FoonLudum Dare ExplorerLD42 → Unbelievable Space Runner

Unbelievable Space Runner

By derek-volker

View on ldjam.com

CategoryRankScoreCount
Overall4823.1770
Fun4793.0270
Innovation6722.3869
Theme4223.4170
Graphics4293.0770
Audio1003.5969
Humor2022.8464
Mood3223.0065

Comments

sthor726 2018-08-12 23:29

Really liked the game but i would try to make the game more difficult, it seemed very easy at the beginning

alexey-akulovich 2018-08-12 23:30

The game is too slow. Can you make it faster?

moczan 2018-08-12 23:32

Solid entry with amazing soundtrack that just gets better and better the longer you play. A bit slow at the start, could ramp up the speed faster.

derek-volker 2018-08-12 23:32

@alexey-akulovich It gets faster as you increase speed ingame. You managed to finish it?

alexey-akulovich 2018-08-12 23:39

After three small accelerations, I'm tired :( Can you make the speed increase more significant?

derek-volker 2018-08-12 23:39

Thanks @moczan !

derek-volker 2018-08-12 23:42

@alexey-akulovich , do you know if i can reupload to modify the speed increase?

alexey-akulovich 2018-08-12 23:52

I would not risk it :) I'll try to run a bit longer.

derek-volker 2018-08-13 00:36

According to the rules i can make some small changes after submit it, so i made a small update in order to provide a better game. If you guys @alexey-akulovich, @sthor726 and @moczan could check it again, i really appreciate your feedback. Anyway, thanks for the reviews!

sthor726 2018-08-13 01:52

The updated speed definitely helps a lot!

alexey-akulovich 2018-08-13 08:24

Hooray! I reached the 7th cosmic speed in this update :)

bentekiller 2018-08-13 11:02

The background story sold me on this game! Wish it would go longer and harder or just have a bit faster start! But it looks good, and has nice music, and I like how literally you took the theme, but could be cool if at the end of the game, the stars would fade and you run into the abyss of space or something!

anstabo 2018-08-13 11:49

I feel like it was more an audio remixer software than an actual game. The sounds are well done considering the gameplay.

oneiros 2018-08-13 12:38

This runner has good lungs ^^

danielefisher 2018-08-13 12:42

Enjoyed the play on the theme.....quite refreshing

dsthedragon 2018-08-13 13:03

enjoyed the music and the art plus maybe your horizontal position should after you speed increase rate

guilhermoni 2018-08-13 16:51

Even tho it works fine and solid, i think there could be a little more to it, maybe some powerups or some progression. Overall its a fun game, well done!

derek-volker 2018-08-13 17:25

hey @bentekiller , i have originally planed to have drawn screens for failure and success (resembly in a way what you described), and 4 panels for story, but i wasnt able to finish them within the time frame for the compo. Thanks you for the review!

phillserrazina 2018-08-13 18:18

A good simple runner! Although I felt like it lacked motivation. Having a score system would've made me fight more to do good. But a solid story and soundtrack. Overall a good game!

esmouc 2018-08-13 18:21

As people said before me, it needs more speed. I've enjoyed it anyway, though. It would be nice to have a score!

gettingrekt 2018-08-13 18:24

I started writing feedback, but then I saw ppl write about the ending! I died twice because phasing activates on "key click" and not on "key down". But now Ill try to see the ending.

Ok, that was sudden :) Anywho, like most ppl likely said. The music is a real banger! Give soundtrack! I also liked the backstory and the effect when picking up the purple radiation.

derek-volker 2018-08-13 18:25

@phillserrazina @esmouc At first i though of adding a freemode with score in which the game wont end until you die and then it would show the player the score. I decided to develop first the story mode and ended up with no time for adding it as well. Thanks for the reviews!

jungle 2018-08-13 21:07

Very nice entry. I was able the run into space. I really like the upgrade speed effect. Congratulations.

lfreinoso 2018-08-13 23:30

The game is simple, I liked the humor and the music, it was cool! Only a few collision boxes that bothered me ... at least it seemed to me that I had not made contact with objects on the way ... but validated, otherwise, cool! Please see my game: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/42/nodelaya-wings

alex-adedge 2018-08-14 14:08

Soundtrack and pixel art are great! Was visually really nice to watch, especially that phasing animation/effect

derek-volker 2018-08-14 14:10

hey @alex-adedge , that was a lot of effort, good to hear it pays out!

dumivid 2018-08-14 15:19

Yet again, the audio make all the difference. The game is very solid, fun but lack dynamic. I think you could improve it very much just by speeding up the tempo or by adding some diagonal or random moving objects. Overall, nice job.

antoined73 2018-08-14 16:03

Nice little game ! I managed to go to the *5 speed level The music and SFX are awesome ! I think you could increase the up and down movement of the character as well, because it doesn't seems fair to just have the speed of obstacles increasing. Good job :)

derek-volker 2018-08-14 16:35

@dumivid @antoined73 thanks for the feedback! Ill try to improve these aspects in the future.

suchista 2018-08-14 17:38

I really like this one! The graphics, music, gameplay, all the stuff is nicely put together. And it's addictive!

Ah, and this take on the theme was also one of my ideas :)

shp 2018-08-14 21:00

Great sound and music! the running animation for the guy also looks like you put a lot of effort into it! the gameplay itself is a bit basic though and takes a while to ramp up

ephoria 2018-08-14 22:12

I like the player animation she laught me a lot :smiley:. I have fund the begin slow. The atmosphere of the game is well felt and gives a real advantage. Great job !

derek-volker 2018-08-14 22:49

Hey @suchista @shp @ephoria thank you very much for the reviews! I really appreciate it!

leetchi 2018-08-15 00:57

I like the concept, takes me a while to understand phasing, I would really like if the speed increase faster ! well done !

andrey-ugolnik 2018-08-15 02:17

Ho-ho-ho, endless space runner. I like it!

chipolux 2018-08-15 04:19

Awesome music, love how it got more intense as I speeded up!

awix 2018-08-15 06:04

Good Gaming Idea, Music needs to be improved Graphics good

bela-bohlender 2018-08-15 09:09

Artstyle, music and the resulting mood is 10/10 but the idea is not that creative. Anyways the execution of your idea is floorless.

chaosthelegend 2018-08-15 11:01

Simple and Fun. No words can describe this game better.

aplite 2018-08-15 13:19

Starts off rather slow. It would be nice if you could sprint to go faster for the beginning stages. That being said I was quite humored by your take on the theme. The phasing power up was a nice way to mix up the game play. It would be cool if you could use the phasing without draining the whole bar.

acuriosity 2018-08-15 19:12

Audio seems really polished with the soundtrack and sound effects all mixing well together... bonus points for HTML5, so nice when I don't need to download/organize/unzip

dubgron 2018-08-15 21:34

I love it! Animation is adorable and a soundtrack is really cool. I wish there were more obstacles than just rocks.

schizoid2k 2018-08-16 01:17

Cool version of an endless runner. The running animation was very nice. Audio was great. It did start a bit slow, but to me, this was ok, since it allowed me to get the feel for the game. It does get faster and more challenging.

mark-usmiani 2018-08-16 05:46

Really fun endless runner, great soundtrack too! Maybe throwing in some larger planets to dodge would spice things up a bit.

blinkenlights 2018-08-16 06:08

A simple concept, not something very original though. The music is brilliant though, and the artwork nice! I really liked the Idea of the player getting quicker step-by-step, instead of gradually speeding up.

arron-fowler 2018-08-16 11:04

Solid entry. The start speed was too slow for me. It felt like I was waiting for the game to get interesting each time I started. I loved the music. Synthtastic baby!

t8kk 2018-08-17 11:48

Hey Derek nice game entry, the game was easy to pick up and fun to play and overall audio was really well executed! For further development it would be good fun to have some kinds of alien ships of variant sizes and bullets all moving in different times making a fascinating semi- bullethell game experience the further you reach with gigant bosses too. The big speed up visual effect was very nice too with the sound effect, overall nice job!

brallex 2018-08-17 17:14

Great game man, it was fun to play, I liked the audio a lot and you implemented the theme in a really smart and funny way:) Good work!

void-productions 2018-08-20 17:28

Very well done man I enjoyed playing it.

Please do check out our game maybe you'll like it and give us some feedback as well.

draeskai 2018-08-22 22:13

Nice entry, easy to understand.

remco 2018-08-27 12:41

The music really makes this one, it fits so well to the game :-) In fact, I think the whole package is pretty polished for a compo-game, when you consider the pixel-animations that where needed.

The parallax is also a cool effect. I noticed however that part of the stars/space dust moved at the same speed as the planets, making it feel like they where glued together. Maybe consider making _all_ of the stars separate parrallax layers?

The game flows nicely, enough challenge to keep you from dozing off, but otherwise quite easy. While the phasing does add something to the game (and I like the visual effect for it), I didn't end up using it a whole lot, since it's often easier just to avoid the planetoids altogether. Unfortunately, this (to me) made it very close to a standard 'avoid the things' sidescroller, with only the (also not quite unique) speed-up mechanic to set it apart.

Some minor remarks:

- The music is louder than the menu-SFX, which is better than the other way around ouf course, but still. On the other hand, I quite liked that all sounds stopped if you clicked out of the game, which is useful for writing reviews :-) - The effect on speedup is quite appropriate, but it lasts very long and takes over the entire screen. I didn't run into anything because of it in practice, but I have to wonder... - Is 'Dr. Kumari' in reference to anything, or just a nice bit of inclusivity? - Some typo's in the help: 'his dream _to_ reach the void', 'slowly _absorbs_', 'he must run in space', 'makes _him_ run faster'

holdmeimscared 2018-08-31 12:05

Humorous take on the theme! I like the music, and that run cycle is on-point :) The "level up" animation when you reach a new speed-threshold is pretty satisfying. There are some misspellings and minor grammar hiccups, but that is understandable if English is not someone's first language and with the Compo's 48-hour limit. It doesn't interfere with meaning, everything is understandable regardless.

I struggled a bit with timing the phasings. Just could not get the hang of it.

But I enjoyed this. Solid entry, congrats :)

derek-volker 2018-08-31 17:31

Hey @leetchi @andrey-ugolnik @chipolux @awix @bela-bohlender @chaosthelegend @aplite @acuriosity @dubgron @schizoid2k @mark-usmiani @blinkenlights @arron-fowler @t8kk @brallex @void-productions @draeskai thank you very much for playing my game and posting a review here. I played and rated the game of everyone that posted here.

I am very happy with the feedback given (which i didnt expect) and am currently working on a post-ludum dare version, improving current features and adding new ones. Be sure to check it out here later if you liked this game and want to play a more polished version of it.

@remco really glad that you took your time to make and in-depth analysis. The parallax are separate layers but yeah, sometimes they move the same speed as the asteroids, making in fact they seem like the same. I am working on it with new parallax backgrounds and asteroids.

I didnt took much time to appropriate mix the sound, which ill redo as well, so its currently kinda unbalanced.

About the speedup, when it happens it made you invulnerable through its duration. I think ill improve it somehow in order to it not look like a nuisance, but i dont know exactly how.

As for Dr. Kumari s name, it has a bit of story behinds it. India represents almost 18% of world population, just behind China, and i though that a random human would probably be someone from one of that two countries. Then i look for common Indian surnames, and while Singh is the most common (meaning lion and adopted as a name for warriors), Kumar (2nd most common) and Kumari (8th most common and a variation of Kumar) are a more generic title meaning boy or son. With that in mind, Dr. Kumari is supposed to be a common man, meaning it could be anyone.

Finally, just as @holdmeimscared noticed, english is not my first language. Sorry for the grammar errors and typos. Ill ask someone with a better knowledge about to check the new version for this kind of mistake before releasing it.

Thank you folks for the time!

andrei9 2018-09-03 16:45

Nice game! interesting graphics :thumbsup: