into the forest depths

This is the best looking game I've played so far! It fits the theme well and I like that you can target different body parts in the combat and I really like that they get visually worn out as you attack them

Amazing art style! I love how you created good-looking characters and a very good blending environment. and I love the turnbase gameplay too, easy to know where it's weakness. It would be cool if you could add some FX or animation so that I can easily see the character attack and the enemy receive the damage.

The game looks absolutely incredible, I truly love the art style, however gameplay felt a little repetitive and could use some music but was decent :)

Love the art! Love how gruesome things get too. Could definitely see myself playing a fully realized game like this. Great work!

The game looks great, but plays very monotonous. I liked the idea of a roadmap for the hero, but it didn't get much development in gameplay. The music is also lacking, it makes a very big part of the atmosphere. Anyway, this is a very good first run at Ludum Dare!

I love the art and overall vibe! I can see how this would be really fun with a more fleshed out gameplay loop 💪

Gorgeous game! SFX and some music would bring this to the next level. I love dismembering gnomes.

The limb severing mechanic was really cool! I experimented a lot in the first few fights before I settled in on going for the head every time. Incredible art, love the style and how well it all meshed together.

Really pretty artwork and good job designing a game with story progression through multiple encounters (levels).

I'd like to be able see the escape chance since I tried to do a peacful playthrough ahah. Combat was a bit punishing in my case (maybe I was just unlucky) because I kept dealing 2 damage and being dealt 10 every single round :P

I also think music would take this to the next level!

Cool submission!

I definitely liked the atmosphere and the character design.
What could be improved within a single jam:
1) I would change the poses. Neutrals are good for dialogue, but they don't mix well with battles.
2) Consistency

Feels like a world with depth, which is very impressive for the little time given 🙏

Love how the post man just rocks up with a knife covered with blood and offers people a package. Great entry! The atmosphere and world building are excellent. There's a hint of humour thrown in and some fun mechanics which I feel more games should look into doing. Had a minor bug with the grandmas who body going missing after 1 hit, but not a major issue.
Would have loved this with some audio i feel like it would have elevated the whole thing.
Art looked beautiful, love all the creature designs. Really good job.

Very great looking game, i love the art! good job! :heart:

I love the art style and the gameplay ! Great game for a jam ! :D

Hey, the art is really great and I love the idea of being able to target different body parts and the different effects when you destroy them. Well done!

Great looking game, I love the hint of humour, the dialogs, and the fact that you can shop off body parts is fun. Awesome job !

Minor bug on the last dialog, I think the deliveree should be saying these lines ?

I would like to see a full project its very good!

"let me kill you! but first i show you how to fight" sealed the deal for me xD nice game

Straight up Fear & Hunger vibes! Love it ^^
I always wanted to see more games use this fighting style, and now there is, hehe
So if you ever plan on making this into a full game, I'm buying!

The graphics are great, but I can't press the start button for some reason, I'm not sure if I'm doing it right, but I can't click on it because it disappears.

Very nice art and fun gameplay. I think some audio could have improved the general experience, and I felt that combat can be punishing if you are out of luck, but overall a nice experience.

I really liked the graphics and the atmosphere! It creates a cozy and intimate feeling of a forest journey. For some reason, it reminded me of DnD and Inscryption!
It’s great that character dialogue choices influence the path. The combat system is interesting (though I still have no idea how that armless gnome was attacking).
Unfortunately, I couldn’t finish it – the second old lady ate me :с

Really nice graphics and gameplay idea

Great artstyle! Cool meachanic where you can cut off arms so enemies can't attack you. Tried to cut off leggs, so I can easily run away, but that didn't played out well xD Overall complexity feels a bit over the top, it's really hard to pass through the granny encounter even when using arms cutting hack. Also I think the experience could benefit from some background music loop, just some open licensed one. Oh, and hilarious first scene with a gnome teaching you how to fight before trying to kill you :D Impressive job overall!

Adorable theme and funny dialog with the gnomes. The whole bodypart hit system is pretty unique and creative. I couldn't believe I missed the wild gnome legs on the first try, and I thought I was being clever. The node system is really nice as well. I could see it being built out further post-jam, having more weapons, equipment, trinkets, animations, effects, sounds, music, etc. Congrats on making this in 72 hours!

Loved the atmosphere and style! Awesome job for your first jam!

Great art! I found the strategy that worked for me for most of the enemies was targeting arms then legs then head.

the game conveys the atmosphere of the fairy tales of the Brothers Grimm

AIM FOR THE HEAD!!!! Good game.

Insanely cool starting point. The graphics are obviously ahead of a lot of the game, but the systems are also really promising. Just needs improved writing to sell the characters and the world better. Right now that feels the most place holder-ish.

And just adding a background track would add a lot to the package as a whole.

cheers

Oh boy, this isn’t exactly a cheerful world haha — the visuals are super polished, and I really like the progression with the little map. I can totally imagine what this concept could look like as a full game. Also, super impressive how much content and variety you managed to pack in with limited time. That said... I was no match for the evil grandma, couldn’t get past her! Great job!

Great game with beautiful art and a simple and fun concept!!

Great graphics! The targeting mechanic is cool but I think the balance is a bit off. Simply spamming head seems to be the optimal play when the enemies die outright with 2-3 successful hits. I couldn't actually finish the game with any other strategy. Severing the arms or legs took too long and I always ended up dying eventually.

The game is beautiful, just found it a little bit repetitive !

The dialogues are the best part of this game for me xD
"I will kill you, but first, I will teach you how to fight" -- that is very considerate of you, thank you

I join the crowd in saying that the artistic direction works wonderfully.
Bravo for including an in-game tutorial.
The humor really adds to the experience. The music is a bit lacking, but you can't always do everything. Congratulations and thank you for the game.

Честно говоря, не очень люблю столь кровавый стиль. Но нарисовано хорошо.

А в целом - отличная заготовка, допилить немного и будет хорошая игра ^_^

Hey everyone, thanks so much for all the kind feedback - this support truly means the world to us! ❤️ We're already planning a polished post-jam version with tweaks and improvements

@xpoho спасибо за отзыв) как референс брали fear&hungry, но я старался сохранить фишку механики урона по частям тела, но не переборщить с уровнем жести было тяжелой задачей

Thank @apophatique, This was our first game jam with this team, and we didn’t quite manage to organize all tasks perfectly from the start — so we couldn’t implement the sound in time. But we’re already hard at work finding the perfect audio for the game!

Very cool artsyle, love the designs and the presentation!

I also like the Fear and Hunger limb severing mechanic, it's an element that offers enough depth to the combat to where it feels satisfying to go back and try different starts

It would be even better if it had some music or a more fleshed out story to help me be more invested in the world

Pretty cool game! I love the aesthetic, both the entity sprites and backgrounds look great! Gameplay-wise, I think the combat could probably be made a little bit easier. Right now it's too RNG-dependent and it's pretty easy to lose the entire game just through sheer luck (or lack thereof). Like I got done by a Granny twice just because 4 of my attacks in a row missed. Oh, speaking of Granny, I got a but where I killed her torso, yet she still kept fighting, just with a floating head and legs.

The body part system is pretty interesting. I liked the way all the parts became more transparent the more damage you did. One thing I'd add is some better way of knowing what the effect will be of destroying a specific body part. Like cutting off arms made some enemies unable to attack, but others just got damage reduction. And I'd expect cutting off enemies' legs would make escaping easier, but when fighting this guy:

I tried escaping to see how it works and I got away successfully only after 7 attempts.

The monks on the road were pretty helpful, but I think it might have been better to get some other (or just more abundant) method of healing after combat. Maybe something that would make you choose between healing and getting better equipment? I liked how you could talk yourself out of some combat situations, but still I only managed to reach the Mutated Gnome once, and I barely sliced his legs off before he finished me.

Bonus points for the dialogues, they added some pretty humorous element to the game. :)

Overall, it's a really nice jam entry. Well done!

@tetracold thanks for the feedback! We honestly underestimated the time needed for sound design — a clear planning oversight. It especially bugs me personally that the audio ended up neglected. Valuable lesson for future projects

Thanks for so the detailed feedback! @lcstark
You’re right about the combat imbalance — we intentionally made the postman an unskilled fighter, and planning for him to gain control as he ventures deeper into the forest.
We considered UI combat transparency (damage previews/body part effects) but kept it hidden for the jam.
Severing legs increases only hit chance against enemies. But your ‘escape boost’ idea is very cool — stealing this for the post-jam patch!

Your game look amazing, love the style and graphics. There is still work to do on the gameplay, more attack types, faster turns, better hit animations. Other than that, is a very nice concept and prototype and I hope you will work some more to finish it. Good job.

@meskaline thanks for your comment, if a lot of people really want to see the full game we would be happy to finish it

The artstyle is quite interesting, maybe try adding some Ambient Occlusion between the srpites and the background to emphasize on the look?
Somewhat reminds me of following wallpaper

Nice Game!

Cool looking game! It has Darkest Dungeon vibes, really liked it. It's very nice, that you can target different body parts and that it will cause different effects (no hands = no attack, no head = instant death), but I do not understand what missing legs are for. I thought you could run away when they are missing.

An inventory system would be a nice addition. Having healing potions, armor parts and stuff like this would add depth to the gameplay, which felt a little bit repetetive. I would also prefer faster turns. Having little sound effects would add a lot to the polish of the game.

The character design was overall nice. I really like the movement of the character on the map screen, which is a nice part of the game. It's neat that you could choose different lanes in some occasions and that you have some dialogue options which have an effect. Congrats for finishing this game. :)

@lllarso thanks for the feedback, you're right, the inventory system was originally planned, but we decided that it would be better to invest effort in polishing the main mechanics, so the monk appeared instead of heals in the inventory

@kartoffel-licht thanks for the feedback, really good idea, will take note

Amazing game ! Loved the game's art style. The combat mechanic was a bit gruesome but super sweet, and I like the idea of having to do a run where you don't have a saving mechanic and have to start over when you lose to beat it.

Cool game, I liked damage system. Tho maybe somewhat hard, like, you can skip knife at the start of the game and then you most likely gonna be cooked(tho maybe not). Also, no checkpoints, so if you loose you should start all from scratch, which is a little annoying. Tho if you get to delivery checkpoint with 10 hp you're anyway should start new game lol. Anyway, really cool concept.

Great art and fun story, though I wasn't able to get very far. The combat is a little to hard and I woul've liked checkpoints, like some of the others have said! I loved the variations of gnomes lol

This game was interesting and quite fun to play and I could say that, it is indeed worth trying to play it. Keep up the good work!

The graphics are absolutely gorgeous and the different body parts that can be attacked and severed independently of each other are a super creative idea! An excellent jam entry!

This is unbelievably polished! And the *gruesome* elements seem to be an interesting part of the mood :smile: Vivid gory scenery xD

Now, the only actual complaint would be that it doesn't feel too different progressing on. But again, if you build up on the existing base, towards more *diverse feeling*.. I guess this could become a killer : ))

Good luck and thank you for the game!

Amazing art and a polished game!