FoonLudum Dare ExplorerLD27 → Unreliable Robots

Unreliable Robots

By untitledq

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CategoryRankScoreCount
Coolness363
Innovation613.88
Theme1153.73
Fun2963.26
Humor5082.29
Overall5483.06
Graphics5892.82
Mood9132.23
Audio9371.44

Comments

joror 2013-08-26 12:23

Had fun driving around and interacting with myself! Nice mechanic for puzzling. :) I am sure I make a teapot lover somewhere happy.

kristinnes 2013-08-26 12:23

I couldnt manage to get the controls to work properly. But other than that it is a good concept.

small-trouble 2013-08-26 12:32

Really fun idea, quite different from the other games I've played so far.

bonsairobo 2013-08-26 18:54

Cool idea. Reminds me a little bit of Ratchet and Clank Crack in Time. I can clip through any walls btw.

fussycashew 2013-08-26 19:04

Very nice mechanic, and I love the use of ten seconds!

juaxix 2013-08-26 19:07

I love the idea of programming robots just by driving them in stead of let them make the calculations, i cant pass the first level, it's a bit difficult for me but it is cool, it reminds me of RoboCode, the maker was in my college teaching us about robots AI. Cool. Thanks for the code!

ganbaregames 2013-08-26 19:09

Interesting idea, but the game itself is confusing at best and tedious at worst. I also have to wonder why it was 3D instead of 2D.

untitledq 2013-08-26 20:35

Thanks for all the comments!

I'm very sad the collision mechanics turned out as terrible as they did. They worked pretty well when I first wrote them (you certainly couldn't just go through walls at a 90° angle...), but then I had to tweak some acceleration values to balance a level and it all crumbled.
I'll probably look into integrating a proper engine like Box2D into this game as an exercise.

@Kyle Mac:
I chose 3D over 2D because I'm a terrible artist and I prefer the look I'm getting from defining some shapes in 3D space and putting on some simple textures. It also works quite nicely during recording, better than I'd imagine it being in 2D, although it's true that the gameplay ended up taking place in a plane only.
I'm not sure why you found the game confusing, but I can see what aspect could be tedious: something I definitely would have wanted to add in retrospect is an option to fast forward the simulation so one could begin recording immediately, without waiting for the cycle to end.

johnl 2013-08-27 16:02

Its a cool concept and quite a fun game.

I found it incredibly confusing to start with, as the instructions are not particularly clear. I spent a few cycles at first just clicking the robot and nothing happened so I clicked it again etc and so your tutorial/instruction screen didn't show up. Then once it did I spent a few cycles moving the robot round with no idea what I was trying to do. I took quite a while to work out that I needed to press space when the robot is somewhere near, but not too near the teapot to pick it up without exploding it. Once all these realisations had happened it all seemed more obvious, but it certainly wasn't clear from the in game instructions how to proceed (or perhaps I just missed something).

teamenschede 2013-08-27 16:05

this game is awesome. Once you get the hang of it. It's hard to figure out the order of things sometimes, but that's the game. What I really would like is a reset button, now I have to replay bots to do nothing, so it doesn't mess up the setup of other bots.

hunlyxxod 2013-08-28 20:23

That was pretty original and really good. I loved it.

norgg 2013-08-28 20:30

Utah Teapot nostalgia.

rejome 2013-08-28 20:31

One of the most complete game I ever played on this contest. Interesting concept, nicely executed. Bugs and approximative gameplay make it difficult to feel all the fun it could give. Also we miss sound! Good job anyway.

imef 2013-08-30 19:56

Nice game! The concept is a bit similar to mine (yours might be easier to handle ;) )!

sergilazaro 2013-08-30 23:58

I loved it! I think I would have liked it more if it wasn't first person control, but that's alright. Also awesome that you use the famous Teapot! :D

sdgusler 2013-08-31 03:18

At first I found the game quite confusing. It seems like a fun idea/concept and with a few tweaks would be a great game.

kirbytails7 2013-09-07 06:27

Nice mechanic. It's a bit slow with having to wait a cycle before switching robots.

crazyrems 2013-09-13 09:04

A pretty good entry. Well made, smooth to play. Very good tutorial.