This game is simply incredible, I can't even really come up with words to describe how much fun I had playing through this demo. The way you paced it out was probably the most compelling part, I am very excited to see where you take this!
The game boy color aesthetic lured me in, and the exploring-by-solving-puzzles loop kept me hooked. Akurra is fantastic - I had to play all the way through the demo on one sitting. There was just enough loose ends available at all times so that if I got stuck in one puzzle, I could just go look around for other mysteries to solve (and there seemed to be a plenty of them!).
When the end screen finally showed up, i audibly gasped - OH NO it ended already!! And that, if something, is the best feeling a demo can give.
...And to be fair, the demo was also much longer than I initially expected, and there was just the right amount of puzzles left after the play-through that I gotta return and 100% it. (my completion time and rate: 1h 33m, 75%)
Incredible game. I missed the Kickstarter, sadly, but will be purchasing it day 1. It will be a painful 2 year wait for sure (haha). While this may not be for everyone due to it's puzzle-style gameplay, I absolutely love sokoban (block pushing) mechanics. The puzzles are beautifully designed, and the game isn't just pure sokoban like Chip's Challenge or Eggerland (Lolo). It actually adds a lot of interesting elements to the genre, like solving puzzles in any order you wish in an interconnected world, and getting stumped on puzzles at first, only to realize that you need to interact with something in another puzzle to further open up the game world. It's genius. The music is beautiful and unique, and really sets the tone for the adventure. Our main character has a great design, and the world he inhabits is mystical and memorable, with wonderful 'Link's Awakening' -style pixel art and secrets galore. My only complaint would be that the music restarts every time you restart a puzzle. I wish it would keep going, as otherwise it break the mood, and thus the player's immersion. Just a small nitpick.
The fact that one person is making this (well, besides the music, and they also have a QA tester from what I understand) makes it all the more impressive. It took me about 3 hours to 100% the demo, and I enjoyed every minute of it. Like a rabid animal, I eagerly anticipate my next taste of this game ;)
TL;DR - This is the best sokoban-style game I have ever played. Please download it. Now.
This game is just amazing, taking the sokoban mechanic as the main mechanic to a full adventure game is genius.. The game is super fun and challenging, puzzles are well designed and the 8 bit aesthetic is just beautiful.. Congrats! Amazing demo
Hello. The game demo seems to be unplayable for me. The game is constantly holding Up, and I can't move in any other direction. I can't navigate the menu, and I can't move the character in-game. I can barely enter a single letter for the profile name to even get started. Since it's full-screen, the only way out is the press Alt+Tab to minimize the game and close it from the taskbar. Is there something I did wrong?
GigaMan I'm sorry to hear that! Do you have a game pad or another keyboard plugged in? There could be a problem where the game is taking inputs from it. You can press P to switch between full screen and windowed, not sure if that will help anything. Is it possible for you to take a video of what's happening?
Hello! I know it's been 3 months and I should have contacted you through discord a long time ago, but I had other business and put this off. I came back to this game today and found out the issue was a vJoy Driver that was installed and the whole time it was taking up a controller slot on my computer and causing problems in many other games I attempted to play.
So, once I uninstalled the driver, everything went back to normal, and now I can play your game! So far, I really like it! Keep up the great work!
After getting this huge bundle and kinda dreading going through all games to find what's good, your Akurra being one of the first games absolutely blew me away.
The GameBoy Advanced era of games is really dear to me, growing up without any pocket change and strict parents. The art style of Akurra but more importantly the rich animation, the amazing eye for detail in every puzzle, everything feeds back into this mindset of squeezing the most out of my games. The absence of language mimicks not knowing English as a native Dutch, bruteforcing your way through a game's inputs and letting the design lead the way.
I got invested pretty quickly in Akurra's starting puzzles, but when I reached the turtle at the end of the first island and I could see a Donkey Kong Country 3-like worldmap, it expanded my perceived scope of the game so much. Figuring out that the patterns on the ground were manually and deliberately placed, figuring out why two crates weren't pushable and imagining how they could be destroyed with a later item, then having everything fall into place was extremely satisfying. I've played a few puzzle games, but the sheer intelligent design going into these is something I had seen, but I had not experienced before.
Wow, thank you so much!! I can't tell you how much I appreciate your comment. I love to hear people's experiences like this with my game, it really is the driving force for me creating it. I tried to make something without verbal language and so it's amazing when people really understand it :). I'm glad that my game spoke to you in such a way, and I hope you will come back and try it out when it's finished! If you weren't aware, we also have a Kickstarter going right now: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/gojirra/akurra
Great game. Had a lot of fun with the demo and looking forward to backing the KS.
*mild spoilers of the demo below*
Am curious though, was trying to 100% the demo and was really stuck on the last star. Pulled up a walkthrough on YT and there's a hint in what I imagine to be an older build of the game that's no longer visible because it's obscured by clouds.
Is there another hint I'm missing that makes this star reasonable to find? Or is it expected that the user solve the puzzle just with the remaining visible info?
i was really excited to play but when i started the game i encountered a bug. It seems like w or the up arrow are stuck in the game. i checked my keyboard but that wasnt the problem. I could barely even put a name. I got the letter A to set the profile and that was it. After that the game launched and as expected my character ran to the top of the screen and got stuck. I restarted a few times but nothing seemed to work.
Hi Fundiments sorry to hear about that! Do you have a gamepad plugged in or connected with bluetooth? The game takes inputs from multiple sources so it could be caused by another controller. Also, did anything change if you quit the game entirely and started again, or restarted your computer?
Had an absolutely fantastic time with this game. Expected to jump in and just give the demo a try for a few minutes, ended up 100%ing the demo over the course of 2 days and 2.5hours of playtime. Wrote a video review for the game here:
Could not put this game down. Jason has done an exemplary job at infusing nostalgic artwork with many creative puzzles and rewarding gameplay. Craig, the man behind the music, also does spectacular work providing that islander atmosphere with his amazing tracks. The community has been really awesome and it's a joy being a part of it and watching the game grow.
I grew up on the Gameboy Zeldas, and this game fills the void that time has made. The puzzles are challenging, exploring is exciting, and the whole thing leaves me very satisfied. I'm a completionist, and this game makes getting that 100% feel very rewarding. Looking forward to being able to back this project on Kickstarter!
Fantastic game that reminds me of my time in the NES era in the 80s and 90s. It feels genuine, it makes you really thing about the solutions and it is beautifully presented in it's format. Good job!
I've seen this game grow from a few little puzzles with almost no animations, to this wonderful demo with rad animations and many difficult but fun puzzles! It's insane how far it has come, and I hope we can get it finished. Jason has consistently impressed me with his clever and original puzzle creation.
Puzzle games are my shiz and this game totally satisfied! Music is awesome, really helps set the mood. I definitely wanted more when the demo was finished and I went back to play a couple more times thru to get 100% and try some speed runs. Totally worth a play! Can't wait for the full version!
Anyone coming here and seeing this, just know that the puzzles are crazy fun and the music is fantastic!
The ability to reset the puzzle easily for each screen really is a nice touch, and so is the "undo last move". You'll find yourself wishing you could keep going after finishing the demo (and you can, but there is eventually a limit, haha)
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Thanks for the Linux demo! Works without issues for me. :D
Awesome!
nostalgic
This game is simply incredible, I can't even really come up with words to describe how much fun I had playing through this demo. The way you paced it out was probably the most compelling part, I am very excited to see where you take this!
Thank you!!
The game boy color aesthetic lured me in, and the exploring-by-solving-puzzles loop kept me hooked. Akurra is fantastic - I had to play all the way through the demo on one sitting. There was just enough loose ends available at all times so that if I got stuck in one puzzle, I could just go look around for other mysteries to solve (and there seemed to be a plenty of them!).
When the end screen finally showed up, i audibly gasped - OH NO it ended already!! And that, if something, is the best feeling a demo can give.
...And to be fair, the demo was also much longer than I initially expected, and there was just the right amount of puzzles left after the play-through that I gotta return and 100% it. (my completion time and rate: 1h 33m, 75%)
This will be a day one purchase for me.
Thank you, so glad you enjoyed it!
Incredible game. I missed the Kickstarter, sadly, but will be purchasing it day 1. It will be a painful 2 year wait for sure (haha). While this may not be for everyone due to it's puzzle-style gameplay, I absolutely love sokoban (block pushing) mechanics. The puzzles are beautifully designed, and the game isn't just pure sokoban like Chip's Challenge or Eggerland (Lolo). It actually adds a lot of interesting elements to the genre, like solving puzzles in any order you wish in an interconnected world, and getting stumped on puzzles at first, only to realize that you need to interact with something in another puzzle to further open up the game world. It's genius. The music is beautiful and unique, and really sets the tone for the adventure. Our main character has a great design, and the world he inhabits is mystical and memorable, with wonderful 'Link's Awakening' -style pixel art and secrets galore. My only complaint would be that the music restarts every time you restart a puzzle. I wish it would keep going, as otherwise it break the mood, and thus the player's immersion. Just a small nitpick.
The fact that one person is making this (well, besides the music, and they also have a QA tester from what I understand) makes it all the more impressive. It took me about 3 hours to 100% the demo, and I enjoyed every minute of it. Like a rabid animal, I eagerly anticipate my next taste of this game ;)
TL;DR - This is the best sokoban-style game I have ever played. Please download it. Now.
Thanks so much! I'm very happy you enjoyed it so much. It's awesome to read reviews like this from people who really click with the game!
This game is just amazing, taking the sokoban mechanic as the main mechanic to a full adventure game is genius.. The game is super fun and challenging, puzzles are well designed and the 8 bit aesthetic is just beautiful.. Congrats! Amazing demo
Hello. The game demo seems to be unplayable for me. The game is constantly holding Up, and I can't move in any other direction. I can't navigate the menu, and I can't move the character in-game. I can barely enter a single letter for the profile name to even get started. Since it's full-screen, the only way out is the press Alt+Tab to minimize the game and close it from the taskbar. Is there something I did wrong?
GigaMan I'm sorry to hear that! Do you have a game pad or another keyboard plugged in? There could be a problem where the game is taking inputs from it. You can press P to switch between full screen and windowed, not sure if that will help anything. Is it possible for you to take a video of what's happening?
If you want to join the Discord, it will be easier for us to chat there and work out the problem: https://discord.com/invite/5fnWhA2
Hello! I know it's been 3 months and I should have contacted you through discord a long time ago, but I had other business and put this off. I came back to this game today and found out the issue was a vJoy Driver that was installed and the whole time it was taking up a controller slot on my computer and causing problems in many other games I attempted to play.
So, once I uninstalled the driver, everything went back to normal, and now I can play your game! So far, I really like it! Keep up the great work!
Glad to hear you got it working!
After getting this huge bundle and kinda dreading going through all games to find what's good, your Akurra being one of the first games absolutely blew me away.
The GameBoy Advanced era of games is really dear to me, growing up without any pocket change and strict parents. The art style of Akurra but more importantly the rich animation, the amazing eye for detail in every puzzle, everything feeds back into this mindset of squeezing the most out of my games. The absence of language mimicks not knowing English as a native Dutch, bruteforcing your way through a game's inputs and letting the design lead the way.
I got invested pretty quickly in Akurra's starting puzzles, but when I reached the turtle at the end of the first island and I could see a Donkey Kong Country 3-like worldmap, it expanded my perceived scope of the game so much. Figuring out that the patterns on the ground were manually and deliberately placed, figuring out why two crates weren't pushable and imagining how they could be destroyed with a later item, then having everything fall into place was extremely satisfying. I've played a few puzzle games, but the sheer intelligent design going into these is something I had seen, but I had not experienced before.
Thank you so much for making Akurra!
Wow, thank you so much!! I can't tell you how much I appreciate your comment. I love to hear people's experiences like this with my game, it really is the driving force for me creating it. I tried to make something without verbal language and so it's amazing when people really understand it :). I'm glad that my game spoke to you in such a way, and I hope you will come back and try it out when it's finished! If you weren't aware, we also have a Kickstarter going right now: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/gojirra/akurra
That was beautiful! So much attention to detail and pure appreciation for Jason's intentions!
When I will buy the game in the bundle, I will get steam key on the release?
Just to be clear, are you talking about the Racial Equality Bundle?
The game in its current state is what's included in the bundle. However, it's about 2 hours of gameplay, so not too shabby.
Thank u
my god
I love the GBA like aesthetics and sound. Music is great. Game is super friendly and fun to play.
I wish you the best in your KS!
Thank you! Glad you enjoyed it!
Great game. Had a lot of fun with the demo and looking forward to backing the KS.
*mild spoilers of the demo below*
Am curious though, was trying to 100% the demo and was really stuck on the last star. Pulled up a walkthrough on YT and there's a hint in what I imagine to be an older build of the game that's no longer visible because it's obscured by clouds.
Is there another hint I'm missing that makes this star reasonable to find? Or is it expected that the user solve the puzzle just with the remaining visible info?
Thanks so much for playing, glad you enjoyed it!
For questions about spoilers, please consider joining the Discord!
i was really excited to play but when i started the game i encountered a bug. It seems like w or the up arrow are stuck in the game. i checked my keyboard but that wasnt the problem. I could barely even put a name. I got the letter A to set the profile and that was it. After that the game launched and as expected my character ran to the top of the screen and got stuck. I restarted a few times but nothing seemed to work.
Hi Fundiments sorry to hear about that! Do you have a gamepad plugged in or connected with bluetooth? The game takes inputs from multiple sources so it could be caused by another controller. Also, did anything change if you quit the game entirely and started again, or restarted your computer?
If you have discord, please join our server and we can help you figure out the issue more quickly: https://discordapp.com/invite/5fnWhA2
Had an absolutely fantastic time with this game. Expected to jump in and just give the demo a try for a few minutes, ended up 100%ing the demo over the course of 2 days and 2.5hours of playtime. Wrote a video review for the game here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=msKW8MPvBeM
Absolutely remarkable quality and definitely worth checking out. I'll be keeping my eye on Akurra's progress, devs deserve a lot of credit!
Wow thanks so much, especially for the review! We're really glad you enjoyed it!
I love it. The music is really nice, the user-friendliness is great, and the actual game is fun,
(I am cameramandude, you pm'd me on reddit)
Thank you!
Could not put this game down. Jason has done an exemplary job at infusing nostalgic artwork with many creative puzzles and rewarding gameplay. Craig, the man behind the music, also does spectacular work providing that islander atmosphere with his amazing tracks. The community has been really awesome and it's a joy being a part of it and watching the game grow.
I grew up on the Gameboy Zeldas, and this game fills the void that time has made. The puzzles are challenging, exploring is exciting, and the whole thing leaves me very satisfied. I'm a completionist, and this game makes getting that 100% feel very rewarding. Looking forward to being able to back this project on Kickstarter!
Fantastic game that reminds me of my time in the NES era in the 80s and 90s. It feels genuine, it makes you really thing about the solutions and it is beautifully presented in it's format. Good job!
Thanks so much, glad you enjoyed it!
I've seen this game grow from a few little puzzles with almost no animations, to this wonderful demo with rad animations and many difficult but fun puzzles! It's insane how far it has come, and I hope we can get it finished. Jason has consistently impressed me with his clever and original puzzle creation.
Puzzle games are my shiz and this game totally satisfied! Music is awesome, really helps set the mood. I definitely wanted more when the demo was finished and I went back to play a couple more times thru to get 100% and try some speed runs. Totally worth a play! Can't wait for the full version!
Anyone coming here and seeing this, just know that the puzzles are crazy fun and the music is fantastic!
The ability to reset the puzzle easily for each screen really is a nice touch, and so is the "undo last move". You'll find yourself wishing you could keep going after finishing the demo (and you can, but there is eventually a limit, haha)