Abysm - my own BD inspired game

[Renons]

Hello!
Is a bit of self promotion Ok on this forum? Since BD inspired games in general seems to be on topic, I'm going to go ahead and ask if anyone is interested in looking at the one I'm working on, Abysm:

https://renons.itch.io/abysm

The first episode/demo with 18 levels is available for download, and if anybody is interested in playing and providing feedback I'd be most grateful.

It has hand-crafted pixels, an extremely lightweight story element, and atmospheric music (which I didn't craft, thereby saving the world from that particular calamity). The game was mainly inspired by BD, as I remembered it 35+ years after playing it on my C128, filtered through a more "realistic" theme. It explicitly favors smaller single-puzzle levels in lieu of the frequently large and sprawling levels that BD provided. I think it ended up sufficiently different from the source material to be considered it's own thing, and BD engine compatibility is an explicit non-goal, there are plenty of games that cater to that, R'n'D very much included This is more like a kind of love letter to a game I loved as a kid.

I'm hoping to finish the game with three additional episodes in late 2025, and might end up putting it on Steam, mostly to make it simple to get it running on my Deck, where all such things belong.

[Holger]

Hello Renons, welcome to the R'n'D forum!

Yes, you have posted at the right place, I would say! And no, there's no problem with a little self-promotion if it's somehow related to BD style games.

I only was able to have a very quick look at your game "Abysm" so far, but it looks very good! I had a quick look at the "jam version" linked there, and I think I will also try the demo version / episode 1 version of your new game! (I will try to run it in a Windows VM, as I only have Mac and Linux at hand now.)

The game was mainly inspired by BD, as I remembered it 35+ years after playing it on my C128, filtered through a more "realistic" theme.

Seems that many of us had the same origins!

It explicitly favors smaller single-puzzle levels in lieu of the frequently large and sprawling levels that BD provided.

I really like this approach!

[...] BD engine compatibility is an explicit non-goal [...]

Perfectly fine! Nevertheless, I wonder (from only having played the first few levels of the "jam version" so far) if your game could be re-created in R'n'D using custom elements and custom artwork. But this is just my specific point of view on all things BD...

This is more like a kind of love letter to a game I loved as a kid.

I could say the same about R'n'D with regard to Boulder Dash and Emerald Mine.

I'm hoping to finish the game with three additional episodes in late 2025, and might end up putting it on Steam, mostly to make it simple to get it running on my Deck, where all such things belong.

I wish you good luck and success finishing your game (or further episodes for it)!

And feel free to announce news about it here in this forum!

[Renons]

Thanks!

Code: Select all

I will try to run it in a Windows VM, as I only have Mac and Linux at hand now.

I gave compiling it for Linux a try, installed WSL2 and all that, but to no avail so far. Will have to try again at a later time.

I could say the same about R'n'D with regard to Boulder Dash and Emerald Mine.

That's obvious, and a mighty impressive love letter at that, the dedication to preservation and sustained effort over time certainly stands out...

And feel free to announce news about it here in this forum!

I will make sure to!

[Renons]

I have now uploaded an experimental Linux build of the Abysm demo to https://renons.itch.io/abysm. Maybe that'll work for you?

[Holger]

It works just fine! Haven't found anything "experimental" about the Linux version of your game.

Very, very good game! Great atmosphere! Cool pixel art graphics! Generally very well done!

Puzzles are not too hard, so it's both challenging and fun to play! Just reached the last level, but still have some problems with the "pale queen". Will try again tomorrow.

Recommended for anyone who likes BD style games!

[Renons]

Very, very good game! Great atmosphere! Cool pixel art graphics! Generally very well done!

Thanks a bunch! Had to wake up whatever long dormant skills all those hours with Deluxe Paint as a teenager bestowed upon me. Amiga pixel art in a non-purist way is probably the general vibe I'm trying for.

Puzzles are not too hard, so it's both challenging and fun to play!

Good to hear, I've spent a lot of time moving levels around to introduce things in a reasonable way, and in general tweaking them to de-emphasize the need for precise timing, especially in the first episode. I'm also trying to avoid making anything worthy of inclusion in the BoulderDashFan YouTube channel, those are highly impressive displays of skill, but are not likely to be a recipe for how to make good levels for general consumption

Just reached the last level, but still have some problems with the "pale queen". Will try again tomorrow.

Yeah, still thinking about how I can tweak that one. I've recently lowered the speed of the projectiles by half, which helped a lot, and lowered the number of Brood from seven to five, but I still feel that I need to figure something out. I kinda wish I hadn't come up with the stupid concept of having a boss for every episode... gels well with the atmosphere of my game, but badly with being primarily a puzzle game.

[Renons]

Grid based "physics" can easily get a bit funny at time... I didn't predict my sliding ice boulders would be able to behave like this:



Interesting, but I think I want to change that before any of my levels depend on this behavior...

[Renons]

I posted an updated version of the demo, and this time Ive made a couple of critical tweaks to the Pale Queen level, borrowing a contraption from further into the game. The goal was to make the level feel less frustrating if you have to restart, and more in line with my general puzzle ethos that once you have figured out how, actually doing it shouldn't be a big problem, well... at least you shouldn't have to string together several hard-to-do moments in a row.

https://renons.itch.io/abysm/devlog/980 ... emo-update

[Renons]

A new version of my demo is now available for download:

https://renons.itch.io/abysm/devlog/985 ... -available

If you enjoy the first episode and are interested in helping me playtest the rest of the game, contact me!

[Renons]

Just wanted to note that Abysm now has the most critical of features for any BD-like, an idle animation:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zdiYHd9FRsE

Not saying it's inspired by anything in particular or anything.

[BrownSky]

Grid based "physics" can easily get a bit funny at time... I didn't predict my sliding ice boulders would be able to behave like this:



Interesting, but I think I want to change that before any of my levels depend on this behavior...

Or would you consider not changing it? After all, it seems like a behaviour that is unique to Abysm, and unique/special behaviours are a good thing for standing out from the herd of BD clones!

[Renons]

Or would you consider not changing it? After all, it seems like a behavior that is unique to Abysm, and unique/special behaviours are a good thing for standing out from the herd of BD clones!

Keeping it was certainly an option that was on my mind, this exactly is the kind of stuff that somebody could build a cool and interesting puzzle from. There were a couple of reasons why I decided this was the wrong behavior for Abysm i particular:
* Firstly, Abysm goes a little bit down the road of being "semi-realistic", having a simple story, not-abstract-arcade type graphics, and physics like the player not being able to outrun falling boulders
* Secondly, the various effects of this behavior were hard to predict for the player... e.g. it was hard to visualize how things would end up
* Thirdly, the various effects of this quickly turned out to be quite common when I started building puzzles with these ice boulders, so it wasn't going to stay something very obscure, thus making it more of a problem for the previous reasons

I think somebody could use this in a nice way in a game, I mean, look at how it actually "bounces" the boulder back... that just looks cool! I am certainly not looking for "real realism", and I certainly have puzzles which rely on learning the particular unrealistic behaviors of Abysm, but for this game I didn't feel this was the right move. I can only hope that Abysm has enough unique things about it that people will find it interesting, even if it lacks this particular niggle. One of the perks of operating in this subgenre is that there are a lot of previous art one can look to for inspiration, but I almost always end up putting a unique spin on whatever I import, to better fit within Abysm.