guess I could say that the random bullet spawning patterns were annoying as all hell. Sure, the camera was too far forward and could've done with being a couple of units further back. Maybe the sound effects weren't juicy enough. I could argue that the difficulty was a little steep and the player's hitbox felt a little unforgiving (though that was probably BulletFury's fault...)

But really? None of those things matter. This is a damn good game, and I'd buy this. 

Developer( 1)

Thank you so much! I'm very flattered to hear such things from a dev like you, I had lots of fun with your game too :)

( 1)

Challenging with tons of variety, topped with great presentation. Only thing I’d ask for though is an option to turn the bloom off; the horizontal hallway that used the huge green bullets were giving me trouble because of how bright they were.

Developer

You're probably right , a bloom slider in the settings would've been nice, thanks for the feedback :)

Viewing comments 29 to 10 of 29 · Next page · Last page