FoonLudum Dare ExplorerLD41 → A Nightmare on the Canned Goods Aisle

A Nightmare on the Canned Goods Aisle

By tudvari

View on ldjam.com

CategoryRankScoreCount
Overall5323.0820
Fun5512.8820
Innovation5362.9721
Theme4653.3320
Graphics5172.8121
Audio3022.9721
Humor1263.3819
Mood2273.2919

Comments

aterlamia 2018-04-23 08:34

Fun game, i like how the music is all calm and happy while there is a killer on the lose. Since your game follows the mouse its impossible to close the window. SO maybe make the esc key close your game?

call-me-nutty 2018-04-23 08:38

Hi Tudvari!

You have a nice little game here, however it suffers from some small issues. First, I found the general gameplay to be interesting yet underdeveloped. The minimap was nice but since it doesn't rotate with the player it got kind of confusing to navigate it. The idea that lights slowly go out in the store was nice but so much more could have been done with it.

To be perfectly honest I found the (I'm going to assume) placeholder people to be absolutely adorable, especially when I saw one endlessly spin in one of the aisles. The game has a very nice asthaetic and all the art blends really nicely. I also loved how calmly the store manager was talking throughout the game "Yeah, you know a guy just got kill- RESTOCK THESE SHELVES MIKE, NOW!!" brilliant!

Biggest problem however was that, well, I barely knew what I was doing most of the time. I kept losing money for some reason. I had no idea why coupons were useful and the "His Distance" thing felt, random? Seemed to me like there wasn't even a murderer in the mall.

Otherwise, with some tweaks you actually have a really nice little game here. I enjoyed it for it's atmosphere too (The audio was really nicely placed). All in all, a good base for a solid game.

EDIT: @aterlamia also made me remember that this game needs to have some sort of a cursor so I know what I'm clicking at.

tudvari 2018-04-23 08:49

@Aterlamia Well yeah, I forgot about that. I always use ALT + F4 in simple, saveless games, and I forgot that not everyone's like that :smiley:

@Call_me_Nutty That was the aesthetic I was aiming for! :smiley:

There is 1 one customer who was put unside a shelf by mistake but I enjoyed watching it spinning around for eternity so I left it in :smiley:

Yeah, I pretty much didn't spend enough time on the game and in the end I had to rush with it. Well, the distance thingy is just a timer (you can stay for 10 sec in the dark). First I wanted a murderer with a real position inside the dark, who steps towards you faster and faster. But no time :sob: I felt that the game isn't fun enough to play in its current state for a longer periods, so I made the pacing a bit fast which resulted in an underinformed player.

Every currently "waiting to be refilled" shelves lower your money (your paycheck), and you get money for fixing bulb and refilling shelves. Customers die too in the dark. If the game would be better balanced and a bit slower it would be fun leading customers into the dark so they die and you will have more time for bulbs and have to spend less on refilling :smiley:

Thanks for the constructive criticism!

hanra 2018-04-23 08:49

Yup, enjoyed that. Loved the music and general mixed pressure of "someone is trying to kill us" vs. "capitalism needs feeding" and it made for a fun and enjoyable experience that I want to go back to, it feels like I can "get better" at this game.

I second the recommendation to being able to exit using esc or some kind of menu. Loved the memes.

gemberkoekje 2018-04-23 08:57

I'm so confused and I felt like the game was a little slow, but that might be my personal preference. I do hope you can flesh it out a bit more in a post-compo version!

thibaut-blanca 2018-04-23 10:38

The music is perfect :D did you make it?

tudvari 2018-04-23 10:41

@thibaut-blanca Sadly: no. But at least the "main" song is royalty free. (If you are talking about Toto's Africa, then it's an obvious no too :smiley:) When I found these 2 songs on youtube, I knew that someday I will need it. And voilá!

smiling-cat-entertainment 2018-04-23 11:31

It's a pretty fun game, I liked the artwork on the products especially and the incongruent reactions of the manager.

I wasn't quite sure what happened at the end - I didn't run out of money or anything, but suddenly the whole store went dark and lights could no longer be repaired - then, black screen and exit screen.

If royalty-free, unlicensed assets, or assets you didn't create during the 48 hours was used to make this game (such as the music), under the rules it should really be marked as a Jam game and not a Compo game.

bcvery1 2018-04-23 11:33

Unfortunately your Linux build is not working, seems to be missing a data folder; here is the error: https://pastebin.com/J9CdA1LC

vidsneeze 2018-04-23 11:50

Enjoyed the exit screen. Customers keep buying everything while i was out replacing light bulbs. Then suddenly there weren't that many customers anymore lol I was able to refill shelves on my own time nice and easy.

Great game i really enjoyed it.

tudvari 2018-04-23 12:43

@bcvery1 Fixed, thanks.

tuomo 2018-04-29 15:53

Super interesting idea, gameplay was bit confusing at times though. Maybe make stuff on the selves bigger, so that player can clearly see if they are running low. Especially the freezer things were hard to see into and see if there was stuff in. Minimap is nice but there are so many selves and aisles that it felt I was more playing on the minimap than actual gameview. Also I’m not entirely sure if I figured out how to switch light bulbs, it just seemed to happen. The coupon thing added too much complication to already busy gameplay. Also the way the story was told left me confused. I didn’t know who I was. And tried to play the game while it was going on. Which probably wasn’t intended, as I was in the dark area where the killed worker was found. Maybe I’m the killer;)

amras0000 2018-04-30 20:14

Still can't seem to run on Linux, seems like you forgot to include some libraries:

```./ANightmareOnTheCannedGoodsAisle-linux.x86: error while loading shared libraries: libstdc++.so.6: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory```