Niki the Ghost

co-authored: @loku, @mikolaj-luczko
Overall★★★★★★★★★★3.12
Fun★★★★★★★★★★2.70
Innovation★★★★★★★★★★2.71
Theme★★★★★★★★★★2.64
Graphics★★★★★★★★★★2.73
Audio★★★★★★★★★★3.09
Humor★★★★★★★★★★2.73
Mood★★★★★★★★★★2.88
Story:
How did Niki become a ghost? That’s kind of beside the point… the important thing is, they can’t escape the earthly bounds, and get into The Paradise.

Niki is trapped here by a curse that can be only lifted by placing the gems in correct places, hence breaking the spell. They get a brief insight into the future at the beginning of each cycle, but if they make a mistake in their gem-wielding efforts, Niki is doomed to start again, and so The Loop continues…

While Niki’s worst fear is clearly a gap in their short-term memory, it’s not the only danger that they face on their journey. The tiles they’re stepping on are quite fragile - some of them already show signs of wear, and it would probably be wise to avoid them.

If Niki forgets the details of their previous insight, they can wait a hundred years for another one, but there’s only so much time a cursed soul can spend waiting for Salvation…

Instructions:

Memorise the correct placement of gems and positions of faulty tiles - stepping on them will result in Niki going back to the beginning.
Complete three levels by placing gems of correct colours, on correct tiles.
If you get stuck, you can use Niki's insight ability - but doing so will make them weaker. Use too many insights and Niki will need to go back to the beginning.

Controls:
- Move by clicking on appropriate tiles with left mouse button. You can move to all neighbouring tiles, also diagonally. You can't move while the correct positions are being displayed.
- Place red gems by pressing the 'r' key.
- Place blue gems by pressing the 'b' key.
- Place green gems by pressing the 'g' key.
- Get insights by pressing the 'i' key.

Team:
- Daniel Bober (interstateeight) - programming
- Mikolaj Luczko - programming
- Piotr Wojnar (Loku) - sound design

screenshot
Genres: puzzle

Comments18

Jaycee Sandvig
Jaycee Sandvig5 Oct 2020, 23:41
Fun! The movement and object placing feel a little sluggish, but it's a fun game with a straightforward objective and I love the ghost jokes between plays.
Curruff5 Oct 2020, 23:51
The idea is an interesting concept, but the movement is slow and sluggish. It's be a lot better if you didn't have to wait after moving 1 tile, and I'd say WASD arrow keys would be a better way to move. Still, for a game jam, it's a pretty good game.
SnailRhymer
SnailRhymer6 Oct 2020, 12:17
I agree that the movement could have been more responsive, especially in a game like this where you might have to repeat stages again. I managed to get to the third level, but the fates doomed Niki to an eternity of ghostdom:

The core gamplay was fun, and I really liked the music building as you placed more gems!
interstateeight
interstateeightauthor6 Oct 2020, 12:47
Thank you for the feedback @snailrhymer! You can actually move diagonally as well, we have updated the instructions on the page to say that now.
Walkingtall856 Oct 2020, 15:51
Yes the diagonal movement was a nice hint, a bit more responsiveness would have been nice (i.e. queue movement and execute once the last move has finished) but aside from that it was a nice idea.
Finn_Tr6 Oct 2020, 17:03
I really like the simple but very fun idea, the art is very good, the music and sound effect is fantastic and make this a very chill, relaxing little game! Well done!
TebionDL6 Oct 2020, 20:19
I like memorising, and this game was a good way of put it into practice. The change I will make is for the ghost to move faster, the rest is quite good.
Meatball
Meatball6 Oct 2020, 22:04
This is great! I like the simple controls and really tasteful graphics/colours/music.
coryru7 Oct 2020, 01:53
The music building was cool but it honestly took me a while to figure out what to do with this one which took me out of the experience. Great style and atmosphere though
Smoothie7 Oct 2020, 02:22
This is a great entry. I was on edge the whole time, I really thought I was going to get jumpscared :sweat_smile: Absolutely nailed the mood category!!
snowinn7 Oct 2020, 04:26
This was a cool take on a memory game ! I like how the music built as you got the gems correct!
Eugenik
Eugenik7 Oct 2020, 04:49
trop mignon!
Savvy Community
Savvy Community10 Oct 2020, 15:09
Hey :D thanks for showing us your game! First of all congrats for your entry, the game itself is really well made and works, music is also nicely done. As other players said, the ghost is moving too slowly, that makes it frustrating to go to point A to B by clicking over and over. I also feel like you could enhance the atmosphere to fit your story even more and add different events for next levels, to make it trickier. That's some suggestions if you want to go back working on this game one time or another, but it's already really nice. Good job!

Cheers!
Akai_Pixels
Akai_Pixels14 Oct 2020, 18:17
Nice game! the mechanics are simple but effective, I'm not the greatest with memory games so I felt that the difficulty spiked a little bit too fast. Sound effects are nice and chill and the ghost it self is pretty cute :D
ARBEX
ARBEX17 Oct 2020, 16:47
cool little number, i like the textures of the sound effects. couldn't find the guy behind them tho, would appreciate social media links
ploy
ploy19 Oct 2020, 11:19
So sloooooow :((( Awesome game mechanics!!!
Matootsy
Matootsy24 Oct 2020, 10:51
Interesting memory game. I like this simple mechanic. It could be addictive with more reactivity and polish and feedback. The fantom is very slow and it's boring to wait that he reach a tile to go to another. I don't feel the theme, because restarting levels is the base of almost all videogames. Anyway. This kinf of mechanic could be addictive with improvement on the whole design.
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