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Finished the game after much suffering, and I enjoyed it! Overall its a neat concept and it felt cool to get up to speed, though at times it felt a bit too punishing. There were a good number of times I would clip the edge of a platform and try to jump and the jump wouldnt come out, so that made trying to space my jumps harder. The dash also felt a little useless after the start because I was never able to rebuild enough speed to clear the later gaps using the dash and bhops, making me almost wish there was a reset button to just try again from the start.

I think the color choice was nice, but had a few slight visibility issues between the player (when dashless) and  the floor, the top of the floor also has a similar value to the background, which made it a little harder to distinguish where edges were, but not too hard ofc cuz they're different colors.

One complaint that could just be a skill issue is that this game did not feel like it could be sight read, and required multiple attempts on a level to complete due to a lack of information. Platform edges come into view too late to space jumps properly, and the end of lvl 5(? I forget which one) was a big example of it. It was pretty frustrating being punished for not going fast enough, and going too fast. 

The camera being ahead of the player is a very good addition, but the camera returning to neutral when forward isnt held makes speed control hard because its easy to lose track of the player.

Thank you for letting me play your game! I enjoyed the simple but challenging nature of it. The SFX was a nice touch too 

Nice game! Had a bit of fun (especially with the green slowdown effect splitting everything into 2 colors). I do have a design note though; right now in the game there is no real reason for the player to put themselves into danger to get more points, as it is easier and safer to stay in one spot and only get pickups that are near the mouse. Having some reason for the player to want to engage with the game/obstacles besides getting bored would enhance the gameplay.

Good  stuff again

Hey, nice stuff with the game! Even though its simple it seems pretty well executed and the style is pretty cohesive, also the music fits well with the vibe of the game.

Few notes:

The game starts out painfully slow and takes a while to pick up. I ended up playing until 6500~ and at that point it was going fast enough to be difficult to react to, but the game was not engaging up until the speed started to pick up because there isn't much to interact with or react to and the challenge is almost nonexistant. Having only 3 obstacles and all of them be spikes doesn't really help either. Overall I'd say to have the game start up faster or progress through the speeds faster.

There should probably be a sound or bigger visual effect when the shield is popped.

The particles in the game were a bit distracting, but thats more of a nitpick than anything

Overall great job! Love the vibe and the lil dude

Congrats on getting the game in for the jam! (even if it wasn't on time, my teams submission wasnt either lmao)

I feel bad because I don't want to rate a game harshly just because it frustrated me, so I'll start with some decisions that I liked.

I think the decision to have the birds not deal damage, but only "confuse" the player is nice. It leads to a few situations where the player can decide to take a riskier path to avoid getting hit, or just take the confuse to avoid taking damage. The game also has nice progression where you start with the fish, then the birds are added, then the octopus comes. A smaller but still good decision was giving the player a bit of control of their jump height by holding down spacebar. I do wish there was a little more control (able to go higher or lower), but having any control is good in a game like this.

However, there are a few game design decisions and oversights that made the experience feel a bit unfair, mainly in the sense of communication. (Note: this is all my opinion so grain of salt of course)

Firstly, it is hard enough to dodge the fish when you can see them, but not knowing if they will appear right under you makes it even worse. If the player has no way to tell where a fish will appear or no warning it becomes much harder to make informed decisions and can lead to it feeling random, or player feeling cheated. Secondly, the reverse controls effect, while cool, needs a bit more in terms of telling the player when it will end, or at least not punishing them for holding a direction when it ends. There were multiple times when I was playing where I would be holding forwards to go backwards, then the reverse would end and I would run into the fish anyways. There is also a bug with the reverse controls where if the player gets hit, their pallete is set back to normal but their controls are still reversed. Finally, the octopus needs some sort of animation or warning before its tentacles come down. In a game as chaotic as this, a little animation or something to draw the players eye to the tentacle that is about to fall is very helpful to help the player have the best chance to react and plan around what is about to happen. The hit box for the tentacle is also pretty unclear

Other game design decisions that soured the experience included: pretty large hurt/hitboxes for the player and enemies which made it feel like I was got hit in places that I shouldn'tve, fish generation that felt a bit unfair, the player falling much faster than the fish leading to me running into fish I thought I had already jumped over, and a lack of sound giving less immersion and weight to actions.

Apologies for the wall of text, again congrats on finishing the jam and making games!

Thank you! I love animating little dudes <3

Thank you! The stone mining animation was a tough one so I'm glad it turned out well!

Yo! Congrats on finishing your first game jam! I think its a pretty good game as its simple & compact, arcade type minigame. I think the choice to vary the timing window was a nice touch to give the gameplay a bit of variety, though I wish it had been taken a bit further by maybe adding multiple yellow windows or something else. I do think it would be nice to indicate to the player when the bar would shift somehow

The game is missing a bit of visual feedback for successful hits and misses, as it is hard to tell how far off I was if I did miss the yellow mark. Adding the visual feedback can also help the game feel more addicting as its easier to attribute the action to a reward.

Game balancing wise I think the multiplier scales too fast to really be a punishment. If the player misses the once they only have to hit yellow 4 times to get back to the top multiplier. The forgiving nature of the scoring and the inconsistent perfect counter makes it more optimal to spam the spacebar key when the bar is not near the edges

The mixels are a little unpleasant (differently sized and scaled pixel art) but I get why it was done that way

BUGS 

It does  seem like there is a bit of roughness regarding the perfect hits, as there are a good number of times where I would obviously miss the yellow and sometimes even miss the green, but my multiplier would stay at 8

Game continues after death. If the player stays on the you died screen, their score will still tick up and more enemies will spawn (eventually falilng onto the player and re-playing the you died sound effect

Overall I enjoyed my time playing the game, and I hope my critique is helpful!

Nice work! I think the dithering shader helped sell and enhance the atmosphere of the environment and the music & art all seemed like it was pointed in a cohesive direction. The shift in music and tone was a bit jarring and I feel like there couldve been more done to ease the transition, though the abrupt nature may have been the intention.

Also there is a bug that made me miss a fair bit of dialogue. New dialogue lays over the old dialogue when a trigger is reached.