Matter
A downloadable game for Windows, macOS, and Linux
You suddenly find yourself in an unknown declining advanced citadel of an unknown planet. Without weapons or resources, the only thing you've got to survive is a device that generates matter, but what if the sole usage of this device unleashes an unknown dark ancient power? Help this lost explorer to reach the way out of this powerful darkness in this abandoned citadel.
With this matter device as your only way to survive, deal with challenging puzzles and dangerous enemies, find hidden places to discover the dark story behind this doomed citadel or to discover hidden power-ups for the matter device.
Immersive pixel-artOld-school inspired visuals with some modern techniques will make you feel that you're inside this lost world |
Challenging levelsBeing able to place your own platforms and walls is a big plus, and you will need it |
Upgradable deviceYou can enhance matter properties to deflect enemies shoots or to explode as timed mines |
Story in the visualsLet the game tell you about what happened to this citadel and why everything is against you in this place |
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Download
Install instructions
- Windows: Unzip downloaded file, enter the new folder and execute Matter.exe
- Mac: Execute downloaded file
- Linux: Unzip file, enter the new folder and execute Matter.x86_64
Development log
- Making of Sentients in Unity3dJun 28, 2023
- Back in action: Sentients unveiled, apologies given, and the quest continues!Jun 14, 2023
- Matter Open Alpha 0.8.6Apr 11, 2021
- Jump, slopes and matter controlMar 19, 2021
- When planet exploration goes wrongMar 17, 2021
- Which level makes you die most?Mar 12, 2021
Comments
Log in with itch.io to leave a comment.
Wow very nice game! I love the controls and look, great work!
Thank you for your good comments!
EDITED: Right after writing this comment and sending the report via app I have tried second time and it runs ;-). I closed and tried again to double check and I was able to play 3 levels of something. No crash, just didn't have more time currently.
I am leaving the original comment to encourage others to try again once or twice as it may work like in my case. There may be still some issue, not sure whether with game's build or Itch app. It is not that heavy nor I have any resource heavy app running at the time except the browser. So it shouldn't crash at all ideally.
Nice game btw. Definitely needs some polishing & fixes like flickering foreground elements having z-index fight.
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I had a problem trying to run the game on Mac via Itch app, just after installation. I am also preparing feedback via after crash form in Itch's app.
MacOS version: Big Sur v11.2.3
I haven't seen any specific reason in the crash report screen, but I might be missing something. Or maybe just the build is not compatible with this OS version. I see lots of complains in various places regarding recent development experience in macOS ecosystem.
Feel free to reach me to check a new build or discuss it further.
I'm glad you could play Matter! Yep, certain levels have some aesthetic issues like depth issues
Btw this Mac issue.. did you have to do something for the game to execute? This issue has been reported often, also I've never tried to play it thru the itch.io app, that's something I could definitely try, and the crash is not about performance, this game is not heavy at all, I think it's due to a permissions issue in Big Sur
No, I just tried again right after crash. The reason I have written a comment first and sent crash report via app was I had some issues with other games in the past, so I just though it will not run. I am glad I checked again.
I cannot help too much with Mac / Big Sur specific issues now except just checking a new build if you make one and ask me.
I am planning to resume my gamedev efforts soon, so maybe then I will have to dig more with my own projects.
I cannot find now the link to the report and I guess there is no UI for viewing them on Itch. There was some "stack trace" referring to a bunch of files, not sure if they were related to some parts of Itch's app or the game though. Do not have any response from Itch team yet.
This is definitely just my stupidity, but how do I get the game in desktop mode? As I am playing I get notifications that I cannot view. If there is no desktop mode, that's fine but if there is, please tell me how to activate it. Thanks!
Ok, in a nutshell: there is no desktop mode :(
This was easier before... in previous Unity3d versions, when you execute a build you could select a resolution and change it to desktop mode before the game starts... this seems to be removed and now I think I would need to do all of these behaviors manually
Nice mechanics with a nice art makes this game interesting! It is featured on my Week's Top 5
Check my video!
Thank you for featuring Matter! Also very nice games you have for your tops! I've subscribed to your channel
Thanks for subscribing!
hi just finished your game and really liked it hoping to see more, but I do have some suggestions first of I feel like there should be a button to clear al mater cause it can be annoying when you have matter off screen and you can't destroy it to refill your ammo, also I don't know if it's just me but there's this glitch that if you stand under a platform and it crushes you you can sometimes fall into the map. Also I personally think that the turrets have a bit too much range making it hard to manage your health and ammo. There is also a bug that when you jump while against a platform you just won't move and then fall off. Please don't take this for hate or anything. I really don't want to come off that way. It was just some problems that I ran into, and again I still had a great experience playing and I love these types of games.
Not at all! It seems like constructive criticism to me, it's just that the list of findings is not short
Thank you for your feedback and thank you for playing, I hope you liked it even with the issues you found
Im playing on Mac and I cant open the game
Ok, no bueno... can you please tell me which version of Mac do you have, and if you are seeing any specific error?
Well I have one of the older macbooks, it just says that it cant be opened and tells me to put it in the trash
Let's chat here https://discord.gg/5kXgYKja to help you further on this issue
This is so cool! I love the concept and so far it's been executed well!! I died, a lot, but it was the right balance of hard without killing the enjoyment! Nicely done!
Hahaha! I just could see a part of your video and I enjoyed seeing you! I won't lie, I also laughed as a maniac when you died so awfully XD thank you for playing Matter and I'm glad you enjoyed it!
You've been unlucky enough to find the most difficult bugs I've been trying to face in this game
Your suggestion about a tool or option to destroy all the matter is actually a very good idea! sometimes the game requires to be too aware of too many things and I agree this could help balancing gameplay
About music: I still need to figure out this one, I've been thinking about just adding background noise and in some meaningful moments, to add music
That's good to know about the bugs, I genuinely just thought I was taking too long! haha. I'm pleased you got such enjoyment out of my suffering ;-).
Thinking more about the music, I actually don't think the game itself really needs it as you've done a great job with the ambient sound effects, I think definitely having some music in the menus would be good though
Great game, Quite challenging puzzle, graphics and audio were good.
I found some bugs throughout the game, you can see them in my gameplay.
Thank you Louis!
Let me see if I saw all of them
Can you please let me know how long did you take to pass the whole game?
It took me 40+ minutes to completed the game. There are two parts with the most time consuming:
- That one level where I must survive going down with a stone platform while being shot with those laser turrets . I didn't know the laser could destroy matter instantly if I create them after the laser was shot. Took me a while to realize though
- The water level, I keep slipping through matters, sometimes I slipped between matters if I stand too long.
This is pretty much it, other parts weren't that hard, just some bugs but not a big problem.
Thanks for the feedback
I really liked the mechanics with the gun and how it was used to interact in multiple ways. It was a little hard to fully grasp how to exactly solve each puzzle with the gun, as some of the solutions did not seem intuitive at first. However, I found that some of the challenges can actually be solved in several ways. As you try enough times, you get the hang of how the mechanics work and how they can be used in the specific situation, which works well overall.
The graphics were good and the audio and us thereof too.
Not much story-wise as of yet, and story does not seems to be a necessity to this game, but would add some nice depth to the environment.
Overall a fun game. It can be a bit frustrating as it is somewhat difficult, this is however exactly what a lot of players seek, so this does in no way lower the overall quality of the game. Great work!
-BH
Thank you SO MUCH for your gameplay, review and rating!
Ye,s this game is not an easy one for sure, while I like it this way, players frustration is something I've been trying to fix, as in earlier versions this game was excruciatingly difficult (you can check previous comments, there is a youtuber that wasn't lucky enough to play a more achievable version of Matter)
Intuition is something I've been working as well, I've been quite reluctant to create explicit tutorials, as you mentioned, the mechanics are quite simple and I feel player would feel more immersed in the world if they just learn by intuition, but I still feel I need more implicit guidance to the player, let the game explain by itself few by few
It's curious you mention the audio, as I've only worked in SFX, Matter still needs ambience background and in some certain moments: music. In the following weeks I'd start working on this.
So far the game doesn't give details about story, however I do plan to put an intro scene at the beginning to explain a little about at least how this character got trapped in such a world. This game has only 6 levels, but I plan to put some more that gives clues that there is an story behind, but it would be secondary, only for those who want to pay attention to this details
Again, thank you for your review, if you have any other social networks to follow you please let me know!
Cheers
Juan Barba
For now I only use Youtube. And about the audio, I just like to mention whether or not I feel that the audio is substantial. I think your use of it is great as nothing is left silent and as nothing feels unnatural or out of place in combination with the actions and events that catalyze the audio. When the gun fires, when the enemies fire so on and so forth. But thank you for reaching out, it was a fun experience to play it! You really got something going for you with this game! Keep up the good work!
I just watched the whole video (it was loading when I saw your rating)... So friend... you would be the 2nd person who ever passed this game! and the first one without any assistance. Can you please tell me how long did it take you to pass it? (I know it had to take longer)
Also, your video helps me a lot, I now see some stuff that can be improved, specially in the last 2 levels
Thank you for your encouragement comments :D
It took me about 1-1,5 hours I think. I have the full footage if you want it :)
Yes sure! you can send it to my email if you prefer that way
Hiii, I've played the game and wanted to give you some feedback and the video I've made about it :D
-The main idea is pretty interesting as the main gameplay mechanic gives a lot of posibilities when having to face the obstacles on the game.-Visually the game looks pretty interesting and ends up being really enjoyable.
-The gameplay mechanics could be polished to make some part of the game easier as I got stuck in one part without exactly knowing how to face that exact part.
-I would like to see a further developed version with a short story combined with some puzzles using those mechanics.
In conclusion, the idea is great and I hope you keep working on it. Hopefully this is useful for the development :D, also if you could subscribe that would help me a lot :)
Regards
Hello!! Thank you for your comments and your gameplay it's very useful
Right now I'm in the process of improving the levels in have, since they were very difficult. But you confirm that levels still need more conveyance and a slower progression, these are issues Matter still need to improve
If you feel curious about what was next, you had to go upside using matter to create platforms to jump and move up
You are welcome :D
I've disabled donations! This is a demo game so there is no point on forcing to ask for donations before downloading. If any of you guys consider I deserve some beers for this game anyway, you are awesome! and here you could give me some support paypal.me/juanbarba109.
Also, I had to remove the MacOS version for now, as there are some issues with Big Sur blocking permissions for the game to be executed, besides it still has some other issues reported back by some other testers.
The MacOS version continues to face issues about the game looking totally dark. If you have this same issue, try playing the game in fullscreen. Also, if any of you players and testers find this issue, I'd really be grateful if you tell me which version of MacOS are you using. Regards!
Hey again! I gave your game a shot and the backgrounds look great plus the controls are much tighter. I still had a bit of trouble figuring out where I was going and I'm not sure how much I can put to me being stupid. Still I'd recommend it to others as it is a fun game if you're good at it.
Hey Miss blue!
You might want to read the last post of my devlog https://forums.tigsource.com/index.php?topic=58794.40, some friends helped me to do testing
TL;DR: I am so mastered in my own game (as a player, not as a dev) that I didn't notice how difficult is my game, I definitely need more people testing my game, and it cannot be me or anyone that saw designing my game, and totally those levels cannot be the ones at the demo
Also... conveyance is not as good as I thought, you got lost tons of times, I gotta think about the left door and why you didn't find it
As always, your outcome is very useful and thank you for that! You helped me to detect some bugs (tho I made it insanely difficult without noticing, sorry for that)
Ah that's okay, the game being hard isn't the worst thing ever after all. They're are plenty of difficult games out there though toning it down a touch never hurts. I dunno how much you should change. Some of it was me just being a complete idiot and I could just be the rare fool against all the others who play your game competently. Either way I'm glad you could find the video useful :D
Hello! I liked your demo, it has good potential to be a great game though I would suggest a small tutorial to ease the player into the game and maybe a bit more diversity on the backgrounds. Aside from that you've made a good start and I wish you like in this and your future projects! I made a let's play of your game here-
Hi Miss Blue... Woww! I'm really glad you played my demo! Thank you for your time doing this video and your feedback, this means a lot for me, specially now.
About the game, unfortunately you played a bit outdated version, the new one has gameplay fixes at the 2nd level and also that tutorial which I saw how much you needed in the video haha! I was laughing as crazy when you tried and failed so many times :D sorry for some stressful moments I saw that shouldn't have happened, definitely will fix those.
About the backgrounds, that's on my bucket list, after I finish all the game mechanics I have in mind, I will focus on aesthetics (there are actually some examples about what I have in mind for aesthetics in the landing page)
Again, thank you for playing and hope you play it in the future with or without video ;)
Cheers
You're more than welcome! I'm really glad you enjoyed it and could take something away from it (even when I was failing miserably ^-^') I'm glad you'll be working on the game more and I'll be sure to check in every so often to see your progress :D
Hey Miss Blue! Just wanted to invite you to give another try to Matter :D now with new levels aesthetics and challenges, tho it would be beyond awesome to have another video, with your sincere feedback I'd be more than grateful!
I tried to make another video but when I opened the game the tutorial menu wouldn't go away no matter what I clicked or key I pressed.
Oh noo! Sorry for that :( I saw the clicking button not do close the modal a few times but I couldn't spot the specific reason and I thought it was an editor bug, I would have to remove the menus in the meantime
You downloaded the Windows version, right?
Yeah I downloaded the Windows version.
Done! You should be able to close the mini-tut and start playing.