Cultists on ICE

by pusheeneiro

Overall★★★★★★★★★★3.64

Fun★★★★★★★★★★3.65

Innovation★★★★★★★★★★4.07

Theme★★★★★★★★★★3.86

Humor★★★★★★★★★★3.39

Mood★★★★★★★★★★3.54

Have you ever wondered what an ice show and a demonic cult have in common?

Thanks to "Cultists on ICE" you can find the answer to this now!

Take on the role of the ruler of the cultists, who create and manages them so that the lines of blood flowing from them summon a demon straight from hell.
See how the lack of friction makes it more difficult to perform a dark ritual and complete 20 levels of increasing difficulty.

Once you're done, post your best time.
Maybe you'll be the one to claim the title of demon summoner with the most grace on ice.

Tip for start (if you want)

Created by:

Design and coding - Pusheeneiro

Used Assets:

Winter Design - fuzzybuttgaming.itch.io/winter-design-0

Animated slime -pixelfranek.itch.io/slime

Skull Sprite - hnyknck.itch.io/skull-sprite

Black Cultist - kdya.itch.io/16x16-black-cultist

Iceblock UI - thewizardofthewoods.itch.io/iceblockui

Spike - pixel-poem.itch.io/dungeon-assetpuck

SFX UI Button Click by suntemple - freesound.org/s/253168/

Hidden Spike Trap by qubodup - freesound.org/s/166535/

Z-Fem 01 - Awake.wav by angelkunev - freesound.org/s/560586/

Slime Jump by DrMinky - freesound.org/s/167045/

horror laugh original - freesound.org/s/133674/

evil laugh-08.wav by Nanakisan - freesound.org/s/132802/

"Burn The World Waltz" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

Tags: #2d, #difficult, #physics, #pixel art, #puzzle-platformer, #short, #speedrun, #unity

Genres: puzzle

Tools: Unity

Comments54

Zee Yuen16 Apr 2024, 02:19

I can't seem to move with WASD??

LDJam user 27355716 Apr 2024, 02:26

Super fun! It felt like one of the games I would have gotten addicted to in elementary school, it reminded me of the games I used to play on newgrounds and what not

Figaro16 Apr 2024, 02:28

A great concept but I found it got tedious. I think I would have liked it more if the cultists weren't on ice and it was more of a pure puzzle game. I often knew what I wanted to do but had to fight with the map too much to do it. Very cool though!

Pusheeneiroauthor16 Apr 2024, 02:30

@zee-yuen Strangely, no one had a problem with this during testing, but just in case the arrow keys should work too.

@mcmuniz Thanks for your comment, the old newgrounds games were one of my inspirations.

@figaro Thanks for feedback, I use ice for some new style of play, the puzzles are especially simpler to equalize the level of combat with the map XD

JakeGilla16 Apr 2024, 02:30

Really creative idea! like the simple puzzle format, but difficulty ramps up quick!

XXXI_16 Apr 2024, 02:30

oh man i need someone to show me how to finish the second level lmao

Pugg16 Apr 2024, 02:32

Awesome idea! The first demon that requires 4 lines kicked my butt

LDJam user 38567116 Apr 2024, 03:04

This was a really fun submission!

Great example of taking a simple concept and doing it well.
There was a good amount of variety in the levels.
Soundtrack was an absolute banger.
Loved the design of the little cultists.

Overall amazing work!

pres230016 Apr 2024, 03:11

This was pretty unique. The difficulty does ramp pretty quickly, and it can be hard to anticipate exactly how the ice would work. I could see people spending a lot of time playing something like this. It gives me a bit of nostalgia for some older puzzle games, and I think it is built well. Nice work!

Kamizenki16 Apr 2024, 06:09

Good work! Seems like a patient game. It is hard for me to interact with more cultists at first.

BenjaminW16 Apr 2024, 06:44

Pretty fun challenge. I agree with the others I can see it being one of those newgrounds games. Gameplay is clear cut and easy to understand, well-executed concept.

Mhanicos16 Apr 2024, 07:28

Love this! Cool soundtrack, and interesting gameplay

Magnat16 Apr 2024, 10:05

Fun idea ! I think the control may need to be adjusted a bit to make it less frustrating when you have to bring more than 1 summon behind the scull.
Nice entry overall :)

Escyll16 Apr 2024, 10:49

Whahaha, this game was fun. Super original but damn frustrating (in the good sense!).
The bouncy guys.... little shits. Great sound and graphics :D.

johsam16 Apr 2024, 11:12

Pretty well

Suksu16 Apr 2024, 11:18

Game got quite frustrating on some levels :D but other than that a nice little concept with cool graphics. Well done.

AshKetchdem16 Apr 2024, 13:28

really well made, awesome soundtrack and super slick (get it?) gameplay. The puzzles are fun and the art style is amazing. Really nice entry, keep it up!

Vantalogic16 Apr 2024, 13:31

Fun game. While I didn’t struggle with any of the puzzles I can see how they would be hard if I didn’t happen to be standing in the right spot just on accident. Really good submission

Floke16 Apr 2024, 14:08

Quite a fun idea! Really difficult and frustrating...
I had a bug multiple times where a cultist (or sometimes multiple) couldn't die anymore, but could also not spawn any blood lines. One time I couldn't finish the level because of this and had to restart the game

Pusheeneiroauthor16 Apr 2024, 14:13

@floke Thank for your feedback and sorry for the frustration.
I see this error, but I don't know how to reproduce it.
This game was supposed to be frustrating, but not because of bugs XD

Floke16 Apr 2024, 14:21

Ah, I didnt mean frustrating because of the bug - bad wording there :D
The levels were frustrating enough, especially these bouncy blue things. They made me _very_ angry...

auphonium16 Apr 2024, 14:34

This is a hidden game, I could get addicted to this game!

betovf16 Apr 2024, 14:42

Great entry. It is kinda difficult but challenging though. Good job!

EmaZuro16 Apr 2024, 16:29

This hgame is really fun, but kinda hard. The friction is well made! Absolutely in love.

sirJupitron16 Apr 2024, 16:37

Hi! clever mix of action and puzzle solving with amazing level design. Thank you!

jnur16 Apr 2024, 17:30

Fun, feel like this could be a really good puzzle game idea even without the ice mechanics. The puzzle part suffers a bit from having to fight against the cultists sliding all over the place :sweat_smile:

konstantinreed16 Apr 2024, 17:58

A fun puzzle; after understanding the principle on the first level, it became quite easy. Thanks for the work!

0x0961h16 Apr 2024, 18:00

Two things that I wasn't expecting to see together: cultists and ice. And you managed to combine them into one. Amazing. :laughing: Very solid entry with a very simple and nice game loop that made a huge space for challenging puzzles. Great job!

Cats in jackets16 Apr 2024, 18:01

Aw man thats hard! I couldnt fininsh second level Music is cool btw

eonarheim16 Apr 2024, 18:38

Great puzzler! Hilarious title! I'm hooked!

Music was great too!

nsadie16 Apr 2024, 18:40

Quite diffi(cult) :laughing:! A really original idea, I liked it!

The_BM16 Apr 2024, 19:49

Noice game.Started simple but got more difficult.

I also found a bug:

LDJam user 016 Apr 2024, 19:53

What a cool and challenging concept! I really enjoyed the mix of puzzles and the unique ice mechanic. Great work on creating a fun and engaging game that keeps players on their toes!

Pusheeneiroauthor16 Apr 2024, 19:53

@the-bm I know about this bug, I'm fixing it in the post-jam patch, but I'm having trouble reproducing it.
I see it several times, but I don't know why XD

StaNov16 Apr 2024, 20:41

It was fun, let's state that as the first point.

The ice was kinda unpredictable, the controls were very unresponsive, but I can see it was the intent and the chaos was kinda nice touch :)

Thanks for stopping by at my stream!

Kirass16 Apr 2024, 22:30

Cool game, I liked it!

OrangeDragon16 Apr 2024, 23:01

Cool game! I like the style and the heavy metal track playing in the background is a banger :)
The gameplay is great, but I gave up on the level where you need 6 blood lines and spawn points are separated horisontally by spikes in the centre. It became too difficult for me at that point and I've already played for 20 minutes by that time ^_^' Guess I'm not much of a figure skater xD
Anyway, good job!

parkuhrmd16 Apr 2024, 23:08

Thanks for the stream submission! I really like the idea of the game, and figuring out the way to position your cultist squad through the ice courses was really nice :)

LDJam user 016 Apr 2024, 23:34

Really liked the game! Hope you make lots more in the future!

Merb100017 Apr 2024, 03:47

Fun idea! Some levels felt more like puzzles and others more like precision. I enjoyed it! The same principle could be used to solve most levels, but others required more work. Great job!

Ziggy17 Apr 2024, 10:02

Cool concept, has some nice puzzles to scratch your head, good work!

Cats in jackets17 Apr 2024, 10:54

Wasnt able to figure out how it really works past level one :(

LDJam user 38700217 Apr 2024, 14:15

Very fun! And I am very bad at this, but I felt compelled to continue. I will someday get through all 20 levels!

Yopin17 Apr 2024, 14:15

Really fun, pretty game. I like that logic puzzles that you've made. First stage firstly was confusing, but after notime, it clicked.

Roman Dubrovin17 Apr 2024, 17:15

This game is pretty challenging and fun to play! Also, I like the music

Rubikon18 Apr 2024, 08:05

I'm too dum-dum to finish it but I can see that it's overall a great game and it's given a lot of thought in level-design.

Tommy18 Apr 2024, 21:54

Really really good game, with a really unique idea and a great vibe! Loved the music and also the SFX of "despawning" cultists :D

Saryah19 Apr 2024, 12:14

Really hard, but good. Thats what she said. Great puzzle mechanics quite unique. :)

Custodi19 Apr 2024, 13:03

So difficult & creative game. I like it, especially SFX, but sometiles feels that input movement is too tough)

schwede19 Apr 2024, 20:42

Glad you joined the stream today, hope you enjoyed it!

Unfortunately, the cultists forgot to put on their ice skates. It's a total slip-and-slide affair. However, it is a game with a lot of potential for puzzles!

Mcgiants20 Apr 2024, 02:23

Most people avoid ice levels, but you found a way to use it to introduce a unique challenge. Thanks for sharing. (PS, thought I was clever on one level where you get a cultist by default with right clicking it, but it did nothing. Dang).

Sariiger21 Apr 2024, 13:27

I don't know what's more frustrating, the spike maze level where you have to get through the maze with 2 cultists, and they keep desyncing from each other and going in different directions even though the inputs are the same, or this troll slime that decided to block the gap after I spent over half an hour getting here, staying there, and refusing to move anywhere.

Despite all the rage inducing parts this game is bringing in, it's very solid and I love the idea! Shame I wasn't able to beat it, but this slime is really just messing up everything.

Pusheeneiroauthor21 Apr 2024, 14:50

@sariiger I plan to add all these fixes in a post jam patch