star-sought 2018-08-13 10:43
Very fun! It's a solid interpretation of the classic space-shooter. I like the laser walls and I love the parallax stars in the background.
Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → LD42 → The Espacito
| Category | Rank | Score | Count | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Overall | 583 | 3.39 | 45 | |
| Fun | 326 | 3.50 | 45 | |
| Innovation | 694 | 3.08 | 45 | |
| Theme | 407 | 3.72 | 45 | |
| Graphics | 696 | 3.29 | 45 | |
| Audio | 692 | 2.59 | 44 | |
| Mood | 630 | 3.08 | 39 |
Very fun! It's a solid interpretation of the classic space-shooter. I like the laser walls and I love the parallax stars in the background.
Looks nice, and it's fun. In the web version, is it possible to try again after dying without quitting and reloading the game? I couldn't find a button for that.
The name of this game is very close to "The Despacito", so i liked this game before i even played it. Luckily, the name isnt the only good thing about this game. The controls to this game are easy, and the goal is immediately obvious, since its a spin on a classic game genre, but with a couple new twists. The enemies are pretty easy, but that doesnt mean that the game isnt challenging. Stopping the walls from closing in on you adds an extra layer of difficulty to the game, and as they slowly make their way in youre left with less room to fight. Its a great balance between to easy and too hard. My one suggestion is the addition of a retry button. Overall, I really liked this game. Great work.
Thanks for the comments! @sylvie and @bilzc10 I was so focused on adding content that I ended up not adding a retry option, although I do intend to make a "post-mortem" version after the jam and this is one of the things I'll add to it. Also, the web version was done in a hurry (because I remembered it would be easier for people to play it than to download the Windows one), so it still says "Press [esc] to quit" which only makes sense on the Windows version.
@Bilzc10 about enemies being easy, there's at least one exception: the "Sunship". It's a rare enemy that moves in an orbit and shoots fire in 8 directions.
Oh, and the pun "Despacito" / "The Espacito" was the first thing that came to my mind - the whole game came after that. Something like "I bet 'espacito' means 'small space' in Spanish... so maybe a game where the available space gets shorter... in space?"
Very fun! I cant stop playing hahaha, great job guys!
I really liked the concept. Having to prioritize between shooting enemies and shooting the laser things. Would have liked for the walls to move in more often, though. Would have made it more interesting to play.
Nice! It's pretty fun. Definitely add the restart button.
This is a fun game! Just a note, at first I thought that the points that enemies drop when destroyed were projectiles I need to dodge, and I was wondering why my score wasn't going up when I killed enemies. Once I figured the game out it was quite fun to play though!
the orbiting asteroid gave me a big spook
I enjoyed this, but a few issues. I assumed the points were projectiles until I realised my score wasn't going up and the game didn't give me much reason to move, because if I moved I would nearly always miss the points, so I generally wouldn't move until I was shot at, then the moment I was safe I'd stop moving again, maybe making the points home in would help? My ship felt like it had too much HP, I think it would feel like higher stakes if I died in only a few hits, and increases the number of enemies and meteors (and decreasing their hitpoints as well) would help make it feel like I was threatened. All in all this was a decent game, but I think with a little tuning this could be an excellent game.
@oats thanks for your comments. I agree there should be more balancing, but bear in mind that the number and variety of enemies scales with the score, so although at first you don't need to move that much, eventually things get chaotic... Because of this, staying at the place the points home in becomes a risk VS reward situation.
That big red asteroid killed me :( we need health packs and shields!
There is something very satisfying in leading your shots and hitting your targets. The controls are smooth which makes combat very nice. One improvement could be better visual or audio feedback when the red lines start to close in since it is such a big part in the core game. Also, the crystals that spawn after destroying an enemy could use a bit tweaking so they are a bit easier to grab. Perhaps slight homing behavior. It also would have been nice if the powerups had a longer duration. Alot of the time, the powerup ended not being used as much due to waiting for the next wave to spawn. Other than that, I would like to see more work on this, I really like these types of top down shooters.
Very nice entry! I am a huge fan of these kinds of shooters! I really like the way the player ship looks, and it really feels nice to fly around and shoot your targets.
Having to prioritize between the boundaries and enemies as well as having the score drop and fly off really made me feel the limitation of the play space, often forcing me to sacrifice a few gems to fight another day. And the power-ups are always a welcome addition to these kinds of games :smile:
I really enjoyed your entry, well done!
@starhacker I do want to do more work on it, to be released after the jam. I don't know if I will add feedback for the laser movement, though, because I like the way the enemies can distract the player from them. Maybe a delayed feedback... Like after 1s of movement your "radar" alerts you or something. Anyway, thanks for your feedback - when I get home I'll check your game as well :)
@pixeljerry thanks for your comment :) I still can't believe how nice the ship ended up looking, since it was my first time trying to draw better pixel art. I made the laser eye ships on Friday night, then I googled for some pixel art tips and made the player ship and other sprites on Saturday/Sunday.
About the power-ups, I had plans (and made sprites) for at least 2 more of them, but time was short... I'll try to work on these and other things for a "post-jam" release.
Hi there, the sound is very loud, other than that I really enjoyed the game! One thing I wasnt sure if its intended or not was when I kill the yellow ship, there are some crystal or something but they are not going straight to me and I need to collect them instead, meanwhile I think if I kill other enemies then those rewards just fly to me. Other than that, the control feels nice and responsible, the shoot is very juicy, you might add a camera shake the the explosion as well to make it even more juicy. A very solid entry, good luck!
@nam-nguyen thanks for playing, and sorry for the loud sounds, I guess my TV volume was too low so I didn't notice how loud it was. I'll have to check the yellow ship, but all the loot drops should follow the same logic: start at random points around the place the enemy was, and start moving with constant speed towards the point the player was at the time of death (so the player has a chance to catch them, but still requiring some effort if there are more enemies around).
@wendel-scardua yes, but the yellow ship is a bit different: it shoots straight at me so I need to be constantly moving, and when it dies, I still had the momentum and thus missed the loot drops. That happens almost to all of the yellow ships especially if I were near them when they die. It might be just that my reflexes werent that good :joy:
@nam-nguyen oh, you mean the orange/red ship. Yes, that one was supposed to be harder than the other enemies (I put one at the beginning just to make things more intense).
a lot of fun !
Really fun game, I really liked the art tho I really missed the retry button! It also seems that there's no indication when the player is hit bullet so that's something you should add. Very solid game altogether!
i loved every aspect of this game great game dude
Very fun game. I wished that the points were much easier to differentiate from the projectiles. I kept on dodging them for a while lol.
The controls were great! I got used to it right away.
Great game, loved the concept. Very well done.
Nice game, Love how everything is balanced! Good luck, Don't forget to take a look at ours if you don't mind and see what it's like when we just focused on graphics in this game jam! Game Link: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/42/spacelab-42a
Hey I love that game ! It has a very nice feeling from the 80s, and has me whishing there where more variety ! (but, hey, that's a jam. So no worries) The mecanism with the game area reducing is well done. Specifically the fact that you gain a little bit of space if you are quick enough. I would have liked though to have a little bit of inertia in the ship though... Good Job !
Thanks for your comment, @vfabien21. I'm at work right now, but I'll check your game later at home. About variety, I'm trying to make a more complete post-jam version, to be released later on gamejolt (I could upload it along the ldjam version but I want to avoid confusion, so I'll wait until the voting period ends). I've put the most recent webgl build on http://scardua.net/the-espacito in case you're interested.
@wendel-scardua sure! I'll try it!
To anyone reading this: I've decided to post current and future post-jam versions on Game Jolt - the main package is still the LD42 version (at least until the event ends), the secondary package being the up-to-date version, both having appropriate titles to avoid confusion.
Nice game loved the art and the gun sounds, also liked the area getting smaller and smaller very cool
Coool! Nice game :thumbsup: +++++
Cool ! It was fast-paced and fun to play ^^ Maybe it would've been cool to have a button to restart, but other than that, the game was easy to get into and, once again, amusing to play ^^