Treasure Balloon

banan 2017-12-04 03:52

Really like the colour palette and overall aesthetics of the game. The contrast between the cute and cheerful blue skies and mountains vs. the dark abyss is well executed, and coupled with the simple mechanics elegantly shape the mood of the game as well as the theme. Overall it was pretty fun for about five to ten minutes. After that it feels like you've played the whole game, which for a free game isn't a big deal.

The one major complaint I have is that you have to spam the arrow keys to move quickly, and that they operate in the same way as they would in a text editor or browser if you hold them down (i.e. one immediate movement followed by a pause and then starts moving quickly). Other than that I really like what you've done.

formalcloud 2017-12-04 05:05

Ah, more adorableness! Nice work!

mark-kennedy 2017-12-04 06:53

Very cute!

meskaline 2017-12-04 07:17

Nice work. Fun mechanics. I was expected that weight would drag me down a little continuously. :D

relsqui 2017-12-04 07:35

@banan I totally agree about the controls. I didn't think of it, but as soon as I read it I was like "oh yeah, that WOULD be better." :) I can't take credit for the palette, Pico-8 only gives me a few to choose from, but I'm glad you like how it worked!

@meskaline Yeah, someone else suggested that too and I think I resisted because physics, but it would add some helpful forwards pressure. I'll try it out and see how it plays.

I'm thinking of starting a branch with those and some other ideas -- if I pull it together I'll post it after the voting period ends. :D

tomer-cool 2017-12-04 07:37

Fun game, I like the design. I think it will be better if you could move more freely.

relsqui 2017-12-04 07:54

I JUST noticed it says "x to drop loot" when the key is definitely z (in the web player, anyway). Why does no one tell me these things. :P Will fix.

bigmetre 2017-12-04 09:45

Nice work. Would be better if it had clearer instructions and some audio cues. (I didn't know you could drop loot to escape monsters)

ginger9 2017-12-04 10:57

I dive to 700, and then throw away everything to rise again with the doubt whether the game has an ending. And nice game :smile:

badly-drawn-rod 2017-12-04 15:14

It's a good start. I would have liked to have seen more progression. Nice to see a Pico 8 game.

tuism 2017-12-04 15:22

Love the look of it!

The concept is really appealing, the game design feels like it could be really good, but a couple things let it down: - I don't feel like I can see far enough to make any meaningful moves, especially given the controls: - The controls, using keyboard repeat as a limiter of speed doesn't suit the game. One could "cheat" the speed barrier by tapping really quickly, but that's not fun and very exhausting. It should be a continuous move speed. Maybe it's a limitation of pico8, I dunno. - The drop loot key is wrong :)

relsqui 2017-12-04 22:33

@tuism That's an interesting point about seeing far ahead. Would it make a difference if there were more caves on screen at any given time (so you had more choices about stuff to interact with), or does it feel like the whole thing needs to be scaled down so you have more of a run-up? I agree that the control change would help.

relsqui 2017-12-04 23:01

@ginger9 Haha, well, the ending is meant to involve eventually getting caught, but it sounds like you subverted that! Clearly I need to tune the difficulty more. :)

torcado 2017-12-05 02:11

wow! super cute game! Movement is a little awkward, being able to hold the buttons would be better, but otherwise I really liked the game! Pico-8 games are always cool to see in Ludum Dare

tuism 2017-12-05 06:33

Well, seeing more caves and also then being able to access or dodge them (given control changes and making it slower) would probably accomplish the same. But zooming out would make the game feel different, which one is better I dunno without trying.

relsqui 2017-12-05 19:14

I dunno either, but I definitely know which one is easier, so I'll try more caves/smarter spawning first. ;) Thanks for the feedback! I'm working on a new version in a branch which I'm now excited to release after judging ends. (Spoilers: everyone who said the controls would be better smooth is correct.)

liquidream 2017-12-07 06:27

Great little game here. I love the simple graphics style you used. Great use of the theme, spot-on spec. Alas, a bit too easy really. Look forward to seeing your final version (post-jam) with everything you have planned.

frescogusto 2017-12-07 19:16

quoting what has been said about controls. the mechanic of falling is nice, could elaborate on it more

nice nonetheless

saintheiser 2017-12-10 04:50

Nice one! 220 is my best score! Like the idea that player dive. This game could rises into something interesting, if you made more locations like Caves, Water Surface, Fired village and so on.

sadcolor 2017-12-12 19:49

I like it. Like everyone else has said, the choppy controls are pretty poopy. Also would have been interesting if having more loot affected your momentum when trying to avoid monsters :o

Also, was a little weird that you drop loot near the right end of your balloon rather than from the center, but that's really minor. And I guess it's intentional (actually, it's demonstrated in one of the GIFs! oops) that you can escape being grabbed since you don't lose all your loot immediately, but it's something I wouldn't expect.

jjjjason 2017-12-13 06:36

Woo, managed to get 15000. I was initially thinking there wasn't a ton of incentive in getting the monsters, but oh boy was I wrong. The physical tradeoffs in grabbing and dropping make an interesting mechanic, especially once the number of monsters starts ramping up (and honestly if movement was easier, it might make the game too easy).

Always good to see more cute games! Even the scary monsters a little cute.

local-minimum 2017-12-17 13:09

I didn't get very far. The x dropping only worked once as far as I noticed. And I found it quite hard to get up and down in time too capture the loots. It was an interesting cute concept though. How the loot kept making you heavier and heavier.

flaterectomy 2017-12-17 16:45

A pretty cute little game, centered around the base mechanic so it's pretty obvious how it works from the get-go. As others have said, the controls feel a little iffy. With just moving around and dropping loot again, I am afraid I got a little bored after a while, though.

The art is basic, but works well and is clearly in the pico-8 style. I wish there was sound. :smile:

All in all, pretty cute, maybe a little too bare-bones for me.