Fox Flares

This is a very nice 2D pixel art platformer, the fox looks very adorable and the environments look really nice. I think the flame mechanic is really clever, as it allows you to choose quickly as to how you should reach the next checkpoint. However, I feel the game is a bit too punishing, once you miss a platform there is no chance to try again so you end up wasting time to try again.

I think if the platforms reappeared after a few seconds, this wouldn't be much of an issue.

Really well done! I got to checkpoint 7 before ragequitting. It is quite difficult, especially the single block platforms... I would really like an option to restart from the last checkpoint without waiting for the heat meter to fill.

@gamepopper Thanks! I thought about adding reappearing blocks, but I ran out of time to do so. You can also hit R to respawn from the last checkpoint.

@handle Yes, I'd probably spend more time tweaking some of the controls/level design. Perhaps I'll do that in a post build. You can hit R to respawn from the last checkpoint. If you want to check out past checkpoint 7 you can use [ ] to skip to checkpoints.

Cool game overall! Great art style, music, graphics, controls! But I found it too unforgiven. If I miss a jump, all I can do is wait for a fiery death, no second chance... And, we were trained by years of platforming to avoid pits, so it could have a tip telling us that indeed we must fall on the pit because it's water there to cool the foxy up. Mozilla may reach you for a talk :D

@kalkatos Thanks! I didn't have time to put more instructions in the game, but they are listed in the description (R to respawn, water to cool off).

Quite a nice game! Very interesting take on the theme. It took me quite a long time to figure out the mechanics though!

Good game! The art is beautiful and the music matches the mood of the game. The mechanics of the checkpoints were interesting and determined the dynamics of the game. Congratulations.

Bom jogo! A arte está bonita e a música combina com o mood do jogo. A mecânica dos checkpoints foi interessante e determina a dinâmica do jogo. Parabéns.

I really like this game ! So cute, beautiful and original :) But keyboard controls are too hard :/

The artwork/animation is just adorable! (The story is actually quite dark now that I think about it. That poor fox...)

Concerning the difficulty; maybe a large part can be fixed by just stretching everything out horizontally juts a little bit? I found that a lot of my difficulties where just in overshooting platforms (... until the 'superjump' blocks after checkpoint 10 or so at least.)

Nice and simple game! I liked it especially the artwork! It was very fun.

Challenging, pretty cool looking small platformer. Very well designed and i like the idea how the time is used.

Very cute, interesting concept, a little fiddly, but not bad!
It took me a while to connect the different levels of heat to the different kinds of blocks, but once I got that it was pretty smooth going.
I also liked that fact that you've got an animation for ducking even though it has no use, heh.

This is too cute! I love this fox :)) The music was nice and relaxing and the artstyle simple but really cute and effective! I liked especially the fox animations. Great game!

Really really nice! the art is so good.
I really liked the concept! But some platforming sections were really difficult, especially with the bounce blocks. My only other annoyance was that moment where you have no control of the character after hitting a checkpoint or respawning. Otherwise it was very good :grin:

Firfox simulator:smile: and checkpoint 7

Really liked it! The graphics were cute, the music was fitting, and the mechanics slowly built on top of each other. I'm not sure that it gets "worse" the more on fire you are --the blue blocks are the best part of the game, in my opinion! Either way, this felt very polished, especially for a compo game! Great job!

This was so adorable! I'm a sucker for good platforming. The keyboard controls felt a little too tight but the controller was mm mmmm good. Finished in 7:31. The amount of time you had between checkpoints felt perfect. Hope you continue this!

Thanks everyone!

@remco good suggestion, I might do that in a post build!

@reality-blind I do have some xbox controller support if you want to try that, but personally I feel it controls similarly.

@torcado Thanks! Yeah, I'll probably need to tweak the platforming controls more later. I probably have too much initial x velocity when you jump and not enough air control. The checkpoint thing you don't have any control for a bit because the fox sighs when it hits the water and I didn't want that animation to be interrupted (though the animation is reused for crouch/sleeping anyway). The timer stops when you hit the water though, so it's meant to be a bit of a break.

@krassenstein Thanks! Yeah there's some gamepad support that was built into the input controller base code, but I didn't really test on it that much so it's not listed, haha. I may tweak some on the controls and add some more levels, but it'll probably stay a relatively small game, at least in the short term.

I LOVE THE CUTE FOX! To help the little fox, I have to find the water as quickly as possible.All the levels make me have fun except the checkpoint 7. XD

Such a fun idea that works perfectly, this accompanied with the cute art and challenging levels makes an all around excellent game.

Nice cute game :) slighly rough with gamepad, the last checkpoint was hard to pass because I kept being bounced leftwards. Poor fox.

Game was really good overall and I like the character. There's no second chances so you have to either wait to burn out and die or restart the checkpoint which felt like a punishing mechanic. The burning was a good idea but didn't seem to impact gameplay at all.

Awesome theme, good graphics, promising gameplay. The levels feel kind of arbitrary though. More time balancing and structuring them would have made this one of the greatest.

Oh my goodness, this is probably my favorite game so far this LD! Beautiful artwork, super innovative idea, perfectly implemented.. I did feel like the bouncey blocks (?) seemed a bit random, I couldn't get consistent behavior, but that's probably my fault. Anyway, very pleasant game, all the way through.

Really cool, albeit dark, idea. The graphics and audio work together perfectly. Felt kinda bad for the poor little fox and my terrible job of getting him to some water :(

Oh foxy why you burning? Great idea, very beautiful to look at, well done!

A bit frustrating at times (darn that 7th checkpoint), but making it all the way through felt so good. The pixel art is top notch, especially for a compo game.

The game is very creative in its design and character. It really makes the checkpoints feel better than just arbitrary flags from where to respawn, which added to the experience. The music and sounds really go nicely along it.

While I had problems here and there (like the dreaded 7th checkpoint), there was another one. I think the 5th? One where, for some reason, the moment I left the spawn, the timer would go very fast. It felt arbitrary, since sometimes it would happen and sometimes it wouldn't. Must be a glitch or something. It was before a vertical climb.

Well, regardless, excellent entry for the compo! I speak for my team when I say we're looking forward to your future entries! Have a nice day! :whale:

Lovely fox burning like hell. Very creative dynamics and great pixel art. Congrats!

This is one of the best games I have played. It is just so well done and the graphics are really good as well. The fox is cute as well and the whole idea is really nice. The ending of the game is also well done :)

It's my favorite LD40 game so far, loved it.

wow - such a great game - really great use of theme - and the tension as you move from checkpoint to checkpoint is outstanding - there were a few rage points - but overall quite fair

Really clever mechanics. A solid entry with great art direction. The only thing that bothered me little when playing was some collision detection that feels a bit off (specially some platforms). But the game is great and it could be a really nice game to try speedrun! Congrats on it!

Great pixel art and a good use of the theme!

Great game. Good art and music. Very interesting mechanic. I just find a bit annoying that once you miss a platform you need to restart (you don’t die instantly and can’t try again) and that the music restart with the game, but it is not a big problem though.

Keep up the good work!

Thanks for the comments everyone! I need to find more time to play through more LD games.

@meatpudding Thanks for the feedback! For me the point of the burning was to set the expectation that the platforming needs to be done within a certain timeframe, and also for adding more motivation for the player to find water.

@oldpeculier The levels are structured to introduce the different mechanics of the game (water, wheat, wood blocks, jumping up, etc). In terms of the timing all the levels can be done within the time frame. Do you have anymore specifics on what you mean? Thanks!

@pvtroswold Thanks! The bouncy blocks could be better communicated. They launch you in the direction you are facing. I added some more feedback in the post compo build.

@moski Thanks for your feedback! The timer going fast is a bug with me forgetting to reset the burn rate if you die in the wheat or something like that. I think it's fixed in the post compo build.

@nathalia-hohl Yah, different platforms can be unpredictable. Good to hear the windows build worked for you! Thanks!

@beavl-games The blocks don't communicate very well when they are solid and not solid, thanks for catching that. I addressed this in the post compo build.

@zeu31 Thanks! I added respawning platforms and water in the post compo build. You can also press R to reset from a checkpoint. The music actually pauses and fades back in when you restart, but it is a bit repetitive so may be hard to tell.

Great game. Wonderful graphics. Nice music and sounds. Checkpoint #9 was to hard for me. I don't know how to make it to the top! :D But very good work! :)

fun mechanic, but it is very hard to control haha

I made it to the end (in almost 7mn, with the Win version), it was fun, and this fox is so cute! Controls needs a little practice, as the differents levels mechanics, but nothing unaffordable (and I know, because I'm not really good in plateformers). Well done, especially for a Compo !

Very nice little project you have here. I will say a few of the checkpoints I didn't understand what to do, but after thinking about it for a few moments I was able to make progress, and made it through without getting stuck much at all. The platforming was a little tricky at times, but nothing I couldn't handle. Very enjoyable!

Love the graphics and fluid gameplay!
Sadly, I had some performance issues, especially right after respawning I would have severely low frame rates...
Good job!

@oivin-f Thanks! I haven't tested extensively on the HTML5 build, you could try downloading the flash or windows (if you have windows) build and see if that runs better.

I love the art and music of the game, it's all very cute and charming. Unfortunately, I didn't think the gameplay was very good. The platforms were too small and the character just slippery enough to make accurate jumping difficult, and the physics on the blue blocks weren't consistent and hard to work with.

@niterich Thanks for your feedback! Slippery is a good way of describing it. I tweaked some of that in the post compo but I don't think it's completely solved yet. The blue blocks launch you in the direction that you're facing, but I could see some weird behavior happening there.

This certainly was a challenging platforming game. The small temporary platforms and the difficult-to-judge booster platforms were the most frustrating, though nice touch on making things feel *barely* passable. It really puts me on the edge. I would have liked a tighter control scheme, so the platforming didn't feel so unfair, as well as some sort of marker indicating the trajectory of the character flying on those flinging platforms.

Very nice! This was cute, fun, and actually pretty well polished considering it's an LD game. Definitely a standout among those I've rated so far.

While I definitely had to get used to the physics a bit at first, I would disagree with the other comments about it being too frustrating or too "slippery". I'm sure you could probably tweak it to be a little more intuitive (which would be nice) but I found it to be just fine once I got the hang of it. I reached the end in 2-3 minutes on my first run.

I really liked the game graphics and the audio along with the music, everything fits perfectly. The game is *hard* but not that hard to become impossible. Good job!

And yeah, that level 7 is a PITA jaja

Super charming and the ending was just so warming and adorable. I also really like the death particle effect.

Weirdly enough, I found checkpoint 7 to be quite easy, yet satisfying. Maybe that's 'cause 6 game me much more trouble. Checkpoints 6 and 11 was where I wished for bit tighter controls, but for a 48hour game the controls are great.

I win! That was awesome! The art is very nice, super solid colour choices. I like the puzzleyness of it, and the controls felt fair. Sound and music were both ok, but not as special as the art or game design imo.

Windows version runs ultra slow for me for some reason, but the browser version worked well.

Oh, I love this! Such a good platformer! Only complain is, at least for the web version, framerate seemed to drop down randomly.

It was fun, beautiful sounds and art, great job!

Sadly, I couldn't get past the 7th checkpoint.

The acceleration curve feels strange to me (too slow at the start, then getting too steep), but I'm not used to playing platformers, so feel free to ignore me...

Other than that I love the concept, art style and the "checkpointing=extinguishing" game mechanic. Congratulations on drawing the best fox sprite that can be squeezed into ~ 18x13 pixels!

(Btw. the game didn't load in Safari, but it worked in Firefox. I see what you did there :wink:)

one of the more innovative games, I like the approach also the graphics are lovely

Thanks again!

@toboggan - Interesting, usually it's the other way around. I have noticed the game can lag if my laptop isn't plugged in because it'll throttle the performance, but otherwise I'm not sure.

@m-1 For the compo I've added skips ([ ]) to each checkpoint if you want to check it out past checkpoint 7! I agree with you on the acceleration, I think there can still be a lot done with fine tuning the controls. I did tweak a bit of that in the post compo I have up but I don't think it solves all the issues. If you check the console (f12?) in safari do you know if it has any errors there? Thanks!

Oh yeah, the fox sprite is 16x16 (I think a bit shorter than 16, but 16x16 is the tile/limitation) not including the fire fx :)

The graphics are fantastic, the fox is incredibly cute and very well animated. Fantastic concept. Great submission!

Very cute and solid. Interesting. But the strategy is limited I think?

@aeveis: The errors are:

16x (for each sound asset):
```
[Error] Failed to load resource: the server responded with a status of 403 (Forbidden) ([sound name].mp3, line 0)
[Error] TypeError: undefined is not an object (evaluating 'a.apply')
(anonymous function) (soundjs.min.js:17:894)
```

and once:
```
[Error] Failed to load resource: the server responded with a status of 403 (Forbidden) (monsterrat.svg, line 0)
```

The downloaded files contain following error description:
```
Anonymous users does not have storage.objects.get access to itchio/html/694982/foxflares_by_aeveis_html5/flixel/sounds/flixel.mp3.
```

This happens regardless of whether I am using private browsing mode and content blockers or not... I guess hwcdn.net just doesn't like me.

Thanks for the tip to skip checkpoints with "[" and "]". I loved the ending!

(I found it too difficult to go from checkpoint 10 to 11, but going from 9 straight to 11 by jumping up on the blue blocks was somehow easier for me...)

I like how slow the character moves in contrast to many jumpers that are way too fast. I first skipped the water holes as in other jumpers, but then it was fun to find out that the water cools you down and you should use it as a tactic to complete this game.

Great game! Sweet animations and a nice challenge!