Pro Epistula Mori

by squimmy

co-authored: @frocto

Overall★★★★★★★★★★3.72

Fun★★★★★★★★★★3.60

Innovation★★★★★★★★★★3.50

Theme★★★★★★★★★★4.22

Graphics★★★★★★★★★★3.35

Audio★★★★★★★★★★3.37

Humor★★★★★★★★★★4.04

Mood★★★★★★★★★★3.59

The time: World War I. The place: also World War I. The carrier pigeons are on strike or something and the War Thunder forums are yet to be invented. The only way to share classified military secrets is to deliver them by hand.

As a runner, your mission is to deliver a message from the General in the south-east of the trenches to the Major, in the north-west.

Heading into no man’s land will make it easier for the enemy to spot you, and leave you with no cover to hide behind when they do. moving through the muddy trenches is safer but slow going, and you’ll still need to hit the deck to avoid occasional machine gun fire.

As the war marches on, the enemy will deploy new weapons against you, but the letters you’ve been entrusted with are vital to the war effort. You must ensure their successful delivery.

Controls:
- WASD or Arrow keys to move
- hold `Z` or `Space` to crawl
- A controller might work too? I haven't tested.

- Engine: Godot (with Dialogic)
- Art: Aseprite, comfy52 Palette Photoshop
- Audio: LMMS, sfxr
- Fonts: m6x11, LT Museum, GreatVibes, Blackadder ITC

*2023-05-02 07:10 UTC: added "'serviceWorker' in navigator" fix for chrome*

The version of the game on itch.io includes a bugfix made after the submission deadline. If you are going to rate the game, please play the version hosted here on ldjam.com.

If you're just playing for fun, try the version on itch.io.

Tags: #pixel art, #war

Genres: action

Tools: Aseprite, Godot, LMMS, sfxr

Comments31

oscarglo2 May 2023, 14:01

A nice arcade style game, with funny writing

MKRaw2 May 2023, 14:05

I love the character portrait art

Renneberg2 May 2023, 14:06

FUn game, loved the humor. Nice to have a few different enemey attack patterns as well

Smoky012 May 2023, 14:16

I agree with the previous comments, the arcade game is very funny, but it's a pity for the little men))

Guardaro2 May 2023, 19:21

Very nice! Challenging, good illustrations, absurdly large numbers of siblings. I enjoyed the additional hazards as things went along. Nice entry!

Saviqq2 May 2023, 19:43

Cute little game, had a good experience, nothing major to complain about :) Collected all the letters. My question is, what font did you use for the dialogs? I like it

Sweedy2 May 2023, 19:43

Dialog system is great, I love pico-style games! Keep it up!

Cinterre2 May 2023, 21:05

The family will never be the same. At least I'm not a weenie. Really like the character portraits. It was quite fun, well done!

eharp3 May 2023, 01:12

The progression of new challenge mechanics works really well. I also liked the narrative setup for constantly dying. There were a couple times where I got trapped after having delivered a letter and couldn't avoid the incoming fire when play resumed. The immediate restart made this not a big deal but it felt a bit like an unnecessary speed bump.

Calamador3 May 2023, 05:28

This is an excellent layering of mechanics. I love how each letter leads you to wonder what crazy thing will happen next to heighten the stakes and the difficulty of each following letter. Also I appreciate how much detail was put into the dialogue, especially your "lives" system.

Only piece of criticism I have for this is that you can sometimes be killed inside the delivery points where you get dialogue but you respawn there too so its not too big an issue.

Oh and I want to say that I really appreciate the menu having settings for sound that play sfx and music so you can tune things just the way you like it! Very much appreciated for a jam game!

squimmyauthor3 May 2023, 12:58

@smoky01 such is the tragedy of war :(

@saviqq the font used in dialog and buttons is m6x11 by Daniel Linssen

@cinterre I was thinking of adding a message at the end of the game to tell you how many memorial plaques were sent to Mrs. Parts after the war, but that seemed a bit dark so I added the timer and made it show the time to complete instead.

@eharp, @calamador yes, I really should have added an exclusion zone around the delivery areas, not just because it can kill you unfairly, but also because the General and the Major are sensitive souls who shouldn't have to put up with breathing poison gas and being shot by artillery...

Zephyr193 May 2023, 15:30

The art is so good.

sorreveloper3 May 2023, 16:33

Very good on the character and dialogue system, reminded me the old games, a fun game to play!

Hoshinu3 May 2023, 16:37

Very fun! The difficulty really ramps up very quickly, but the theme is on point and you did a great job with the art and characters! I really liked the duck and cover mechanic too, very unique!

Antonin Browne3 May 2023, 16:40

I really like the dialogue and atmosphere, great game!

spacemyname3 May 2023, 17:38

Love your art style! Had fun playing :)

HerryFabien3 May 2023, 17:42

Man they had way bigger family back in the days it look like hahahaha.
The placement of obstacle can get really weird sometimes.

Like when they bombard one of the outpost and you are told "your brother died in no mans land" . Also the bombardement is slowing you down BEFORE they appear when it is still just a target

Apple Dash3 May 2023, 18:12

I didn't think that you can make a silly WW1 game, but here we are. I really liked the writing and how it fits the gameplay. As for the gameplay, it can be a bit annoying later on, when the shelling becomes overwhelming and your movement is slowed down because of all the craters.

Brandon Campbell3 May 2023, 20:20

This was funny, and the gameplay was original. My only complaint is that you have to go through a dialogue sequence every time you die.

Paul Avallone4 May 2023, 00:40

Very clever game. Love the style. Art and sound are on point. Music is good too. The game buildings in difficulty very well with the new kinds of attacks. Great job!

LDJam user 2805094 May 2023, 10:27

Cool game!

Love the handwriting and scribbles on the letters. And the faces of characters are great

The final stage is moderately challenging. Fun gameplay!

kanity4 May 2023, 11:41

The concept is interesting, I like that the gameplay feels fresh, and holy crap there are a lot of brothers! :) The letters unclocked after playing are a great addition, and I really liked them. The gameplay was a bit hard for me, but I enjoyed the challenge itself. Music really fits the game.

Flaterectomy4 May 2023, 16:57

The never-ending waves of brothers was a fun way to explain multiple lives! Clever design and nice ramping up of difficulty and new forms of incoming damage. The music started getting on my nerves a little after a while - a lot of mud in the bottom end of the mix. All in all, *I had a blast.* Well.. I got blasted.

XeduR4 May 2023, 21:41

I do have a soft spot for the art style used in the portraits. For a game as cutesy as this, I felt the brothers were a bit too expendable. :smile:

At first I thought you were supposed to run on the wall, but then I realised you can just run across the field and that was the entire point (or only way to survive given how the firing zones worked). I think that could have been stressed a bit more. That cost the lives of at least 3 brothers.

SvenErik5 May 2023, 12:52

Haha very nice arcade game~ That little whoop on the warthunder forums too tehehe~ Got the movie "1917 vibes out of it too. Loved the minimal graphics style, very lovely palette. Overall a jolly good job on it!

Skel3ton5 May 2023, 20:17

I liked that you can actually read the letters. And it was funny how many brothers were massacred in this terrible conflict :D

Very well written. Fine humor.

In the end it was pure chaos and I liked it

LDJam user 05 May 2023, 20:40

hilarious, well done. just fantastic writing in general. the game was fun, and pretty hard, but not annoying

ping785 May 2023, 20:55

Nice game, Love the dialogue and atmosphere.

Well done.