Barbing For Money

emery 2017-12-05 08:05

Your game Barbing for money is a really cool idea and really puts the theme of "The more you have, the worse it is", into a really cool game. I enjoyed the game a lot and the idea of having to strategically place your barbs on your body adds a whole new level to the game.

Pros: - The fact that the audio was all created by what I assume is your voice, is extremely funny and really builds up the mood of the game into a happier feel. - The Idea of the game was really fun - The ability to choose where you want the barbs to go - The opening animation scene (Was really cool)

Cons: - The movement was a bit hard to control, I tended to go too fast and run straight into the barbs. - The momentum of the player was a bit too strong, I normally tried to go to the barbs and when stopping slide into the barbs - The stick figure character

Overall this was a really nice game and you should be proud of what you achieved. :)

hollowspecter 2017-12-05 09:56

Windows Build please!

akirassasin 2017-12-05 10:03

The audio is amazing, hahah! The player is hard to control though, maybe try setting rigidbody.velocity based on input instead of applying force?

britt-henderson 2017-12-05 10:55

@emery Thank you for that! i really appreciate the detail you put into that note! Why do you feel the stick figure is a con? I'm also gonna add a closing scene, but idk if i can showcase it here

@hollowspector: I'll get that within hte next 12 hours hopefully @hollowspector: up

@akirassasin: I'll try that. Thank you. Maybe i could also give it more cool down when you release the button, but i agree that it is a little difficult to control especially when you need to avoid landing on the barbs.

schizoid2k 2017-12-06 01:16

Lots of fun to play. The voice over and sounds effects were funny, concept was interesting and definitely matched the theme. Good job with your entry!

hugimugi7 2017-12-06 20:40

I love it!

kundan 2017-12-06 20:51

Nice

fluidvolt 2017-12-08 22:56

It's funny how much audio can add to a game! Enjoyed the voiced(!) cutscenes and the music -- it's like Bleg was just humming along while barbing! I thought the barb-attaching mechanic was cool, even if I'm not sure if there's a strategy there or if it's arbitrary. I opted for a long line of barbs jutting out to the right :)

britt-henderson 2017-12-10 02:45

@fluidvolt Thank you for the comment! There isn't currently a strategy, but i want to update it such that there will be!

tyranosaw 2017-12-14 12:55

This is a great little game, is this your first Ludum Dare? Anyways, the game is fun in it own right, it follows the theme really well and has that slight frustration but that satisfying reward of progression (like Getting Over It). If you ever wish to continue on this game, here are a couple of things i could recommend to you. Polish, polish is the one thing every game must have, it is what makes games feel good to control and play, everything in a polished game is satisfying. You could add things such as particles for when the player jumps or lands or sound effects for placing the barbs. Here's video demonstration of someone polishing the simple game of Breakout: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fy0aCDmgnxg The second thing to consider is controls and movement. Playtest, playtest and playtest. Before release, give the game to family and friends and give them a go. See how they react to the game, if it is in a negative way, edit the game. As one comment suggest from Emery "The movement was a bit hard to control".

All in all, this is an awesome game. Love the voice and the intro to the game was clean and smooth. Congratulations on the game! :smile:

johnbrynte 2017-12-22 22:18

So... this was great! I actually made a game for **LD36** with my friends based on the same building mechanic (see [my page](https://ldjam.com/users/johnbrynte)) but we struggled to come up with a good use for it in our game. Seeing your game I think that you're really on to something; The feeling of *"Oh, a barb-thingy!"* followed by *"Hm.. so where do I put it.."* is just wonderful.

Still, I failed to see if the barb-stacking affected the game in any way, like with collision or so. So my main suggestion would actually be to make the barbs collide with stuff. As an example I felt like wanting to stack the barbs in order to reach difficult places, like in the image below.

barb.png

PS. Sound design and graphics are spot on :ok_hand:

benjamin-bos 2017-12-23 21:07

The adio is fantastic, i had lots of fun.

lilkrit 2017-12-24 01:29

I agree, audio wise this game is awesome lol. And I like the humor. I assume the controls were hard on purpose but it was way too far... sliding was terrible :/

jjjjason 2017-12-24 04:38

The pixelman graphics and voice narration and music are incredibly funny--there was one time where for some reason I had two badumpaas playing at the same time and I giggled so hard I fell to my death and then got a Nooooooo

As some others have mentioned, the physics-ness of the platforming does hurt the game, as it makes jumping feel floaty and slippery. That mixed with some of the jumps actually being a little difficult does make it frustrating at points. Then I just hear the music again and it's hard for me to get too upset, so good work with that.

dcolgan 2017-12-24 16:51

Any game that has mouth sounds gets my stamp of approval!

britt-henderson 2017-12-28 06:35

@tyranosaw thank you! ya it's my first. I agree that it needs a ton of polishing, so that video will come in handy for future design! thank you! :D

@johnbrynte Thank you! The original intent was to make it so that the barbs would fall off or hurt you if you collided with something, but given my implementation of how i made the barbs follow the player it proved very difficult and outside of the scope of a game jam game to get working correctly. So, i might go back and implement that.

@lilkrit I agree that the sliding was a bad design choice. I guess when i was testing it i was used to the slidiness, and others didn't tell me, but now i know and will watch out for that. I already fixed it and it feels a bit better, but I might need to fix it such that instead of using addforce i just set the velocity. Thank you for the comment tho!

@jjjjason Thank you! I will probably toy around with the gravity a bit more then. I'm glad the music had such a possitive effect xD I'm glad you enjoyed it!