ALERT: If you played the game and got a horrible graphical glitch before, the file has since been updated with a fixed version! If you'd like to redownload, I would greatly appreciate it!

Fight to victory (or death) with Leif the sprout as he reclaims the land from the necromancer witch Skullicia!

Clearing a tile lets you choose one of three side-grades, each with a benefit and a negative side-effect. A cleared tile's effect will affect then all the tiles to its side! Get it? It's side-effects affecting to the side!

Clear a whole area and the effects inside it reach through adjacent areas. Clear 4 areas, fight the boss, and win! (...or not. The game might be a bit hard. Feel free to press K to instantly kill all enemies on screen!)

There are 15 effects to choose from in all! My favorites are All-round, Peashooter, and most importantly BIG STICK. Let me know yours!

Notes:

  • The kill-all-enemies key is a holdover from my testing, not an official feature, so it doesn't proc on-death heal from Life Sap.
  • If you have a lot of stacked attack debuffs, the game might say you are dealing zero damage. You're actually always dealing at least one damage.

Controls:

  • WASD - Move
  • Left click - Attack
  • Enter - Progress dialogue
  • Space - Dodge (if you have the effect)
  • Right click - Teleport (if you have the effect)

Includes the font "Diary of an 8-bit mage" by Chequered Ink (https://www.fontspace.com/diary-of-an-8-bit-mage-font-f28455)

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  • Thomas Sjerps
    Lv. 29

    I really liked the combat mechanics, although I didn't really feel any difference with the power-ups. Maybe I shouldn't see them as powerups if they do as much harm as they do good :) Very nice game!

  • Ratchet
    Lv. 8

    Very enjoyable experience, I like the fit to the theme as well as the UI and sound. Enemy design is good and the world map system helped to feel a good sense of progression.

    Beslimed
    Submitted

    Beslimed

  • Tydecon Games
    Patron

    This is a very cute game with a lot of variety and interesting side effects, I really enjoyed the style and the sheer level of variation you've got going on here, great job! :)

  • Jupiter Hadley
    Lv. 13

    Very cute game! I found it to be quite interesting to play. I included it in my GM48 compilation video series, if you’d like to take a look. :) https://youtu.be/2x0hqeP3RWA

  • Jaspo
    Lv. 16

    Pleasantly difficult, cute art style, large scope but not a lot of variety aside from the many effects, which fit the theme and were fun to choose between. Music and sound fit the game well and the intro was nice.

    Yukon
    Submitted

    Yukon

    • illdie
      Lv. 12
      illdie Developer of Leif and Death

      2yrs ago

      Thank you! I feel similarly about variety, it probably would have done better with another system to shake things up as it goes on. It's good to hear the effects worked out well and helped in that regard though!

  • K.K
    Lv. 1

    I enjoyed the game! It had a lot of interesting things involved. I think the overall tile mechanics can be really strategic, Though I do wish I got some relief with some of the health options. Kills only healed 1 Hp and you took 5, seeing that I never quite got control over my health. And the tile healing was 5HP for the whole tile. I think the damage the enemies did was great, I wish I got something like 3 health per kill and maybe 20 per tile just to feel like I had an edge. But really would love to see this game evolve, It felt solid and I found myself playing it and just enjoying the overall play style and enemies. Great job!

    • illdie
      Lv. 12
      illdie Developer of Leif and Death

      2yrs ago

      Thank you! That definitely is the biggest thing I wish I went back and changed, it's definitely too hard to regain health given how rare healing effects are.

      Other than that, it's good to hear you enjoyed it! Thanks for the feedback

  • TheBookSnail
    Lv. 2

    Great music and the enemy telegraphing is very well done. High difficulty for me. I didn't have any graphical issues that I noticed. Intro was choice, nice job. It's literally side-effects 😂. After playing a bit I wished there were more effects that build up.

    DyeDrop
    Submitted

    DyeDrop

  • Henry Haak
    Lv. 41

    I'm not sure if it was just my computer, but I was having a strange issue with the way the game was drawing. It looked like there was no background layer to clear the previous frames from the surface, and it ended up looking like a glitchy, flashing mess.

    With the game in this state for me it's difficult to get a grasp on it, but I was able to still play for a little while before it became nearly impossible to see.

    The cutscene at the start was cute, and I enjoyed the simple story of the game. I also thought the mechanics (from what I understood at least) were really cool. I liked the ability to choose the side you wanted to travel to, and the upgrades with downsides were also a fun addition.

    I really wish that glitch wasn't happening to me so I could see more, because this seemed like a charming and fun game with interesting mechanics. Still, I was impressed by what I could see.

    • illdie
      Lv. 12
      illdie Developer of Leif and Death

      2yrs ago

      It was your computer insofar as that glitchy mess you talk about seems to be dependent on your GPU or something, and it never happened on my machine for some reason. I've since gotten a (hopefully) fixed version up, I would appreciate if you redownload and let me know how it goes.

      Thank you for the other feedback! I'm at least glad that cutscene happened before the game became unplayable lol

  • Ross Boman
    Lv. 30

    I'm not sure the game is working. It's drawing the sprites over and over everywhere they go. You can't play the game after a couple rounds because you can't see anymore.

    EDIT: The current version works now. I really really like the idea of this game. It reminds me of binding of isaac but every room gives you an item effect. It's fantastic. What I wasn't a fan of were the fast moving bone throwing guys. I felt like i got hit a lot without being able to see it coming. The melee attack was a little wonky too and I ended up going peeshooter everytime it came up just to avoid melee. i think with more polish and more content this would be a really fun game.

    • illdie
      Lv. 12
      illdie Developer of Leif and Death

      2yrs ago

      Thank you for leaving this feedback, that issue doesn't happen when its run on my computer for some reason. I've since identified the most probable cause and fixed it, and I was able to update the project file in exchange for disqualification from the rankings. I would appreciate if you redownload it and let me know what you think! (and if it's actually fixed or not now - it never happened on my computer so I can't check myself)

      EDIT: Thanks for playing again! That's definitely true, I didn't do another once-over for balancing the enemies and player attack and it shows. Big Stick and Peashooter help a lot in overcoming that, but if I come back to it I'd want to make the base attack a little more reliable/tune some of the enemies to be more reasonable.