This game was an interesting one for us. With a theme like "Beneath the surface", we wanted make a game that interpreted the theme from a more figurative perspective, rather than a literal one.
What we ended up with was a game about censoring, where you decide what will be available to the public, and what will stay beneath the surface.
Remember that it is a game jam game, so some of the balancing is a bit off, as there was very little time for testing.
We hope you enjoy our game!
Game made by:
Pontus Lunden - Designer - Artist - Composer/Sound design
Glory to Arstrotska! I mean- Long live the Loyalist Government!
Love what you guys have done with the look and feel. Simply fabulous. Both graphics, music and soundfx all work well together.
The only improvements I could think of were to make it a bit easier to drag improved (censored?) documents to the print or deny envelope. As well as getting a little bit more guidance in the beginning. Super well done, my favourite in the Mood category this year and a strong contender overall!
Thanks for this great game! I was initially captured by the graphics, scrolling through the ludum dare front page, and was looking forward to the completed game since. I really like the gameplay and finally (I guess) "won" the game after (actually) some tries. As Jod pointed out, the game really reminds one of Papers Please, especially when you find yourself in a position, in which you are able to decide if you want to support the government or the rebels/diverse people wanting to enter Arstrotska, while focusing on completely different aspects. The music adds a lot to the great atmosphere created by the graphics and texts, but I had some problems reading the really pixelated font and dragging the papers around.
Apart from these minor points, I love the game and would be incredible happy if you keep working on it post ld...
Stunning use to setting and mood. It's clear that a lot of effort went into the text. You displayed a mastery over the medium. I would play this game for hours, granted extra content was released. Keep up the good work.
Very polished looking and good game! I really like the idea of having to handle the paper on your desk in this direct manner. Apparently I would make for a good censor :-/ ... I should play it again helping the rebels so I can sleep again :D
Really well done. Great tone and presentation. I appreciate the way the feedback for the decisions was deferred, made me pay particular attention to the text and really contributed to my enjoyment.
I hate to be another person to draw Papers Please parallels, but hey, it's obvious you've drawn some inspiration from it. Not that this is a bad thing. You've taken the effective parts of the formula, and put them into something different. The aethethics are lovely, and the game plays nicely, save for awkward controls. I found it a bit easy to be the oppressive man I wished to be, and it would have felt good to have a bit more of a challenge in that sense, but honestly I don't see any realistic way of addressing that without taking away from the game in other ways, and it works fine as it is.
This was really cool, and has a great atmosphere. Good interpretation of the theme as well. I love that these type of games are becoming more popular as of late.
Really polished presentation here. The graphics, the music, it all works and is very cohesive. Similar to Papers, Please of course, but it does do its own thing too. I'd love to see this expanded into a longer game with a bigger storyline.
Really loved the game. It was a great take on the theme, and did a great job putting me in someone else's shoes. I would have loved if for at least part of the game I got more feedback on how my choices were making the numbers go up or down - only getting feedback after all the articles are submitted made it hard to distinguish which action caused what result. Also, it was hard to find the proper point to grab a paper from - being able to grab the title or having a little handle would have helped.
Nice idea, even if it's a bit similar to Lucas Pope's "The Republia Times". I liked the ambiguity of some of the choices (will the government want me to censor stuff like "X will be checked if it's relevant"?).
One thing I'd fix was the way you pick up and close the documents, since it's very unintuitive (you have to grab the border? why not the headline?).
Spierek: We ment for the entire paper to be grabable, but the collision boxes of the text (including the headlines) was giving us problems, and we weren't able to fix it in time. As of right no you don't have to use the borders, it's just that that place usually is the only place with without any text.
Very well done. As a newspaper journalist when I'm not making games, this really struck a chord with me.
My tendency, having run a newsdesk IRL, was to publish and be damned - except for the obvious government propaganda pieces, which went on the spike! So I ended up getting shut down but also sparking a popular uprising, which I thought was a fairly upbeat ending in the circumstances. I take it there were other endings if I'd chosen differently?
Awesome game, great writing, nice graphics and good music, this is all I asked for ! The only thing I have to say is that it's sometimes ambiguous whether what we do will go in a direction or in the other.
I enjoyed how you included different aspects of the social life of the world you were trying to illustrate. I liked taking the role of the editor and being a good servant to my government. (p.s : fuck the rebels).
Brilliant entry, one of the best I've seen so far.
Comparisons with both Papers, Please and The Republia Times are inevitable, but this doesn't change the fact that you've done a wonderful job. Music contributes immensely to the atmosphere, you could almost picture yourself in a black & white film taking place in the late thirties. Congratulations!
Just to nitpick a bit, I agree on some of the commenters saying dragging could be a bit easier. The first time I played I had some troubles with it -_-U
I'd tweak the controls as they can be a little unintuitive but this is a nice take on the Lucas Pope formula (similar to both Republia Times and Papers, Please) but I find this kind of game VERY compelling. Awesome music, and nice graphics too.
It's great to see a political game, especially one tackling the often-falsely-assumed right to freedom of expression. Obviously it's a dramatisation in an authoritarian country, but it nevertheless shows how easy bias can be employed, and how important important the press are as a check on power -- arguably the most important check on power.
Everything is good about this except, as others have mentioned, it is sometimes hard to pick up articles to put them in the envelopes. Very solid entry for an excellent take on the theme.
LOVE IT! Fantastic game, nice style, interesting concept! i had a little trouble trying to figure out how to drag papers, but besides that absolutely amazing! -Flatgub~
Being a journalist, the idea of balancing what higher ups want with personal politics is a feeling I know all too well! Wonderful atmosphere and style. The font choice was initially a little murky to read, but I managed to adjust quickly.
The atmosphere and graphics are amazing. Great choice of gameplay also. It of course reminds us a little of Papers, Please, but in a good way. The added mechanic of satisfying two groups is really interesting.
Amazing. Just like "Papers, Please". I didn't quite understand the two bars on the right side. I didn't know if I was doing a good or bad thing in the game. Loved it, though.
First try - government side! - Ingame tutorial actually as ingame text? Very cool. Took me a while to drop it back, though. - The art and the music are absolutely wonderful, and the sound effects fit well. - The dragging was kind of hard sometimes. Like: Where can I start to drag this? Oh, I have to click again now? - Sometimes I didn't understand why one or the other meter went up, but I guess that's to be expected. - Aw, I was dismantled anyway? I hoped that they'd like me so much that they'd let me stay. Okay, another try!
Second try - publish ALL THE THINGS without looking, just for the sake of it! - Well, that went well for week one! - Not as good for week two though... - Pretty great in week three! - As in week four! Status: Rebel meter nearly maxed out, suspicion meter a bit over half. - Uuuh, week five was bad. Rebel maxed out, but suspicion nearly too. - Week six: Oh, that went surprisingly well. Rebel plus, suspicion minus? I'll take it :D - Hu. I "won". I didn't expect that to go so well.
Third try - let's see what happens if I lose. - Hum. I am not sure I *was* terminated in the end or if it was only planned, but I still feel like a hero! Ha! :)
So, uh, apart from "winning" (yeah, I know that I can decide my affiliation myself, but doing good sounds more like winning to me) when just publishing all, this was a fantastic game! Great atmosphere, good writing and it was on a serious topic while still being fun. You guys did a great job there!
Yeah, I wasn't sure how to just gain rebel score without suspicion score either. I mean, the rest are clear: - Government-articles only: Nothing rises - Rebel-articles only: Both rise, with the suspicion faster ...but how they are disconnected, I don't have any clue.
"Innovation and humour are not that good" ...haha. Yeah no innovation AT ALL. Just the same as all of those other newspaper censorship games, right? :D
Great mood, art style, music. The universe made me think of a pre-1984 universe where everything starts to fall apart. On a side note, some characters and texts were very hard to read. Anyway great job !
Loved it. Struck especially close to home as someone who's been marching the streets with thousands of other protestors and not seeing any coverage from major media outlets in the pocket of the government. You've taken a page (or a whole booklet) from Lucas Pope sure, but remixed it with charm and style, and I think you've done a great job.
Great entry, reminds me of Lucas Pope's Republia Times. All it was missing was the sound of someone smoking cigarettes like a chimney and the atmosphere would be complete.
Y
yourlittlehelper3 May 2014, 18:49
Different articles maybe. That'd be nice, so that it's different everytime
Y
yourlittlehelper3 May 2014, 18:49
But it's an amazing game just sayin... Favorite so far
Love the overall tone set by the graphics and music. I assume the goal was to get the white bar as high as possible, not super clear, IMO.
I think it would've been good if the head of the paper was draggable, with a lot of text there wasn't a lot of margin for dragging the paper sometimes.
Good game! Although I was never sure what to do to please ones or the others.
D
DDRKirby(ISQ)4 May 2014, 22:05
Nice job :) You already covered my feedback in your post-mortem, but yes, great job overall, very nicely capturing the Papers, Please aesthetic. The sound effects are really nice here, I know it's a small detail but really ties everything together :)
This reminds me a lot of The Republia Times, in a good way. I do have a couple of criticisms, though. In a lot of cases, I have trouble telling whether statements are good for the government or good for the rebels. For example, if the government shot a bunch of rebels, is that going to be taken as "You're trying to get the public to feel like they're being oppressed" or "You're trying to show that the government can handle this threat"? I suppose that that is part of the gameplay, but it would be nice perhaps to have the style guide at the beginning describe exactly what the government wants from the player. Additionally, despite the game's largely storytelling focus, the endings all feel a little underwhelming. Maybe if they had a second page's worth of conclusion it might feel more like it means something. The art for this game is wonderful, and the music is also good.
All 5! Love the storytelling, atmosphere, Papers Please inspired dystopia. If you continue to develop this, I had to click or drag in a way that felt random to close a paper.
getting a cool "Papers, Please" vibe from this. Dragging the papers around was a little irritating since it took me ages to try and get it to drag it to either deny/accept
Awesome concept! Only issues are the mouse dragging as some people have said and that the effects of censoring/not censoring seem kind of ambiguous. Would be nice to know per-paper instead of for the whole group.
Great concept and style! Would be great if I could remove not only the whole paragraphs but independent words too (like 'there was a [s]small[/s] riot'. But that would be far too much work for 72 hours probably.
Comments82
Love what you guys have done with the look and feel. Simply fabulous. Both graphics, music and soundfx all work well together.
The only improvements I could think of were to make it a bit easier to drag improved (censored?) documents to the print or deny envelope. As well as getting a little bit more guidance in the beginning. Super well done, my favourite in the Mood category this year and a strong contender overall!
I was initially captured by the graphics, scrolling through the ludum dare front page, and was looking forward to the completed game since. I really like the gameplay and finally (I guess) "won" the game after (actually) some tries. As Jod pointed out, the game really reminds one of Papers Please, especially when you find yourself in a position, in which you are able to decide if you want to support the government or the rebels/diverse people wanting to enter Arstrotska, while focusing on completely different aspects. The music adds a lot to the great atmosphere created by the graphics and texts, but I had some problems reading the really pixelated font and dragging the papers around.
Apart from these minor points, I love the game and would be incredible happy if you keep working on it post ld...
rejooh :)
Superb game, loved the style and the gameplay. Controls were a bit tough on the papers sometimes, but I worked out a system.
Not that this is a bad thing. You've taken the effective parts of the formula, and put them into something different.
The aethethics are lovely, and the game plays nicely, save for awkward controls.
I found it a bit easy to be the oppressive man I wished to be, and it would have felt good to have a bit more of a challenge in that sense, but honestly I don't see any realistic way of addressing that without taking away from the game in other ways, and it works fine as it is.
An excellent game, well done
You should make this a complete game. I'll buy it.
For me it became only after some ingame weeks clear what those numbers and bars on the right side mean.
One thing I'd fix was the way you pick up and close the documents, since it's very unintuitive (you have to grab the border? why not the headline?).
My tendency, having run a newsdesk IRL, was to publish and be damned - except for the obvious government propaganda pieces, which went on the spike! So I ended up getting shut down but also sparking a popular uprising, which I thought was a fairly upbeat ending in the circumstances. I take it there were other endings if I'd chosen differently?
Comparisons with both Papers, Please and The Republia Times are inevitable, but this doesn't change the fact that you've done a wonderful job. Music contributes immensely to the atmosphere, you could almost picture yourself in a black & white film taking place in the late thirties.
Congratulations!
Just to nitpick a bit, I agree on some of the commenters saying dragging could be a bit easier. The first time I played I had some troubles with it -_-U
Nice execution and nice ambiance, but I wasn't always sure how I was gaining points with the rebels or raising the suspicion of the governement.
#### #### ## ### ## ### #### ##### #### # #### ###### #### ##### ####. ## ## # #### ######## ## #### ### ###### ##### bloody ######. ## #### ## ## ## ### ## ###### #### ## ## # ###########, ### #### ####### ### brilliant!
Very solid entry for an excellent take on the theme.
Fantastic game, nice style, interesting concept!
i had a little trouble trying to figure out how to drag papers, but besides that absolutely amazing!
-Flatgub~
Innovation and humour are not that good, but very well overall.
But sometimes I could not read what was written ...
I realy love the graphics and the songs!!
Glory to Arstotzka!!
First try - government side!
- Ingame tutorial actually as ingame text? Very cool. Took me a while to drop it back, though.
- The art and the music are absolutely wonderful, and the sound effects fit well.
- The dragging was kind of hard sometimes. Like: Where can I start to drag this? Oh, I have to click again now?
- Sometimes I didn't understand why one or the other meter went up, but I guess that's to be expected.
- Aw, I was dismantled anyway? I hoped that they'd like me so much that they'd let me stay. Okay, another try!
Second try - publish ALL THE THINGS without looking, just for the sake of it!
- Well, that went well for week one!
- Not as good for week two though...
- Pretty great in week three!
- As in week four! Status: Rebel meter nearly maxed out, suspicion meter a bit over half.
- Uuuh, week five was bad. Rebel maxed out, but suspicion nearly too.
- Week six: Oh, that went surprisingly well. Rebel plus, suspicion minus? I'll take it :D
- Hu. I "won". I didn't expect that to go so well.
Third try - let's see what happens if I lose.
- Hum. I am not sure I *was* terminated in the end or if it was only planned, but I still feel like a hero! Ha! :)
So, uh, apart from "winning" (yeah, I know that I can decide my affiliation myself, but doing good sounds more like winning to me) when just publishing all, this was a fantastic game! Great atmosphere, good writing and it was on a serious topic while still being fun. You guys did a great job there!
Yeah, I wasn't sure how to just gain rebel score without suspicion score either. I mean, the rest are clear:
- Government-articles only: Nothing rises
- Rebel-articles only: Both rise, with the suspicion faster
...but how they are disconnected, I don't have any clue.
"Innovation and humour are not that good"
...haha. Yeah no innovation AT ALL. Just the same as all of those other newspaper censorship games, right? :D
different game.
and a new kind of game.
don't know if I've seen news paper sims before.
you seem swedish too?
I've ran out of superlatives!
I think it would've been good if the head of the paper was draggable, with a lot of text there wasn't a lot of margin for dragging the paper sometimes.
The most original entry I've seen so far, and the one that fits the theme in the best way. Really excellent, and I loved the jazzy mood :)