Ludum Dare #48compo

into the past

by ty

Overall★★★★★★★★★★3.58

Fun★★★★★★★★★★2.83

Innovation★★★★★★★★★★3.32

Theme★★★★★★★★★★4.24

Graphics★★★★★★★★★★3.63

Audio★★★★★★★★★★3.71

Humor★★★★★★★★★★1.25

Mood★★★★★★★★★★4.03

*into the past* is a 5-minute top-down narrative adventure game about exploring the past and healing.

made by bucketfish for ld48 compo: deeper and deeper.

TRIGGER WARNING!

*into the past* touches on subjects such as depression and mental health, as well as implied self-harm and a pen knife. proceed with care!

in *into the past*, you play as a protagonist reminiscing the past and your journey coming out of depression. the theme for the jam is deeper and deeper, and my take on it is going 1) deeper into depression and 2) deeper into the past.

controls

use either arrow keys or wasd to move around and click on the objects that light up to interact with them.

Tags: #2d, #narrative, #time travel, #top down adventure, #top-down

Genres: interactive fiction

Comments31

Emily Pitcher26 Apr 2021, 06:30

Hey, I can't move at all from the start of the game. Maybe check your input?

ty_author26 Apr 2021, 08:29

@emily-pitcher that's odd, everyone else who's played it said it worked for them. are you playing on html5, mac, or windows?

TomekS26 Apr 2021, 08:42

Wow the presentation is excellent, very nice to the eye and coherent. I love it

VainCil26 Apr 2021, 08:54

Wow, this is special, I was sucked into the story right away! Graphics are beautiful, and the music does a great job at not feeling too repetitive. 5/5 in Mood and Theme!

Just a little confusion at first with the fact that the keyboard doesn’t allow the player to interact with elements. Am I right? The space bar can be used for going to the next page when reading stuff, but not to start reading or to do "Recall" or "Back".

TinyHatGames26 Apr 2021, 09:42

Interesting take on the theme, it's sort of heavy but with a happy ending. I liked it!

frogmen26 Apr 2021, 09:55

deceptively cute... so dark in a really interesting way. great take on the theme. hope the main character finds some peace

Emily Pitcher26 Apr 2021, 10:06

For some reason, it works now -- I'll go ahead and play your game now!

Sir. Syko26 Apr 2021, 13:18

Wow such a deep game in such a short amount of time. Very nice, well done :smile:

TomBuston26 Apr 2021, 13:35

Nice take on the theme, the narration mechanic with the "recall" is a great touch to tell this story.
Well done :)

Saraza2326 Apr 2021, 17:33

I love the music and the drawings! Also moving and controlling the character is super fluent

FussenKuh26 Apr 2021, 21:39

Quite an interesting concept with some quality art and sound. With those tools, you've really done a good job creating mood in this game.

N30HRTGDV26 Apr 2021, 23:19

I like the concept, the delivery and execution are also pretty well done!! I am thrilled with the "recall" mechanic and I hope to see more of it.

Chensu26 Apr 2021, 23:21

Really love the graphics! It's all perfectly done

ty_author27 Apr 2021, 03:42

@tomeks @vaincil @frogmen @emily-pitcher @sir-syko @tombuston @saraza23 @fussenkuh @n30hrtgdv @chensu thank you so much for your kind comments!
- yes, you can't interact with the items with the keyboard - i started off trying to use it, then i realised that it would be pretty tough to work when the player is near two interactable items. spacebar for next in dialogue is unintentional - an input i forgot to remove - but it seems to add to the effect, so i'll keep it!
- i'm planning to expand on this game or make a sequel, so if you have any ideas or additional suggestion/feedback at all, feel free to let me know! (either here or via discord at bucketfish#3961) thank you so much for your support

Emily Pitcher27 Apr 2021, 03:46

I'm back with comments (Had to wait a day to leave them because I hadn't submitted my game yet lol). I really like the topic you chose -- I personally prefer deep narrative games, so this really touched on that. The concept is really nice!

made327 Apr 2021, 07:34

A deep game for a deep topic. I like that with every recall the environment changes and adds to the mood

Aret2427 Apr 2021, 07:44

I put mood all the way, I'm really sorry for her :( Game is cool, as some people said, yes I would like to see a sequel (a bit longer) with more story about her. Art style is so nice that I want to hug the main character

Valid27 Apr 2021, 07:50

Nice art with a deep message. Thanks for the game, definitely could see more content being added.

mockthebear27 Apr 2021, 22:04

geez the art you made. Also the message

Marcenat29 Apr 2021, 10:40

It's hard to talk about such subjects, and I think your game shows that video game is a great medium for that.

The art is effective, the writing is good, but my favorite thing is the progressive soundtrack, it really elevate the experience.

I wish it wasn't so short which shows it was good ^^

Great job, I wish you the best !

Recher29 Apr 2021, 23:13

The "recall" mechanic recalls me (ha ha ha) of this previous game, made by deepnight, who win regularly Ludum Dares : https://deepnight.net/games/memento-xii/ . Maybe you should try it. It's also about history, mood, atmosphere and loneliness.

I liked your game, we should have more like this. We do not know if it is biographic, autobiographic or completely invented, and that's also what is interesting with it. Some mysteries.

About more technical concerns : when the white shine-lines appears to show an interactive object, it is difficult to know exactly where to click to use it. I often try to click in the center of the lines and miss it.

Thank you for this game.

ty_author30 Apr 2021, 10:13

thank you so much @recher ! i checked out the game you recommended, it's a really neat piece of work. i will keep in mind your comments about the white lines for a post-jam version :) thank you for taking the time to write such a detailed comment!

U-Tsang Clan30 Apr 2021, 22:37

I get `GLctx is undefined` when I try to start the game on OSX. Is there a fix for this? It worked for me on a Linux machine, so I played and rated it. Nice game otherwise. :)

ty_author1 May 2021, 00:18

@u-tsang-clan oh, that's weird. are you running it on web on osx or the downloaded version? i use a mac and it works for me both ways D: i'll have to look into that. but thanks!

LDJam user 2365451 May 2021, 03:45

Unique take on the theme, and brave choice on the subject matter.

I feel like it was a staple of a bygone era of games where you could "talk" with any object to get a description of it. I appreciated that element in your game, where there were extra objects to interact with, even when they didn't progress the main story forward.

Great work for your first entry!

ElSombrero1 May 2021, 04:06

I saw it's your first game and I'm so impressed dude
Great Job

wheybags1 May 2021, 13:59

Hey, video playthrough as promised :) https://seafile.wheybags.com/f/a222b8237b8641b186eb/

Short and to the point little game. Music was nice! For your first game well done. I think my first game ever was just snake :D. I tried the downloadable windows version first, it seems you forgot to upload some accompanying files, it didn't launch for me. I also had some small trouble with the hitbox on one of the interactable items, but I got it in the end.

yetanother1 May 2021, 15:56

The cute music contrast well with the game.
The concept is a really interesting interpretation of the game.

Molpe1 May 2021, 19:30

This is a very nice game with a serious idea nicely incorporated. I like how you can see all the things around changing. I LOVE the art style and the music! :heart: Great job :heart:

My LP :slight_smile:

ty_author1 May 2021, 23:46

thank you so much for your playthrough, @molpe ! i really enjoyed watching your video and i'm so glad you liked it and all the kind comments you made during the video. thank you so much.

STiN5 May 2021, 13:56

Nice and simple game. Good job

Other games by @ty

★3.79

★3.83

Procrastination Simulator

★3.50

LD50

co-authored