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TimestampSince previousGameSeveral's comment
Apr 25 02:19:00 HMS Imahara While pestering someone to test my Windows build, I also pestered them to download and start up your game. Alas, I did not have the time to continue staring over their shoulder for more than a minute, but I saw enough to confirm that I want to play it. A pity there's no Mac build.
Apr 25 02:40:00 21m 00s Minisk, You Will Upon realizing this would be game primarily about shooting random spawns, I was quite dubious at first, but having to frequently outrun my own wild arrows made for a very pleasant experience. Well done on the gravity + planet size + ease of missing.
Apr 25 03:04:00 24m 00s Cube God This is a concept I've wanted to see delivered for some time. Would love to play a Mac build.
Apr 25 03:42:00 38m 00s Tiny Eco I quite like the concept--cellular automation seems to be woefully under-explored as a starting point for gameplay. The assortment of "puzzles" in your entry is a nice touch. <br/> <br/>The other comments here do an excellent job of highlighting the shortcomings (in-game instructions, amount &amp; clarity of visual feedback, goals). It's a shame you didn't have time to implement more visualization of the variables in play; done abstractly, I could imagine the simulation being quite hypnotizing.
Apr 27 01:07:00 45h 25m TINY LIZARD SWELL WORLD Amid scores of partial entries, it seemed perfectly reasonable to dismiss this as a broken demo after I mashed wasd a bit and observed no discernible reaction. <br/> <br/>After reading the comments, I decided to take another go. It was amusing for a bit trying to figure out what was going on, in a sort of cactusquid way, but the interactions that I discovered were too irritating to pursue, and soon the app hung long enough to warrant a force-quit. <br/> <br/>If anyone else enjoys these sorts of puzzles, it looks like the ruddy stub things move to different grid-structures at different times and disappear. You can (sometimes?) lure them out if you're standing in the right spot nearby, and the stubs will follow you as long as they're red on top. If you stand in the right spot in relation to the stubs, there will be a bit of pixel noise in a circular area around them, and they'll be content staying there forever. If you're out of that zone for too long, they'll lose the red and wander off, either back to their grid structure of choice, or to a random spot away from a grid structure for a while, before holing up in a structure again. Is there any reward to commanding as many of these stubs as possible? or leading them anywhere? I'm not curious enough to bother. But I appreciate that things emerge as symbols, and the symbols lead my imagination to interesting places. Kudos to racarate on that. <br/> <br/>(One more note: If you stand still for long enough, the gridlines around you will flash pink in a circular region. If nothing else, this can be helpful for locating the lizard, as the pixel is often completely invisible on my monitor.)
Apr 27 02:26:00 1h 19m Children of DiscoDroid I'd love to see this in a more finished state. <br/>The visuals are quite lovely, and the dancing animation is direct path to joy. <br/> <br/>The "generosity" on death is an amusing touch, too.
Apr 27 21:38:00 19h 12m The Moth and The Menace That head-thing looks grand, but I'm afraid I may only moan &amp; curse &amp; mumble for a Mac or web version. Do consider it next time!
Apr 27 22:47:00 1h 09m BEEFWAR Knowing that I cannot play this in OSX is like passing a gallstone.
May 6 20:17:00 213h 30m Dwindling Worlds I'm inclined to file this under the "guess what I mean" kind of game, rather like riddles, crossword puzzles, and a slew of indie games that only seem to work (in my opinion) if there are very few linguistic cock-ups, insultingly obvious solutions, or totally insufficient clues. It's interesting to see this entry explore a gesture-based format, mostly for the difference it make in the experience (relying on audio to deliver the clues does a lot to augment this), but also in the way that it constrains the possible answers (providing one does not go overboard). I actually kind of like fact that "waggle 'til it works" seemed to be a perfectly viable strategy, as it helps frustration feed back into the "game" in a potentially constructive way. <br/> <br/>A few complaints, though: <br/>- The "any key to start" feels a bit misleading. Though I'd read the instructions before downloading, by the time I got to playing (a bit later, after reading some other things), the "key" business gave me the impression I was supposed to play with the keyboard, at least until I quit and checked the readme. Why not ask for gestural input to start? ("Move your mouse around the world to start" or something. A hint could be hidden in the voiceover, too.) <br/>- There were a few cases where I figured out the puzzle before the voiceover stopped, and was left trying to work out the simultaneous audio tracks. I'd have preferred to hear the "completed" track continue while the visuals remained in some sort of "win" state, then transition to the next puzzle &amp; its VO. <br/>- As others have stated, the audio quality made the words undecipherable rather frequently. <br/>- There were a number of occasions where I had no idea why a gesture did what it did, but this may be related to the above audio issue. <br/>- The size of the worlds at their smallest seemed too small to reliably make out colors (on my monitor, at least). <br/> <br/>That said, I found this to be a very refreshing experience. Thanks for sharing it! <br/> <br/>(Note: everything I've written here refers to the original version.)
May 6 22:09:00 1h 52m LHC I liked how you handled "observing" electrons, and representing their motion. <br/> <br/>More visual feedback (some indication of when, where, &amp; why you're getting points) would significantly improve gameplay, I think.
May 7 01:22:00 3h 13m Submarine: This Ain't Your Momma's Bathtub, Tovarisch On OS X 10.6.8, I was able to start the game via the .bat file in Terminal (I opened the .bat while within the game folder, to take care of the relative paths). <br/> <br/>For Mac users that haven't fiddled much with Terminal, the easiest way to do this is probably just to open Terminal (in Applications &gt; Utilities), type "cd" and a single space ("cd "), then drag the game folder into the Terminal window (this should autofill the path to the game folder) and hit enter (this should navigate to the folder) then type in "submarine.bat" (or drag that file into the Terminal window) and hit enter again to start the game. <br/> <br/>Glad I made the effort to get things working--this is a very charming entry! <br/>Was confused at first (adding the "help" menu to the normal game screen would be useful), but I made it to the bear entry by just doing what seemed to make the most sense. After reading the "help" and taking another try, I was able to beat the game quite easily. (perhaps my "story" decisions helped, though?) <br/> <br/>If you plan on making a more polished version, I'd advise cleaning up the text to catch some of the typos &amp; grammatical stumbles. Otherwise, much of the roughness adds to the humor, I think. The crew portraits had me chuckling immediately.
May 9 00:07:00 46h 45m Path O' Invasion Pretty thoughtful start! <br/> <br/>To the earlier requests/suggestions, I'd add: <br/>- some sort of time controls, to stop/slow/speed up movement/action. The first couple of levels felt too slow, and later levels too fast. Being able to pause &amp; consider strategy would certainly help with the difficulty. <br/>- some additional ownership indicators. Mousing over, for example, to see a list of % (e.g. 20% neutral, 50% player, 30% rogue), and a constant visual element (maybe outline color? or another badge?) to indicate who currently controls the unit. For units that had special icons (the sword, for example), I definitely had a hard time determining affiliation, especially mid-battle.
May 9 00:19:00 12m 00s My Kid Dropped The Planet The concept &amp; screenshots look appealingly odd, but I'll need a Mac or Web build to be able to play.
May 9 01:28:00 1h 09m ineptia Glad to hear you're continuing development! <br/> <br/>To add to preceding suggestions: <br/>- Instead of just shooting the bombs, I'd love to defuse them with a similar RoboRally mechanic, perhaps controlling one hand to de-solder, cross wires, and/or yank out pins in the correct order. <br/>- I'd kinda like the viewable area to be one tile larger in each direction. <br/>- There's more to mine from RoboRally that could be good fun--in particular, timed events, like strong gusts (provided forewarning 5 turns in advance) &amp; on/off deflector shields could add some interesting wrinkles. <br/>- The theming of the levels brings Megaman to mind. Have you considered adding perks to successful animal-scanning, or making more level-specific objects/enemies?
May 9 02:20:00 52m 00s Oh No, Tiny Rover! I'm in OS X 10.6.8, and the app crashes on start. Looks like the relative path is stumbling somewhere? It can't find Resources or ludum. <br/> <br/>Pity, too. The screenshot exhibits an interesting aesthetic. <br/> <br/>log: <br/>usage: dirname path <br/>LudumDare.app/Contents/MacOS/ludumdare: line 4: cd: ../Resources: No such file or directory <br/>LudumDare.app/Contents/MacOS/ludumdare: line 5: ../MacOS/ludum: No such file or directory <br/> <br/>Exited with exit code: 127
May 9 03:45:00 1h 25m Terraformer Breath Beautiful work. <br/> <br/>The controls for breath are pretty awkward, but the metroid-vania elements are well executed, and the mood is thoroughly absorbing. There's a nice bit of synergy going on between the leaping mechanic, the theme, the pacing, and the music, I think. <br/> <br/>Looking forward to trying to finish the game tomorrow.
May 10 01:26:00 21h 41m Desire Desire text was invisible on Firefox 12 in OS X 10.6.8, but I was able to play in Unity from the source files (though all text was quite misaligned). <br/> <br/>With animations (waving at desired people? interacting with environment tile? -- generally showing appreciation/disappointment to placement v. specific desires), extra graphical polish (outfits associated with names, perhaps, for faster visual identification?), more sounds, and a few board variations, this could be a pretty strong little mobile game. Quite diverting as-is, too.
May 10 01:53:00 27m 00s The Big Bang Hah. Well done. <br/>Noticed the "filled" indicator on the second go, thanks to the audio cue. Something a little stronger would probably help, though. (Perhaps a heart over the target planet?) <br/> <br/>Control improvements in the post-compo version are a significant improvement, too.
May 12 02:29:00 48h 36m Tinytanic Brilliant. <br/> <br/>Having a fire pop up a couple of pixels in front of me while I'm charging is a bit frustrating, and lack of cooldown time indicators is a bother, too. Also not very clear why I was naked, but it added something to the experience. <br/> <br/>Regarding the game as a game, I want to argue that agency feels lacking--I don't feel like my knowledge/skill improvements make much of a difference, and I don't find much in the way of strategy. Regarding the game as art, I don't think this agency issue is a problem at all; given the theme, tone, and pacing, it makes perfect sense. <br/> <br/>Kudos on the mode-switching &amp; the ghost captain.
May 12 16:15:00 13h 46m Out for arrest Amusing little game. There's definitely room to expand on the ideas. <br/> <br/>Having a larger area turn red to indicate proximity may help playability. As it is, the proximity indicator area is quite small, the color change is fairly slight (yellow-&gt;red?), and the mechanic involves moving the magnifier rather quickly, which can result in blurring of adjacent colors (not sure if this is more screen-dependent or eye-dependent, but because there's a darker outline around the areas, it can result in some orange-looking false-positives if I'm not moving the cursor slower than most people walk). <br/> <br/>To add to gameplay, it might be worthwhile to add deployment of cops, squad cars, or sirens to potentially herd criminals or otherwise cause them to move somewhat differently. Similarly, different movement patterns for different kinds of civilians would be interesting, and help to distract or draw attention. At the start of a level, a "last known location" for some criminals might add to the atmosphere (and make early levels easier) too. And having cops or cameras on the ground trigger alarms on identification (not always correct) could also improve immersion &amp; make gameplay a little more hectic. <br/> <br/>Didn't notice if there was an explanation for the instant-arrest on click, but it seemed like something that could be mined for humor or mood. Some explanations imagination suggested during play: Orbital cop bombardment? Teleporting cops? Abiogenesis? Cops hiding literally everywhere? Invisible cops sprinting after the satellite's shadow? The ineffable will of the law? Or is something going on more like the "agents" in the Matrix?
May 12 16:32:00 17m 00s Enzyme Frenzy Perfect scope for 48hrs. Gameplay becomes an interesting minefield--somewhat reminiscent of bullet-hell shooters. <br/> <br/>Kinda wish there were some alternative to instant-a-death, but seems like this is likely just a matter of preference. <br/>Would also prefer it if a differently colored enzyme wouldn't suddenly appear in front of the white blood cell while it's charging full speed; some sort of forewarning of the enzyme's appearance (and future location) or some placement avoidance of a radius around the player's position (perhaps with some consideration of current velocity) would be a nice subtle touch.
May 12 16:51:00 19m 00s Jetpack Pixel Pleasant little one-button avoider. As others have observed, the day/night cycle &amp; lights coming on are nice touches, and it seems like you could go even further. <br/> <br/>Although it was an unpleasant surprise at first, I was able to fairly quickly get a handle on the weirdly sudden gravity by thinking of pound-the-ground moves in platformers; perhaps if there were some graphical cue to this effect (maybe a small blast at the top of the pack?) it'd help to explain or get a "feel" for the rather sudden velocity change, but it could probably stand to be a little more floaty either way.
May 12 17:38:00 47m 00s OWWW Excellent work on further development! In the post-compo levels, the visuals and multi-tasking/disparate elements to hold in mind border a bit on evil (to the extent of wanting to stop playing and take an indefinitely long break), but VVVVVV did that too (and, I think, somewhat less interestingly, as far as I have played).
May 12 18:45:00 1h 07m Three Trials Like controlling a caffeinated cricket on ice. A bit too finicky to want to finish the game, but it was kind of interesting to try to die before touching the ground, so I'd respawn closer to where I fell from. (I don't believe that qualifies as a "fun" mechanic, but it's interesting all the same.) That said, if you were aiming for hardcore platforming, I wouldn't say you're very far from the mark. <br/> <br/>Pleasant graphics outdoors. Particularly liked the ship design.
May 12 20:35:00 1h 50m Craemle Zone Cheers on the audio/visual aesthetic, and curiously drunken mood! Gameplay felt a little rough, though. <br/> <br/>Had a fair bit of trouble understanding the voiceovers (often quality &amp; enunciation issues, sometimes competing volume with the music (admittedly my speakers are somewhat muddy, though)) and reliably triggering the phrases I wanted/needed to hear (e.g. unfortunately triggering the "thanks" instead of the "what I'd like next" or triggering the "what I'd like first" instead of the first "thanks"). Some additional/immediate visual feedback would be helpful (dialogue bubbles or ideographic thought bubbles, perhaps?). Also useful would be restricting the phrases to only salient ones, interrupting phrases on successful delivery, and perhaps triggering delivery feedback when visiting with an item in tow. Alternatively, maybe just the ability to manually skip current dialogue would be enough. (If using text/thought bubbles for each clip, perhaps the player could shoot these to skip the clip?) <br/> <br/>I also had trouble identifying a few things visually. Again, this is a case where additional visual feedback would've helped -- a text description of whatever I picked up or was near to would've been nice. <br/> <br/>These audio &amp; visual intelligibility issues on top of the extra legwork (the repetition of destroying the rocks on each visit to reach the planets, of waiting through dialogue clips to hear the next one, and the slowness of movement) ended up draining my patience before I received any twos in the upper left. Perhaps I'll take another go later, though--I'm sure I'll want to return to the audiovisual experience.
May 12 21:55:00 1h 20m Nanobot Adventures The text descriptions were a pleasant surprise; reminded me of System's Twilight. How you're handling healing is an interesting touch, too. If you continue development, I'd be interested in seeing how the world evolves. <br/> <br/>A curious bug: the tanks I encountered were never visible (luckily, the text clarified why I was unable to move).