FoonLudum Dare ExplorerLD29 → Project Tethys

Project Tethys

By vilya

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CategoryRankScoreCount
Coolness1100
Audio2923.18
Theme4083.43
Fun5083.07
Graphics5663.16
Mood6192.92
Overall6253.12
Humor9951.76
Innovation11342.19

Comments

vilya 2014-04-27 23:34

For any of you trying out the standalone versions for Linux or Mac: I've built them (using Unity) but haven't had a chance to test them. Please let me know if you find any bugs!

zebi24 2014-04-28 10:37

Nice game, very intense... it really sets the mood with the dark ambient and the music (the music is really great). And I've doubled your highscore. ;)

oatsbarley 2014-04-28 11:29

The music is awesome! Could do with some less drag and some gravity to make it feel a bit more "submarine". Good job!

vilya 2014-04-28 11:36

Thanks zebi24 & oatsbarley! The music was all made on my iPad believe it or not. GarageBand FTW!

oatsbarley: I actually had drag and gravity in the game early on & it was more submarine-like, but I thought it felt less fun so I took it out.

hexagore 2014-04-28 12:21

An 8-bit classic style done in a state of the art game engine with gorgeous lighting effects. Nice :)

If I had any feedback it would be that it could do with being a lot harder, just to raise the tension a bit. Although quite why anyone would build a big fancy underwater station and defend it with just one submarine is beyond me. ;)

icereci 2014-04-28 12:24

You can limit the range of "player fire" to avoid off-screen killing. overall liked it.

martinysa0311 2014-04-28 12:25

this game is a high quality game. Realy good. Bullets light might seen not work properly for the left side? Anyway is great.

aaronjbaptiste 2014-04-28 12:26

Great visuals and audio. The colours you used were very nice. Needs to be a little bit more difficult, but still pretty fun!

thomz12 2014-04-28 12:46

Nice game, love the music and graphics! Good job!

franklins-ghost 2014-04-28 12:55

Great visuals and like the music although the explosion noises become a bit to much.

davidb 2014-04-28 13:09

I like classic gameplay, always fun.

vilya 2014-04-28 13:18

Thanks a lot for the nice comments so far everyone!

icereci: I do actually limit it, but it's allowed to go a little way beyond the edge of the screen. What you might be seeing is that the enemies sometimes bomb each other, because they're spawned randomly & I didn't have time to add logic to keep them separated.

martinysa0311: well spotted, thanks! I used one light per bullet & I think it ended up being too much over to one side of the bullet geometry.

aaronjbaptiste: the enemies keep spawning at the same rate, so I guess if you're fast enough at clearing them the difficulty will remain low. I should have thought of that & had the spawn rate going up over time, or something. Thanks!

Franklins Ghost: I agree about the bomb noises. Sorry about that!

bazld 2014-04-28 17:28

Very slick, great job. The lighting and music are nice touches.

snoother 2014-04-28 21:31

Really good, well-suited music.

colludium 2014-04-28 21:46

Good game - it got very busy very quickly. Good graphics thanks!

orangepascal 2014-04-28 21:57

great action game, reminds me of Defender :) nice!

romko_pidstryhach 2014-04-28 21:57

Great music. Controls are very responsive, feels good. However, explosion sound needs some panning and volume changes depending on its position.

vilya 2014-04-29 08:36

orangepascal: thanks, that's exactly the reference I was aiming for!

Romko: great tip about the sounds, much appreciated!

littleball 2014-04-29 19:04

Nice little game. Would be nice to see a mini-map in a post-compo version. Well done

craigsmye 2014-04-29 19:16

Nice. I like the tactical element of dealing with attacks from three directions.

randoman 2014-04-30 09:09

Nice concept and execution!

garethiw 2014-04-30 13:11

56000 woop! Music sand sounds were excellent, controls could have used some more physics to increase the feel of it being a sub. Good work!

blockbot 2014-04-30 19:00

Really cool combination of game types, nice job!

grayhaze 2014-04-30 20:05

Really enjoyed this! Managed to score 73000 before things got too chaotic. Well done! :)

jaypc 2014-04-30 20:16

Love this game, someone said it already, but reminds me of Defender

vilya 2014-04-30 20:28

Thanks again everyone!

littleball: a mini-map was one of those things I kept thinking about while I was making the game, but kept putting off for "later". In hindsight I really wish I'd done it.

GarethIW: it's not just any sub, it's a super advanced attack sub which can... um... defy the laws of physics when it moves. :-)

JayPC: awesome, Defender was one of the main inspirations - and it's a great game. Thanks!

noom 2014-05-01 01:01

Neat little game, I liked the graphics albeit their simplicity and I thought the audio was great. Would have liked to see more in the way of upgrades or something to that effect to break up the monotony of click-spamming and give more reason to continue playing.

hybridmind 2014-05-01 02:12

Ended up getting over 50k points before quitting because it was just too easy I guess? Seems like a very solid start. I dug the music and the graphics a decent. My critical feedback would be that despite the graphics placing me in a watery environment, the movement is entirely unconvincing as to occurring in water. This game might as well just be in space. The next piece of feedback would be to work on some form of difficulty curve and get a few other things starting to be introduced to mix it up and make it more challenging over time. One note about the shooting mechanic, while it makes it harder that you can't look away w/o shooting away, I found that pretty frustrating. Once again though, solid effort! I dug the look of my sea base.

vilya 2014-05-01 07:56

noom & HybridMind: thanks a lot for the feedback! My original plan was to have enemies arriving in predefined waves of increasing size and complexity. I'd planned 4 different enemy types and a bunch of different offensive & defensive power ups. I also wanted to have friendly little scientists swimming around that you can rescue or the enemies can kidnap. Unfortunately only a few of those plans survived contact with the deadline. :-)

Regarding the movement, a few people have been making that point. I thought it was more important to have fast & responsive controls, but perhaps that was the wrong choice? In hindsight I think maybe I could have kept it sub-like and had a speed boost power-up, to get the best of both worlds. I'll try that out in the post-compo version. Thanks!

lightsoda 2014-05-01 11:07

A couple of things, it feels weird to use LMB to shoot when it doesn't control the direction you're shooting, and the sound for the explosions can get a bit overbearing, almost like there's a constant noise.

Pretty decent shmup though, good job. Also I love Resogun.

vilya 2014-05-01 12:11

Thanks lightsoda. You can use left Ctrl instead of LMB if you prefer - these are the two things that Unity maps to the "Fire" action by default.

shigor 2014-05-08 08:05

Simple, but fun. Nice garage band music btw :)

mcapraro 2014-05-09 05:40

neat variation on the sub theme!

kyatric 2014-05-09 16:43

Nice music, I disliked the enemy bombs sounds though, a bit overwhelming over time.

I also do agree that a bit more challenge/difficulty would be welcome and reinforce the interest of the game.

Very nice light effects on the base when the projectiles move over it.

Congratulations on making a game in 48 hours and submitting it to the compo.

jimmyboh 2014-05-09 18:42

This is great! Some changes to the sub would be nice, like decelerate instead of stopping on a dime and shoot to the direction the mouse is pointing. Really fast paced and engaging. I didn't have any motivation to leave from above my base though, so maybe give the player 3 separate bases and have to defend each of them? Great job on this!

jupiter_hadley 2014-05-09 20:32

I like the look of the game, but I destroyed my own base! I included it in part 17 of my Ludum Dare compilation video series, if you want to check it out :) http://youtu.be/wBne0r55jPY

vilya 2014-05-12 20:18

Thanks for the comments everyone, it's great to hear.

JimmyBoh: that's an excellent idea! I'd originally hoped to have little people coming out of the base that you had to protect as well, but didn't have time to fit them in. Adding additional bases is a much simpler way of getting the same result. Thanks!

Jupiter_Hadley: thanks a lot for trying the game, it's awesome to have a chance to see what someone does in the game when you're not watching over their shoulder! I think I agree about the base, in hindsight.

dustoutgames 2014-05-13 04:59

Well made game. The controls were smooth and responsive. The graphics looked good, and the sound and music was great. I found it a little too easy to just stay direction above the base and strafe up and down, but when I made myself actively hunt the enemies, I had a lot more fun. Good job!

vilcans 2014-05-15 20:59

Works fine on Linux.

It's action-packed and has great lighting effects. What more can you wish for?

I think it would be good with feedback (audio and visual) whenever the base is hit. When the base is hit, it should feel bad. :-)