FoonLudum Dare ExplorerLD39 → TITAN, Defend Earth before it's too late

TITAN, Defend Earth before it's too late

By michaeltwg

View on ldjam.com

CategoryRankScoreCount
Overall973.9188
Fun2373.4688
Innovation124.3389
Theme2373.7788
Graphics1754.1389
Audio1753.5985
Humor3932.4568
Mood1193.8481

Comments

alexanderteah 2017-07-31 21:36

I love the art! Though I was a bit confused how to get more power... :/

mvdvelden 2017-07-31 21:41

Really love the concept and the art. It took me a while to realize i could switch seats though.

michaeltwg 2017-07-31 21:44

Thanks a lot ! yeah, power is on the back of the titan

nekusoul 2017-07-31 21:44

Neat graphics and sound, although the screen effects could be a bit toned down.

The gameplay idea is also neat and the jump in particular feels great to use. It took a bit understanding the layout of the titan at first.

sun-wukong 2017-07-31 21:51

That's quite original concept and well executed. I liked gameplay even though it soon become repetitive, I got bered somewhere after 200 score. It was fun to try different weapons at start but it soon becomes jumping between bolter and generator. Also the shield seems to do nothing, it does not protect from damage as I thought it would.

It does WH40k inspired?

michaeltwg 2017-07-31 22:29

Thanks for the reviews! @Sun, as there is a little time remaining I'm uploading 2 corrections regarding your feedback. And yes 40K was a part of my inspirations.

reuno 2017-07-31 22:55

Really cool gameplay idea. I didn't get how to gain more power though. I'll give it another try tomorrow :)

anudin 2017-07-31 23:06

This is absolutly incredible. The art is perfect the game idea itself is so cool and well executed! The UI was good sound was good the only thing that could've been improved on is music and balancing. Nethertheless - this is an awesome entry. I bow for you.

peredom 2017-07-31 23:32

Awesome game! the art music and everything fits together very well. The idea is very original

bajarymi 2017-08-01 00:04

So far my favourite game. Really creative idea, fits the theme perfectly, and the way the screen is laid out is all perfect ★★★★★

shamuel 2017-08-01 04:42

Very fun to play, I didn't see that one of the seats generated power for a bit, I think the lightning bolt color just blended with the metal exterior of the robot, but once I got that it was great! As was said, the jumping feels really responsive. I like that controlling the ship presents a life threatening danger because of switching seats and stuff, it feels like the actions taken on the part of the pilot are much more meaningful.

jesper-fyhr-knudsen 2017-08-01 06:28

Your game looks great, it's a bit confusing to figure out how to play it properly though.

alien 2017-08-01 08:57

Really good game though but i it was confusing for a moment but i quickly catched on.Overall a great game with really nice graphics

tkuusis 2017-08-01 09:17

Great art style and atmosphere and also a really innovative design! I feel like the flamethrower is too far away from the generator compared to the hand cannon to be usable but I guess it's more effective if you use the shield to group up the enemies in front of the machine first?

michaeltwg 2017-08-01 09:54

Thanks a lot for your feedbacks ! :thumbsup:

@tkuusis Yes the best way to optimize the flame thrower is to use it with the shield ^^

flobar 2017-08-01 11:45

This is such an awesome concept. Really creepy as well. Reminds me of terminator a bit. Well done man.

rocketship 2017-08-01 12:02

Phew, that was tricky. The art was very pretty, liked the little blur effects on the sides of the screen too. The monsters looked fantastic. Climbing the titan could have had a little "crispier" graphics maybe, I was a bit lost for a good while on each playtime :D

Generally the difficulty was good, took a while to get a grasp on the mechanics and the seat placement but it was enjoyable once you got the hang of it. Sideways jumping could have been a little slower in my opinion, but luckily the grabbing mechanic worked perfectly and responsively and helped out with the quick jumps.

UI to me had a bit awkward layout, I feel the amount of energy could have been placed to the lower part of the screen, now I found myself going up and down with my eyes, which wasn't ideal. Altogether though, enjoyed myself, very well done!

pip-turner 2017-08-01 12:05

Love the art and the idea behind the gameplay! Got a bit repetitive, but lots of promise. Had a blast playing it.

zyzzyzzyz 2017-08-01 12:08

Gameplay is very inventive. It feels really satisfying to jump around the Titan trying to get everything to work and delaying your inevitable doom. Pixelart is gorgeous and the music is appropriately ominous. I like the scream the player makes when he falls off too.

There didn't seem to be much need to use the howitzer, it just wasn't as convenient to get to as the shields and the gun. Perhaps an alternate enemy type who is impervious from the front would add some variety and increase the frantic nature of the gameplay, and make the howitzer more useful.

loktor 2017-08-01 12:09

** First impression **: That looks interesting :)

** Graphics/Sound **: Sounds/Graphics are really fitting for an apocalyptical theme :)

** Gameplay **: I really enjoyed the concept of being a tiny dude defending evil demons :D altough the jumping took some time to get used to it :)

** Overall **: I am impressed by how much you guys managed to achieve in that short time frame, really great work :)

dene 2017-08-01 15:42

Nice game! Jumping is a little bit annoying, but anyway I like it.

hishicorne 2017-08-01 18:29

The controls are a bit hard to take in hand - specialy jumping -. However, the game is fun, the art is amazing, musics are perfects ! The concept is absolutly original !! I had a great time playing it !

moosalicious 2017-08-01 20:07

Very cool game! Especially since you made it solo. I really like how you used some screen effects to make the visuals feel more premium. Interesting concept also, though I feel the navigation across the robot is a little too difficult to be fun.

michaeltwg 2017-08-01 20:58

Thanks for your feedbacks, yes there are many rooms for improvements as a cooperative mode or enemy variations.

That's heartwarmer to see that you liked it :heart:

james-dunlap 2017-08-01 23:51

Great game, inventive, and very well done. I guess my only issue would be that I often fell off the titan when getting out of a chair as it took me a while to realize that I had to hit space again to grab the machine. Perhaps allowing the player to exit just by moving would have helped.

battlecoder 2017-08-02 01:29

Fitting music and nice shader! (or whatever you used to achieve that CRT-like effect). This version is definitely more balanced than the compo one. It happened me twice that I paused the game with ENTER and was unable to return to the game, so I think there's probably a bug there, but I really like the improvements you made.

I think it would be nice if you gave the player the option to climb back the titan after falling. I'd also recommend you to avoid adding different input devices if not needed. If the only use for the mouse in your game is for one button, you better use another key on the keyboard. Unless the mouse pointer can be used to aim/move the camera or something, then there's no real reason for using the mouse at all.

Anyway, I liked your game a lot. Impressive work, especially considering it was made by just 1 person!

michaeltwg 2017-08-02 09:03

@james-dunlap that's a very good idea, by the way you didn't use the jumps to move faster between seats ?

@mrtwister there is a bug on the pause menu indeed, avoid it ^^ and very nice advice for the controls. Not sure if publishing a patch regarding those issues fit in the Ludum Dare Jam?

pklaschka 2017-08-02 16:59

Very cool game – a bit difficult (getting to know the layout of the titan and so on), but if it wasn't, it would be boring :grin:

I would love to give some more constructive feedback, but the only thing I could think of was already mentioned by @james-dunlap (exiting the seat by just moving instead of jumping), so:

**To keep it short and simple: A very cool game! :thumbsup:**

tayopi 2017-08-02 18:01

Really cool game! It's such an interesting idea. This would be a super fun multiplayer game.

tomdev 2017-08-02 19:22

Great gameplay idea, really cool been able to use all that different weapon on different parts of the giant robot body, the graphs are dope and music is cool, will be cool to see a sequel of this game with more enemies and weapons.

failedstarfish 2017-08-02 20:03

Really liked the split screen, very clever game mechanic. Took a while to move around and learn where to go but after a while it was a bit easier. Art work is fantastic, over all good job!

michaeltwg 2017-08-03 04:52

thanks a lot, yes I will work on new enemies and other improvements :thumbsup:

sarah 2017-08-03 05:41

Really cool concept, the art is so cute :) The whole game is really fun, and I love the split screen, it makes the game seem so much more epic!

spacesparkle 2017-08-03 10:12

Very unique idea for a game. I feel like the jumps are a bit too aggressive but other than that everything works really well together!

zdeno 2017-08-03 12:38

Amazing gameplay comcept! I love it!

My only complaints would be about jump controlls. They would deserve better implementation, sometimes while I was holding multiple buttons at once the jump wouldn't work.

lajazuve 2017-08-03 13:24

I love the concept the concept ! clever and stressful . I think the jump is the awesome idea with this concept!

svr-audio 2017-08-03 14:15

I had to rate both the jam and compo game because it a great game, it feels like a mix of Power Rangers's Megazord and Godzilla with Contra art style, this is so cool. The concept is great very smart stuff, I can see myself playing a multiplayer version of the game with my friends each of controling one of the weapons or different titans. Good art, good sound, good gameplay, I loved this game, great job !

strangeryann 2017-08-03 14:26

I found it very challenging to control (I keep on falling off when I jump ^^#) but original. It would be interesting to add some depth so the challenge goes beyond seeing how many enemies you can destroy with the ammo given to you at the start of the game without falling to your death - but for a game jam it's a solid concept, well done :D

michaeltwg 2017-08-03 15:15

Thanks a lot for your feedbacks. That give few ideas to improve the jumps on a further version.

And I added a patched version in the description that ease controls a little.

natrium729 2017-08-03 18:33

It's really better than the compo one, especially the Titan is the top left-corner with more visual feedback. (For what I think more generally, see my comment on the compo version.

autumnotopia 2017-08-03 22:41

Overall, I think the graphics and the general atmosphere were really nice. Having to scale the titan to access different things is an interesting spin on a lot of mech/kaiju-genre games, though I think the locations of the seats and stuff could be made a little clearer in the minimap (as it is now I feel like they blend in a little)

daydreamerstudios 2017-08-04 06:44

Great game! The concept ist brilliant, I really enjoyed playing this game. Good job.

josehzz 2017-08-04 15:33

Nice concept, a little hard to understand at first (did not read the instructions :P) but overall a like the mechanic, in the future you should consider adding a multiplayer mode, managing who's going to shot and defend could be really enjoyable.

gabet-games 2017-08-05 16:40

It's a very interesting concept, it seemed very original. Liked it! :)

ryte2byte 2017-08-05 17:36

Interesting idea, but very confusing. The player really blends in with the background. Same with the UI as they're all blue.

A mini-map (or, better yet, some visual indication of where you and the controls are on the titan in the battle screen) would have gone a long way. I found it difficult to know where I was based on the background.

Also a bit of an oversight: When playing with a controller, if the player exits the control screen using Button 1, they will immediately be falling as the game starts. It took a while for me to even understand that Button 1 also grabbed. I usually expect platforms in games that look like this.

Being such an interesting concept, I feel this game really suffers from a lack of instruction/player training.

Art, music, style, and concept are all top notch!

rikoclon 2017-08-05 22:28

I liked the concept, the split screen is way cool. The graphics looked great. some variety of enemies would be awesome but its a jam, so no loss of points there. the variety of firepower def made up for it. Pressing jump again to grab on made things easier, at first I kept falling to my death thinking up would latch me back on. I def did not find the power supply, and that would have made the game much more fun. maybe some type of indication where to go when it says running out of power. I like the mood of the music, it fit well, i even liked the organ as the lead instrument, i just wish there was more too the musical hook that plays over and over. its not bad just repetitive. kinda made my brain hurt after a few times. great sfx. Great use of innovation here! And all by one person... Very well done!!

peachtreeoath 2017-08-06 06:05

Super cool idea man, Shadow of the Colossus meets Lovers in a Dangerous Spacetime. One of the qualms I have with LIADS is that the player movement is really uninteresting. You move around some ladders to get to the optimal spot to shoot, but you may as well just take that minigame out and put a delay on your node switching. You solved that issue here by making switching weapons an actual skill-based process that you can get better at. Nailing a seat from across your mech feels awesome and like you're actually improving. I played the compo version and I didn't see the issues the others had with the controls but maybe it's from having experience with the genre.

michaeltwg 2017-08-06 08:13

Thanks a lot for your feedback. Yes I was short in time to add other ennemies and to guide more efficiently the player. I will work on a version with more variety soon.

drag0mir 2017-08-06 12:31

good job. Good sound, cool arts!

ericquagmire 2017-08-06 19:14

This game awesome! At first I could not understand what to do and how to control a robot. But then played without stopping :) 10\10

pixel-game-wizard 2017-08-07 03:09

This is a really neat idea.

I was surprised at how intuitive I found the interface. I skipped reading some of your intro, but regardless I figured out what to do pretty quickly. I saw the big machine/mecha on the bottom screen. Then I saw the top left screen. I knew right away I had to look for mechanisms to control the mecha. A few deaths later (from hitting space bar and falling to my death), I was already figuring out how to play the game proper. Before long I found myself running between the power recharge and the canon as my main seats. That was really interesting learning all of that. :-D

Having said that, I do agree with another poster @ryte2byte above that I think I would have enjoyed it a little bit more if there was a minimap display somewhere, just to provide some initial orientation.

Thank you for sharing this, it's an interesting entry and it's fun to learn!

pyokoanarogue 2017-08-07 16:36

thumbs up, very nice entry. congratulations!

mars 2017-08-07 20:23

Awesome concept! I really like the idea of this game, it's a refreshing new concept that's unlike anything I've seen before. The controls felt pretty slick, so the jumping around was quite fun. Difficult as well, the shifting between seats offered significant challenge at first. It seems like the kind of thing you get the hang of over time though, so it's not a bad thing.

I see some complaints about lack of training, but personally I found the whole concept very intuitive. I found it quite easy to ascertain the location of the player character by looking at both the zoomed in view and the zoomed out view in unison. I never had to look for the seats, I found them quite easily.

zenmumbler 2017-08-07 20:27

The alien invaders sure are persistent, and numerous. Cool pixel art and nice overall presentation. Game is a bit thin but certainly not run of the mill. Nice.

paracatgames 2017-08-07 21:55

Very cool! I really dig the aesthetic style.

royoyo 2017-08-08 05:31

Great and consistent artstyle!

Love navigation - the ability to jump but not fall off is great decision.

Difficulty is really challenging and it's good thing :)

flaterectomy 2017-08-09 18:53

A big robot indeed! The graphics look quite good - though more contrast between background and player/intractable object would have helped; the music sets a clear tone and the sound effects are solid.

For me, though, the controls and concept of moving was just a challenge that I couldn't properly overcome. My only deaths were self-inflicted in this way, and after half a dozen attempts I just felt bad about my inability to hold on.

Objectively I feel you did a good job with this, but subjectively I would've loved a safety net. ;)

michaeltwg 2017-08-09 18:55

Thanks all for your feedback.

@flaterectomy I will try to work on the contrasts, have you tried the patched version ? http://www.thewildgames.com/games/LD39JamPatch/Titan_LD39Patched.html

There is a kind of a safety net in it.

catoto 2017-08-10 18:41

Nice!

mianagames 2017-08-13 18:03

I loved you game. very funny. Congrats.

fran-segura 2017-08-16 17:26

Nice concept, I loved the idea of having to climb in order to reach the different weapons. It was a little confusing at first and personally found the game pretty hard, but overall it's a nice entry. Congrats!

coauctor 2017-08-17 11:56

Really interesting idea with splitting the screen for indirect controls. The thing I did not understand is whether I need to use other chairs or not. Also, it's unobvious how to recharge energy. Graphics and audio are cool, I especially liked TITAN design.

Thanks for the game!

tapestry 2017-08-17 21:23

Really liked the concept of moving around, switching seats on your titan. Also loved the music. Good job on your game!

ferran-benavente 2017-08-18 09:41

Great game! I enjoyed it very much!

I really liked the idea of having to move around the mech to use the different parts of it, the game is controlled perfectly and the music and art style set the mood of the game so well!

Btw, is your titan design based on the titants from "Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind"?? It reminded me a lot to them :D

Congratulations!!

somnium 2017-08-19 08:24

A very intriguing game! The split between climbing around between the different stations, and managing the larger battle was very interesting! It became quite hectic! The art and music worked well together to create a great mood as well.

>As the only crew, >a Titan Operator >must thwart all the foes!

michaeltwg 2017-08-20 14:51

Thanks for your feedbacks!

@coauctor you need to use the seat on the back to resupply and other weapons like the flame thrower and the shield are very useful depending on the situation.

@ferran-benavente “Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind” isn't a direct inspiration, do you have a picture of the titan you're thinking of?

ferran-benavente 2017-08-21 17:22

@michaeltwg ok, now I see that "titan" is the giant robot. I thougt it was the name of the monsters, sorry :P

Anyway, this is what I was talking about: https://newanimethursday.files.wordpress.com/2011/12/screen-shot-2011-12-19-at-6-27-07-pm.png