Game Jam Extended Post

[TomFulp]

I regret not going more in-depth about the Game Jam entries in yesterday's post, so here's a more in-depth look at each of the entries that weren't included. I'll include critiques but also keep in mind these teams did just have 48 hours. If the critiques help to improve the games post-jam then yay - I'm sure the teams are already aware of plenty of things they want to improve.

• 
  The Hut in Ayre Forest by TroisNyxEtienne

  A boy's search for a cure for his younger sister... leads him to a cabin in the woods.

  Score

  3.39 / 5.00

  Type

  Game

  Popularity

  3,614 Views

  Rated

  Everyone

Beautiful art and music. My initial response to the combat was that it needs an impact sound effect and if the enemies get pushed back when hit, I would prefer a smoother slide back vs the "pop" back. The puzzles are nice and it's an ambitious size for a game made in a weekend. Some more gameplay polish could go a long way towards long-term playability.

• 
  Cab In The Woods by Seppyb63

  Be a Crazy Taxi for the Things That Go Bump in The Night

  Score

  3.43 / 5.00

  Type

  Game

  Popularity

  2,281 Views

  Rated

  Everyone

Fun take on the theme. I enjoyed the SkiFree inspired Yeti level the most and the Lagoon the least. The collision on the car in the lagoon level seemed way too unforgiving, where I collided with objects I clearly wasn't coming in visual contact with. I'm impressed that you tackled three game engines in one weekend!

• 
  SoulCrusher Cabin by Manly-Chicken

  Long ago in year 666 Satan came to earth to make evil. You must stop him.

  Score

  3.34 / 5.00

  Type

  Game

  Popularity

  3,295 Views

  Rated

  Ages 13+

Looks good, plays really well, lots of fun with a great payoff at the end. The genre itself has been overdone but this did bring a nice upgrade system to the table and a good variety of boss styles. Really impressive for a weekend of work. My one suggestion is to make the enemies flash yellow when hit instead of flashing transparent. When they turn transparent you can see all the layers of vector art and it looks weird.

• 
  Cabinalt by cupnoodles

  What would you do if progress came knocking on your door?

  Score

  3.35 / 5.00

  Type

  Game

  Popularity

  2,289 Views

  Rated

  Ages 13+

Art style was fun and playing this brought a smile to my face. Sometimes the random placement of obstacles makes it seem kinda impossible but I could just be bad at ramming people.

• 
  Journalist Jimmy by Guy-Unger

  GJ8: Get Jimmy away from the zombies!

  Score

  3.31 / 5.00

  Type

  Game

  Popularity

  895 Views

  Rated

  Ages 13+

A nice point and click given the time restraints! The dialog sequences felt too drawn out and hard to hear but the ghost was amusing nonetheless.

• 
  Billy's Barricade by MonoFlauta

  Help Billy defend his cabin from the horrifying monster!

  Score

  3.31 / 5.00

  Type

  Game

  Popularity

  1,360 Views

  Rated

  Everyone

I loved the idea that you are stacking things in front of a door and some monster is trying to break it down. The way the objects maintained left and right momentum made it different from games with similar mechanics that I've seen. The scrolling was interesting but I think I would have preferred to see the door at all times as the objects stacked up, maybe it could zoom out instead of scroll up to accomodate the height of objects? Also when I failed, I would have liked to see the monster burst through the door. Great concept though, worth revisiting!

• 
  Angry Face vs the Cabin by FsebastiamL

  Angry face vs the cabin in the woods!!! NG game jam8

  Score

  3.29 / 5.00

  Type

  Game

  Popularity

  903 Views

  Rated

  Ages 13+

A solid action game engine and the action ran fast. I missed sound effects the most, they would have had a huge impact in this sort of game. A good start if you want to do more brawlers.

• 
  Frozen by ZeroCreativity1

  Swap Tiles to go further into the cabin and get Warm.

  Score

  3.28 / 5.00

  Type

  Game

  Popularity

  880 Views

  Rated

  Everyone

Was impressed to see the Continuity style tackled in 48 hours! My biggest suggestion would be to make it clear on the title screen that you have to use the arrow keys to start moving - I clicked around for a while before trying that and I imagine some people could have shrugged their shoulders and left before realizing. The main character has a nice design.

• 
  Game jam 8 by rhys510

  Run, jump, dodgeas a castle crasher and hide away from the falling trolls.

  Score

  3.16 / 5.00

  Type

  Game

  Popularity

  798 Views

  Rated

  Everyone

It looks and plays nice but starts off too slow. I think starting at the speed of wave 3 would help, I think a lot of people will run out of patience waiting for that first gold coin to land. Has some good concepts like filling in blocks that could be built upon.

• 
  Cabin Brick Breaker by zephyr6

  Cabin themed Brick Breaker

  Score

  3.16 / 5.00

  Type

  Game

  Popularity

  862 Views

  Rated

  Everyone

As worn out as I am on brick breaking games, I actually played this for a while. Still, it IS a brick breaking game, albeit a cute cabin one.

• 
  Lumberjacked by Pahgawk

  Help nature fight back against the lumberjack!

  Score

  3.15 / 5.00

  Type

  Game

  Popularity

  1,219 Views

  Rated

  Everyone

Great art, nice intro and promising gameplay. I like the concept of trying to block the lumberjack from getting home, I just played for a while and wasn't sure if there was an end. A scoreboard would REALLY increase interest, since otherwise it was hard to find an incentive to keep at it. Also the acorn seemed unhelpful enough to not be worth getting, which was kinda a bummer. Still feel like a fun game could come from this foundation.

• 
  Lumberjack vs Treehuggers by funstorm

  You're lumberjack, now fight off these pesky treehuggers before they destroy your cabin!

  Score

  3.11 / 5.00

  Type

  Game

  Popularity

  9,450 Views

  Rated

  Ages 13+

Great art and plays well, this game felt very nicely polished. I found myself wanting more upgrades and some medals would help incentivize sticking with it for the long haul.

• 
  Rob's Cabin Quest by NoLanLabs

  Whip and blast your way through countless enemies to save your family! (GJ8 TeamPogoStick)

  Score

  2.99 / 5.00

  Type

  Game

  Popularity

  5,256 Views

  Rated

  Ages 13+

Controls felt kinda awkward with running and whipping but I liked the ambition behind it. Decent for people who want more after playing Binding of Isaac.

• 
  BGE - Best Game Ever by Holon

  When a man asks, "I know BG means Best Game but what is E," you reply with "EVER!"

  Score

  2.88 / 5.00

  Type

  Game

  Popularity

  1,575 Views

  Rated

  Ages 13+

It really is!

• 
  Cabin Survival Horror by dartosgamer

  Kill Zombies, Stay alive, Get points

  Score

  2.83 / 5.00

  Type

  Game

  Popularity

  806 Views

  Rated

  Ages 13+

It made me smile but in the scope of the jam, some other games tackled the multidirectional shooter genre better.

• 
  cabin in the woods ngj 8 by t4upl

  cabin jam submission

  Score

  2.79 / 5.00

  Type

  Game

  Popularity

  598 Views

  Rated

  Everyone

Has a bug where you need to refresh the page otherwise you're stuck on the intro screen. Beyond that, it's nicely rendered. :)

• 
  Oh my... Ghosts! by emanuelmaues

  Ghosts are trying to sneak into your cabin in the woods.

  Score

  2.14 / 5.00

  Type

  Game

  Popularity

  1,571 Views

  Rated

  Everyone

It was great to see an HTML5 game in the mix! I'll be posting more about our HTML5 support later this week. It's a fun concept but the controls took some getting used to with moving around in a circle.

• 
  Cabin Within Wood by maxman43

  Can you uncover the hidden secret of the cabin within wood?

  Score

  2.00 / 5.00

  Type

  Game

  Popularity

  4,432 Views

  Rated

  Everyone

At first I didn't realize you could pan the screen but once I did that I was able to solve it. Another one that made me smile.

And finally, one entry isn't on NG because we don't have Unity support up and running (yet): Cabin Wars! It's a 3D-rendered artillery game where you can even toss cars at your opponent.

As mentioned yesterday, the winner was Shadow Tag:

• 
  Shadow Tag by Elvidian

  The children are out at night, and they want to play...

  Score

  4.00 / 5.00

  Type

  Game

  Popularity

  15,169 Views

  Rated

  Ages 13+

I also made note of the more experimental "Out There Somewhere." Experimental is good in jams.

• 
  Out There Somewhere by I-smel

  I hope I win some o' that jam!!

  Score

  3.36 / 5.00

  Type

  Game

  Popularity

  7,182 Views

  Rated

  Everyone

It was exciting to see Unity and HTML5 in the mix this time but in terms of the best games, Flash has remained king so far. Maybe things will heat up in the next jam!

Thanks again everyone for participating.

[Manly-Chicken]

Thanks so much Tom!
Really appreciate the critique!

[Nevermind]

Tom delivers.

[Luis]

In before Manly-Chick. Good write up, I cant help but like Out there somewhere. I like depressing games lately. Im about to cry just thinking about it.

[Mattster]

Some great results from the jam! I especially enjoyed "Out There Somewhere", something really new.

Great work to all who participated :D

[NoLanLabs]

Tom Fulp, master of the compliment sandwich.

But seriously, thanks for doing this.

[TomFulp]

At 10/16/12 01:36 PM, Luis wrote: In before Manly-Chick. Good write up, I cant help but like Out there somewhere. I like depressing games lately. Im about to cry just thinking about it.

Yeah I wonder if it means we're becoming old men.

[Saminat]

At 10/16/12 02:07 PM, TomFulp wrote:

At 10/16/12 01:36 PM, Luis wrote: In before Manly-Chick. Good write up, I cant help but like Out there somewhere. I like depressing games lately. Im about to cry just thinking about it.

Yeah I wonder if it means we're becoming old men.

Someone as cool as you? Well jeez, then that's something to look forward to :}

[DivoFST]

I regret not going more in-depth about the Game Jam entries in yesterday's post, so here's a more in-depth look at each

Thanks Tom!
Having a leader that actually cares is awsome!

[GokuVegetaGogetta]

Cool to see your critique Tom, IT SHOWS YOU CARE XXX.

[XsakuX]

At 10/16/12 02:00 PM, NoLanLabs wrote: Tom Fulp, master of the compliment sandwich.

But seriously, thanks for doing this.

I second this ^^^

[PIED3]

Ah Tom, you are too kind!

[tyler2513]

Some awesome flashes included this year! Good work everybody!

[Spudzy]

Yeah, it's great that you've done this for all the game jam entries. It means a lot coming from you.

[I-smel]

NEWGROUNDS IS THE PEOPLE'S GAME SITE.

The funny thing about Out There Somewhere being a lonely experimental thing is that I DID NOT put that much thought into it.
You see games like Time Fcuk or Don't Look Back or whateve other game based on authentic real-life experience, and I could never make a game like that, cos I just feel like it'd come off so corny and transparent and dumb.

So Out There Somewhere is a fake art game, and I'm about as emotionally invested in it as I am in Robot Dinosaurs.
Which launches into a seperate discussion, assuming this was a bigger game I spent more time on. How important is authorial intent? Does it make my work any better, or more impressive, or does it push games as a medium, or am I any more proud of my work to squeeze that reaction out of people?
Not really.

That's basically the thought process I have whenever I wanna make an art game and decide not to.
I had fun making a game that's that minimilistic though.

[Adam-Beilgard]

At 10/16/12 02:07 PM, TomFulp wrote:

At 10/16/12 01:36 PM, Luis wrote: In before Manly-Chick. Good write up, I cant help but like Out there somewhere. I like depressing games lately. Im about to cry just thinking about it.

Yeah I wonder if it means we're becoming old men.

Lulz...

...becoming

[ForNoReason]

You are a man that garners a lot of respect from your actions, Tom.

inb4 luis

[Jazza]

Good guy Tom listens to the people.

[Saminat]

At 10/16/12 06:16 PM, Jazza wrote: Good guy Tom listens to the people

Now let's just hope now that people will stop complaining and enjoy themselves!

[iNvicta-Studios]

Thank you Tom, for saying what I wanted to say about the these games.

[BoMToons]

Tom Fulp for President!

[squidly]

See, this is what we wanted - reviews :D

It honestly makes it all the more rewarding when we get recognized, AustinBreed used to do them, it feels like this Game Jam was a wee bit less... official?

I dunno, I hope the next one is at the same caliber as the last ones have been in terms of set-up.

Thanks for the post, Tom!

[TroisNyxEtienne]

Thank you, Tom <3 It's great to know how we've fared.

[SwagMuffin]

Thanks so much for revisiting Tom :D

[KyleRoberts]

At 10/16/12 01:14 PM, TomFulp wrote:

http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/604457
It was great to see an HTML5 game in the mix! I'll be posting more about our HTML5 support later this week. It's a fun concept but the controls took some getting used to with moving around in a circle.

So, is this the first HTML5 game to be submitted to NG? I didn't realize HTML5 content could be posted yet...

[TomFulp]

At 10/16/12 09:59 PM, KyleRoberts wrote:

At 10/16/12 01:14 PM, TomFulp wrote:

http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/604457
It was great to see an HTML5 game in the mix! I'll be posting more about our HTML5 support later this week. It's a fun concept but the controls took some getting used to with moving around in a circle.

So, is this the first HTML5 game to be submitted to NG? I didn't realize HTML5 content could be posted yet...

We had a few games submitted this week, I'll be highlighting them in the next post! It's invite-only at the moment but people are welcome to contact me if they have games they want to try uploading.

[maxman43]

Nice! Made Tom smile! There's one life goal complete.

Really awesome that you did these reviews, great to hear feedback from the top.

[Hyptosis]

Very cool! ^5

[XwaynecoltX]

Nice write-ups.

hope that the winners are much greatfull for all that you do for them and the site.

~X~

[Addict]

Majority of these games turn out to be garbage since one of the requirements is to make it within 48 hours. But there's a couple games that do stand out and tend to actually be pretty good (and bug free, for the most part).