I reeeally loved the game. It’s so cleverly made. It really reminded me of Mario and Luigi: Superstar Saga — and it’s my favorite game of all times! The way you see unsolvable elements in a puzzle or areas that you can’t reach, and then you upgrade your sword and realize that it can be done — it's such a nice feeling.
I was struggling in the ice level with the cracked rock, and saw people suggesting adding a dialog box that hints you towards upgrading your sword. The hint is definitely needed, but it would be a lot cooler to not use the game’s interface for it. For example, the animal in the same room could hint on the solution by saying “man, some things just can’t be moved” or something like that.
The only thing I didn’t like was the falling mechanic. When you have to go from one dungeon to another and fall at the end to do it aaall over again it‘s frustrating.
Thank you so much. I feel so humble to hear people comparing my game to classic legendary Nintendo games. It warms my heart!
I loved your suggestion about the cracked ice block. I may go with it for a next update. I noticed that lots of people get stuck in the part.
I get your frustrations with the bottomless pits too. I saw a guy playing the game on twitch and it was painful to see him trying that dungeon over and over again. Hahah. I need to rework that part.
I went as far into all the dungeons as I can and completed the second one (even found the chests) but can't get into the third one with the plant or beat the first one
a pixel art está muito boa, mas a música não devia ser o ponto principal? eu só escuto um loop de 28 notas numa escala crescente e decrescente.. Chega a doer os ouvidos
Ei, grata surpresa em descobrir que esse jogo é seu! Estava procurando ele esses dias e nem imaginava que o Dev falava português. Precisamos trocar figurinhas!
What a great experience! Loved the whimsical vibes. And the music is perfect!
I too got stuck in the ice area. If you ever do more patches, maybe have a message pop up that says something like, "Your sword isn't strong enough yet" if you hit the cracked block?
Thank you so much! Really happy to hear that!And Yeah! Definitely this part is a point where a lot of people get stuck. I really like your idea, it gives a hint that the player should go somewhere else without spoiling the experience.
You're welcome! For me, at least, I assumed each area was a self-contained dungeon like Zelda, so I didn't expect to have to backtrack. Once I understood the rules, though, it was smooth sailing!
I put this onto my 3ds and found it to be my favorite out of the Zelda like games I've played like awakening and stuff like that for me a tight well paced experience will be better then a larger one can't wait for Dx and maybe a potential sequel it nailed a balance of challenge and find all the cells on my own felt so satisfying finally seeing the use of them thanks for making such a incredible game I made my itch.io account only so that I could comment hopefully to you the love I have for a world I spent so little time in the art style to the enemies truly made an island into a world when I beat the game I to wanted to fly off to see other parts of your world thank you.
Wow! Thank you so much for your kind words and sharing your experience! It fills my heart with join every time that I receive a comment like this and yours was one of the best that I have ever received. Thank you. Truly! I’ve been gathering energy to start working on a DX version of this game, fix some bugs, add some new features and possibly a whole new area!
Can't wait to seem more of this world and to see it in more colors sounds awesome keep up the work but do it at your pace your really talented and we want you to do only what you love that what make your world feel alive the love you had for it put into it's fun characters and art.
Oh! I don’t know how to create one but I will check. Should be easy. :) Thanks for asking! Unfortunately, I am on vacation with no access to my PC so I will have to wait until February to upload it. :(
If you made this with GB Studio, you can just go to the Build Terminal, click the Drop-down thing on the Export button, and click Export for Pocket (I think that's what it says)
I meant to come back here and say I did just that! Though I did just GB core
UPDATE: I thought for some reason the GB files were meant just for GB but I realize now if they are from GB Studio and have color I should use GBC. I see color now and am excited to play. It was "greenscale" otherwise :)
Hi! Sorry for my late reply! I am glad that worked for you! And thanks @durona for the help!
To answer your question, this game was developed in an older version of GB Studio that does not support analogue unfortunately. The only way is through GB core. Again I am glad that you’re able to play it now. Thanks!!
What a well-crafted, cohesive game! This wonderful little Zelda clone is one of my favorite Game Boy games! It's perfectly paced with just the right amount of challenge. And, it has a cute design that uses the Game Boy's minimalistic, black-and-white aesthetic to great effect, with masterful use of negative space.
Swordbird Song takes me back to when I was a little kid in 2001 playing Zelda: Oracle of Ages on my Game Boy Color. It's inspired me to re-discover Game Boy games again after a 20-year absence. From the bottom of my heart, thank you for making this.
You’ve just made my Christmas with such a nice comment. Thank you! I’m beyond words to express how happy I feel when people comment that the game took them back in time and felt like playing Zelda for gb again. That’s one of my fav games of all time and I hope I have made it justice with this humble Links Awakening inspired game. :)
This was really fun! One of the best GB Studio games I've played, an absolute treat! Great art, great dungeon and puzzle design. You really nailed the Link's Awakening aesthetic, but made it your own! I can't wait for your next game, and I would 100% buy a physical release in future.
Nice short zelda-like game. It was short yet fun. The challenges are good although I wish movable blocks were using unique sprite, instead of showing drag marks on the floor.
The joke from Owl King is good, though I wish this boss would fight in better way than this.
There's a bug in which the room with second boss was already open when I entered large room for the first time. However, it was closed after I pushed a block toward room. I don't know if it's from the game or my emulator.
Thank you so much for playing my game! I was afraid that having unique sprites for movable blocks would make the puzzles too easy to figure out. haha. But I get it! Sometimes the moving blocks are kinda unfair.
Thanks for reporting the bug with the door. You are the second person who faced this bug, I believe there is something wrong with the code or maybe an engine bug.
i wouldnt really call it short. Due to the bakc and forth between the 3 areas, it sure took a while. but yeah, compared to zelad with 8 or 16 dungeons, it was short in comparison :-)
Hey Felipe, thanks for this great short zelda-like game, it was a nice experience. I love these new games for old consoles.
The cutscenes are great, the humor was also nice.
I loved the graphics and how color was used only on the characters, it creates a nice contrast. It is incredible how charming the grayscale graphics of the GB can be.
I also like that it is short, these days I find it hard to jump into games that will take 40h of my time.
The only part that was not top notch was the combat, generally it was very easy, but it does not detract from the experience overall.
I also love the "business-model", pay what you want. The only thing missing here in itch.io is the option to pay extra after you played the game.
Hey, don't sweat about the combat, I can understand it was not the focus of this game. As a developer myself, I can perfectly understand when we need to compromise to be able to deliver.
needed a new game, friend recommends RDR2, it’s great and everything but this, THIS is what I wanted, vey good game thank you. One of the wizard owls by the very ended pushed me out of the map somehow, prob. My fault for running away like a coward. Very fun hope there is more soon!!! Best of lucks!
Wow! I never thought that I would compete with Rockstar but take that RDR2!! Haha! Thank you so much for your kind words!
About the bug. The same happened to me when I also tried to run away from that room. On a future patch, I will probably lock the player in the room with the mage owls!
This is an incredibly quality gameplay demo. 10x larger than any other GB Studio game demo I’ve seen! I love how vast the game world is, and yet it never felt confusing or assinine to navigate. It gave me the same feeling as LoZ:LttP, but with all the padding cut out. Nicely done! Love the characterization too!
Some feedback: I died a lot on the ice level’s narrow passageways. It looks safer than it really is. If there was one more tile of walkable space either side, or if the art for those tiles was narrower, that’d make it feel fairer.
Afaik there’s no indication as to which boulders are movable in the ice puzzle after defeating the first miniboss with a key door. The one with two floor switches.
Also, there’s a few grammar issues in the opening cutscenes and dialogue. Would recommend getting more people to review the text prior to launch. :>
Hi! Sorry for taking so long to reply! Thank you so much for your kind words, I feel very happy that my game gives you LoZ:LttP feelings, it is an honour to me!
Your comments are very helpful! For sure I will address them in future revisions!
Thanks for your kind words! You are the first person that mentioned something about humour and I feel very happy about it. haha! I wanted the game to not take itself seriously and have some silly lines!
amazing demo, tbh this was one of my inspiration on RIPIR, hope to see more. fonts bro, i find it a lil hard to read...just a lil bit tho, also screen transitions should be faster in the menu/map
well my script for the roll is pretty simple. speed increase when directional buttons are held , else [interact with npcs nd object] u can use it on ur game too.
Played this on my phone so maybe I was just fumbling with the controls, but I felt like maybe the sprites for enemies and projectiles don't fully align with their hitboxes? Or maybe the player's is larger than it seems? And there's definitely an issue in the bottomless pit room, I fell off the edge a few times but there was still edge visibly there, it was only an issue on the vertical paths. The boss was really hard for me, maybe there should be flashing when it is about to teleport or something? Any sort of telegraphing would make it seem more fair. Otherwise I enjoyed it! I like the design of the player and the boss. I'm a pretty big fan of link's awakening and you got the vibes down, and having the same(?) owl sprite as that game is fun, it's such a perfect design.
Hi! Thank you so much for your feedback! Yeah! Definitely this tech demo is a little bit rough on the edges when it comes to some mechanics and specially the boss. Haha! I totally understand! I’m trying to address these points on the real game, or at least have a little bit more polished mechanics on the next demo that is coming out soon. :)
Really enjoyed this. I like how each room has a unique puzzle / enemy and comes together to form a cohesive dungeon. The final boss was challenging, and it took me several tries to beat. Looking forward to seeing where this project goes!
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Gonna play this on my DSi. So excited. The art looks cute.
Thank you! I hope you have fun!!
I reeeally loved the game. It’s so cleverly made. It really reminded me of Mario and Luigi: Superstar Saga — and it’s my favorite game of all times! The way you see unsolvable elements in a puzzle or areas that you can’t reach, and then you upgrade your sword and realize that it can be done — it's such a nice feeling.
I was struggling in the ice level with the cracked rock, and saw people suggesting adding a dialog box that hints you towards upgrading your sword. The hint is definitely needed, but it would be a lot cooler to not use the game’s interface for it. For example, the animal in the same room could hint on the solution by saying “man, some things just can’t be moved” or something like that.
The only thing I didn’t like was the falling mechanic. When you have to go from one dungeon to another and fall at the end to do it aaall over again it‘s frustrating.
Thank you for this wonderful experience!
Thank you so much. I feel so humble to hear people comparing my game to classic legendary Nintendo games. It warms my heart!
I loved your suggestion about the cracked ice block. I may go with it for a next update. I noticed that lots of people get stuck in the part.
I get your frustrations with the bottomless pits too. I saw a guy playing the game on twitch and it was painful to see him trying that dungeon over and over again. Hahah. I need to rework that part.
simple art but very good game
Thank you!
Does anyone know how to get past the Icra level with the cracked stone blocking the way
You may find something you need for one dungeon in another dungeon.
I went as far into all the dungeons as I can and completed the second one (even found the chests) but can't get into the third one with the plant or beat the first one
Don't forget to do side quests! Also the blocks with the arrows mean you can jump down, you might want to check the other two dungeons again
Im loving this thread here. Haha! Yeah. Remember to go back to the other dungeons again. And grab all the energy cells!
love it!
I got stuck at the final level, parcour was never my strengh ;)
you can do it!! Thanks for playing!!
a pixel art está muito boa, mas a música não devia ser o ponto principal? eu só escuto um loop de 28 notas numa escala crescente e decrescente.. Chega a doer os ouvidos
Obrigado por jogar! Uma pena que a música não tenha agradado. :(
Hi if you would like to make physical carts , let me know, i do this for a living. We can work togheter.
Let me know
thanks
hey! Let’s chat about it! My twitter is @freinicke or we can chat on discord.
do you have a g mail
I finished it! Great Game! I really love it!
greetings from Berlin 😊
Thank you so much for playing!
Ei, grata surpresa em descobrir que esse jogo é seu! Estava procurando ele esses dias e nem imaginava que o Dev falava português. Precisamos trocar figurinhas!
Vou baixar para jogar no portátil.
Grande abraço.
você sabe como passa daquela parte do gelo naquele puzzle onde tem o amigo do macaco??;_;
Não precisa ficar tentando essa parte. Vá explorar os outros dois dungeons e vc vai achar o caminho! :)
Okay obrigado :D
Siiim! Sou brasileiro! Obrigado por jogar!
I just finished the game and I absolutely love it. I will post a positive review on my blog.
Thank you so much! Please send me the link and I will repost it on my social media! :)
I can do that. But it's a german speaking blog^^
That’s ok! I may have a couple of German followers. Hahah!
nem parece br de tão bem feito a arte viado, tu é muito foda, abraço ai
Que nada! Tem muito BR fazendo coisa muito boa por aí! 😁😁😁 Obrigado pelos elogios e por ter jogado!
What a great experience! Loved the whimsical vibes. And the music is perfect!
I too got stuck in the ice area. If you ever do more patches, maybe have a message pop up that says something like, "Your sword isn't strong enough yet" if you hit the cracked block?
Thank you so much! Really happy to hear that!And Yeah! Definitely this part is a point where a lot of people get stuck. I really like your idea, it gives a hint that the player should go somewhere else without spoiling the experience.
You're welcome! For me, at least, I assumed each area was a self-contained dungeon like Zelda, so I didn't expect to have to backtrack. Once I understood the rules, though, it was smooth sailing!
definitely taking note of that for an eventual update. Thank you!
Short and cute. Keep designing! Excited for what else you can come up with.
Thank you so much! I have a bunch of game ideas but still trying to find the time to invest in making another game.
I put this onto my 3ds and found it to be my favorite out of the Zelda like games I've played like awakening and stuff like that for me a tight well paced experience will be better then a larger one can't wait for Dx and maybe a potential sequel it nailed a balance of challenge and find all the cells on my own felt so satisfying finally seeing the use of them thanks for making such a incredible game I made my itch.io account only so that I could comment hopefully to you the love I have for a world I spent so little time in the art style to the enemies truly made an island into a world when I beat the game I to wanted to fly off to see other parts of your world thank you.
Wow! Thank you so much for your kind words and sharing your experience! It fills my heart with join every time that I receive a comment like this and yours was one of the best that I have ever received. Thank you. Truly! I’ve been gathering energy to start working on a DX version of this game, fix some bugs, add some new features and possibly a whole new area!
Can't wait to seem more of this world and to see it in more colors sounds awesome keep up the work but do it at your pace your really talented and we want you to do only what you love that what make your world feel alive the love you had for it put into it's fun characters and art.
that was a really nice game.
But what was up with the guy that wanted to stop me twice?
because of him, I drew some wrong conclutions about a potential backstabbing incoming :-/
I had more plans for that character but they didn’t make the final cut. Haha
Same! I expected him to show up at least one more time. Rule of three and all that.
Great game.
will there be a sequel?
First I will make a DX version for this one. Maybe a sequel one day.
Will you also port it for Android?:3
no plans to port it for android atm :(
After fighting boss in frozen area you can go behind big chest by walking from right side at the height of (chest+1 tile up) left.
That is a softlock, please fix it
Thanks for reporting it. :)
I like the game the brain confuses me and I'm stuck at freezing part...
lots of people get stuck there. Haha! Try searching other areas of the tower.
pocet file pls i just got it for christmas and need soething to play :(
Oh! I don’t know how to create one but I will check. Should be easy. :) Thanks for asking! Unfortunately, I am on vacation with no access to my PC so I will have to wait until February to upload it. :(
If you made this with GB Studio, you can just go to the Build Terminal, click the Drop-down thing on the Export button, and click Export for Pocket (I think that's what it says)
Please see the other comment I actually want to play this on my pocket and I may have to do a refund otherwise as I'm a little new to the process.
UPDATE: all good now I was just overwhelmed.
If you download the GBC core it'll play perfectly! https://github.com/mattpannella/pocket-updater-utility
I meant to come back here and say I did just that! Though I did just GB core
UPDATE: I thought for some reason the GB files were meant just for GB but I realize now if they are from GB Studio and have color I should use GBC. I see color now and am excited to play. It was "greenscale" otherwise :)
Hi! Sorry for my late reply! I am glad that worked for you! And thanks @durona for the help!
To answer your question, this game was developed in an older version of GB Studio that does not support analogue unfortunately. The only way is through GB core. Again I am glad that you’re able to play it now. Thanks!!
Were you able to get color that way, or was it in "greenscale?"
What a well-crafted, cohesive game! This wonderful little Zelda clone is one of my favorite Game Boy games! It's perfectly paced with just the right amount of challenge. And, it has a cute design that uses the Game Boy's minimalistic, black-and-white aesthetic to great effect, with masterful use of negative space.
Swordbird Song takes me back to when I was a little kid in 2001 playing Zelda: Oracle of Ages on my Game Boy Color. It's inspired me to re-discover Game Boy games again after a 20-year absence. From the bottom of my heart, thank you for making this.
You’ve just made my Christmas with such a nice comment. Thank you! I’m beyond words to express how happy I feel when people comment that the game took them back in time and felt like playing Zelda for gb again. That’s one of my fav games of all time and I hope I have made it justice with this humble Links Awakening inspired game. :)
This was really fun! One of the best GB Studio games I've played, an absolute treat! Great art, great dungeon and puzzle design. You really nailed the Link's Awakening aesthetic, but made it your own! I can't wait for your next game, and I would 100% buy a physical release in future.
Thank you so much for your kind words. I am really happy to hear that you have fun! That’s the most important thing to me!
wheres my credits for npc names? jk, congrats man top 1 gb studio games as of today.
love the game so far but I don't understand how to break the cracked rocks
You have to look on the other areas of the tower. :)
This is SO NICE! Great puzzles, cute pixel art, and those amazing Link's Awakening vibes... I love this game.
Thank you so much! Glad that you liked it!
Nice short zelda-like game. It was short yet fun. The challenges are good although I wish movable blocks were using unique sprite, instead of showing drag marks on the floor.
The joke from Owl King is good, though I wish this boss would fight in better way than this.
There's a bug in which the room with second boss was already open when I entered large room for the first time. However, it was closed after I pushed a block toward room. I don't know if it's from the game or my emulator.
Thank you so much for playing my game! I was afraid that having unique sprites for movable blocks would make the puzzles too easy to figure out. haha. But I get it! Sometimes the moving blocks are kinda unfair.
Thanks for reporting the bug with the door. You are the second person who faced this bug, I believe there is something wrong with the code or maybe an engine bug.
i wouldnt really call it short.
Due to the bakc and forth between the 3 areas, it sure took a while.
but yeah, compared to zelad with 8 or 16 dungeons, it was short in comparison :-)
Hey Felipe, thanks for this great short zelda-like game, it was a nice experience. I love these new games for old consoles.
The cutscenes are great, the humor was also nice.
I loved the graphics and how color was used only on the characters, it creates a nice contrast. It is incredible how charming the grayscale graphics of the GB can be.
I also like that it is short, these days I find it hard to jump into games that will take 40h of my time.
The only part that was not top notch was the combat, generally it was very easy, but it does not detract from the experience overall.
I also love the "business-model", pay what you want. The only thing missing here in itch.io is the option to pay extra after you played the game.
Thank you so much for playing my game! I am happy that you enjoyed it! I always feel very happy when people mention the story and humour. haha!
I agree with you that combat was my weak point when designing this game. I will make sure to improve that on future versions or future games.
Hey, don't sweat about the combat, I can understand it was not the focus of this game. As a developer myself, I can perfectly understand when we need to compromise to be able to deliver.
needed a new game, friend recommends RDR2, it’s great and everything but this, THIS is what I wanted, vey good game thank you. One of the wizard owls by the very ended pushed me out of the map somehow, prob. My fault for running away like a coward. Very fun hope there is more soon!!! Best of lucks!
Wow! I never thought that I would compete with Rockstar but take that RDR2!! Haha! Thank you so much for your kind words!
About the bug. The same happened to me when I also tried to run away from that room. On a future patch, I will probably lock the player in the room with the mage owls!
im a bit stuck...how do i break the cracked rocks??
If you're stuck with the cracked block in the Icra area you have to explore the rest of the tower, the answer for this puzzle is not in Icra.
Okay thanks for the tip ^.^
That's the best GB Studio game I've ever played. Congratulations, inspired me to finish mine even being another genre.
So happy to hear that! Thank you so much!! Eu tb sou brasileiro! :) Espero ver o seu projeto saindo em breve!
The problem is that unfortunately I can't rate this game 2x five stars but i would if i could. :) 5/5 (2x)
That is so nice to hear! Thank you for your kind words!
parabéns continue
Obrigado!! :)
you are a pro! such a nice game
Thanks for your kind words! I feel veeeery far from a pro but I'll take it! haha!
Amazing!
Thank you so much!
This is an incredibly quality gameplay demo. 10x larger than any other GB Studio game demo I’ve seen! I love how vast the game world is, and yet it never felt confusing or assinine to navigate. It gave me the same feeling as LoZ:LttP, but with all the padding cut out. Nicely done! Love the characterization too!
Some feedback: I died a lot on the ice level’s narrow passageways. It looks safer than it really is. If there was one more tile of walkable space either side, or if the art for those tiles was narrower, that’d make it feel fairer.
Afaik there’s no indication as to which boulders are movable in the ice puzzle after defeating the first miniboss with a key door. The one with two floor switches.
Also, there’s a few grammar issues in the opening cutscenes and dialogue. Would recommend getting more people to review the text prior to launch. :>
Hi! Sorry for taking so long to reply! Thank you so much for your kind words, I feel very happy that my game gives you LoZ:LttP feelings, it is an honour to me!
Your comments are very helpful! For sure I will address them in future revisions!
Wow. Amazing!! I like the Zelda games, so I like it so much. Lots of great idea. Grat!!! The game design, ideas, humour are also great!!
Thanks for your kind words! You are the first person that mentioned something about humour and I feel very happy about it. haha! I wanted the game to not take itself seriously and have some silly lines!
amazing demo, tbh this was one of my inspiration on RIPIR, hope to see more. fonts bro, i find it a lil hard to read...just a lil bit tho, also screen transitions should be faster in the menu/map
Hey! Thanks for playing! I checked your RIPIR proof of concept and it looks awesome! I wish my character could roll too!
I was having some trouble with the fonts too, I will try to fix that on the next version.
well my script for the roll is pretty simple. speed increase when directional buttons are held , else [interact with npcs nd object] u can use it on ur game too.
Played this on my phone so maybe I was just fumbling with the controls, but I felt like maybe the sprites for enemies and projectiles don't fully align with their hitboxes? Or maybe the player's is larger than it seems? And there's definitely an issue in the bottomless pit room, I fell off the edge a few times but there was still edge visibly there, it was only an issue on the vertical paths. The boss was really hard for me, maybe there should be flashing when it is about to teleport or something? Any sort of telegraphing would make it seem more fair. Otherwise I enjoyed it! I like the design of the player and the boss. I'm a pretty big fan of link's awakening and you got the vibes down, and having the same(?) owl sprite as that game is fun, it's such a perfect design.
Hi! Thank you so much for your feedback! Yeah! Definitely this tech demo is a little bit rough on the edges when it comes to some mechanics and specially the boss. Haha! I totally understand! I’m trying to address these points on the real game, or at least have a little bit more polished mechanics on the next demo that is coming out soon. :)
Really enjoyed this. I like how each room has a unique puzzle / enemy and comes together to form a cohesive dungeon. The final boss was challenging, and it took me several tries to beat. Looking forward to seeing where this project goes!
Thanks for playing the game! I am very happy to hear that! Every feedback is ver welcome!
I will post a new demo in a couple of weeks! This new demo will be closer to the final game look and includes the first area of the game + story!
Thanks for playing! I spent 1 month working on this demo, first time making a game on gbstudio do it took a while to get familiar with the platform.
The golden bird is just a boss for the demo but the actual game will have a story and much more. :)
No plans to release the source project at this point, maybe after I release the actual game I will publish the source project for the demo. :)