Blackout

nitzanel 2017-08-01 17:38

At first it wasn't really clear what i was supposed to do, but after understanding it the game was quite fun. I think some more polish of the ui - maybe score, how much money you have and need - could help alot.

felipe-tavares 2017-08-01 17:45

Thanks for the feedback! We really should have focused more on the UI, we left it for the end and had to do everything in < 3 hours :/ I really like the cat-bill idea tho haha

cameronpenner 2017-08-01 17:46

Fun game! The UI was mostly self explanatory, so I was able to figure it out after a couple tries. There were a couple times where the map generated in a way that I couldn't see some buttons, being off screen, or behind the bill. Overall though, simple and clean gameplay, well done.

felipe-tavares 2017-08-01 17:59

I am glad you liked it! You can click and drag to move the camera!

amigopadilha 2017-08-01 18:03

I liked the game concept and was fun to play! The only problem is that was pretty dificult to identify what plug I should connect to power each line.

Great job, fun to play =)

felipe-tavares 2017-08-01 18:09

@amigopadilha Yeah, I agree. A bit of highlight on mouse over would probably solve that. I am thinking of making a post compo version to address a few issues (and mobile!).

angela-he 2017-08-02 01:45

This was very surprising; the design feels complex and well-thought out, and it managed to hold my attention for many minutes. I really liked the small details - day/night cycle, handwritten note-like UI, so many icons, and - is that a cute cat holding my resource bill!?! :D

If you plan to flesh it out, I suggest including a difficulty curve and introducing different kinds of icon one at a time - at first, I was overwhelmed by all the icons, and didn't know what the difference between the 'plug' and 'city' icon was. Then later, as I got more skilled, I thought it could be harder. Overall, awesome entry :D

felipe-tavares 2017-08-02 02:57

Thanks @angela-he! I am super glad you noticed the little things!! I completely agree with you when you say sometimes the display is way too crowded, specially at the beginning.

I am thinking of doing a mobile version for casual users, but I am not sure yet.

drazil100 2017-08-02 06:58

This game was pretty difficult for me (I am not great at multitasking and can't split my focus very easily) but I really like the concept of this game. It was a little difficult to figure out what to do and what the icons meant but it was a very creative game.

One of the more confusing aspects of this game was the switches being elevated off of the grid. It was hard for me to tell in a rush what switch went to what and I often hit the wrong switches trying to turn on another block.

Aside from any mechanical problems the visuals were amazing and the game felt like it worked. As far as how it felt it was pure chaos. If I knew what I was doing I could definitely see myself having a ton of fun with this game as games in which you are expected to do everything but can actually achieve nothing are some of my favorite types of games!

Great job and thanks for sharing!

felipe-tavares 2017-08-02 16:08

I watched your stream of it @drazil100! Yeah, the elevated icons break the line between "districts" which makes a bit harder to figure out where to click, I did this to "sorta" solve another big problem in the map generator that was a lot harder to solve, sorry about that! Little time calls for half-solutions sometimes haha

mortus 2017-08-04 19:18

I like it a lot, very fun to play, and you definitely get that rewarding feeling when you earn money. Even plugging districts in is rewarding in itself because of changing icons and sounds etc. Those are little things but they're really, really important for a fun gameplay.

However, as others have noticed, elevated icons really make it hard to see which lines you need to connect or disconnect. I think moving them lower wouldn't hurt, as well as highlighting the lines they connect to when you hover your mouse over them.

felipe-tavares 2017-08-05 16:34

Thanks for the feedback, @mortus! You really understand the fun theory haha You pointed out exactly what makes it rewarding. I do like the highlight idea, I think it would really help in the heat of the moment. Right now sometimes you just go brute force and try a few connections to see whih one is the right one.

alobker 2017-08-10 19:04

This game would have worked just as well as a 2D game, but fun nonetheless.

felipe-tavares 2017-08-13 10:02

Thanks @alobker! I didn't quite get why the 2d/3d thing is important, care to elaborate?