SAGE 2024 - Demo Tricky and the Dream Caster: THE TRIAL

Bugs i experienced:
1. There was a strange bug that locked me in place with only camera movement, it was strage because i was reading a sign (too close?), the one with the key chest, and ending the read softlocked me, not even a warp saved me ;c.

2. Changing controls in the controller keybind menu is strange, when i put multiple buttons in one action, all the button i pressed works to that action, its like it saves all the buttons (and i dont know the key to unbind if theres one).
- Another bug in that menu is that if i change the button to accept it doesnt work anymore despite having it binded to a botton.

Despite all that the experience was fun, thanks for this fun demo :D

The game as a glitch where when you bounce on a moving platform you keep the speed from the moving platform. Making you fly in the air.

Man, I need to play more 6th-gen 3D platformers; Tricky feels exactly like what you'd think that kind of game would be like with its visual style and semi-linear level design, yet it simultaneously feels like I've never played anything like it. Fun in ways I have a hard time explaining.

If I have to critique, it's a little janky with the Tricky sometimes locking in place in his falling animation on some steep parts of geometry (though I can empathize with how hard it is to get steep slopes right), and a softlock someone else mentioned where talking to a sign makes him perpetually dizzy. Plus, I wish you didn't have to constantly mess with the camera to get it pointing where you want (some sort of auto-follow function when you're moving would be nice).

Gameplay is like the perfect blend of Spyro and Crash Bandicoot, with Sonic-esque characters for good measure. I love the intentionally Dreamcast/PS1 look to everything, even the title menu. Nice big area to explore, solid level design, and a very smooth responsive movement engine. Like Arionic, I got softlocked by reading certain signs, which could only be fixed by quitting to Main Menu and restarting. Aside from that, a fantastic and nostalgic experience all the way. Even the voice acting is top-notch! I hope to see this finished!

The second the level opened up and the first cutscene had Dreamcast-style talking animations I knew I was going to have fun. And I did, this game is really fun and really feels like those classic platformers you'd see on the Dreamcast (and Saturn, if it didn't fail). The movement is also really solid, Tricky being able to jump out of a slide or ground pound to reach areas he couldn't normally felt really good, and the checkpoint warp mechanic was extremely helpful whenever I wanted to take any side paths.

The game in its current state is a little buggy (it's an early proof of concept, so it's understandable), one bug I ran into the most was that if you mash through dialogue too fast, Tricky's controls get locked and you can only change the camera and warp to a checkpoint. I was able to break free from that state somehow on one time it happened, but the other time I wasn't so lucky. Also, some of the animations are mixed a little strangely, like Tricky kind of sliding in his idle animation if you walk slowly enough and the slide animation not always playing if you chain slide jumps.

I will say though, the dialogue glitch only really happened twice since I was only skipping through sign tutorials, the actual character dialogue is absolutely amazing. Volt is such a funny character, constantly trying to find the most chaotic solution to every problem and getting really excited seeing Dash be so angry. Probably my favorite bit of dialogue though is a secret bit of dialogue the second time you talk to SAM after helping him get his visual memory back (also a cute nod to the Dreamcast). SAM calls Tricky "Travis" and he has to correct the mistake for the third time, but this time Volt tries to gaslight the robot into thinking that's his actual name. This game is awesome.

Hello, I tried to run the game, but after the "A controller is recommended" screen Avast flagged your Windows executable as a malware. I'll report the file to them as a false positive, but just wanted to let you know! I'll keep you updated on whether they answer or not.

Linky439 said:

Hello, I tried to run the game, but after the "A controller is recommended" screen Avast flagged your Windows executable as a malware. I'll report the file to them as a false positive, but just wanted to let you know! I'll keep you updated on whether they answer or not.

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It might just be an issue with Avast, the only other problems I've had with this sort of thing is Windows Defender trying to block it due to being from "an unknown source" which it does with most Unity games.

possqueen said:

It might just be an issue with Avast, the only other problems I've had with this sort of thing is Windows Defender trying to block it due to being from "an unknown source" which it does with most Unity games.

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Yeah for sure, I just wanted to let you know in case anyone else runs into the same issue ;)

Nicely done! Thank you for making this playable on low-end PCs and on Linux

I've been having an issue today where if you play for 20 minutes, eventually the left stick stops working. What's even stranger is all the other buttons and the right stick work just fine, but only the left stick doesn't. And just to clarify, no this isn't an issue with controller itself. My Xbox Series X controller has worked perfectly fine ever since I got it. It still works fine in other games. Only here does it have issues. So I think that's something you could fix in the next demo.