FoonLudum Dare ExplorerLD30 → Connect and Conquer: Emperors

Connect and Conquer: Emperors

By moosefly

View on Wayback Machine

CategoryRankScoreCount
Fun234.02
Coolness1100
Theme533.93
Overall543.90
Audio1103.69
Mood2483.33
Innovation4482.93
Humor4842.14
Graphics4923.10

Comments

buttsteam 2014-08-26 08:25

Chrome deems the file malicious, cannot download. :<

moosefly 2014-08-26 10:52

I think it was because I hosted it in dropbox. Try the mirror link and see if that helps :).

malf 2014-08-26 18:00

Liked the game a lot , but the ai albeit being dumb is superhuman in his control of the ships

It kept sending ships at full velocity and i have to keep pace with mouse !

puppetmaster 2014-08-26 18:06

+feels completed
+music
+settings
-port
-sending ships

slikker 2014-08-26 18:11

Its a fun game, only comment I have is that the AI is a bit fast. Well done!

moosefly 2014-08-26 19:40

@malf
@Slikker
@anyone else having problems with the AI being too fast
Set the "AI update timer" value in the menu higher, it decreases the reaction speed of the AI :).

@puppetmaster: What do you mean by "port"?. We tried a few different ways of sending the ships, and deemed the current method least crappy :P.

Thanks for playing and commenting!

Anssi@MooseflyGames

reyn 2014-08-26 19:51

Nice. I also took connecting worlds literally.

oinkiguana 2014-08-26 19:59

Pretty good space colony take over the other guy's land kind of game. Very similar to all the others, but the bridges idea is good and execution is good. Graphics and sound suit it well. AI can be overwhelming at times, but not terribly.

xanjos 2014-08-26 20:19

Despite the fact that connecting to other planets seems to be quite slow, I had a lot of fun playing this entry. The primary gameplay mechanic fits the theme very well and I absolutely loved the background music.

capitals 2014-08-26 20:21

I enjoyed the game, while not a new concept.

sekaru 2014-08-26 20:38

I really enjoyed the game. It felt tense, difficult and when you eventually win it feels very satisfying.

puppetmaster 2014-08-26 22:13

I'm not so good in english, i'll explain my vote. For sending ships you need exactly drawing a line from one planet to other planet. It prevent playing fast. "port" means for me "I know this game!". For every game i vote, i give positive and negative feedback(points). Even from your comment i have learned , never let your friend change gameplay (friendly --> hard) without you at 3 o'clock (deadline) in the morning.

zoneone2 2014-08-26 22:16

I've seen a few games with a similar approach, but this one made me feel more in control than the other ones.

madk 2014-08-26 22:32

Awesome! Would've killed though for some pathfinding when ordering ships around.

moosefly 2014-08-26 22:45

@puppetmaster
Thanks for clarifying!

@madk (also kinda related to @puppetmaster)
Pathfinding sure would've been nice to lessen the amount of micro-management needed. Too bad we ran out of time as is and didn't even finish our original to-do list (which, for some reason, didn't include pathfinding :D).

We knew straight from the start that it probably wouldn't be all that unique, considering the theme and it seems we were right :P. Bye bye points in innovation!

Anssi@MooseflyGames

zncatlaw 2014-08-26 22:55

Gripping game jam game, got me clicking all frantic-like. Thanks!

kirbytails7 2014-08-27 05:09

This game is wonderful! I really like it. Having to move your ships quickly to keep them alive keeps things moving, and building your own connections between planets is quite satisfying. Well done!

atomicvikings 2014-08-27 16:14

challenging game. but I guess I picked a difficult AI setting. very awesome work! :D

ragepaint 2014-08-27 16:28

Simple yet fun game. Can get a bit hectic when you set the AI at a 1 second interval but nothing unbeatable. Nice job!

ofursnati 2014-08-27 17:08

Great game. one of the best I have tried so far. GJ.

razoric 2014-08-27 18:09

got game me hooked so yeah, good job!

ix 2014-08-27 20:34

This gameplay concept has been well-explored elsewhere, but this is a nice presentation and bridges do change things up a bit. I liked having to click fast to keep planets re-supplied.

hellblazer 2014-08-27 20:50

Excellent entry! It actually feels quite complete. It's a simple concept, but it's fun (and frantic!). Great work.

lkr 2014-08-28 18:58

Enjoyed this one a lot :)
Nice and simple visuals, and good music.

I liked the bridge building part a lot, but it did seem like whoever built the bridge connecting two networks would be at a loss after spending all the resources building it (while the other one built ships), unless they had turtled up with more planets/higher income in advance.

All in all - thumbs up!

moosefly 2014-08-28 20:57

@lkr
Damn, looks like you figured us out :P! At the moment building a bridge can indeed be a disadvantage. Just goes to show how little time we had for balancing the game.

Thanks for playing and commenting everyone! We really apreciate it.

Anssi@MooseflyGames

mrjohnson22 2014-08-30 20:19

Wow, what a blast! Free-for-all strategy games are always a ton of hectic fun, and this game doesn't disappoint. In a 4-player match, there's always a fair bit going on, and the multitasking that's required to stay alive is exhilarating. I started out playing a 2-player game, though, and was felt that many of the game's mechanics (ship caps on planets, being able to send less than 100% of ships over a bridge) didn't have much of an effect, but these fears evaporated once I booted up some 4-player mayhem & upped the planet count. There is indeed a lot of strategy involved in this game!

Also, great work on the very appealing menus, the minimal yet informative UI, the fitting soundtrack, and *especially* the breadth of gameplay customization options. They really give this game a ton of depth & replayability.

nooner-bear 2014-08-31 06:58

I remember having played a game rather similar to this, but regardless, this was a fun play-though. Good work.

sunflower 2014-08-31 10:32

Pretty good entry, managed to win on a large map with the first faction. Also, while AI is dumb, it seems to compensate well with number of ships it can end at once. >.<
Bonus points for including different factions, with their logos and such. I wouldn't mind seeing a campaign mode out of it, but then I'd prefer there would be difficulty levels, so that people whose eyes aren't all over place could have a chance to win, too. ^^"

bluesky 2014-08-31 20:29

Awesome! Fit to the theme.

geekygenius 2014-09-03 06:37

Wow! That was the most fun I've had playing a LD game in a while! I have saved the game onto my desktop it is so much fun. I liked how you had to build the bridges before you came over, that was a very nice mechanic. I do have a few things I would change though. Some sort of pathfinding to get from one planet, to another that is indirectly connected would be nice. As long as it doesn't break gameplay, it would allow the player to manage their resources better. It was also confusing about what color I was. It seems to change with how many players there are, I would stick to just one for the human. Over all, fantastic game, I would love to see this perused later.

strong99 2014-09-03 09:21

Very good gameplay and interesting AI. Took a while before I understood the slowdown in creating bridges. Loved the mass famine when there was too much of the resource on a planet.

jomomomo 2014-09-03 13:47

Can't play windows games... can I get a web ver?

drcicero 2014-09-04 16:22

i could not build any bridges or send ships.

you forgot following line in FILE src/game.lua, FUNCTION game:released
x, y = RES.gamePosition(x, y)

;)

moosefly 2014-09-04 16:34

@DrCicero
Good catch and good job spotting the fault in that mess of a code! I guess I'll add a disclaimer that even though you can change the window size, the game won't work after that ;).

Once again, lots of good constructive comments and even a few very flattering ones, thanks! We'll have to see what we can do with this project in the future.

Anssi@MooseflyGames

drcicero 2014-09-04 16:43

But then i fixed it. Very good game!

simonchauvin 2014-09-05 09:06

I played a lot of entries in which you have to conquer planets but this one is clearly the best I've played. It's so well designed and addictive. Great job!

jupiter_hadley 2014-09-07 20:40

I sucked at this game but I included it in part 20 of my Ludum Dare 30 compilation video series, if you’d like to take a look :) http://youtu.be/3H1YVzN-nuA

snicklodocus 2014-09-11 21:17

Cool game! There's a lot of clicking involved (it would be cool if you could automatically send ships). I liked the music and the settings menu was nice. Good job!

munkeebacon 2014-09-11 23:47

Very very fun!

creative630 2014-09-12 12:24

Well executed game. Seen many games doing the same sort of influence type game mechanic, but the added slowdown mechanic was fresh. The graphs, music and visuals were a nice touch. Next time add sound effects :)

klianc09 2014-09-12 14:20

I really like the slowdown of time while giving orders, this emphasizes the strategy aspect of the game instead of other games where you just have to "click really fast" to win.
The red faction seems to be best early in the game, especially if there are few planets. The blue faction is better when there are a lot of planets because they simply outproduce everything. Green and yellow factions seemed to have rather neglectable benefits.
One of the most important aspects of RTS games is, to have your troops always on the front, where the battle is. Multiselection and ordering them to go a path over multiple planets would spare one a lot of clicking.

Overall I really liked, especially the music. Having to build bridges beforehand was a nice change for this type of games.

(And a test run having all 4 factions be controlled by AI confirms my theory. Red and blue quickly controlled most of the map with blue eventually winning over red.)

moosefly 2014-09-12 15:01

Thanks for the in-depth comment klianc09! Your faction analysis is pretty much spot on with what I have experienced :). And yeah, being able to move your units to the frontline more easily, for example via pathing, automated ship sending (rally point style) or multiple selection would really improve the experience for the player!

Love the constructive feedback we have been getting, keep it coming you all! It'll really come in handy if/when we decide to take this idea further!

Anssi@MooseflyGames

sheepolution 2014-09-12 18:28

I really like these kind of cell/planet conquer games. I noticed that playing with only a few planets can be really unfair, since it will take less long for the opponent to have more resources if he is closer to a second planet. When I tried to play against the smartest AI I played for like 15 minutes until I realized I wasn't making any progress :P

Good game, good job!

conflictivelabs 2014-09-13 04:50

Wonderful game! While this is not the first "Galactic Battle For Territory and Supremacy" game I've played this LD, it is by far the most [immediately] enjoyable!

The simple approach to strategy (boiled down to 1 "resource", only 3 well-thought options for deploying units (that totally makes sense), and only 1 available action for exploration and terrain conquest) is easy to understand and simple enough to allow REAL decision making, which more complex games lack due to the large number of available actions and variables involved in any situation that calls for quick action. The fact that time slows down when you are performing any of the strategic actions helps a lot with this too.

Graphics are good, audio fits perfectly and also helps create a mood. It is a very solid, smart and simple game. LOVED IT! :)

klianc09 2014-09-16 18:39

@Anssi@MooseflyGames
I don't know if you will see this, but I replied to your comment on my game's page.

I also find it funny that we are tied with the fun score.
Great job with your game. (And I hope there will be more from you in the future.)