An Epic Tale of Tea and Tumult
A downloadable game for Windows
This is the epic tale of Kettle, the little whistling tea kettle who could boil without a stove as long as he keeps whistling (microphone input), and who would stop at nothing to save his best friend and his village folk from the evil Coffee Queen and her corrupted coffee minions.
Microphone-powered:In this game, you'll physically need to take a deep breath and whistle/sing long sustained notes into the microphone. The longer you sustain your notes at the proper volume levels, the faster and more powerful Kettle becomes, as he boils and whistles with increasing berserker rage. But note that Kettle becomes increasingly harder to control and has less precision as he increases with rage.
Headphones are recommendedto avoid background noise from the game getting picked up by microphone. Speakers work fine in most cases if you turn up the "Background Noise Level" slider to compensate for it. You can recalibrate the mic during the playing by pressing Esc for the pause menu, and clicking the Calibrate button.
30 Second Trailer:
Playthrough:
Controls
| Action | Control |
| Boiling Rage runs faster, jumps higher, pushes things better the longer you sustain it | Whistle/sing in your microphone at a medium volume (orange section of sound meter UI). Gets more powerful as you hold the note for longer. |
| Overheat charges rage faster. May hurt if you overheat for too long. | Whistle/sing in your microphone at a loud volume (red section of sound meter UI) |
| Cool down Once in a while, being a little more coolheaded and tempering Kettle's anger to just lukewarm or cold will get you there instead of full rage mode | Stop whistling/singing (gray section of sound meter /UI). |
| Look around | Move mouse. Scrollwheel to zoom. |
| Walk/Run | WASD or Arrows |
| Jump | Spacebar. Hold to jump higher. Release to drop. |
| Pour Water | Hold left mouse button. |
| Stomp Attack | Jump directly over an enemy and release spacebar when you see the red target icon above the enemy's head. |
| Pause/Menu | Esc |
| Accessible mode of whistling (if no mic, or you can't use your voice) | Right mouse button. Triggers on both button down and button up. |
You have unlimited lives/respawns, but will respawn at the last checkpoint with half health if you die.
Hint: if you're not sure where to go, follow the non-dairy fairy godmother after you meet her. She'll leave a trail of rainbow glitter. Also, you can look for the next fire, which usually indicates where to go next..
Made in 10 days for theLv. 99 Game Jam. Theme:Take a deep breath. I applied the theme by making the player actually have to take a deep breath in order to sustain a long whistle/singing notes in the microphone. This audio input, at the right level, will power up the hero, a little tea kettle who whistles when boiling.
This is an episodic game, and it currently consists of the first chapter (Escape for Stovetop Village), and the intro for the second chapter. I have 5 chapters planned, and will continue making more if the game wins a suitable prize in the Lv. 99 Game Jam or if there is enough interest/funding.
Accessibility:For those who cannot physically whistle/sing a note and sustain it, you can use the right mouse button to simulate whistling. Both pressing and releasing the right mouse button rapidly will count as whistling/singing, but it is a little harder to modulate.
Credits and 3rd Party Attributions: I did the programming, design, story, and all the 3D models/animations, and generated the voice narration using play.ht. The music, sound effects, and 2D icons were 3rd party assets. See the credits_and_attributions.txt file included in the .zip for more details.
Known Issues:
- Standing in fires doesn't necessarily help you boil, depending on your framerate.
- The speech text is a bit small when playing on full resolution 4K mode. Play in 1080p or 1440p if it's too small for you.
- Selecting "Oculus Virtual Audio Device" as a microphone in the audio calibration screen will crash the game. Set a real non-virtual microphone in the Windows settings first, and then start the game.
| Status | Released |
| Platforms | Windows |
| Rating | Rated 5.0 out of 5 stars (1 total ratings) |
| Author | andyman404 |
| Genre | Adventure |
| Made with | Unity,Blender |
| Tags | 3D Platformer,Action-Adventure,Atmospheric,Comedy,Cute,Dark,Funny,microphone,Singleplayer |
| Average session | About a half-hour |
| Languages | English |
| Inputs | Keyboard,Mouse,Voice control |
| Accessibility | Subtitles |
Download
Install instructions
Extract the .zip file to a folder. Run "An Epic Tale of Tea And Tumult.exe".
Comments
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I was really gripped by the tragic and surreal storyline at the beginning of the game, where cute tableware living in a small world is under attack.
I really like the fact that you have to use the microphone input to build up the boiling gauge and become stronger! I was so engrossed in the game that I was out of breath while playing. This is my favorite piece! *meow*
Yeah adjusting the sensitivity helped a lot with keeping the rage bar up. Whistling or singing would have worked better for gameplay but I don't think many people want to just hear us doing either so just had to talk as much as we could to make the video more entertaining. Also loved the game and hope you will be able to continue it after the jam is over.
