Down, down into the dark. Can you make it to the light?
This game was made using the open source engine Clap, created by Heviosso.
Art was done in Blender. Animations are Mixamo.
All coding done by the talented Heviosso. Art and level design by MikeMikeMakes. And Alsid jumped in wherever help was needed.
This game was supposed to be a series of puzzle platforms going ever downwards in search of the light in the dark. Supposed to be….
Instead, you get to enjoy the opening level, bugs and all.
Controls: - WASD to move - Arrow keys to rotate the camera (sorry, not the mouse this time, but game controllers are also supported) - ENTER to switch bodies: you need to be within close range to another body for it to become available for switching into
Please let us know of any bugs that you run into, and if you do, we'd like to know which variant did you play (native, html5) and what is your OS and/or browser. Thank you in advance!
Changelog
v0->v1: - fixed a bug where when body switching wraps around, it could cause a crash - fixed a bug where a body keeps on running if you switch away from it - fixed end game condition detection, which among other things could cause the camera to rotate without being asked to - fixed a bug in body switching UI widget that wouldn't show one of the bodies as active even though it is
Really enjoyed the level style, however the Enter key really inconsistently worked for me when I was playing which unfortunately really hampered playing the game!
I love the lighting and vibes, and the 3d puzzle-platformer concept has a lot of potential. I like the body-swapping mechanic too - obviously I've only played the tutorial level, but I think you could create some neat puzzles with it. It would have been really cool to explore a bunch of varied levels exploring the mechanic further. You should consider continuing this game after the jam and seeing where it takes you!
@becky I'm sorry about that! Can you tell me which variant you played (html5, windows, linux, macos) and what's your OS, and, if it was html5, what's the browser? Thank you for reporting the bug and also for the feedback!
We're intending to continue the game, at least for our own enjoyment. I really want to create the level 2 design that we had to leave on the cutting room floor for this jam.
Great mechanics with switching bodies, but it was a horrible idea to rotate with arrows, and the mechanics wasn't explored well enough. Well, or I just haven't made it far enough.
Ah, classic overscope:) Visauls and animations are stylish, but I could not get over the fence. Was there any specific reason to control camera with arrows instead of mouse?
Loved the style and graphics of your game! As a playtester ran into a few problems: 1) The body kept running if you switched without stopping. 2) It was very unobvious that the ladder down appeared after activating the last platform. 3) It was unusual to control the camera with the arrows, it would be more familiar with the mouse. All in all I liked the game, thanks!
Your game seems really really cool, this intro was very imersive but the enter button is not working very well and there's a bug that one of the bodies keep in the falling animation forever and i cant jump :c
@duckmaniac Thank you for the feedback and bug report.
Yeah, the final platform should really be more obvious. We ran out of time and didn't play test it enough. In general, the mechanics of it all should be more clearly telegraphed to players. A wise lesson for the future.
The enter key only works when in range of a body. Unfortunately, we did not telegraph this AT ALL (except for a small text pop-up, but that wasn't enough), so likely that's why you couldn't progress. Our bad! Thank you for attempting to play it anyway (:
(Also, there might just be a bug. We're looking into it)
@heiden-bzr You are correct that the mechanics weren't explored enough. You probably got plenty far ;)
We had plans for deepening the ways in which you can use the body switching, but we ran out of time. Hopefully, we can do more cool stuff with it in a future version of the game.
I had a bug (HTML5 Firefox) where the camera would continuously rotate to the very bottom unless I held up to override it. But as ever while you unfortunately had to cut material I am extremely impressed by anyone who comes to LD with a custom engine.
@alpacalypse@nicekot I believe I fixed the problems you brought up; @duckmaniac I definitely fixed the one that you found. I am very grateful for your feedback and kind words! If you find the time, give it another go (the links changed in the post above, also a changelog added), I hope you'll find it satisfying and worth the time. This is the first time this engine gets "battle tested", so I apologise again for silly bugs, but thanks to you, there're fewer of them now!
For ENTER to work, you have to be within range of the next body. The location in your screenshot is not within range. I realise with your feedback (and that of others) we need to explain this concept more clearly (and probably also show it visually through some kind of UI).
To get access to the body on top of that island, you have to activate a set of stairs. This you do by getting across the wall in the middle. For future versions of the game, we'll make these elements clearer.
It looks amazing, the character moving feels pretty good. I was a bit skeptical about moving the camera with the arrow keys, but it really wasn't a problem in the end. I got stuck after unlocking the bridge for the second man, no idea what I had to do after that and I couldn't find a solution, but overall, I had fun playing it.
This was a fun little puzzle game. Fluid animation and controls, and the setting was interesting too. The swapping bodies could maybe be more clear with which body your swapping too but overall it was fun little puzzle game.
windows version: Texture fickering and this from the terminal
[settings.c:52 @settings_default] error: [model.c:289 @model3dtx_add_texture_from_buffer] loaded texture0 0 0x0 [main.c:598 @main] [not supported at main.c:34] failed to initialize networking [model.c:473 @model3dtx_set_texture] program 'contrast' doesn't have texture emission_map or it's not a texture
it looks really cool though but I couldn't get very far :(
Not sure if it was intentional, but it was like the W key was pressed down 100% of the time, which made it pretty difficult. I was able to unlock the 3rd character and have him run up the stairs, but it wasn't clear what the next step was; at some point I fell off and apparently won the game?
Very interesting/original idea overall, but I could have used a bit more direction.
Amazing game with gorgeous graphics and fascinating body-swapping mechanics! The potential is enormous - eagerly looking forward to more levels and new adventures!
@cody-raethke Yes, you're a winner for reaching the lights! The W down is definitely not intentional, if you know how to reproduce it, I'd be very thankful! But how did you manage to stand on switch platforms for any amount of time then? And you're absolutely right, there had to be better (and timed) directions. Thank you for playing!
@whysguy52 Regarding the Enter not working, @mikemikemakes wrote a good explanation: "For ENTER to work, you have to be within range of the next body. The location in your screenshot is not within range. I realise with your feedback (and that of others) we need to explain this concept more clearly (and probably also show it visually through some kind of UI).
To get access to the body on top of that island, you have to activate a set of stairs. This you do by getting across the wall in the middle. For future versions of the game, we’ll make these elements clearer."
Regarding texture flickering in windows: can you take a screencap? And can you paste somewhere everything that the game prints to the console (there's GL driver information etc) -- that'd help me. Thank you for giving it a go and providing feedback!
This is a really neat game. I won't go on about the UX/UI experience regarding swapping to a new dude as I see other commenters have touched on that. What I will say is that once I figured it out, I was instantly impressed and had a ton of fun! Game looks really cool too, something about it works. Just the right amount of detail.
Honestly my only complaint with this is that it ended quickly :( which makes sense, it's incredibly difficult to design puzzles, so kudos to you for the ambition on display. Cool game, great work!
Neat! I was a bit confused at the end... was afraid to jump to my death - but turned out to be the end of the tutorial! I like the style and hope you continue working on the rest of your planned levels.
Hey there! I also had the issue with the enter key. I read some other comments that you need to be in a certain range for it to work? But even close to the character I could not get it to work :(
Tested both the Windows and HTML versions (on Firefox). I also had a flickering problem on Windows. Another thing that happened to me is that the HTML version would not load on Edge.
Just finished. Interesting game. Graphics are original and the puzzle idea was fun. Would love to see how the game could end up if continued after the Jam. Solid GG !
@cody-raethke Do you perchance have a github account? I'd be immensely appreciative if you could file your findings here: https://github.com/virtuoso/clap/issues/new/choose, because they'll get buried here. The fact that you're on Linux should actually be an advantage: most of the development and testing on my side also happens on Linux. Also, do you by any chance have a game controller connected (that is not in my copy of gamecontrollerdb.txt)? Lastly, can you run https://ash.works/clap/ldjam57.exe under wine (vanilla wine9 works, maybe earlier ones too)? In the menu there's "Devel" that opens a window with a bunch of checkboxes, if you tick "character motion", I'd like to see "motion", "angle" and "velocity" vectors when you're not pressing anything. Also, everything that it spits out to the console can potentially be useful. There's also a linux build with debug UI enabled, it just doesn't get deployed at the moment.
And yeah, thank you for getting back to us and reporting! It's a new custom engine, so silly bugs are inevitable.
@floppynub Thanks for the kind words! And yeah, making the puzzles was a challenge. Coming up with them is one struggle and then actually building a level that works the way you envisioned is a whole 'nother thing.
That's where gamejams are great. They forced us to make a thing and throw it out there. Otherwise, we'd still be tweaking stuff and we'd have no idea if the core concept even works ;)
Selfmade game engines always impress me :O One of my controllers had a slightly drifting joystick which made me constantly move forward. This is not really a bug but maybe something that could still be avoided. Not sure how complicated it would be to filter the input with your engine.
Very cool puzzle and remarkable graphics and animation for a jam! Loved the stylized look. I think a little more of a tutorial and player feedback would help understand the puzzle, but overall very impressive start.
@anton-florey Thank you! We aim to impress! :) It's all fixable, of course, the proper fix (I think) would be to add in input selection UI, and then a stick drift cutoff slider (or something like that). It does already disregard stick motion in the range [0.0, 0.2), so your controller must be especially drifty. I added both to my todo list. Thanks again for reporting and for playing!
@loka Why surprised? It's been some time in the making. It's probably true that having full access to all the nuts and bolts gives one a degree of control that's not easy to achieve with the one-size-fits-all engines. In reality, of course, it all came together in the last moment with @mikemikemakes's design and assets. Thank you for the kind words! And if you're ever shopping for an engine, you know where to find me. :)
Took me a bit to figure out, but eventually reached the end. A non-negligible portion of time was spent looking for another secret passage that opened up somewhere, when all I needed was to drop down from the final platform for once. ^^' The game would have benefitted a lot from mouse camera controls, keyboard-controlled camera felt quite clunky.
I really liked the artstyle here. I appreciate that the artist didn't spare polygons on those trees! I would have liked to see more of this landscape, there's this whimsical, dream-like charm to it. ^^
Love the art style! It's very unique and even my potato-pc can handle it 😄 There were some platforms that did not light up with foot-imprints. I did not know what they were, but decided to put two of the little men on there. The third one I walked off the platform and the game ended
I can see that you had big plans for this one. I think the foundation is a good one and I see potential. It needs some refining and more levels as you said. Are you planning on a post-jam version?
Edit... I see that this is an LD57 entry 😅 No idea how this ended up in my list but I liked it nevertheless :-)
@wouter52 Thank you for playing anyway! And yeah, sorry for the UX. Yes, we didn't make the LD58 unfortunately (well, I didn't: ended up chasing too much). Re: platforms: there are temporary switches (stairs only appear while you're standing on them) and permanent ones (trigger once, the platform stays). The former are glowing, the latter aren't. Re: post-jam version: very likely. The only post-jam change so far was added particles and a few engine changes (color grading, shadows, ambient occlusion etc). There's a short video here
Since it lives in the engine git tree, you can always check out the latest version here.
Comments55
We're intending to continue the game, at least for our own enjoyment. I really want to create the level 2 design that we had to leave on the cutting room floor for this jam.
Was there any specific reason to control camera with arrows instead of mouse?
Yeah, the final platform should really be more obvious. We ran out of time and didn't play test it enough. In general, the mechanics of it all should be more clearly telegraphed to players. A wise lesson for the future.
The enter key only works when in range of a body. Unfortunately, we did not telegraph this AT ALL (except for a small text pop-up, but that wasn't enough), so likely that's why you couldn't progress. Our bad! Thank you for attempting to play it anyway (:
(Also, there might just be a bug. We're looking into it)
We had plans for deepening the ways in which you can use the body switching, but we ran out of time. Hopefully, we can do more cool stuff with it in a future version of the game.
Thank you for playing!
Still, very neat!
For ENTER to work, you have to be within range of the next body. The location in your screenshot is not within range. I realise with your feedback (and that of others) we need to explain this concept more clearly (and probably also show it visually through some kind of UI).
To get access to the body on top of that island, you have to activate a set of stairs. This you do by getting across the wall in the middle. For future versions of the game, we'll make these elements clearer.
Thank you for giving the game a try!
The swapping bodies could maybe be more clear with which body your swapping too but overall it was fun little puzzle game.
For future editions, we'll make next steps more clear and/or add a tutorial at the start so players are more equiped to understand the game's logic.
windows version: Texture fickering and this from the terminal
[settings.c:52 @settings_default] error: [model.c:289 @model3dtx_add_texture_from_buffer] loaded texture0 0 0x0
[main.c:598 @main] [not supported at main.c:34] failed to initialize networking
[model.c:473 @model3dtx_set_texture] program 'contrast' doesn't have texture emission_map or it's not a texture
it looks really cool though but I couldn't get very far :(
Very interesting/original idea overall, but I could have used a bit more direction.
The W down is definitely not intentional, if you know how to reproduce it, I'd be very thankful! But how did you manage to stand on switch platforms for any amount of time then?
And you're absolutely right, there had to be better (and timed) directions. Thank you for playing!
To get access to the body on top of that island, you have to activate a set of stairs. This you do by getting across the wall in the middle. For future versions of the game, we’ll make these elements clearer."
Regarding texture flickering in windows: can you take a screencap? And can you paste somewhere everything that the game prints to the console (there's GL driver information etc) -- that'd help me. Thank you for giving it a go and providing feedback!
Honestly my only complaint with this is that it ended quickly :( which makes sense, it's incredibly difficult to design puzzles, so kudos to you for the ambition on display. Cool game, great work!
@heviosso it behaved that way every time I booted up the game; I'm on Linux, if that makes any difference.
> But how did you manage to stand on switch platforms for any amount of time then?
I just switched characters the moment I stepped onto the platform - it was tricky, but a fun challenge :)
Tested both the Windows and HTML versions (on Firefox). I also had a flickering problem on Windows.
Another thing that happened to me is that the HTML version would not load on Edge.
Still, really liked the premise and art style o/
The fact that you're on Linux should actually be an advantage: most of the development and testing on my side also happens on Linux.
Also, do you by any chance have a game controller connected (that is not in my copy of gamecontrollerdb.txt)?
Lastly, can you run https://ash.works/clap/ldjam57.exe under wine (vanilla wine9 works, maybe earlier ones too)? In the menu there's "Devel" that opens a window with a bunch of checkboxes, if you tick "character motion", I'd like to see "motion", "angle" and "velocity" vectors when you're not pressing anything. Also, everything that it spits out to the console can potentially be useful. There's also a linux build with debug UI enabled, it just doesn't get deployed at the moment.
And yeah, thank you for getting back to us and reporting! It's a new custom engine, so silly bugs are inevitable.
That's where gamejams are great. They forced us to make a thing and throw it out there. Otherwise, we'd still be tweaking stuff and we'd have no idea if the core concept even works ;)
We're excited to continue this. All the feedback has been both helpful and encouraging.
We'll post any future updates on ldjam.com.
One of my controllers had a slightly drifting joystick which made me constantly move forward. This is not really a bug but maybe something that could still be avoided. Not sure how complicated it would be to filter the input with your engine.
Thank you for the kind words! And if you're ever shopping for an engine, you know where to find me. :)
The core mechanic is intriguing, too! With more elaborate levels, this could grow into a first-class puzzle—or even a co-op game.
Great job, and thank you!
I really liked the artstyle here. I appreciate that the artist didn't spare polygons on those trees! I would have liked to see more of this landscape, there's this whimsical, dream-like charm to it. ^^
There were some platforms that did not light up with foot-imprints. I did not know what they were, but decided to put two of the little men on there. The third one I walked off the platform and the game ended
I can see that you had big plans for this one. I think the foundation is a good one and I see potential. It needs some refining and more levels as you said. Are you planning on a post-jam version?
Edit... I see that this is an LD57 entry 😅 No idea how this ended up in my list but I liked it nevertheless :-)
Re: platforms: there are temporary switches (stairs only appear while you're standing on them) and permanent ones (trigger once, the platform stays). The former are glowing, the latter aren't.
Re: post-jam version: very likely. The only post-jam change so far was added particles and a few engine changes (color grading, shadows, ambient occlusion etc). There's a short video here
Since it lives in the engine git tree, you can always check out the latest version here.