FoonLudum Dare ExplorerLD34 → Crane to Freedom

Crane to Freedom

By mhsco

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CategoryRankScoreCount
Coolness298
Fun573.88
Audio1313.52
Mood1483.54
Overall1573.70
Humor2162.97
Theme2284.02
Innovation2783.47
Graphics3313.38

Comments

walaber 2015-12-14 02:21

really fun, nice job! I ended up playing all the way to freedom :)

nooner-bear 2015-12-14 02:30

This is fun! I'm always a sucker for physics games.

karlipoppins 2015-12-14 03:01

This is a lot of fun! I love the physics and the take on the theme. Reminded me of those arcade machines where you lose 95% of the time!! (God that whale was so hard to grab lol). Also good job on making it non-repetitive as the crane changes throughout the gameplay. Great job!

burgerdare 2015-12-14 03:19

very clever idea! I totally forgot that there are a lot of crane games that use this kind of two button control scheme.
My only major complaint was that I thought waiting around for the claw to close was a little tedious. It would have been nice if the timer depleted more quickly if no buttons were held down, because that's kind of a signal that the player is happy with their position.
Outside of that, this was a terrific entry with a great idea, pleasing minimalist graphics, and a lovely little background song!

jcmonkey 2015-12-14 04:23

nice game, it kept my attention for a little while.

madjackmcmad 2015-12-14 04:32

Whyyyyyy did I spend so long playing this!? Because it was super fun :) Good job.

candlesan 2015-12-14 04:53

Had a LOT of fun with this - really great job!

amyk777 2015-12-14 05:06

This was very fun. I didn't want to stop playing!

ghen 2015-12-14 08:45

claw machine, always fun, either its a video game or on real life :D
i hope real life claw machine as good as claw machine on this game :D

rfdshir 2015-12-14 09:34

Simple and fun. Like it!

2015-12-14 11:12

Save WILLY !

gafblizzard 2015-12-14 11:37

I played all the way to freedom! Though it didn't seem to end there, I stopped at that point.

It was neat that you could knock balls out with the sides of the crane without grabbing them. Unfortunately, even with the stability upgrade, the crane seemed to swing a LOT when you are trying to position it.

It was kind of fun playing with the physics though.

mrdave 2015-12-14 12:25

Simple game bursting with fun. I played for far longer than I should have.

fervir 2015-12-14 13:06

The music was really fitting haha. I liked the game.
Couldn't get that octopus though, the game went back to the title screen.

thembi 2015-12-14 13:38

I like it. My only complaint is that some of the big items like the whale and octopus got stuck inside the walls & claw a lot. Dropping the octopus through the correct way was almost impossible. The way I ended up getting it was to push it all the way through the wall on the right side, haha.

fistmaker 2015-12-14 18:22

Great entry! Got to freedom, had a good time. Some of the animals got stuck from time to time on the crane, but otherwise had a great time playing.

boltkey 2015-12-14 18:33

It was kind of satisfying to grab 5 balls at once, also finally getting that whale out. I got freedom, but quit afterwards. It got repetitive quickly.

It was annoying that half of the play time, I had to just wait for the timer to reach zero. Maybe if it grabbed after 2 sec of inactivity or something.

knason 2015-12-14 20:49

Nicely done! Played it for too long. :-) Fun to actually manage to grab stuff, never works for me irl :-)

athenaofdelphi 2015-12-14 22:21

Nice and simple, kept me playing. Music was nice and the physics were great. Excellent fit with the theme. Nice :)

jcwelgemoed 2015-12-16 16:05

Nice entry. I've always sucked at this type of game though :)

jimbly 2015-12-16 16:32

Freedom in 35 1/2 grabs! The extra half because I got the octopus stuck on my grabber and had to shake it off before it'd fall down... Nice job on the game!

tuism 2015-12-16 16:40

hahaha :) Very cathartic and much more enjoyable than it should be :)

The to freedom thing reminds me of that game 1000000 (by the guy who made You Must Build A Boat).

I think the Whale is an allegory to Moby Dick isn't it? Can't get it. FFFFF.

What I would have liked to see
- some way to say grab now (perhaps both buttons together or double tapping down)
- better "handles" so that I could grab things by protruding bits more reliably.

fluidvolt 2015-12-17 02:03

Hehe, this is cool. Had fun burying the crane in the ball pit and grabbing as much as I could. Unfortunately the game crashed when I was halfway to freedom. Love the whirring sounds and off-kilter farty synth music. Very warioware :>

hotboxgames 2015-12-17 22:10

Simple but fun - kept me playing for quite a while! :)

tompudding 2015-12-20 22:07

Gah your crane is fiendish! I couldn't grab the whale ever, gaaaaaaah :)

xaedes 2015-12-20 23:13

awesome game, music didnt let me go, made me play until the very end, very enjoyable experience!

jamesmowery 2015-12-21 08:07

I really enjoyed the game. It was insanely addictive. I started playing, and thought I'd give up soon after picking up a few things, but I found myself continuing on. One big improvement I'd really love to see is the ability to trigger the grabber on your own (maybe press both Right + Down buttons at the same time?) to speed things up. But I really enjoyed it, so keep up the great work.

ithildin 2015-12-23 14:49

I don't generally like physics-based games, but yours was a welcome exception. The crane mechanics felt realistic in an annoying BUT fun way. Good job!

And now back for that ***** whale.

pixzleone 2015-12-27 18:44

Good music with simple gameplay. Good work!

decayconstant 2016-01-04 00:53

I love crane games! :D
The physics in this felt very nice and I was actually able to get the squid (but I had to squish it in with the claw :P).

aflatminerstudios 2016-01-04 04:13

We got it in 40 grabs, though it would have been about 10 less if the octopus hadn't got caught at the top of the chute (against the claw) and later in the chute wall. Nice work, was super fun.

radmars 2016-01-05 01:35

Impressive physics in this one! I agree with other players that waiting for the timer felt tedious. Maybe the "down" arrow simply triggers an automatic grab sequence, rather than controlling exactly how much slack you let out. This would mirror how real-life claw games work.