The first record of Vampires occurred in the 13th century. The anti-pagan treatise "Word of Saint Grigoriy" reported pagans worshipping Upyri, creatures that we now refer to as Vampires.
While the details of 13th century Upyri have been lost to history, you are unfortunately all too familiar with them. You are the latest to be sent to the castle as a sacrifice to the Upyri. Can you defeat the creature within and escape the castle?
Controls
- WASD or Arrow keys to move
- Mouse to look
- Any mouse button or the E key for Action
Gameplay
Upyri is a horror themed adventure game where you need to solve puzzles to escape the castle. Explore and look for hints in the environment. Make your way into the Keep in the center of the castle, then the tower, and find the lever to open the front gate.
Bonus info
The symbol used as the games icon and featured in the game is based on the real pagan symbol for the devil. The pagan symbol for the devil is a circle with a crescent on top facing upwards, representing the horns on the devils head. Here the symbol is flipped upside down to instead represent the fangs of the Upyri.
Feedback
Game plays incredible smooth, and audio was great. Was really blown away by the graphics.
Fantastic work! The graphics are amazing, the ambiance is really well executed, the controls are smooth, and the collision is solid. A little bit of extra juice might go a long way with this one, like a slight head bob and footstep sounds, but even so it's great as-is. I really enjoyed reading the post-mortem, and I'm looking forward to seeing where this engine goes next year!
My first game on the computer (not including the default ones like spider solitaire, etc.) was "Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time (2003)". Well, playing your game immediately reminded me of my first game, although the theme is different, but the game world itself... I really enjoyed it, thanks!
Also, I had a desire to try to make such a game for a long time, but I started my journey on the web, due to strange circumstances :D, well, and C++, where would you go without it)), but only console development, so you can say that I developed desktop hardly practiced.
And I thought for a while to try to switch to desktop development, with the help of all kinds of engines such as Unreal Engine or Unity 3D... but still I wanted to be able to not just work on learning new things again - which is undoubtedly a worthy cause, but I would like to immediately go to the most fun thing for me - creating a game :D.
And today I came across your game, at this contest, which I knew about even earlier, but I decided to try it only today. And how lucky I am!!!! I met your game! The game - which shows that a game that would have a game world like in the game "Prince of Persia" or even better - you can try to implement it even as a web game! And your game is a living confirmation of this!
Ohhh, I'm happy! I am happy that I decided to participate in this competition!
Well, now a little about your game :D.
I noticed that the sky is static. If the stars and the moon moved a bit, very little, maybe even different cosmic rays - I could admire it for a long time :).
I liked how I moved, but for some reason I always wanted to be able to jump into windows, that is, to have a jump and jump on small objects, I think I would have even more fun then!
When I first opened the sarcophagus of a vampire - I was scared :), but he paid for it with his life :D.
As I played the game, I noticed an interesting selection of text - hahaha, even this is fun aaahh))).
Thanks and congratulations!
Absolutely great!! Couldn't stop until I made it! :D
And the graphics are so insanely good for just 13k! Wow!
The graphics look really great, though the strong shadows don't really fit with the dark sky. Unfortunately, the game was really slow on my computer, I probably spent more time staring at the loading screen than playing it.
This is such a great game! The 3D is really impressive with awesome textures, lighting and shadows. The player can run up and down to several floors; I have no idea how you do it :) The sky is beautiful, and the game itself is super interesting and fun to play! Just to propose a small improvement, to me the sound of the player walking was unpleasant. Great job, congratulations!
I love the atmosphere. Visually impressive. From castle textures, to beautiful night sky. Generating svg textures was a clever idea.
Castle is well designed. Subtly placed shortcuts save you from unnecessary backtracking.
Sound of footsteps depending on surface is a nice touch.
Wow, the 3D graphics were amazing.
I liked the castle layout and level. Even looking into the distance from the battlements to the hills and sky.
I found spiral staircases with blocked off doors, keys and such.
But found it quite hard to move around because I could either move with the keyboard or look around with the mouse, but not do both at the same which slowed my progress.
Wow thank you for the compliments on the graphics! That's very strange about the issue with the mouse. I haven't seen that or heard it from anyone else. Do you have the same issue with any other game that uses mouse and keyboard like this?
I was looking forward to playing this one after seeing your progress updates. Very nice!!
I agree with others that the graphics and atmosphere are top-notch. The sky looked great!
One small thing-- I kind of wish I couldn't fall? I kept falling off of stuff and having to walk back up, haha
Very impressive!
EDIT: I was wondering about the symbol used in the game. Thanks for providing some info about that. Cool!
I Never Thought I would see A 3D Horror Game IN 13Kb 🙀 The game is so well done and Even little things like the loud footsteps against the quiet background Makes The Game TRULY Terrifying. 👻. Overall one of the best games I have seen so far! 😃
Wow, compelling! Great atmosphere, nice 3D textures, decent audio (I like the different footsteps for different areas). The puzzles are simple but remind me a lot of classic 90s DOOM -- "I see a lever over there, how do I get there" type of problem-solving. Great job.
Goddamnit man.
"It's 13Kb how scary can this game be?"
"Oh, look some blood... ooooh spooky. Hah."
"Looks like it's just a moody puzzle game"
"Victory is at hand... one more lev-OH NONONONONONONO CRAP CRAP CRAP"
This is my review, I typed it with my heart still racing and I'm not changing it.
Wow! Thank you so much. I think this is my favorite review so far as It captures exactly what I wanted to go through peoples heads when they played the game!
Seeing someone have the exact experience I wanted the game to provide makes all the hard work worth it. I really appreciate it!
-Rob
Gosh, I guess 13kb is enough to scare me. This упирь was so spooky that I asked my wife to play this game after me to check her reaction. It's the first js13k horror I played and it's amazing! Nothing to add, really.
Looking forward to seeing postmortem on this one!
Oh! And was surprised that in the end of game (when you walk form castle) there is no upir to follow the player =( Please add one.
Wow, thank you so much! I love that you had your wife check it out to see her reaction. The fact that the game made enough impact for you to share it means a lot, really appreciate it!
I do have a post mortem, it's on js13k resources page under the 2023 post mortems, but you can also just click the link to my website right here by my comment and the upyri post mortem will be right there at the top (as of right now it's the latest thing I've posted).
I did think about having upyri float up from under the bridge as you cross it. I think it's a really nice idea, but I also wanted the player to be able to escape. Still I do think there's a hybrid approach where they do come after you but then you run faster and the screen fades out. Maybe you make it maybe you don't, the player doesn't know for sure.
But ya thank you again for the kind words, and for playing and sharing the game!
-Rob
Fantastic looking game!! Gorgeous! I wish I could walk a bit faster. It was a bit dark in the beginning but I turned the display brighter. I didn't finish the story. Probably the best looking game so far.
Well that was a surprise! That was a lot of 3D to pack into such a small package, and great work with the procedural texturing. Next time, focus on the palette to give it a little more life. Get more contrast out of your hues, e.g. put some purple in your ambient, then light it with teal moonlight.
The gameplay was maybe a little too simple, but it kept me going to the end. I got a kick out of the different footstep sounds for different flooring materials :)
I think the only thing I would add is a sprinting mechanic - if you run too much, you are at risk of awaking the Upyri.
I loved the fact that if you fail killing it, you are respawned close (so you don't have to replay the whole game from the start).
As others pointed, fog would be a great addition for its atmosphere - or a single point light at the player's position, to simulate a torch. Other than that the modelling, texturing (those clouds!) and the sparse sound (played always at the right moment) are awesome :)
Thank you so much! I really like the idea of having sprint but limiting it by having it alert the upyri. Makes for quite a nice jump scare opportunity while have a balance of movement speed. I considered having a sprint that would only last like 2 seconds and then you'd "get tired" and stop, but that felt lame.
The upyri scare idea solves the same goal but doesn't feel lame. Could also be extended to where you can sprint all you want outside on the grass, but inside it was a risk. An idea that would be reinforced by the different footstep sounds. Then you can sprint to the edges of the map outside and then just slow down once you go inside.
I also was going to have the player hold a torch in the original design, and ideally have it be the light source for the shadows. But point light shadows are a bit tougher than directional, and I just ran out of time and space.
Thank you again though for playing the game, the kind words, and great feedback! -Rob
I like the 3d graphics, and that the sounds are synced to some special events. (Seeing the blood...) Also the castle is very well designed for the gameplay, for instance, when a trigger is pulled there is a shortcut to get back down by jumping instead of walking back the whole way.
Talking of "walking": I'd really love to be able to jump (even if its not needed to escape, but this could be used in leveldesign aswell. Also the ability to run. (In combination with jump)
It's a bit short, but really entertaining up to the end. Very well done!
Edit/Update: I was wondering, what shock-moment the other people were referring to, and so i started it once again. This time leaving the stake behind. What a twist! Nicely done, i even got goosebumps although i was prepared for "something" :-)
Thank you so much! I also really appreciate you noticing and calling out the level design. Integrating actual level design is quite hard in a 13kb game (and in 30 days), and I put a lot of thought into making it as nice as I could given the constraints.
The game originally had jumping, but it introduce a few problems like being able to jump out a window to escape, being able to jump over the wall to escape, and needing to add ceiling collision detection to the game.
It does make sense though, could have some obstacles or gaps on the castle walls as an extra small challenge, and would give the player more agency. So, I agree it's a good idea, just not one that I could fit into the game along with the whole castle, textures, shadows, upyri model, etc :)
I really love the edit/update where you went back and found upyri! My hope was that most people, even if they picked up the stake, wouldn't think immediately to stab the cofffin and would try pulling the lever first.
Thank you for the awesome review!
-Rob
Wow, nice looking game but was basically a slideshow on my laptop right from the get-go. It's a shame because I was looking forward to playing this one.
This is really unfortunate. Every year I test on my 2015 Macbook as sort of a performance test. The game ran alright on my 8 year old macbook and I considered that good enough given the constraints of the comp. If it's a gpu bottleneck, there's not much I can do, but likely it's a cpu bottleneck, which I could improve with a little extra space and time by building out a larger grid for the broad phase of the collision detection. But since I was very tight on space and time and it worked on my laptop, I didn't get to it.
I hope you'll be able to give it a try in the future!
Wow, that castle is an amazing achievement! Suggestion: A little bit of fog in your shader would add a lot of atmosphere and would only be a few bytes
Thank you so much! The fog idea is a great idea, and it had crossed my mind but I just never got to it.
Thank you again for the kind words and feedback! -Rob
Impressive for a 13kB game. I got scared by the Upyri :D I wish the game let me walk faster 😅
Thank you! I really appreciate it! I did try to tune the movement speed to where it didn't feel slow and monotonous, but that it also wasn't a fast action game. The game is modeled after a "puzzle horror" type game like Amnesia, where it's a little slower paced. I did also try to put in "completion skips" so that when you reached your goal, you could drop down for a faster route to the next goal and didn't have to retrace your steps as much.
That said, when you are exploring I totally get wanting to get around faster, especially in the longer corridors or when hitting a dead end.
Thank you for playing the game, the kind words, and the feedback!
-Rob
Impressive piece given the size constraints! Really like the graphics and genre and ambiance of the game. I wish the sfx had some variation in playback rate to give some life to the footsteps (the #1 sfx in the game).
Thank you so much! I worked really hard to fit a game like this into the size and time limit.
The variable sfx rate is a good idea, and one I actually had in my game last year (Charon Jr.). The playback rate of the engine increased as your speed increased to make the sound of the engine revving up.
But ya, in the context of fitting the whole 3d rendered castle, hi res textures, shadows, etc etc, that just wasn't one of the features I could keep. Such is the nature of the comp :)
Thank you for playing the game, the kind words, and feedback! -Rob
I love the ambiance this game evokes, it's really sinister right from the start. The night sky is also incredibly well done! The game is challenging (in that you need to wonder around a bit to figure out the next steps) but not too much, so it keeps you engaged right to the end. The sound effects and music are the only parts that aren't excellent, but given that this game includes a complete realistic 3D castle, including textures, it makes sense that certain things had to be heavily optimised in terms of byte impact.
Thank you so much! Ya there were a couple more things I would have liked to do music and sound wise, but ya as you rightly say there's only so much space, and also only so much time.
Appreciate you playing the game, the kind words, and feedback!
-Rob