Autumn 2024 update & call to playtesters


Foreword

so, this game has become a success.

it has a total of 20k+ browser plays, and has been featured in itch.io's 'New & Popular' rankings.

i thank all players very much, for making my dream of being a professional game developer come true.

Development

any further updates on Jimi come from the design document i've written for a 3-5 hour experience.

the idea is that there's two factions, cats (who play typing games with the keyboard) and mice (who play reaction games with the mouse).

they get into a conflict and Jimi acts as the catalyst for resolving that conflict.

more on that later, i have to restrain myself from spoiling everything!

Next update when??

once i have gathered enough playtester data for this version.

known issues in the current version that will get fixed in the next version:

  • the cat dialogue shouldn't have Z to accept, it breaks the game's keyboard usage convention.
  • there is a path to the void outside of the game. (if you reach that part, consider yourself having won the game, even though the credits sequence doesn't play.)

what more i need from playtesters:

  • are the precision platforming quests a welcome addition, or do they corrode the concept of the game?
  • what sort of time does it take for you to beat the game?
  • if you haven't beaten the game, what was the obstacle where you got stuck?

i look forward to your comments!

Get Jimi can not read

Download NowName your own price

Comments

Log in with itch.io to leave a comment.

(1 edit)

There's quite a few issues I wanna point out :


- I feel like the warp transitions when starting and finishing a quest are way too long, I think it breaks the flow a little bit. These should at least be shortened by half imo (except maybe the first one as it's a bit more excusable imo)

- When trying to transition between screens, sometimes it may look like there's nothing like as in you are blocked by the edge of the screen, when in reality it's a wall on the other side. Making the screen pan regardless may help communicating that there are stuff, as well as revealing the openings (although I must say this may cause spoilers).

- I am not a fan of the precision platforming of Quests 2 and 3. I think quest 1 is fine as it does teach you about double jump and dash, but the rest are too hard and shouldn't be mandatory. I say that as someone who considers himself really skilled at games by the way. The main issue here is that I came here for puzzles, exploration, adventure, NOT for frustrating platforming challenges. People that aren't as good as me or rather play casually are probably just gonna stop playing at this point.

- The game seems to be fixed to QWERTY, at least for the *. As someone with an AZERTY, I had to look up where the * was on the QWERTY keyboard. I personally didn't really mind that but fellow AZERTY users may genuinely be confused at the "Press T and Star" puzzle (that is if they understand that star = *) and think it's broken if they don't know what the issue is.


- After finishing the game I tried out Halloween mode, and after dying like an idiot to the first bat, I respawned at the save point for Quest 3... I don't think this is intended xDDD 


That's all I had to say, I overall love where this is going for with really cool ideas, I see this didn't receive any updates in almost a year so I really hope this project haven't been thrown in the bin as I see potential in it :)

(+1)

I'm in the "no precision platforming" camp. The concept of the game is about being clever, solving puzzles, and exploring every nook and cranny. Precision platforming is a pure twitch skill, and the mere presence of it excludes non-hardcore players.

(It's especially bad when a switch happens partway through the game, like when Hollow Knight suddenly turns into Super Meat Boy after maintaining a high but reasonable difficulty until that point.)

I guess my viewpoint is that precision platform players will generally prefer to play a game that's all precision platforming, while anyone else is likely to be turned off by its presence.

(+1)

thank you for your input. i should at least make sure that the precision platformer quests are entirely optional.