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Gold N' Steam
Gold N' Steam
By juan
View on ldjam.com
Comments
I really like these type of resource planning games. Reminds me of Mini Metro quite a bit. I like the computer-terminal-like green you picked for the game, I think it goes pretty well with the gold that the trains were collecting. I think it's possible to complete the entire game with just one train, which would be less fun. I think some mechanic to encourage players to purchase more trains would make the game's interest curve ramp up faster. (The game got a lot harder even with two trains! But enjoyably so!) Overall, I think with some extra polish, this would make a for a great game to publish! Great entry.
gris
2017-05-02 18:35
Pretty cool!I also got reminded of MiniMetro. I've been wanting to try something like this for a bit. A pitty you didn't have some time to throw some crappy sounds at it to make it more lively, but there's only 48h so...great game anyway. Congrats(Enhorabuena!!)
Absolutely great! Really liked how one has to plan the routes for the multiple trains running at the same time, and then execute a planed set of changes to keep every train doing something useful and prevent them from colliding. Only real improvement to the core mechanics that I'd suggest would be adding detection for a game over state: now it's possible to run into a situation, where one has no resources to produce another train, and all the trains have just crashed.
Of course adding music (maybe something fairly ambient-like?) and sound effects would improve this, but at this point just adding more content (levels, perhaps other modifiable track parts such as draw bridges or other track modifications, ways to spend resources to improve production, if deemed to fit to the theme) would make this a fine game on it's own.
All in all, the gameplay mechanics are very nice and polished, the visuals are great and unified across the line, and most importantly, it's fun to play. One of my favourites in LD38 so far!
A neat simulation, the graphics are clear and stylish.
It only needs one more aspect to be a game, if that's what you want that is.. **A timer!** Try to get to 100 points as fast as you can. Well ok, you also need a highscore (lowtime?) system, but that's besides the point.
Fine work!
Oh man, I got soooo punished for my greediness in trying to coordinate 4 trains together. whoops.
Nice aesthetic! I do think that the clicking to change train direction felt a bit clumsy though. Maybe instead of having to cycle through the choices (with some arbitrary order), being able to click on one of three buttons would be better?
Neat game, I recently played a lot of Mini Metro, so its cool to see things seemingly inspired by that. The micromanagement aspect was interesting, and seemed to work well in this case. I feel like you could expand something like this to be a full fledged game!
I love it! There's something super satisfying about little AI things moving boxes to make money. Also, who doesn't love trains? At first I was all like, "I'm never gonna crash a train. I got this down." Then my hubris kicked in a a trashed 3 very expensive trains in 30 seconds, lol.
In the tutorial, some of the text didn't line up with the button properly (Playing at 1080). No biggie, just FYI. UI scaling is the devil :wink: As for improvements, just the obvious: More levels with more complicated routes.
Oh, and my secret weapon for sound in LD? A microphone. You can make tons of sounds fast with just your mouth and some tweaking in Audacity. Heck, one time I even used a voice recorder app on my phone that synched with Dropbox!
tobico
2017-05-07 03:10
I like the green terminal style graphics, and the system of moving boxes around. I think it could benefit from adding some kind of peril or goals that force you to move faster. I was able to make just one very long train and complete the game easily with no risk of crashing.
Like others have said its a shame about the lack of sound, which would have really brought the game to life. I would really have like the opportunity to automate some stuff, being able to put the arrows on an adjustable timer would have added a new dimension. Overall I enjoyed the game though!
I like this game, but like others before me, I ended up just running one giant train. With these kinds of single objective games (picking up cargo), I always like to see some kin d of bonus system. Picking up differently coloured cargo to move to a specific station and drop off or something, to gain some kind of bonus. Just to break the monotony.
The stylized art is good, but there's room for improvement. Just looking at Fallout's pipboy interface should give you a good inkling. And with trains and boats at the harbour, sound would've been a really nice addition. So much industrial audio potential. (But I get it, it's a lot of work.)
Nice work!
I loved the whole concept! It reminded me a lot of a DS game from my childhood with a very similar concept, so extra nostalgia points for you! The graphics were spot-on and I had plenty of fun playing it, but I did run into one measly little problem... I pressed switched an arrow in the middle of my train and everything was ruined. http://i65.tinypic.com/241v47k.png
Loved it!
jishenaz
2017-05-14 00:26
I really like the gameplay and room for strategy in this game! But for some reason, it makes my computer fans spin, even at Good graphics setting. I could of course just play the game at lowest settings.
I like the "warehouse" where you buy more train parts, although it should warn players that new engines instantly spawn while cargo cars don't. There should also be incentive to travel out to the more remote regions (remote from the warehouse), because it seemed to me that the game could be played without attending to those remote stations.
juan
2017-05-14 10:43
Hi guys, thank you for giving your thoughts about my entry! It's cool to see that it's interresting to play, even if it's just a proof of concept at this point.
@wildmusketeer : " I think it’s possible to complete the entire game with just one train, which would be less fun". That's a major problem at this point, as you can pretty much break the game by doing so: with one train, you can't lose, and it's boring. Actually, I didn't want to "force" the player to deal with more trains (understand, spawn a train every while). I think it would more be interesting to just make the player realize that it's not the most efficient strategy.
@ddrkirbyisq : "I do think that the clicking to change train direction felt a bit clumsy though. [ ] being able to click on one of three buttons would be better?" I think it would be a good idea with small level (like this one), but I'm afraid that this would become a mess with something bigger (just imagine having 20 buttons, it would be quite awfull to deal with imo)
@kleinzach : "I recently played a lot of Mini Metro, so its cool to see things seemingly inspired by that" It's quite funny that so many of you find a Mini Metro feel to it, as I didn't played this game a single time. Well, just going to add this one to my TODO-list then :D
@ryte2byte : Thank you for this advice! Adding sound to a game really makes the difference, that's true. Before LD, I focused on improving my coding (a bit too much maybe). Now, learning to make sound and music is my next objective (I planned to get a MIDI keybord soon, to really dig into it)
@dragonzlay : Yes, this happens from time to time : you can cut a train in half by switching the arrow: The wagon doesn't follow the main engine actually, so you can make them living on their own by doing this. But all wagons are linked with a spring contraints, so it becomes weird when it's happen (ofc, fell free to check the sources if you're interrested in this). But I already got a solution to that!
@jishenaz : What's your configuration? I didn't try to run the game on another pc for now, it looks quite annoying.
Again, thank you for all your feedbacks, it really helps me a lot!
jishenaz
2017-05-14 16:18
@juan When I was first playing, I was playing at *Simple* graphics settings (I said *Good* before, my mistake), with a resolution of 1024x768.
My CPU is *Core i5 750 Lynnfield* and GPU is *GeForce GTS 250*. My computer is 7 years old.
zorongo
2017-05-17 14:55
Cool game, your own version of Mini Metro with interesting tweaks like controlling the direction. All the tutorial is a bit overwhelming but it's a minor detail. If you want to play our game: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/38/dr-zorongo
ragnta
2017-05-17 19:58
I was 11 to the 100, and my car crashed :( It's a good game, but a little bit slowly. Good job
I liked the complexity of the game, the trains are excellent collide)
This is an interesting game, but Im not sure the risk of running multiple trains at once is worth it? Might have to think about how to balance that trade-off a bit better. A great idea though, definitely worth putting more work into!
2017-05-18 07:46
I really liked the mechanical ideas you presented here, really scratches that itch to make things efficient. I would only point out that the controls feel a little clunky. The spaces between the tracks were also spaced out really evenly, which meant that more often than not a mistake that was made couldn't be undone. That's understandable given the time constraints though. Good job!
If you like, please take a look at the game my team made for the jam, you can find a link to it on my profile page
Nice game. It was a little short, but I still liked it.