Theme : Joined Together

I made animated feets and eyes and placed them on a key sprite to create the character. I designed different type of keys, using a custom shader to change to palette of the character based on the type. To fit the theme, keys are joined together on a bunch, and you can swap between the different key-characters from the bunch. Each type of key has different properties (ex : multiple jumps) so they allow to reach different part of the level. Keys also have 1, 2 or 3 pins, which can only open matching doors.

The more key the player has, the heavier the bunch get. It affects the ability to move and jump of the selected key-character. The player has to choose which key to pick up and which on to leave behind to clear the level.

The goal is to open the heart-door that can be opened only with a heart key. I decided to introduce this key pretty early in the game. So when reaching the door, the player has to remember this key and go back accross all the levels to get it (they can't pick it up the first time otherwise the bunch gets too heavy to clear the level).

Level editor

I decided to make a small level editor for this game. It's an investment of a few hours, but I believe it was worth it. While it took me a bit of time to make, it saved me time in return while building the level. More importantly, it made making the levels and iterating easy and fun. This made me build better levels, as building levels became the fun part of the project. If building a level was tedious, I would try to get over with it as fast as possible and it would greatly reduce the quality of the puzzles.

Results

The game couldn't get enough ratings to get ranked properly (due to the quite bad itch rating system for game jams). Sadly games has to be available in browser otherwise people skip them, and I couldn't get a web version out in time.

I'm personally really happy with the gameplay, the puzzles and the graphics. I feel like I hit exactly the difficulty and complexity of the levels I was going for. I was very short and time though, and could barely make the game playable in time. I had no time to polish the game too much, and add the tutorial and ending. I believe the game was a bit ambitious from the start, but it turned out fine in the end.