Totems

Overall★★★★★★★★★★2.87
Fun★★★★★★★★★★2.53
Innovation★★★★★★★★★★3.52
Theme★★★★★★★★★★2.44
Graphics★★★★★★★★★★2.37
Audio★★★★★★★★★★3.65
Humor★★★★★★★★★★1.90
Mood★★★★★★★★★★3.28
Coolness★★★★★★★★★★100%
Please run in Chrome, Safari, or IE. A very recent Firefox update seemed to break the audio.

Beneath the surface lie melodic totems, waiting to be unearthed. Stand before them, listen to their muffled melodies and reproduce them to unlock their secrets.

Arrow keys = movement
1, 2, 3, 4 keys (not number pad) = play note (4 notes per sequence)

Source code can easily be retrieved from browser, it's found in game.js and pulsar.js.

screenshot

Comments35

Boodog28 Apr 2014, 03:47
Nice! The audio was pretty good!
terraco28 Apr 2014, 03:47
Couldn't hear anything - Windows 8.1
microapple
microapple28 Apr 2014, 03:48
Interesting concept. Took me a while to figure out what was going on, a tutorial would have been useful.
Lacaranian
Lacaranian28 Apr 2014, 03:53
<3! Yessiree, that's a good one. No spoilers here though.
Joseph Miller28 Apr 2014, 03:53
Really cool idea, but I couldn't replicate any of the melodies. I don't have great hearing though. Wish there was some kind of visual help, but the art style is great. I really enjoy minimalism.
malmazuke28 Apr 2014, 03:55
Very original idea. Great atmosphere
Daniel X. Moore28 Apr 2014, 03:55
Really interesting. I was only able to get a couple of the totems. It was hard for me to match the patterns the totem played to the notes I could play sometimes.
Nanolotl
Nanolotl28 Apr 2014, 03:56
Really great atmosphere and neat idea.
I had a lot of trouble figuring out the sequences, but got them all eventually.
Good job.
zanenga28 Apr 2014, 03:56
I love the concept and audio! Very nice! It could use a bit more of visual feedback and/or a tutorial, though.
Brian Corr28 Apr 2014, 04:15
Hi! I really liked this. The atmosphere is oddly intriguing for something so small. If it wasn't a game jam I'd be expecting/hoping for some grand unifying mystery to it all and I'd be way on board.

I think the graphics and sound and mood are all really great. It would be nice maybe to have something other than total silence when you're not near a totem. I get that it's supposed to be about listening, but some chirping birds or wind noise would suit I think. I didn't understand for a while that the 5-dot structure was not a totem, so that was confusing.

I think if you were going to change anything, I'd have some kind of cooldown so that i didn't have to tap tap tap and wait for the buzz to know that i was 'starting' my melody.

Anyhow these are minor gripes. This is a cool concept and the execution is really polished, great job :) :) :)
nesis28 Apr 2014, 04:41
A really nice idea for this game. It'd be great if the graphics were equally awesome - I get a feeling that this idea worked a little further could be as cool as Journey.
Jonochrome28 Apr 2014, 05:21
I love the idea behind this, but all the notes you have to interpret are vague chords with confusing pacing. Wish it was more apparent which muffled note starts each four-note melody. I was able to successfully copy one of the melodies and just couldn't figure out the rest.
Brian Stegmannauthor28 Apr 2014, 05:51
@Jonochrome If you walk away from a totem until there is no sound and walk back, the first note you hear is the always the beginning of the melody.
BumbleBirds
BumbleBirds29 Apr 2014, 04:46
Couldn't hear anything, doesn't seem to be working very well on my end. :(
Gins29 Apr 2014, 07:48
It didn't work in Firefox, but in Chrome it did.
I like the concept, although it was very hard to hear some of the pieces. Then again, I've never played music by hearing so that may be why it's was hard.
Oddly Shaped Pixels
Oddly Shaped Pixels29 Apr 2014, 11:35
Really great, the ambiance is fantastic! Sometimes it's hard to know where a pattern begins and where it ends but I managed all 4 totems and it felt great! XD
Brian Stegmannauthor29 Apr 2014, 13:58
@BumbleBirds and @Gins, sorry, the audio's not working in Firefox on Windows. I'll convert the audio to a couple more formats tonight and apply a patch. Thanks for letting me know.
Brian Stegmannauthor29 Apr 2014, 14:16
Thanks to everybody for all the feedback and complements so far. I'm very interested in creating games that are based around music, mysteries, and puzzles with minimal conflict, so it's great to see that a simple idea such as this is a good one.
rvmook
rvmook30 Apr 2014, 00:18
I really like the concept, would've been nice to have a mastermind kind of hint system to see if you're in the right direction.
Hypnohustla
Hypnohustla3 May 2014, 08:49
Beautiful little game. And I don't mean the graphics, they could use a bit polishing. :D But a really nice entry, thank you :)
ThingoStudios5 May 2014, 22:27
A cool idea with lots of ambience, but it was a bit too minimalistic for my taste.
BadgerPriest
BadgerPriest7 May 2014, 00:30
Really great concept. I agree with all the rest though about the difficulty of figuring out the order of the notes. I got stuck on one of them for way way too long because it was not at all clear enough that the same note was being repeated twice since it otherwise sounded like a long note with 3 more after it.
mechabit
mechabit7 May 2014, 00:36
Great atmosphere. But like others have said add some visual feedback, don't want to alienate people who are hard of hearing or tone deaf.
Brian Stegmannauthor7 May 2014, 01:05
I completely agree about the lack of visual feedback making it somewhat difficult.
LinusPrime
LinusPrime7 May 2014, 01:13
Very unique game mechanic, a lot can be done with this. Good job, keep up the great work!
NoTrueSpaceman
NoTrueSpaceman7 May 2014, 01:19
I really liked the mood of this! I had to crank the volume to properly hear the puzzle melodies though. A visual indication of your currently 'entered' song would help, or perhaps a way to clear your entry. My favorite game of he jam so far :)
Delca9 May 2014, 19:46
An awesome entry! I really like the gameplay, although I had difficulties recognizing the notes sometimes.
Anyway, the game was very enjoyable. Great job!
foolmoron
foolmoron14 May 2014, 15:31
Awesome idea and atmosphere. Hard for me because I can't figure out tones at all.
DannyG5917 May 2014, 19:27
I love you too <3
ZeppelinCaptain17 May 2014, 19:52
Too tone deaf to play this game, I can't even hear when the sequences start and end, and I can't for the life of me match the sounds that the player produces with the totem's.

A little too simple for my taste, I think more could be done with a little sound guy like that :)
danialhyatt
danialhyatt17 May 2014, 20:21
Great game, great idea, well done!! i think you could improve it by making each note in a melody shorter, as in a flurry of 4 notes, and then silence, then repeat, then silence, then repeat, so on and so forth. the long draw out notes made me just play the note i heard very slowly. it would be cool to "sing a song", quicker melodies, with a pause to let the brain digest it
wschorn
wschorn19 May 2014, 01:56
great concept, hard to know when to start a melody from. pacing is also a bit winky. but a sweet jam game overall!

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