Seize the Clay

co-authored: @adamd, @failedstarfish
Overall★★★★★★★★★★3.83
Fun★★★★★★★★★★3.65
Innovation★★★★★★★★★★3.81
Theme★★★★★★★★★★2.50
Graphics★★★★★★★★★★4.47
Audio★★★★★★★★★★3.67
Humor★★★★★★★★★★3.13
Mood★★★★★★★★★★3.92
Seize the Clay is a short game about Pottery!
Choose your material, sculpt a pot and paint it in a variety of colours. Controls are all handled by the mouse, just click and drag your way to pottery success.

Game was made in 72hrs by a team of 3:
Gameplay & Music by @SecondDimension
Art by @FailedStarfish & @AdamD

Notes:
* I made the music during the weekend, but I ran out of time for proper sound effects
* The calculation which determines the value of each pot is broken, so it's a bit random (will fix post-jam)
* The progress bar on the oven works, but might look a bit odd (again I will fix this post-jam)
* I know the link to the theme is a bit of a stretch, we just really like this idea wanted to try it!

Comments30

Dark1knight30 Apr 2019, 02:54
I found the graphics to be very nice and the sound very fitting, i just hopped for some sound effects for the actions. The game was a nice play and although i could not really understand how it fits in the theme, nonetheless it is a very polished game for a jam and had very nice crafting steps which made it a bit complex but in the good way.
tg139730 Apr 2019, 03:06
This game is so cute! I really liked making the pots, even though I wasn't that great at it lol. I'm a little confused on how it gets at the theme - like, I can kind of see it, but I feel it could have been integrated better. I also think it could use some re-balancing - by the second day when I figured out how to actually play, I made over 3000 dollars when all I needed was 100. All in all, this was a really fun game!
KonH
KonH30 Apr 2019, 19:31
Great concept and overall mood!
turbogros30 Apr 2019, 21:22
hahaha i guess i'm a bad potter ! Seeing my bad skills was really fun.
The aesthetic is really cute :)
jjjjason
jjjjason1 May 2019, 04:02
So I know the big boys and girls up top are telling us the theme this time is "your life is currency" but based on the last couple games I've played I think the real theme is "super goddamn cute" and man this game nails it.

This game is very fun and pleasant to play through. I wish it had some sound effects to go along with the various activities but that's post-jam material. Art style, interaction mechanics, the wonky organ music all contribute to such a happy atmosphere.
WongKongPhooey
WongKongPhooey1 May 2019, 10:40
I laughed out loud when I went to sculpt my first pot and stuck my ham hands right through the middle of it, shrinking the middle to the width of a twig. It's a great jam game that feels really polished and clean. It's also totally unique. Well done!
Tuomo
Tuomo1 May 2019, 13:03
Absolutely wonderful atmosphere! Music and the visuals are on point and executed perfectly. However I think that the gameplay needs lot of tuning. At first I thought that creation of the pots fun and interesting mechanic, but after playing through several days I noticed that it didn’t really matter at all what I did to the pot. I did experiment where I created two pots according the order and one that wasn’t anything like the order. Got best price out of the “bad” one..

Overall I think that your game is a solid entry. Artsy atmosphere really makes up the shortcomings in gameplay. Great job!
Akagane1 May 2019, 13:17
The music didnt play the first time I launched the game. One more thing is that the paper is the same color with the white clay, so it can be difficult to understand the form of a pot. Except grom these problems the game is nearly perfect!
Erkberg
Erkberg1 May 2019, 17:36
Pretty damn awesome game! The mechanics are quite innovative, the visuals are beautiful and cute, music is quite fitting and relaxing. The color mixing was a bit beyond me, I think there could be more feedback what color you currently have. Also, some sounds would've been nice. Still, a great game from you yet again, good job!
SecondDimension
SecondDimensionauthor1 May 2019, 18:16
@dark1knight @tg1397 @jjjjason - Thank you all very much, we're really pleased with the mood of it. I agree with that some sounds effects would be good, but I just ran out of time (only just got the music done). Also I know the theme interpretation is loose, but we just really wanted to try this idea out.

@WongKongPhooey @KonH @turbogros - Thanks for the kind words!

@Tuomo - Thanks for your nice comments about the mood! I agree on the pot valuation, it is just straight up broken. I essentially made it check that the exact RGB colour value matched, but that is way too specific and makes it seem kind of random. Although porcelain pots are worth a lot more, so that could have contributed to it

@Akagane - Glad you liked it, I agree about the porcelain designs on the white paper, but we just didn't have time to change it

@Erkberg - Thanks! I did really want to change the paintbrush to show your current colour, but it was one of many things I had to abandon due to the time limit
saucygames
saucygames1 May 2019, 20:51
Beautiful visuals felt like a story book! life is hard for an artist haha. "if i turn up the heat all the way it will bake it faster just like real cooking lolol"
Linheha1 May 2019, 22:11
This game is so cool! It's one of my favourite so far :) Really love the graphics and the gameplay, I found it relaxing and I love games like this!
Just one thing, maybe you could add more feedback on the painting part, like which color do you have on your pencil before putting it on the pot (or maybe it was made on purpose?), and also, I realised on my 3rd pot that the paint jar on the right was water (I didn't saw the icon right away), so maybe (it's just a suggestion) you could change the shape of this pot, to differentiate it from the others?
I hope you will continue making games like this! :)
Well done! :)
ruddgasm2 May 2019, 00:53
I absolutely love the art in this. It reminds me of a lot of childrens books, especially with the animal characters. Very cool concept as well. I really like trying to make the pots as close to the design as possible and enjoyed each of the mini games associated with it. I ended up playing for about 5 days before I started just selling cracked, paintless, shapeless, cylinders of clay and people still payed over $400 for each of them so it seemed impossible to lose at that point. Cool and unique with great art, my kind of game.
Jiri Hysek
Jiri Hysek2 May 2019, 21:07
Amazing graphics and with music and chilled gameplay the game has really nice overal mood.. my children will love it, we have to play it tomorrow :)
ProdigalSon
ProdigalSon3 May 2019, 00:43
This was relaxing and a refreshing take on the theme, I mean it is really hard to connect it with the theme but I appreciate the change in tones and the relaxing mood this has.

My first attempt was...shall I say not good. lol

But then I made this master piece! Even has a heart to match the theme ;) lol

Nicely done
ColeSlaughter
ColeSlaughter3 May 2019, 06:47
Well this is a downright gorgeous game! I love how much space it gives the player to be creative, you don't see that much in LD games. :)

As an engineer, I was particularly impressed by the sculpting phase of the pottery making process

Bringing down the temperature during the baking part could mmmaaaaaayyyybe be sped up a bit, but that's just me nitpicking.

This was a pretty relaxing entry!
inkyglow3 May 2019, 07:58
What a gorgeous game! Such a peaceful feeling, I really enjoyed it. The art is superb!
Tommyflower
Tommyflower3 May 2019, 08:09
Being a potter and a programmer I've always wanted to make a gam like this one, but I could never think a good way of representing all the phases. This little gem makes my dreams come true! I absolutely adored the cute graphics, the music and the organic way to move from a place to another maintaining the context of the little studio. Every detail was well thought and the modeling phase realistic and intuitive to play. The only part I had trouble to understand was the kiln. The mechanics of firing weren't very clear to me. The thing is you want to choose the right temperature, but in this case you have to cue until you see the bar moving and then it wasn't clear how to stop the kiln. Maybe it's just me. A little idea for future development that comes from my pottery background: one of the most triky parts is filling the kiln with pots so that they don't touch each other (or they would stick!). Also if the temperature is too high the glaze can run and again you end up with pots sticked to the shelf. Beautiful game! I'll play this again and again!
Jin9310
Jin93103 May 2019, 09:12
Wow I didn't really expect that I will have the opportunity to try pottery during this jam :) What a nice surprise and nice entry. Very cute graphics and overall mood along with really well handled pottery-mechanic. Even the painting feels really good and everything is nice and easy to control. Really nice entry!
koemeterion3 May 2019, 18:59
Loveley. Just that one word!
DeathBySnail3 May 2019, 20:50
Cool idea, worth bending the theme for. Love the huge dog hands.
LeviDSmith
LeviDSmith5 May 2019, 02:18
This is a really nice unique game, but it's too bad the Ludum Dare theme wasn't pottery games. I like how it rates your pieces after you complete all three. At first I didn't know how to sculpt the clay, then I figured out how to move the hands around.
Drauthius
Drauthius5 May 2019, 17:37
I couldn't figure out how to move the hands up and down, only inwards at the bottom, creating some very questionable pottery. Nice concept though.
Sam Machell
Sam Machell5 May 2019, 19:35
The process of making the pots was fun but I found the paint specifically confusing. The lack of feedback made it hard to work out what I was doing wrong when it wasn't coming out well. Graphics are beautiful! Great job!
Webox
Webox5 May 2019, 19:39
Damn those are some beautifuls drawings and style. I loved it, super relaxing.. My pottery was a piece of.. sh.. Great job! it doesn't quite fit the theme but you said that in the description!
icedmetal575 May 2019, 19:40
Really interesting game. Great art-style and music. Reminds me of Richard Scarry or Night in the Woods style art. Gameplay is pretty cool too. Took a moment to realize what I was doing.
MlleAB
MlleAB5 May 2019, 20:15
I loved the graphic style. Very good work on it! My remarks will concern music that lacks punch at times and perhaps too much of a plump. Then put in place a variable cooking time and faster energize the game It seems that there is a bug when waiting for customers, the time of appearance being very long
Great job to the team, I hope to see you again in October. Your team promises!
Stefan Jovanovic
Stefan Jovanovic5 May 2019, 20:25
Such a beatiful graphics. Reminds me of Night in the Woods. Also gameplay is nice as well as the sounds. Keep up the great work!
SimplePotential5 May 2019, 20:45
I liked this but I never could figure out how to shape the clay. I could make it tall and slim or short and fat but no hour glass shapes or anything like that. Obviously possible form other people's screen prints though. I liked the take on the theme and the controls were done well (aside from what I'm sure is me not figuring out the aforementioned shaping). My stuff sold for about $1100 each but only played for 3 days so I guess shape didn't matter much
lukbebalduke
lukbebalduke6 May 2019, 03:09
Wonderful! I had a lovely experience playing your game! You all did an amazing job putting together the artistic style along with gameplay and audio so smoothly, creating a chill setting that makes this one of the best entries I've played so far!

I cannot exactly see where the theme is featured in this game, but honestly - I don't think I care that much haha!

Keep up the good work :)

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