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[Kazerad]

After ditching my original plans to make a comedy platformer game, I decided to try something darker and more atmospheric. Hence:


Download: http://www.foxmage.com/ShineV2.zip
Use WASD to move, mouse to look. Hold mouse still over something to look harder. 1, 2, and 3 switch items, right click views items.

What you see here is unfinished, but playable. It's sort of an adventure game, I guess, or maybe more of an exploration thing. My goal was to create something close to survival horror, but due to time constraints a lot of the ideas I had planned had to be cut. Some of this is evident in half-finished things, such as how you have an oxygen meter that never goes down.

I used a LOT of people's graphics. Most of them in really obscure ways that distort/scale/recolor/crop them to the point they are almost unrecognizable. I made an effort to use things in obscure ways: Arne's giraffe sprite is used as a top-down protagonist, hammedhaaret's trees were rotated, transparented, and used for shading, someone's shmup sprites got used as a urinal... etc.

I haven't actually played it all the way through and have no idea if it's even possible to beat. Ryavis helped me out with (aka wrote) the AI, so I have almost no idea how it works either) Maybe that makes it more fun, though .

Feedback appreciated! Maybe I'll take the good ideas in this and make them into a decent game later.

EDIT: originally I had the original version linked down here since I updated the game a bit after midnight on the deadline, but since a number of people have submitted since then I've removed this old link. Let me know if I need to put it back!

[Kazerad]

Updated credits list, with what the graphics were used for:
Might still be forgetting some... don't think so though, will add if I notice
EDIT: Forgot sounds! Added now.

amidos2006 - Books
Andrius - tools, clipboards, papers, potted plants
Arachne - floor tiles
Arne - Rafan biologists
Bob le Moche - Glow Globs
can-o-spam - picture frames
ChrisFranklin - lens flares, glows
cougarten - 3qgar font
davidarcila - crates, barrels
dbb - flames, various machines
Emilio - arrow keys, monitor closeups, doors, toilets, vending machines
ETG - floor tiles, blood splatter
György Straub - greenhouse ground
hammedhaaret - shading and textures
Huge - bunsen burners, various machines
Hyptosis - walls, floor tiles, tables, chairs, doors, numpad parts, various machines
Joaquim - plants, parts of the Specimen
kavs - clipboard
Kazerad - blood splatter, various machines
KittenEater - faucet
Kren - tree
lulzapricot - numpad keys
meadowsweet - parts of the specimen, various machines
mojofltr - bathroom signs
Mr. Trianglehead - various machines
NMcCoy - crates, boxes, water, shadows
Oddball - Rafan in photographs
oneup - elegante pixel font
0rel - Veta's arm
oryx - chalkboard
OutofOrder - novel cover
Pencerkoff - wires, machine gun flash, flashbang sparks, papers, trim, tubes
pgil - doors
Radix - parts of the Specimen
rogerlevy - organs
tocky - computers, office desks
Traumadore - book cover
Zaratustra - trim, pipes, wall sides, zaratustra_assemblee font

chris_b - background ambiance
NialM - footsteps through water, reloading machine gun, flashbang bouncing
John Nesky - Monster heartbeat and vocalizations, generator hum, footsteps, gunshots, keypad sounds.
boomlinde - flashbang explosion
Yokky - music in greenhouse scene

[Jo-o]

just started playing, it's stunning.... awesome

[Ryavis]

Tip: Unless Kazerad fixed this (which I doubt he did), the monster is entirely able to sneak up behind you if you have your back to a wall. So, uh, hiding in corners ain't gonna help.
AKA this really could have used more development time.

[feeblethemighty]

This game is great.  It's pretty effective in terms of atmosphere.  The first time those crazy shadow creatures came up behind me, i jumped in my seat.  Though, they didn't prove to be much of a threat.  They didn't hurt me at all, so i ignored them and then suddenly when i was reading a book, they got me.

[Kazerad]

Wow, more positive response than I was expecting . Also, updated the credits list with what resources were used for.

This game is great.  It's pretty effective in terms of atmosphere.  The first time those crazy shadow creatures came up behind me, i jumped in my seat.  Though, they didn't prove to be much of a threat.  They didn't hurt me at all, so i ignored them and then suddenly when i was reading a book, they got me.

Yeah, one of my biggest regrets is not having time to add better monster animation. I wanted the thing to loom behind you for a second before killing you, but don't think I conveyed that well enough. Of course, it doesn't help that "killing you" is a "oops you died" box. Ah well, maybe will screw with it after the competition. Next time I'm going to start with the beginning and end, adding the middle later (since it can be cut out more smoothly).

Glad it made you jump, though  

[Melly]

The very limited visibility works wonders for the atmosphere (though you probably narrowed it a bit too much horizontally), and as far as graphics go you did a great job of using the assets. I love the little details, like the reflection of the character on the terminal (an idea is to have some kind of shade pass quickly on the reflection at some point in the game to make players jump). Also I found amusing how the bathroom signs had the same giraffe sprite on both man and woman. :p The sound work is pretty good for the atmosphere too.

There's a ton of potential here. It's just not implemented. Items don't seem to work at all against the shadow creatures and the game should probably pause while you're investigating something, or maybe have some kind of warning when a monster comes too hear when you're reading stuff.

I really like what you got here. Survival horror was definitely not what I expected to see in this compo, and despite its unfinished state it's a welcome surprise.

[Kazerad]

Also I found amusing how the bathroom signs had the same giraffe sprite on both man and woman. :p

Haha, was wondering if anyone would comment on that. I was already using the same giraffe sprite for male and female characters and nobody is wearing anything gender-specific (or anything at all for that matter), so I decided I'd just imply there was some kind of sexual dimorphism the player was incapable of perceiving.

As far as items go, Flashbangs and Glowglobs should do something, but I'm not entirely sure. The AI is kind of in a state of clusterfuck; when Ryavis first added it I had lofty goals about the monster being able to stalk you, open/close doors, set traps for you, start eating corpses if you evaded it for too long, and ultimately even writing messages to you on the walls. A lot of the preliminary mechanics for that are still in there. When the deadline began closing in, goals shifted more toward "make it work by any sloppy means possible". Lights seem to at least sometimes ward it away when you throw/shine enough at it, so partial success?

Considering the positive response to the atmosphere/concept stuff I might play with this some more after the judging. Fixing some little things like making the monster louder, flashlight beam wider when horizontal, etc. Good to know you at least think there's potential!

[Ryavis]

Well, flashbangs make the monster immediately run if it's on screen. In theory. It's faster to just spin around in place with your flashlight though.

[oryx]

Uhh.. I have no idea what happened, I randomly died in the bathroom in a lame dialog box sort of way - but... up until then... holy crap, this is genius. Really inventive use of assets, I can only imagine what you might be able to do with art tailored to a game you were making! Then again, would anyone actually come up with the idea of using a giraffe in a gas mask in a survival horror game?

[yokomeshi]

This game

is TERRIFYING.


The first time I turned away from a keypad and found it standing right behind me... I almost choked on my drink.  Even though I knew it was coming.

By the way, I actually like that it's unfinished, since you get the horrifying (and perfectly justified) feeling that nothing you do matters -- you're just running around, waiting to die.  Most such games lose a bit of their scare when you realize that there's a solution, but here... only the text box awaits you. 

[Kazerad]

@Oryx - you probably got attacked from behind. If I add to this after the competition one of the first things I'll do is make it more clear where it came from when you get killed. Maybe a nice proper death animation, with shadowy claws engulfing you and pulling you into the darkness as the flashlight clatters to the ground.
Thanks for the chalkboard, btw. Or at least what I used as one.

By the way, I actually like that it's unfinished, since you get the horrifying (and perfectly justified) feeling that nothing you do matters -- you're just running around, waiting to die.  Most such games lose a bit of their scare when you realize that there's a solution, but here... only the text box awaits you.  

It's rushed and sloppy, but there actually is a "good ending". The specimen can die, Veta can get out of the lab, you even get a text box telling you that you lived happily ever after. I don't know if people can actually get to the end without knowing how to do it (deadlines hate beta tests and I forgot to label the rooms), but it's at least possible.

Hopefully that will only taunt you more: every time you are textily devoured in the shadows, you could've lived.

[OutofOrder]

somebody actually used one of my backgrounds. awesome! gonna try it out then

[John Nesky]

I love the cryptic monster behavior. Way creepier than predictable monsters. One of my favorite entries that I've played so far...

[cougarten]

haha, great you used my font, would you spoil where to find it? (the ultra-small font it was and i am to scared and to busy to find my font

[Kazerad]

I love the cryptic monster behavior. Way creepier than predictable monsters. One of my favorite entries that I've played so far...

Thanks! I feel like I should make a proper version of this game now that Assemblee is over, but I'm a bit worried it would lose something if I had time to make the monster work right. I've received a lot of complements on how unpredictable the monster is, but that's ironically just because I didn't have time to debug it.

haha, great you used my font, would you spoil where to find it? (the ultra-small font it was and i am to scared and to busy to find my font

I'm not sure you'd be able to find it if you tried . When I had writing that was too small to read without zooming in (e.g. the graffiti in the storage room or the prayer in the room with the bunsen burners), I used your tiny font printing at a size that made it even less than 3px. Illegible of course, but it only had to vaguely look like words.

[homeDrone]

You've done a great job so far with this.  It would be worth whatever polish you think it could use after the compo. The Giraffe was a great choice.

[J. R. Hill]

Can I suggest a death scene?

White text:
I'd like to at least see the shadow monster touching Veta, then have the flashlight fall from her hand away from her (so she's out of view in any direction, and then have a small pool of blood form in the flashlight's lit area.

[Kazerad]

Can I suggest a death scene?

(whited out text)

This is excellent, will almost certainly use it . I probably won't be adding anything new to the current game I have since the code is a rushed mess and I think I could do much better now, but I am pretty much decided now I am going to do a non-assemblee remake of this.

Though I am curious about people's thoughts on...

-The machine gun. It does absolutely nothing against the monster; I implemented it because I wanted it to feel like you were up against something that could not be harmed by conventional means, as opposed to giving the player a feeling of "I wish I could find a gun so I could take this thing down". Did it work, or just feel unnecessary?

-The "save system", or lack thereof. You start at the beginning after each death, but due to the nature of the game you know more passwords and shortcuts and can pretty easily re-reach where you died. Is this more immersive, or are conventional savepoints preferable?

[cougarten]

haven't played to much, but I love to save...

another thing I'd suggest if it looks good: a windowed oder 1x version without resized pixels