Click, drag, rotate, explore and build the castle!
Background
We had some very rough idea (interactive illustration) before the jam started. Then we tried to fit the theme into our game. But that particular game mechanic (punishing players for click count) was ruining the casual experience. So we gave up and put that mechanic out. Hope you will find the theme in the game by yourself!
Credits
Michal Berlinger - programming
Jan Netušil - graphic design, music
Software
- Unity - Adobe Illustrator - Affinity Designer - Unity plugins: Odin Inspector, Pro Camera 2d, Colorful fx - Auxi Studio
Beautiful game! Reminds me at the early Samorost titles in the way you explore the world. Gave me a lot of "Aha" moments. Plus the artstyle and audio is really lovely :) Great entry!
Cool game with a neat mechanic! Certainly doesn't match the theme so I had to rate down for that, but graphics are amazing as well as the audio. And the mood is set right from the start!
Overall: I enjoyed it although it was a very short experience and maybe there should be some indicators for what's intractable after a which where the player doesn't find anything
Hey, thank you all. Yeah, it is kinda short. In five steps you build the castle, and that is it. There is a cursor mouse over / hover indicating interaction, but for sure it could be more polished and giving better feedback to the player. But you know, time... :)
Just incredible! The sense of discovery was something truly special. My wife and I both were blown away by the colors. Well done. I just wish it was longer! 5 stars all around!
It's nice to see the castle build up. Spoilers: I think my favorite interaction was pulling the roots down, pretty surprising. I was stuck for a little while before I found the cloud. Then I didn't expect to move the water like that but it worked out.
All in all fun to play around with from start to finish. Great art style and music too. And from reading your description I actually encountered the same problems. Wanted to challenge the players to play as optimal as possible, but it just made things too complicated and didn't fit the game. Lost like 7 hours to it, hope you didn't burn through that much!
Very, very nice, clean artstyle. Loved the smooth transition animations and the music. To make audio even better you could've added small soundeffects for turning the waterwheel, collecting sheep, etc. but that's just a minor thing.
Really didn't fit the theme all too well, but it's a good, polished entry nonetheless.
Beautiful game, easy and nice to play, great work. Also i don't think you should worry about theme, it is only a not necessary choice which does not matter when you make with love YOUR vision of game. P.S. Help please, don't know how to finish. :confused:
It took me a little while to find all the pieces of this cute and poetic puzzle, but it was fun to try. It's not a problem that is a little short, it's enough for a LD, but too bad that some elements are unexploited (like the treasure box on the bottom left). Good job anyways, and I would play an enhanced version of this! :D
Wow great art. I played on Android and it was pretty cool. Managed to build the castle completely I think. Some kind of indicator that you are or aren't done would be cool. Just not sure if there is a way to open that chest.... Hmmm..
@mactinite There should be a text box saying you completed it.
Maybe something is not working as it should, so here is some guide ->
!!! SPOILER ALERT AHEAD !!!
five steps to do: - rotate left hill and drag lift - rotate right bottom hill and clean sheep - rotate sun and click all night wolfs - click cloud to rain, then drag hills, then rotate mill wheel - drag roots
This one feels close to my heart: almost like a children's book come to life. If it were longer and there were more things to manipulate, it could become a truly sellable game. Very nice job!
Nice 'n quiet. Appreciated during these busy days :slight_smile:
The art has a very clean and polised look. The day/night cycle was also nicely done.
Both the cloud and the pull-down trees took me what seemd like ages.
If I've any complaints, its that most of the things you could do where 'one use only'. Less 'puzzle' and more 'where's Waldo', to put it in other words.
I _think_ I can see the theme as well, since you're destroying things to make 'more'?
Beautifully done; simple mechanics and a ton of graphical polish. I did get stuck for a good while unable to find the raincloud, but got through it in the end. There's one red rectangle in the caves down at the bottom that I would've liked to play with too. Some sound effects would also add to the charm, but that's down to time constraints more than anything I'm sure. Very nice work.
A fun little experience that lets you explore a beautiful scene. The color difference between night and day is really nice, sadly it gets grey halfway between. It's really difficult to fix that though. I don't know how.
That's one of a n innovative game idea! :) The gameplay feels smooth and the graphics look polish and aweseome! Enjoyed every minute of the game, but had to read the spoilers to find the cloud with the rain o_o *sigh* I'm kinda impatient xD" Love it!
Beautiful graphics and art style! Very good job. I think it needs more feedback when you complete something, its hard to know when you've done something correctly.
Simply beautiful! Nice music too! But in the end it made me click all over the place but I guess that's in line with exploration games :) still, I would prefer to have "highlighting cursor" when I hover over something meaningful.
Very nice game :) The art and music work nicely together. If there were even very simple sound effects to player interaction it would have been even better :) Good job!
P.S. (SPOILER) How long it took me to click the cloud, you can't even imagine :D
This is beautifil. Based on the picture alone I would assume different music, but current fits really well =) I struggled with finding the clues so I had to read cheats, but now when I figured it out I wish I had more levels to play.
Awesomely done game. It must've been pretty hard to design all that cleanly and stay cohesive. Music choice was a little odd to me, but at least it stands out. Really solid experience, and I didn't mind the game length since this is LD after all.
Yes. I think this ldjam's theme is putting too much pressure to the player. I did a lot stress-management in my game trying not to scare the players too.
Hi Abuki! Nicely done. I, too, had a problem that the castle was built, everything clicked, yet the "win" screen didn't appear. I like the graphics, animations and the music. I don't like clicking-only games very much (even thought our game design dragged me to making one :D) but I had no problem enjoying yours! :)
Beautiful music and art and lovely gameplay. I understand your decision to cut out the "the more you click, the worse it is" even though it was your only connection to the theme. I clicked around *a lot* and would probably not have finished if I were afraid to click that much.
Wow, I love love love the art style and game/interactions! Some thoughts I had were that if you click and drag without there being anything interactive, it shouldn't turn into the hand icon. Also, the music did feel a bit off at the beginning when it was only nature - maybe if it started off more peaceful and melodic and transitioned to the more medieval sounding theme as you progressed? The wolves were also a bit hard to find. Overall, one of my favorites!
Woaaah, doesn't really have nothing in common with theme, but looks awesome and reminded be about all those flash games i was playing on browser when i was younger! Thank you very much and good luck!
Though I could not see the connection to the theme. The game itself is definitely the best I have played so far. The graphics are absolutely amazing and the mood is a happy peaceful type of game which I really enjoy. Having to look for all the different puzzle pieces really made this enjoyable. :)
Great game (even I failed to find the link with the theme).
Remind-me "grow" games.
It could be great if it could be a sort of "book", where you can turn page (have an other drawing, and the following of the story) when you finish to found all things, etc.
Like @dunin says, it's reminiscent of "grow". Games like this are excellent for teaching people that clicking and dragging on a screen makes things happen.
Unique, succinct, and fun. I can definitely see this on mobile/tablet because of the way you can push, pull, and spin objects, especially with new levels. I definitely think you should keep developing it. Only bug I noticed was the HTML5 version in Safari for me has a crunchy green outline on some of the assets that spoils your beautiful artwork a bit. Not a big deal, I know HTML5 can be a pain. Nice job.
I decided to play this game on android an I was quite suprised by how well it worked. I managed to finish all the little puzzles and manage to get to the end, which I was quite proud of. The game itself was very unique and innovative,and the graphics were simple yet they worked well. It's a game you can just waste some time figuring out. The music was good, although it felt slightly unfiting. I would have liked to hear some sound effects just to really make the world come alive. My only other suggestion in an otherwise well made game was that I would have like the "hit boxes" (for lack of a better word) when tapping to be a bit bigger, as it wouls occasionally take many taps to get something small (like the roots). However this was really enjoyable and congrats on a great game
Great game. I finished it, although I was a bit frustrated that I didn't find a way to open that chest thingy (if that's what it's meant to be in the bottom right).
I really liked the art style with the minimal shading.
At some point, the cursor got stuck on being a "hand" symbol, which wasn't a major issue though.
That's just nice little toy. Make more. And I love the day/night cycle mechanism - could be used to do more story telling like werewolf/vampire story or just as a progression mechanic.
Very interesting experience. The music, art, and puzzle like experience is definitely nothing like I have seen before. It was confusing to figure out where to click though.
What I like the most about this is the visual style. It stands apart most LD games. Great job in creating a really unique experience!
The art is beautifull, and it is always fun to play these relaxing puzzles. However, it is lacking a little bit of something to create a powerful atmosphere or add some fun. Maybe the castle apparition is not fun enough to fully reward our efforts (for example include some bits of illustrations telling a story...). On the other hand, the cloud/hills/well serie is really cool.
Very clean and lovely art! A little puzzle that lives. I thought it was stuck, but apparently I had already completed it. Well, only so much you can do in one LD. :)
Theme I could not find, but that is fine. ;) Well done!
Beautiful game! Would probably do exceptionally well on the app store / play store. Really nice colour palette (including the variants). Music is really good too.
I don't really have any critical feedback, it feels like this succeeds at everything it tries to do. :)
I appreciate that this is different. Also, it seemed like more than five moves were necessary, but maybe I didn't need to do some things, like kill the wolves. After I extended the trees, they continued to show clickability, but I couldn't do a 2nd thing with them. I could totally see you expanding on this with more stuff you have to do during night, which then affects the day, etc...
This was an awesome experience. The art is beautiful and the music takes it over the edge. Its a small puzzle, but the concept could be easily extended to more beautiful areas/worlds to build castles or other buildings in. Good job! (Can I have more, please?)
Comments94
Great entry!
Overall: I enjoyed it although it was a very short experience and maybe there should be some indicators for what's intractable after a which where the player doesn't find anything
It's a shame that it doesn't last long though unless I'm missing something :thinking:
It's nice to see the castle build up. Spoilers: I think my favorite interaction was pulling the roots down, pretty surprising. I was stuck for a little while before I found the cloud. Then I didn't expect to move the water like that but it worked out.
All in all fun to play around with from start to finish. Great art style and music too. And from reading your description I actually encountered the same problems. Wanted to challenge the players to play as optimal as possible, but it just made things too complicated and didn't fit the game. Lost like 7 hours to it, hope you didn't burn through that much!
To make audio even better you could've added small soundeffects for turning the waterwheel, collecting sheep, etc. but that's just a minor thing.
Really didn't fit the theme all too well, but it's a good, polished entry nonetheless.
P.S. Help please, don't know how to finish. :confused:
Did tou rotate mill wheel and tapped all wolfs?
Maybe something is not working as it should, so here is some guide ->
!!! SPOILER ALERT AHEAD !!!
five steps to do:
- rotate left hill and drag lift
- rotate right bottom hill and clean sheep
- rotate sun and click all night wolfs
- click cloud to rain, then drag hills, then rotate mill wheel
- drag roots
But this game defies the theme and became nice piece of light among others :)
The art has a very clean and polised look. The day/night cycle was also nicely done.
Both the cloud and the pull-down trees took me what seemd like ages.
If I've any complaints, its that most of the things you could do where 'one use only'.
Less 'puzzle' and more 'where's Waldo', to put it in other words.
I _think_ I can see the theme as well, since you're destroying things to make 'more'?
The color difference between night and day is really nice, sadly it gets grey halfway between.
It's really difficult to fix that though. I don't know how.
now, go, play and rate some games :-P
Love it!
Lindo jogo! Parabéns pela mecânica e pela estética aplicada. Vejo muito potencial nesse projeto!
P.S. (SPOILER) How long it took me to click the cloud, you can't even imagine :D
I feel like it is a bit distant from the theme. But that is just a nitpick.
Loved it!
Awesome Art!
The music feels just nice too.
Didn't really get the theme though, but still had a great time !
thanks for making these kind of little puzzle games, i miss those a lot.
Remind-me "grow" games.
It could be great if it could be a sort of "book", where you can turn page (have an other drawing, and the following of the story) when you finish to found all things, etc.
The game itself was very unique and innovative,and the graphics were simple yet they worked well. It's a game you can just waste some time figuring out. The music was good, although it felt slightly unfiting. I would have liked to hear some sound effects just to really make the world come alive. My only other suggestion in an otherwise well made game was that I would have like the "hit boxes" (for lack of a better word) when tapping to be a bit bigger, as it wouls occasionally take many taps to get something small (like the roots). However this was really enjoyable and congrats on a great game
I really liked the art style with the minimal shading.
At some point, the cursor got stuck on being a "hand" symbol, which wasn't a major issue though.
What I like the most about this is the visual style. It stands apart most LD games. Great job in creating a really unique experience!
Pity that you couldn't really cater much to the theme, though.
Very nice :thumbsup:
I thought it was stuck, but apparently I had already completed it. Well, only so much you can do in one LD. :)
Theme I could not find, but that is fine. ;) Well done!
I don't really have any critical feedback, it feels like this succeeds at everything it tries to do. :)
Cute sound effects like in Samorost would make this so much better.
Nice unique experience.