Completed Pokémon Unown Ruins

Spoiler: Game Screenshots

Game Download: https://www.mediafire.com/file/99veezktzybggx5/Pokemon_Unown_Ruins.zip/file
Made Using: Pokémon Essentials
Team: Vendily!
Notes: It's really short, like 10 odd minutes short. It's all puzzles, with each room of the ruins having a different, self contained puzzle within. So if you mess up, you can just leave and re-enter and it'll reset back to normal. There is a boss at the end of the game. You'll know it when you see it. While I've never actually lost to it in all my tests, and it does change to a more favourable version if you end up really messed up to it, a save can't hurt.
Resource Pack: https://eeveeexpo.com/resources/353/

Spoiler: Credits

Pokemon Daycare
By Vendily

Using Pokemon Essentials Starter Kit
Flameguru
Poccil
Maruno

Otter Flooflord for the first map, the exterior area.

Annone (Unown Font): Gyusan
fontspace.com/gyusan/annone
It doesn't actually appear in game, but I used it to make the item icon for the Unown Tablets
========================
GenI-V Overworlds
========================

-Neo-Spriteman
-MissingLukey
-help-14
-Kymoyonian
-cSc-A7X
-2and2makes5
-Pokegirl4ever
-Fernandojl
-Silver-Skies
-TyranitarDark
-Getsuei-H
-Kid1513
-Milomilotic11
-Kyt666
-kdiamo11
-Chocosrawlooid
-Syledude
-Gallanty
-Gizamimi-Pichu
-Zyon17

Eric Matyas's Audio
https://www.pokecommunity.com/showthread.php?t=405412
Music by Eric Matyas
www.soundimage.org

The journal and load icons from Daycare get reused here, with edits.
The load screen, title screen, and credits screen are all from HGSS, with colour modification.
The tiles are all modifications of default tiles. The ruins doorway is the regular cave entrance ontop of the normal brick wall.
The Mew Tile puzzle is just a recolour.
The rough floor is just a mix between the regular ruin floor and a rough cave floor tile (Though I have forgotten which one specifically)

 

[Ekat]

I just finished the game!

Spoiler: Spoiler

I think my favourite out of the bunch definitely had to be the mirror puzzle. It was super creative and fun to go through.

The game had some great little nuggets of puzzle ideas that could be expanded into something bigger. I fully understand why you kept it short, though. I also liked the little bits of l o r e and such that came with the journal pages. The "get a better binder" message was probably my favourite, though.

My only suggestions would be:
1. Give the player the running shoes. I'm not sure if that will interfere with the aforementioned puzzle. If so, you can just remove then with $PokemonGlobal.runningShoes=false every time they enter the room, and return them once they exit.
2. Maybe edit the pillars where the tablets go so it's clear that something is supposed to fit in them- a little indentation or such, idk. I didn't realize they were more than just set pieces right off the bat, and I could see that causing confusion for other players.

All-in-all, awesome job with this! It was short, fun, and super interesting!

 

[Aki]

Oh my gosh I love the whole idea for this little game, it's great! I didn't figure out untill the end though that the journal pages had important hint/clues on them...but I'm glad I read them before the boss. I'll second Ekat's point about this though:

2. Maybe edit the pillars where the tablets go so it's clear that something is supposed to fit in them- a little indentation or such, idk. I didn't realize they were more than just set pieces right off the bat, and I could see that causing confusion for other players.

I only interacted with a pillar by accident, I'd assumed the blue glyph was gonna activate something when I got all the tablets, or that the Unowns on it would react? So I tried standing on it and talking to an Unown but ended up interacting with the pillar instead.

Great little game Vendily!

 

[TechSkylander1518]

Really enjoyed this game!

Spoiler: Specific praise

-That intro menu is really well-done!
-I love that she just breaks down the cut tree, that's fantastic
-It's small, but I really like that you compacted the menu down to only what you need for the adventure!
-It's really fun that the protag's dialogue changes for every page, it keeps things fresh!
-All of these puzzles were really well-done and fun! It's really cool to see all the mechanics you implemented in the game!
-That boss battle was super great! I love that you managed the OW action with it!
-That music fit the game perfectly- I don't think there was ever a time where I thought "Okay, that's been going on long enough, let's get something else going."

Spoiler: Some critiques

• It's a little unclear that the Unown at the start are actually floating above- they still trigger the grass animation when they pass through it, so it makes it look a little strange when you first see them floating above a building or tree, I almost thought it was an error at first. I don't know what to suggest to fix it, other than maybe shadows under them?
• I loved using the journal to learn more about the world, but I wish I didn't have to wait to fall down before I could read the three pages I collected up top.
• I clicked on Unown outside the cave, and they played their cry and vanished, but didn't do anything else- was something supposed to happen, or is it just to prepare the trainer for how to do the word puzzle? Or is there a bonus I'm missing?
• Speaking of the word puzzle, could I suggest some way of checking what letter the Unown are, at least when they're facing sideways? When they move around, they sometimes stay facing sideways, which can be tricky when Fs and Ls and Ts look the same from that angle. That might be intentional, though.
• The patience puzzle took me a whole minute... which isn't much, but considering the game is about 10 minutes, that's 10% of the game just waiting in place, which is at least 5% too much for my liking.
• Did the Oddish... do anything? It has its own page in the journal, but it didn't seem to be relevant again at all. Maybe that's a Pokemon Daycare reference that flew over my head, though.

Spoiler: Minor typos

-Besides will anyone even care - should have a comma after besides
-painted to look like a pokeball - should be Poke Ball (or Poké Ball if you like to get fancee)
-in a small unassuming cave - should have a comma after small
-the closest location possible - missing a period, unless there's a second part to that and I haven't found the page lol

 

[Tomix9tomix]

That was really fun! I loved the journal pages idea, I collected all 10 and read them all :P

The puzzles were nice and diverse too, and not too challenging. The final boss was a cool idea. You've made a really unique game that stands out and I like that. It also felt like it had a lot of polish, The menu was clean and I didn't encounter a single bug which is something odd for a game jam game. Good job!

 

[Vendily]

I updated Pokemon Unown Ruins to fix some issues, mostly typos and less than fun puzzles.

Spoiler: Changed stuff

- The purple room Unown moves much faster than before.
- The blue room Unowns now all have direction fix, so no more annoying sideways frames.
- The pillars in the main room now have indents in the tiles, so no guessing needed to progress.
- Pages can now be read as soon as you pick up the journal. You still lose most of them when you fall in the pit.
- The Unowns in the exterior area no longer trigger the grass animation.
- A new page was added, because the fake pokeball never actually gave you one. Oops.

If you've already beaten the game, there's not much new to be seen in a replay.
The old download & resource pack have been overwritten.

 

[Elle]

I love puzzles and by the sound of it, this is a great game for that! :0

 

[AngelusMortis]

Not much more that I can say that hasn't been said already.

What I will say is that I absolutely loved the break from the norm, having nothing but puzzles to solve and no battles whatsoever. I loved each of the puzzles, particularly the Shell Game.

Job well done, Vendily. I'd love to see more puzzle-oriented games in the future.