Shadowfey
This is an entrant in the Pirate Software Jam July 2024 - Shadows & Alchemy.
The GDD for this game can be found here
Story
Shadowfey is a simple shadow with simple dreams, to just sit and chill in the background, not freak anyone out, just kinda be there and be a good shadow. But alas Shadowfey has been snared by a tinkering wizard in The Prism! a confusing device where instead of light and shadow being separate, they are mixed - and worse, light steals the very shadow essence of Shadowfey. Rather than be an unfortunate experiment, Shadowfey must escape The Prism and return to the normal world.
Gameplay
It's a simple single screen puzzle game that involves moving objects around a level to cast shadows/light and have objects move in a way that lets your Shadowfey character make it's way from a start to a finish.
It's casual friendly; you can attempt a puzzle as much as you like, there are 26 levels total, with about half being teaching puzzles the other half being challenge puzzles.
Controls
Left Mouse Click
- Start a Shadowfey level attempt by clicking >>
- Click menu/ui buttons
Left Mouse Drag/Drop
- Drag Black Barriers around the level to block light
- Drag extra Goals to set custom paths for Shadowfey
Spacebar
- Kills Shadowfey instantly, useful to quick cancel an attempt
EMERGENCY
- If the level gets broken somehow, you can click the top left menu button and select "Reset Level"
Mechanics
Color affects Shadowfey in different ways, some good, some bad:
- Any amount of Color affects Shadowfey the same, so lighter/darker shades of a Color are exactly the same mechanically, eg. if some Cyan is overlapping some other Cyan to make a more saturated Cyan - it's exactly the same as if there was only 1 layer of Cyan for Shadowfey
- Cyan - reduces Power which Shadowfey needs to Attack things (including the Goal flag for each level)
- Yellow - reduces Speed which makes Shadowfey move slower
- Pink - reduces Resist which makes all Colors affect Shadowfey more/faster
- Green - grants Shadowfey a Speed boost
- Red - grants Shadowfey Dodge which lets Shadowfey pass through objects instead of Attacking them
- Blue - grants Shadowfey Protection which makes Shadowfey immune to Color draining
- White - no effect
- Gray - no effect
Barriers block light and cast shadows:
- Black - these Barriers can be moved by the player to change the light and shadow of the level, a key to solving many puzzles
- Grey - these Barriers cannot be moved, but can still be Attacked or Dodged
Goals set the direction that Shadowfey moves through the level:
- Every level has a Final (not numbered) Goal flag
- Some levels let the player drag/drop more numbered Goals around the level - Shadowfey goes to them in number order, but each Goal costs a bit more Attack than the previous
Enemies appear in some levels:
- Blue eyes don't move and cost some Attack Power to destroy, or they can be Dodged
- Spikey eyes can move and kill Shadowfey on contact, but they can be Dodged
Gems of Cyan, Yellow, Pink colors appear in some levels:
- A Gem refills to max the Color resource for Shadowfey
Level Editor
You can make your own levels with the same editor i used to make the puzzles! (also handy to cheat past levels if you get really stuck)
In edit mode:
- Completing a level doesn't auto progress, so you can iterate easily
- The tick box bottom right enables/disables the use of Goals
- The left menus spawn a the chosen thing on your mouse cursor
- You can toggle a Barrier between Black/Gray by pressing Spacebar while dragging it
- You can set the movement path for a Spikey eye by pressing Spacebar while dragging it
- Click Save on the right side to set the level name and the message/hint/taunt, then close Edit Mode with the top left button
- Outside of Edit mode you click the top left menu button and choose "Share/Load" which will display the level code in a textbox for you to copy and paste somewhere to share
If you make a cool puzzle, add a comment to this page with the code so other's can try it too :)
Enjoy!
Status | In development |
Platforms | HTML5 |
Author | pixelfireplace |
Genre | Puzzle |
Tags | 2D, Casual, Colorful, Godot, Indie, Level Editor, Minimalist, Pixel Art, Short, Singleplayer |
Comments
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This game is officially way too smart for me. I made it to level 14 but I had a damn good time doing it.
The art and visuals are simple but effective and read extremely well, which is exactly what you need when your game involves precise movement and control of light. The menu is really squished however and pretty much unreadable and without a fullscreen option I'm not sure I could even began to attempt to understand the FRICKEN LEVEL EDITOR? Hello, wow imagine being able to build something like that into your gamejam game for people to make and SHARE levels. Amazing.
The audio is great the music has a nice balance of chill and beat to keep me engaged and the SFX are retro crunched to hell which I like.
The gameplay and mechanics though are just on another level, they are absolutely dialed in to perfection and the systems and integration with the character are simply amazing. The gradual increase in difficulty and mechanics was great I just wish I could have beat level 14. I couldn't figure it out at all!
Overall a seriously impressive and mechanically robust puzzle game that boggles my tiny little mind.
Very clever puzzle design, I like it! You did a great job at gradually introducing new mechanics level by level, and making it more and more challenging. The menus felt a bit squished, a bigger viewport or full screen mode might help with that. But for the game itself it was fine. Also, great song choice and loved the little lore text in the description - Shadowfey is a good shadow! 🖤