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[William Broom]

Am I right in thinking that there's no kind of save system in the game? It seems a little harsh to send players right back to the beginning when they die.

Otherwise awesome, though.

[Zaphos]

Xerus! This is wonderful. Pretty and clever and convolouted, but never frustrating. I too loved traversing from one world to the other physically, rather than... spiritually? Never figured out what the underworld monsters did, but I figure it's a Bad Thing.

The underworld monsters make you restart the game from the beginning.  It's a bizarrely harsh design choice for an otherwise completely forgiving game ...

Anyway, this is pretty fun!  The super jump between worlds is great.

[___]

More awesome feedback!  Yay.

I put up a new version with some fixes.  First, the intro, gameover, and ending screens should be responding to the Z key now as well as ESC.  I also toned down the volume of the sound effects per request from some players.  Nothing too extreme, but just enough to make the music stand out a little more (because I think the music is awesome.)  The last issue I tried to address was the soul sucker things attached to the player.  The screen now flashes red as you lose your soul, so players should register that as "something bad is happening" a little easier than before.

Speaking of the soul suckers.

PRO TIP: You can shake them off.  If they hit you, jump around, mash the arrows, you'll throw them off.  I'll have to make this more clear somehow.  Any ideas?

--

As far as optimization goes, I did try to do a lot, but I didn't get into the particles too much.  There only should be about 100 to 200 instances awake during the game, but the enemy shots do add quite a bit...

--

I didn't really think the punishment for dying in the underworld was too harsh, the game is only about a 10, 15 minute play through from start to end.  Maybe... restarting just the level and the punishment only being that the time you spent in the level before dying is kept on your time for that level?  (What a sentence that was.)

Once again I appreciate all the feedback...!

[Nitro Crate]

Amazing game, im just lost in the words to describe how awesome it is.
although death in the underworld sucks. It wouldn't be so bad if I knew i could shake them off.

Out of curiosity, what was this made in?

[Melly]

Game Maker, I believe.

Also xerus, mind detailing a bit how you coded the particle effects? You might be doing something in an unproper way with them.

[___]

Game Maker, I believe.

Also xerus, mind detailing a bit how you coded the particle effects? You might be doing something in an unproper way with them.

Yes, it's Game Maker.

Ahh uhmmm theyre all objects.  There's a main particle object that gets just like an angle and a speed, and some other stuff like lifespan, and then all the particles inherit from that.  So each step they update their positions based on their speed and angle, and adds one to it's life, when the life reaches the lifespan, it gets destroyed.  Each specific particle has maybe a small add on to their behavior, like explosion ember particles are constantly floating upward... etc.

[Melly]

Wait, maybe I'm confused, but you said that each single particle is an object instance?

[___]

Wait, maybe I'm confused, but you said that each single particle is an object instance?

Yes, each particle is an instance.

Updated the first post with FAN ART.

[Melly]

No. Nonononononono.

GM has a built-in particle engine. Look for it and read about it. It's pretty easy to use.

Do it for the love of cheese. A particle is much simpler and faster than an instance, and it still gives you control over their movement behaviour/sprite/duration/etc.

[___]

No. Nonononononono.

GM has a built-in particle engine. Look for it and read about it. It's pretty easy to use.

Do it for the love of cheese. A particle is much simpler and faster than an instance, and it still gives you control over their movement behaviour/sprite/duration/etc.

Oh, okay.. well I guess I figured I'd have more control over my particles if I did them with instances.  I'll try to see if I can rework my game to use the built in particle stuff.

[Once]

Very good game, I'm impressed.

I am stuck in level 4, do you have any hint on what to do here ?



Thanks for this game !

[William Broom]

I beat it in the end. It's not really very harsh once you know how to shake off the underworld enemies, in fact you could probably survive down there indefinitely with no trouble. It just isn't clear that you can shake them off.

Once - I think you just have to head left and down, and you should be able to drop into the underworld.

[Once]

OK thanks !

[Melly]

No. Nonononononono.

GM has a built-in particle engine. Look for it and read about it. It's pretty easy to use.

Do it for the love of cheese. A particle is much simpler and faster than an instance, and it still gives you control over their movement behaviour/sprite/duration/etc.

Oh, okay.. well I guess I figured I'd have more control over my particles if I did them with instances.  I'll try to see if I can rework my game to use the built in particle stuff.

The problem is that GM instances should be kept to a minimum. They can really lag things if you make a lot of them or keep many active at once, especially if you gave them step events.

So yeah, go with particles. I believe you can do the same thing you did here with them, and they will be much lighter.

[scytos]

Wow, this is one of the best I've played so far. Not only the concept is great, but it is also very well executed. I really like how you took advantage of the idea of two worlds to create very interesting mechanics and puzzles.

I had the problem of not knowing that you could shake the underworld enemies off and I died after advancing quite a bit. Either way, I think death should only restart the level. It is more of a puzzle game than an action game, so once you've managed to solve the level, you shouldn't need to do it again.

Other than that, great work.

[Lim-Dul]

Yup - brilliant game - the controls and jumping physics are very smooth which is my basic requirement for any platformer.

The music, the graphics and the smart puzzles all work in perfect harmony.

Still, I have several suggestions:

1) a pause button
2) like other people mentioned - perhaps going back to the beginning of the level when you die
3) more leeway on the two-world boost maneuver - I played through the game several times now and I still don't get the timing right most of the time - somehow it feels detached from the visual and audio hints you're getting when crossing world boundaries

That's basically it.

[Pyrofyr]

I simply must say, this game is brilliant, and I simply can't wait for a full version.

There are a few downsides but I'm fairly sure that they are demo only problems.
1)No save mechanism is kind of annoying, because if I want to finish up later, I need to go through all of the previous levels
2)The boosting being necessary is a bit tough, this is both a downside and an upside, I enjoy how 'hard' it is, because I've already mastered it for the most part, but at the same time, since things like boosting and shaking off the underworld baddies seem to be things you pretty much 'need' to know, they should be introduced better.

Overall I love this game, the art is very fresh, and I'm sure that about a million and one people have pointed out how similar it is to Pixel's style, and reminiscent of it, the funny thing however is that it's not close enough for people to yell 'clone!!' but just close enough to remind you of it, and invoke the feelings that the game has already instilled in the individual.

[Valter]

My main problems with the game, now that I've actually beaten it.

-It's pretty easy to exit the level, if you know what you're doing. And I don't mean "beat", I mean leave the boundaries. There should be some way to make the sides infinite, to keep people from leaving the borders.

-There are some pretty tricky spike dodging areas, and it's annoying when you die spontaneously when you accidentally run into them. It would be better if spikes were only lethal from the pointed edge.

[Nitro Crate]

as fun as boosting is, it's possible to skip portions of the level by boosting instead. (Or is that a "mAd skilz cut ur tiem dwn hax" thing?)

[___]

Alright gang, I have a new version.  It's not "official" yet, and is only available right here.  Once I'm sure there are no problems or bugs in this version, I'll update my main download link.

LIST OF CHANGES:
 - Spikes now only kill you if you touch them on the tip of the spikes.  The sides are treated as walls.
 - The game over screen now returns you to the level you perished in, not the title screen.
 - Added boundaries on some levels and stopped the player from leaving the screen.
 - Added a shake off helper graphic above the player the first time a soul sucker attaches.
 - Last level fixed to account for all possible graves.
 - Changed the timing for the rocket jump a little bit to make it easier to do consistently.
 - Known Issue:  The particle effects slow the game down for some users.  Looking into a reworked particle system.  (No promises.)

Hopefully this meets most peoples suggestions.  Taking off the severe game over punishment should please a lot of folks.  The rocket jump timing was changed a little bit, but not too much from what it was.  You don't really need to know it to win, but it does help cutting down time in some situations.  I want people to see how fast they can go through all the levels!  (Some of them can be done in 2 or 3 seconds!)

Overall I love this game, the art is very fresh, and I'm sure that about a million and one people have pointed out how similar it is to Pixel's style, and reminiscent of it, the funny thing however is that it's not close enough for people to yell 'clone!!' but just close enough to remind you of it, and invoke the feelings that the game has already instilled in the individual.

Actually you're the first I've noticed that has mentioned any pixel similarity ;p