Hey, thanks for playing !

There isn't much secrets to how fast the game was developed : knowledge of the engine and hacky code.

As for the pathfinding mechanism : every province has a list of "neighbors" to which they are connected. When choosing a province to move to the AI will try to take the most advantageous one.
Note that I completely forgot to add a case where the AI wants to get back to a province it has already conquered so it gets stuck whenever too much of the board gets red. Oops.

Thanks a lot, the whole game is completely bugged but I'm pretty happy  with how much I was able to cram inside this one

Super creative interpretation of the theme. Really liked what you did with this.

The instructions are a bit dauting at first but everything is a lot simpler than it seems.

Probably my favorite so far. Super cool how much depth is hidden at first glance.

It's quite clunky but I love the idea, nicely done.

That last cat king is an absolute nightmare. Simple stuff but really nicely done

Good stuff. Really well put together

The probabilities make it pretty easy for the battle to end in a draw but still, nicely done.

Heyo

Haha always neat to see someone playing the game, even by accident

Ah I understand completely, we had to make a lot of cut due to stuff working in engine but then breaking in the web export, It's always painful having to remove so much of what was functioning.

Being able to cut what need to be cut without hurting the core gameplay is such a hard process, good on you for still uploading a working product. Have a great one

Hello again !

Since it's pretty late in the voting period I didn't bother leaving a comment to save some time.

In a nutshell :  I think your game is supposed to emulate a "capture the flag" scenario between two teams, but in singleplayer ? The graphics are neat enough and pretty unique whilst remaining readable. The style of all three of your games is pretty reminiscent of little big planet, quite liked that.

The gameplay is clean and simple, the teapot controls adequatly and jumping around is always a pleasure. Aiming with your tea-shots is a bit clunky since the teapot turns slowly and doesn't follow your cursor.
It's still easy enough to be accurate since ennemies don't move however.

It's a shame that your implementation of the theme isn't a bit stronger. I think it lacked some opposition. Collecting cards is easy and, since ennemies don't shoot back and can't move, I never felt in any actual danger. The timer is also extremely lenient and it's definitely feasable to collect every card then pick the red one repeatedly to score a higher score. More emphasis on the companion would have also been great.

The leaderboard is a nice touch, although it only display a single name, but I think the game needs more stuff to feel really alive. More opposition, more danger, a more defined companion.

Still, neat entry. My biggest grip is how it lacked on the theme implementation side.

Hi Ilias and thanks for commenting !
Sorry for not answering your first comment, I though it was AI-generated since you're pasting it in a lot of comment section. Are you conducting a poll for university ?

Anyway, I already played and reviewed your game, neat stuff

Thanks a lot for the kind word ! We intent to keep working on it in the coming year

Alright ! Really liked your entry by the way, super tight polish

No worries ! A lot is going under the hood and what's there is absolutely rough.

What was the problem ? After the team folder is created youn need to click on it then affect 5 players from your pool on the right.

After this is done you can click each player individually (on their summary on the left side of the screen) then place them in the little "placement" blackboard. Once this is done you should be able to click "submit" and your team will be created.

Thanks for playing ! A lot more is going on in the background and what's shown here is only a small part of what we wanted to make.

Have a nice one

I absolutely adore everything about this one !

Reminded me a lot of sword and sandals or sword and souls. Great upgrade system, challenging opponents, all of this is so neat and varied. The gameplay differences between the giants skeleton and the trident orc are striking, love that.

My only complaint is having to restart from scratch after each death, really good entry;

Haha thanks a bunch ! I had comments on some of my earlier games that my tutorials were too succint so I tried to push it a lot further this time. This may be too much

Thanks for playing anyway

It's such a charming concept ! It reminded me a lot of those early wiiU titles which focused a lot on asymetric gameplay.

It's a bit rough around the edges and the dark character is quite at a disadvantage but using the timer as a scoring system and alternating who plays who is already quite fun. Really neat entry

Super cool entry, absolutely love how you guys went for a multiplayer survival game in such a short time frame.

Graphics are simple but clear enough. I had some trouble understanding that zombies were dropping bullets and not spray cans. Other than that it's pretty neat, barricads are easy to place, guns are responsive, it's a solid start to an even better game.

I had some trouble during night 2 however, where the game placed me in an endless "wait for respawn" timer despite me having a full health bar (thanks to heavy apple consumption). I think you may have a bug on that end.

240 points against the final boss. Really pleasing experience.

It's really rare to see AI generated graphics looking so coherent, really neat presentation to go with a pretty tight game design and a solid interpretation of the theme. Really like how you incorporated the companion into every aspects of the game, everythings come together extremely well.

The only criticism I could have, like the low difficulty and clunky card balancing, are completely null and void in a jam game. Excellent entry

Thanks a lot for your comment and the very detailed bug report ! We're well aware of all those problems but as you said : time constraints an the fickleness of Gamemaker web export forced us to cut a lot of corners during the last days.

Still hope you've appreciated what's there, sincerely expect to see your entry at the very top. Have a great one

Reminded me a lot of "hidden in plain sight" on the first xbox. Really cool implementation of the theme, neatly balanced. Really like that the spy are not the only proactive group thanks to the companion dog.

I was able to clear level 5 during the few seconds after I had already lost by bashing the spy right after he killed the last scientist. I don't know if this is intended but I had both the win and loss message and was able to get to the next level.

Really cool entry overall, great job

Honestly I think reducing the stun duration would do wonder, currently it's long enough for 3 HE grenades to be thrown and with a bit of extra time to spare

We had a similar take on the theme but I must say yours is a lot cleaner, more focused. I really like what you did with this.

I'd be interested in how exactly your algorythm works. My guess is you're taking the average power used by the player on each configuration and adding a small variation but I'm not sure.A

Anyway this was a really pleasant experience, seing my companion slowly starting to score bullseyes more reliably than me is very satisfying.

Very charming little game, nice juggling act. Your minigames are clear and simple enough to be understood right from the first glance, super clean.

If I had to nitpick :  I didn't really liked that arrival animation when switching from one world to the next, I felt like it was a bit of a time loss without too much benefit (it does look neat however).

Wow this is something else entirely. Excellent entry

Really love how you refined that Papa's pizzeria gameplay, the companions really is a gamechanger. This is so well produces, just a bit more pizza variety and it could easily be a complete game, great work

Finding the right balance to actually pull the bricks was an experience, I ended up just pressing both mouse button at the same time so that the camera rotation would compensate the brick movement. Really neat stuff you have here, do you have any advice on how to pull the bricks without the entire structure coming along with it ?

Not half bad, really had a fun time. It's a bit sad how overpowered the flashbang/HE/HE/HE combo is but It's nice to have enough options to experiment. Really clever use of each grenade type.

As always, being able to play 1v1 locally is such a nice addition

Here goes :https://evigouroux.itch.io/barball-downloadable-version

It's entirely identical to the web build but should be easier to scroll since it's not embedded in a web page

Hi and thanks a lot for your comment !

The scrolling not working in full screen is definitely weird, in insight we should have added another way to browse your players without it. I'm going to upload a downloadable version to the itch page, hopefully it will make you able to play in fullscreen or, at least, get the full experience. Thanks a lot for reporting by the way.

I usually share your sentiment on registering in jam game but, at the time of making this, it seemed like our best option for a persistent multiplayer game. We probably could have managed something by using the player's itch account in retrospect.

Anyway thanks again for sticking by, this was definitely a huge challenge in such a short time.

Thanks for the kind word ! Really liked your entr

That's weird, have you tried creating a new account ? Both password should be at least 8 chars long and identicals and the login should be at least 4 chars long

Sorry for the inconvenience, I'll have a look to see if I can help on my end

Does it says that when trying to register ? Or are you trying to log in?

It's possible the game is telling you that instead of "bad credential"

Thanks a lot for the kind word, the game is pretty rough around the edges so can't say I'm too surprised by these black screens. Thanks for playing anyway

I feel like the game is quit a bit too easy, two or three machine guns were all I really needed to complete it. The second level is also bugged and ennemy tends to get stucks in the walls so they need to be cleared with an airstrike.

Still pretty neat, nice tower, powerup and ennemy variety. Pretty deep for a Jam TD

Really well made, I'm going to mirror the last comment a bit and say that not having an invincibility frame makes damages a bit unrealiable. Still, pretty good one, simple but pleasant. Movement is fluid and responsive and the different ways each companion plays adds a bit of variety.

Solid entry.

This may be my favorite so far, amazing work and a great take on the themes. It's amazing how much depth this has in such a short timeframe.

Combat is clear and well made, your artworks are simple but endearing, really great combo overall honestly. I love that rythm of rest and explorations, really feels like a simplified Dnd campaign, I have yet to try it in multiplayer but having the option to betray each others sounds like a great addition.

I adore your four characters by the way, really nice to see you didn't stick to the usual thief/mage/warrior archetypes, they all feels fresh and interesting. You really went above and beyond with this one.

This may be my favorite so far, amazing work and a great take on the themes. It's amazing how much depth this has in such a short timeframe.

Combat is clear and well made, your artworks are simple but endearing, really great combo overall honestly. I love that rythm of rest and explorations, really feels like a simplified Dnd campaign, I have yet to try it in multiplayer but having the option to betray each others sounds like a great addition.

I adore your four characters by the way, really nice to see you didn't stick to the usual thief/mage/warrior archetypes, they all feels fresh and interesting. Dialogues are a bit scarce but really enjoyable and I was really surprise to see you actually tracks wounds in real time on each character sprite. You really went above and beyond with this one

Pretty solid.

I really liked how the pick up are used as clue to know what elemental you should use for each obstacle, the game teaches its mechanics flawlessly. It was a bit of a pain to start over from scratch after each death however, some more checkpoints would be nice.