Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → LD42 → Backpack Goblin
By timothy-spit and halfmule
| Category | Rank | Score | Count | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Overall | 913 | 3.09 | 29 | |
| Fun | 797 | 3.01 | 29 | |
| Innovation | 279 | 3.51 | 29 | |
| Theme | 478 | 3.63 | 29 | |
| Graphics | 1110 | 2.42 | 29 | |
| Audio | 525 | 3.01 | 29 | |
| Humor | 446 | 2.86 | 27 | |
| Mood | 846 | 2.82 | 27 |
This was a fun take on a Tetris like game. Having to control both the goblin and treasure for the backpack added a level of complexity and difficulty that made the game challenging. The only thing that would of been nice would be some power up or something to help remove items. For example at the start i messed up and blocked my backpack entrance off which meant i couldn't move anything in for the rest of the game.
Otherwise it was a neat little game!
Hello @rob-parker, thanks for the feedback!
For the longest time we considered a way to remove items. But eventually we decided that it suffices to move existing items around (and truly run out of space). In theory you should have been able to click/tap on the item blocking the entrance to move it somewhere else. There is an achievement made especially to highlight this possibility.
However I wish we had done more to show off this interaction, as everything else is controlled by visible soft keys and it is not obvious to click on existing items (and then lose focus when a new item is picked up).
Very nice idea and lots of scope for expansion into an enjoyable full game, I think (obstacles/enemies/shops on the road, the opportunity to increase backpack size or sell items etc). I had fun playing and got quite good at juggling items in my pack. One thing I would have liked is the ability to simply hold down a key to move an item rather than keep tapping it (I played on desktop). Good job!
The idea its good, but the desktop version suffer from screen resolution. Try pls to fix this and make the game with now height orientated. Overall, nice game with good concept, good job.
The fact that you can block entrance so easily is rather offputting unfortunately. It's really easy to get stuck, and restarting doesn't seem to be an option, or at least, not in a fast way.
Good idea though.
@panurge: Yes, one could do so much to expand the game! Originally we wanted to have a character walk around in a full-fledged classic RPG map, and the backpack contents were supposed to subtly influence the character (e.g. open a lock if key was kept). The final goblin on the road is pretty much only a "choose next item" feature, but one always has to settle for what works good enough in these game jams.
Yes, holding down the key would be good, especially if you want to move things all the way up to a wall. The way it is now it costs more time to to put things deeper in the backpack which just feels inconvienent.
@Dumivid: Did you try the fullscreen option in the in-game menu? It does not use the whole screen, but I think it's good enough for a jam game with focus on mobile use. It would of course be nicer to have a horizontal version.
@Shozou: One can tap items to rearrange them freely. Someone else commented on this before, and it is a shame that we did not highlight this feature more.
Interesting combination of multiple concepts. Felt like a Tetris-like puzzle meets the old “small inventory backpack dilemma”. The multi-tasking challenge also added an interesting twist. I think the possibility to move items continually by long-pressing a key would be a nice addition. Had some fun with this one. Good luck!
An interesting evolution of the Tetris requiring to managing upcoming objects. The implementation, I think, is under developing? Especially controls. It's hard to keep focus on the top queue and the main board at the same time. But, anyway, good job!
The "inventory puzzle" genre sees a new entry: They tend to appear frequently in game jams and I saw one of them in this LD earlier.
This is one of the better takes on the concept that I've seen. The spatial manipulation aspect of both "next item" and "item in bag" is a good way to keep the interaction clean and straightforward. It might even be fine to focus only on the bag, and then add piece rotation and various clearing combos to move it even closer to Tetris and put additional focus on the items and their different qualities - despite all the games that try to ape Tetris, the idea space is still rich with possibilities. Modern Tetris lets you hold a piece in a swap position and functionally speaking, that does nearly the same thing as moving the character into a different item, it's just simpler for the player to manage.
The goblin theme is still good and would work even if it were made into a second screen/level select kind of thing. Maybe a reason to clear pieces would be to overcome hazards or defeat foes by pulling out the right item! It would be fun to have different roads to travel on, a sequence where the goblin goes in to sell all these items, etc.
The game loads extremely slowly, you might need to check that out.
Fun game! I love all of these inventory management games that have came from this theme. Great, relaxing but still upbeat music as well.
Nice idea and concept, a bit hard to play simultaneously though. It would have been great if holding one direction allowed to move the items faster so that we can organize the inventory in an easier way.
But I think you can dig in this concept, maybe the inventory could be handled as a tetris like, this way you would move the goblin up and down and the inventory only left and right, the items would fall down on its own. And when you pick up a new item, the previous one quickly goes down. :slight_smile:
Nice concept and game. Also it would be nice to select the item to move with keyboard too, because you always need to move your hand from keyboard to mouse and it's annoying
For me it was hard to combine two activities. I can't control the goblin (to choose most expancive things) and manage backback at the same time. I think it's difficult thing to balance this two kinds of gameplay together at the same time. Anyway I like this enrty because of attention to details: achivments, different items... And atleast it works well and there no killing things on goblin way:)
I loved the dual controls and achievements that added to replay. It was a really fun experience. Here is a link to your segment from my stream: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/299088812?t=01h01m58s
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