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Wait, so is this game actually proprietary in the end (or has proprietary components)? The Solarus games webpage seems to suggest this. See the attached file. Or here: https://solarus-games.org/games/oceans-heart/

If yes, then I am super mad because I helped you beta-test this game for free, assuming this game would be 100% FOSS, no strings attached. But I was NOT willing to contribute anything (not even bug reports) to proprietary software. >:-(

And to add insult to injury, I've just found this game on Steam with 1000+ reviews at a price of ca. 15$ so it looks like it has generated at least 15,000 bucks (before taxes) and I basically gave you free labor while foolishly assuming it would be a non-commercial project. And the actual profit is probably way higher because only a fraction of players leave a review.

So I feel like my labor has been successfully stolen which is just not OK. Even if the game turns out to be 100% FOSS, not revealing upfront it will go commercial is just not OK. I know, I know, commercial software is compatible with FOSS standards, not arguing against that. All I'm saying is that I think if commercial is planned, that should always be upfront, anyhting else just feels scummy. I am a developer myself and I know how valuable beta tests can be to software development.

I still hope at least this proprietary thing is just a misunderstanding (in which case I am only half as mad), so please clarify:

Does this game contain any proprietary/strictly copyrighted files? (For some reason I can't find the source code right now but I could swear I must have seen it before somewhere. It's been many years, after all.)

If Ocean's Heart IS FOSS, then please fix the Solarus games webpage (or ask who ever maintains it to do it). And the webpage should probably also link to the code repository.


And I guess I've learned the hard way to be more careful before contributing anything to random Internet projects. :-(

Sadly, if you create fan fiction, you're very quickly in the realm of copyright infrincement. It's very hard to do serious fanfiction without committing some form of copyright infringement somehow. It is so bad that sometimes, courts interpret copyright so broadly that they even consider mere characters as copyrightable. Which means you might not even be safe even if you did not copy anything verbatim. The only way to be 100% safe is to distort your work so much that basically only allusions to the "original" remain, but that's obviously completely besides the point of fan-fiction. That's the thing! Fan fiction is only fan fiction because you want to stay "true" to the source material.

Long story short, fan-fiction is basically impossible to do legally. Copyright sucks.

This is one of the examples that shows how much power people are granted with the excuse of copyright. The power to strike down the creative work of others ... Ironic, considering that copyright allegedly is there to incentivize creative work. Anyway ...

The ONLY reason why most fan fiction is not attacked is because the copyright holders usually tolerate them for various reasons. But there is no legal reason that I know of that prevents the copyright holders of the source material to strike down fan-fiction. I think the main reasons why they (usually) don't do that is: 1) Fear of reputation loss (you'd basically attacking fans and risk a shitstorm) and 2) They don't perceive it as threat. But that's only a guess.

This makes me wonder: Is there some kind of "exit strategy" when Day X arrives and Nintendo goes into full attack mode? I mean, the games are still games in their own right and absolutely deserve to exist IMHO. It's not like they are just rip-offs, there's still a significant own creative work involved in these games, that's something that needs to be stressed.
Even if you are forced to take things down, these games should at least be securely archived/backed up somewhere, for the future, if copyright ever is changed to the better (or even abolished).

I would also organize a massive shitstorm and make yourselves heard when Day X arrives. It should be made clear to the corporate world that attacks on fan-fiction are NOT possible without consequences.

Hello again, I just want to point out I have finally received your copy of the game and I started playtesting.

It looks pretty good so far, but I have reported a lot of bugs to you (check your inbox).

Bye!

@Alvinser: Maybe open up a new thread so the community can collect all secrets together?

Hey, thanks for releasing this little game. Nice!

But I have to admit, I only managed to beat that room with the 4 torches with your hint ... :/

Anyway, thanks!

I have found some spelling/grammar mistakes:

"X et V for the assigned items,"

X et V?

"Echap to open the save menu."

Echap?

"You can change this commands"

→ "these commands"

"The darken rooms are the ones (...)"

→ "dark rooms"

"which proof you succeeded"

→ "proofs you have succeeded"

"for playing and succeed in this 1st chapter"

→ "succeeding"



Edit: I see both Zeldo Chapter 1 + 2 appear in Frensh in the Solarus launcher. This is for title screen but also description. The game name is also in French in the Solarus homepage.
Can the game description be translated to English so it's more visible to the English-speaking audience?

I wonder if Solarus lets you provide a game description in multiple languages ... That would be useful.

Well, then. I like to sign up for the October/November beta test, then.

Aaaand it's still on MediaFire ...

Can't you just upload it on your own homepage yourselves? I don't think Zeldo even is allowed to upload anything directly on your homepage, if I'm not mistaken. Weird.

Or are you afraid Zeldo will sue you for copyright infringement? Lol, that's not going to happen, you do realize all code is under a free software license, right?

You have to be more afraid of being sued by Nintendo instead of Zeldo.

I am confused.

I have requested a beta in about June 2019 by sending you a PM. Still I got nothing except excuses.

If you don't want me as a beta tester, please just say it openly so I have clarity and can move on. Thanks.

This sounds great!
I would really appreciate it if you would post an English language version of the Zeldo 2 thread, so that most of us can actually read it. This is just too great a game to be just be so invisible to many players.

Did you read my review?

One of the main promoted games, Le Défi de Zeldo - Chapitre 2: La Tour des Souvenirs, is in current danger of getting deleted off the Internet.
https://www.solarus-games.org/en/games/defi-de-zeldo-ch-2

If you click on "Download", the only download link you git points to MediaFire, and NOT an URL on solarus-games.org. AFAIK this is the only game where the URL points to something external.

Please be aware that MediaFire is notorious for deleting files, it's definitely possible they will delete the file one day. MediaFire is NOT suited for permanent hosting and should not be relied on.

PLEASE re-upload the game on solarus-games.org to make sure the game is preserved. This game is far too good and should not be allowed to die. Thanks for your attention.

Source: I have had previous bad experience with broken MediaFire links because they apparently deleted the file behind the link already. IMO MediaFire should only be trusted with short-term hosting, when it doesn't matter the file will not stay online forever.

Ooff, yeah, oh, yeah. I remember the Lost&Found Office. Boy, it was a long time ago since I last played this game ...

But yeah, the key to solving this is to take notes and write down everything because there is so much you must remember. I don't think I drew an entire map (maybe a very rough one, but DEFINITELY not as detailed as yours), but I did write down where I could trade items, where items were wanted, where to find each "office", person or sign, what the signs said, etc. My notes are long lost since ...

Yeah, it was a real chore to solve the dungeon, but I did not want to give up.

But the 2nd dungeon was almost equally insane, but for entirely different reasons.

It's amazing how this April Fool's "joke" is still a real playable game. I was surprised how much work was put into this parody game.

Looks like I'm part of the lucky few in "the know". Yeah, I liked that part, too. The dungeon was quite different than the others to, with some unexpected puzzles. Cool thing.

Ironically, I have found the area MUCH earlier than I was supposed to because of lack of tools. Heh.

I have known this game for years now but never managed to complete it until recently. I think it was because I was stuck in the game because a critical chest in Hyrule Castle did not appear, but this bug seems to be fixed a long time ago now and I managed to proceed. ANYWAY ...

It was great fun, and a lot of the other games you offer on the homepage are great, too (I have written a few rewiews already).

The game is very polished, and there's not much I can complain about. Which is very rare if you know me ... It certainly gives back memories to ALTTP. I can't remember if there's anything to complain, really, it's been a few weeks since I completed it. One thing which goes into my mind right now is that the fish creatures near the secret tower do not jump/flop like actual fish, they creep on the ground which just looks wrong. But it's a very minor thing. Maybe there's other things, but I can't remember.

The overworld is great, the dungeons are great, pretty much everything about this game is just fun. It's basically just like ALTTP. Maybe it has not as much depth and content as ALTTP but that's perfectly fine. A game does not have to be very long to be great. I consider "Awesome per Second" to be an important metic. ;-)

The world design feels pretty well thought-out. There is nothing in the world that seems out of place. Everything seems to have its place, which I consider very important. There are no "WTF" moments or areas where I think there's something missing or incomplete. I have seen so many games which fail HARD in this area. I have no idea how much time it took to design the whole world, tile-by-tile, but I assume it was not very short.

I have completed the game (obviously), but I have not found all the secrets. But probably most of them. No idea if I ever will find them all. But I like the dungeon design as well, and the underground river, and those little secrets everywhere.

Anyway, I just wanted to say thanks for this nice little (ok, not so little) game! Thumbs up!

Hello. This is just my opinion on the website solarus-game.org but whatever.

Basically I just wanted to say thank you a lot for giving the other "unofficial" games a chance to shine as well by giving them actual exposure right on your website, and not just bury them under 100 metric tons of forum posts like some other communities tend to do (I'm looking at YOU, minetest.net!). It's not just free exposure for ZSDX, but for many other games as well. Because there are great games from the community as well. That's exactly how a game engine website should look like. It makes the life of potential players easier to find the relevant, playable games. The list seems well-curated as well, you cannot download crap or incomplete games here.

So yeah, good job, and please keep it up(dated)!

Hi! I'm Wuzzy.

I am going to review this game now. I have played version 1.4 on Solarus 1.6.0. Beware, this review will be quite chaotic ...

I have played this game a while ago and completed most of its tasks. It's a nice game and the world is really, REALLY, big. The world is really huge. I mean it. This makes for a much different gameplay because you need much more time to explore each tiny angle of the world. Exploration is fun! But it's also difficult to remember all. The map doesn't give much detail and it sometimes is just outright wrong. You need a good memory if you want to explore the whole world, that's for sure. The exploration part of the main land is a major part of the game, and I think it's also pretty good. Each area of the world has a meaning, a purpose. There's always something you can do. There are a few "useless" areas, but I think it's okay, as they still add to the overall flavor.

At least, up to the point you completed the main quest. The Northern area ... different story. I'll come to that later.

It's good you added flutes, these items are very helpful indeed and really needed, given the world size. The navigation with the flutes was annoying. There are huge areas in the North that are completely flute-free, which means you have to walk much longer. Also, it's very confusing how flutes are selected. There is no logical order in which flutes are selected (it seems random) and you can only go forwards, never backwards. Why not using a logical order like North-to-South, West-to-East?

The dungeons were fine. Not great, but fine. They are much simpler than what I have seen in other Solarus games, but the rooms are also a bit larger. The dungeons are still good enough to be enjoyable, don't get me wrong. The most difficult dungeon IMO were the sewers. In fact, I actually completed it AFTER completing the main quest (you know my bugreport). I think it's probably it took me forever to find the final entrance, or better: To find it again (because I forgot ...).

The progression. I liked that the game started very simple with the party and very slowly introduced more and more stuff. That's a different pacing than I'm used to, but I think it has been done well. The party was a nice addition, but I was confused by the smith. The smith always said he will do a "demonstration" soon but it never came. Thanks, smith, for wasting my time ...

There's a ton of things to explore. It took me a very long time to see most of the game. I don't know how long I have played the game, but definitely too long. XD NPCs and towns are good overall. I like all the different species populating the world, with their own backstory documented in the library.

All the various side quests are pretty fun. What I really liked were the magic items like deku sticks to give to the great fairies. There's also many different other secrets in the whole game, which I always appreciate a lot.

The "arrow" game near Hyrule Castle seems a bit broken. It has crazy high payout rates, I sometimes get >1000 rupees for one game. The eyes also get faster after every game, but the speed resets after re-entering. Eventually the eyes become impossibly fast. I think this game needs more balancing ... Maybe make the eyes slower again when you had a bad round. Also, the person always tells you that you did "great", even if you score 0 ... But to be honest, I don't even mind the crazy high payout rate. There are some crazy expensive items and I believe it would just have been a chore to grind all the way to 5000 rupees every time. Even if the arrow game seems OP, I think its actually fine as it is. IMO it was enough work to win the 5000 rupees, then return to the shop, return back, etc.

The use of items, especially in the early game, is following the formula of many Zelda games, and that's a good thing because it works. That you always progressively unlock new areas. However, in the very late game, this forumla breaks down.

The soundtrack was great.
Sometimes the soundtrack changed too fast or didn't make sense. In the Cave of Ordeals, the music changed from "battle" to "peaceful" without any logic behind it. Sometimes it was the peaceful music in the battle phase. The minigame houses had the "castle" music. But these are more like nitpicks, the soundtrack's still great.

I didn't really understand why the game had to add a "stamina" mechanic. I don't see what it was for. OK, so I was forced to eat things and go to sleep from time to time. OK, so a bit of time management but it wasn't a real problem to me. Also, stamina became progressively less and less meaningful when your stamina bar became huge. Stamina didn't break the game, but I just don't see what's the point of it as it didn't affect the game that much.

The Northern area was, to be honest, disappointing. It feels much emptier and frankly, just incomplete compared to the mainland. There's a noticable difference in quality.

Actually, the whole late game (after you completed the main quest) overall degrades in quality, to be honest. The Northern dungeons are clearly not that good compared to the rest. Well, they seem broken, too. And the game doesn't even consider them dungeons (no map). The cities are much simplier, so are the NPCs. One city is just outright incomplete (you know which one I mean) and the North Castle is also weirdly simplistic (only one NPC dialog line for all NPCs), compared to Hyrule Castle. The Zora village also has annoyingly many closed houses, and the Zora halls are extremely simplistics. The world design of the North is not bad, it's more the cities and NPC stuff that is lacking.

Another thing which I didn't like: The late-game items which are expensive and hard to obtain, namely, the flippers, feather, hammer, shovel. They turn out to be a big disappointment. These are items which you can only use in a very few specialized places. In other Zelda games, each tool has its own unique use and almost always unlock new areas. In this game, however, these items pretty much don't unlock anything new at all, apart from a few few specialized places and a few shortcuts. The flippers also seem mostly useless. The waterways are an absolute CHORE to wade through, and there's almost zero reward for exploring the waterways. The shovel isn't too bad, actually. It's useful in getting you lots of stuff in a short time, so I guess at least that item paid off.

The flippers also unlock very little in the game. IIRC the flippers are only useful in Zora's Domain and to enter the Island Dungeon. There is zero reward for exloring the waterways any further. The waterways are basically a giant barren desert in which almost nothing interesting can be discovered. So the flippers are mostly just for shortcuts. This is very different from other Zelda games, in which the water area is a little world in its own right, it is its own rich world with many new things to explore. I mean, the flippers are not useless, but I was disappointed in the lack of world design when it comes to the water. What was also frustrating that there are way too few ladders to enter the land again. If you are DEEP in the water area, and there's no ladder, you must swim all the way back ...

What I liked about the north are the two fetch quests. If those fetch quests just wouldn't have been so broken! But searching the flowers was a nice addition. But you know the rest.

The trade quest was hard. I actually had to cheat, to be honest, but, oh, well, "git gud", I guess. XD

I don't think it's possible to ever enter the water temple again, am I right? Even with the Zora flippers. Once I have completed the water temple, I am unable to drain the lake ever again, the button is already pressed when I enter the sewers.

The biggest disappointment was the feather, to be honest. It's very difficult to get but I think there are only 2 places in the entire world that you "unlock" with the feather: the swamp temple puzzle becomes solvable and you can jump on an island in Subrosia. But it turned out to be a stupid Poe soul! I was so mad!! Poe souls can be bought or even gotten in infinite numbers for FREE at the cemetery. Also, Poe souls are the most useless items in the game. Their only use is to guide you through that forest, but you don't even need Poe souls to do that. I have explored the whole forest way before I obtained my first Poe soul.

The worst part of the game is the bugs. The production quality of this game isn't as great as the other Solarus games, to be honest ...

What I want to say is: Boy, this game is buggy and broken as hell, when I first played it! I don't know how often I had to reset the game because I was stuck, or the game just outright crashed and lots of smaller annoying bugs that hindered the game flow. I was the one who reported all the bugs on GitHub lately and I hope all the bugs will get fixed. I am pretty sure there are even more bugs which I have not found or I just have forgotten them. Did you not playtest the game?

Anyway, fixing the bugs should be number one priority for future versions. And testing. Number 2 priority might be a rework of the North, but only because the area just "feels" quite empty and incomplete. The quality of the North should be brought to on par with the rest of the world. Otherwise, I wouldn't make more major changes to the game, even if not everything is perfect.

Frankly, I would not recommend this game to other people at this point, but it's because of the bugs. But remove the bugs, and the game is recommendable.

Overall, I still had a whole lot of fun playing this game. It's a classic Zelda clone, but also different simply because of the sheer scale. It really makes a difference. Quality-wise, it's not quite on par with ZSDX, there's just too many things that need fixing, polishing or balancing.

There is probably a million other things I could write about the game, positive and negative, but I am getting exhausted from writing and I keep forgetting things.