Breaking the Cycle

You find yourself stuck in a strange world. Time seems to work differently here, and almost everything in this dimension repeats in an endless loop. Including your actions.

For a while, you just go with the flow, passing through the same rooms again and again. Without ever questioning why, you just do it.

However, over time, you slowly start to lose sense of reality, including your own identity. You don't even remember who you are or why you arrived here anymore.

One day though, you suddenly recall a faint memory of the day you arrived here, exploring some abandoned ruins by the area with your friends but then losing sight of them.

Could there still be a way to find them and break the cycle you've been stuck in? Only time will tell, but one thing's for sure: going in circles won't get you very far.

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Breaking the Cycle is a 2D metroidvania/puzzle platformer that I made for GMTK Game Jam 2025.

The game's main mechanic revolves around manipulating the world around you using tools you would typically find under the playback bar of a video: Play, Pause, Fast Forward, and so on. 

That's how I implemented the theme for this year's game jam into the mechanics of the game: since all objects and levels follow some sort of cycle or cyclic animation, you can cleverly use the tools you obtain to change how your surroundings behave.

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Controls: 

[ E ] to open the map and controls menu.

[ R ] to Restart Current Screen

Arrow keys LEFT/RIGHT to move

[ Z ] / Up Arrow / SPACE to Jump (You can double-jump!)

[ A ] [ D ] to select an ability (Abilities have to be unlocked first!)

[ X ] to use the selected ability 

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Good luck and have fun playing! :]

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All code, art, and music assets created by me.

Font Used: Masaaki

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As you can probably see from the map screen, I didn't quite accomplish my goal of making a 25-room metroidvania within the 96 game jam hours (minus sleep).

As a result, some of the mechanics weren't properly showcased to their full extent (especially the rewind area powerup) and a lot of planned rooms got cut from the final build.

Despite this, I hope you enjoy the game for what it is :>

WARNING: also, since this is a submission to a game jam, I didn't have much time to playtest. Some areas might be excruciatingly difficult or outright impossible. If you can still beat the game despite that, congrats!