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Going Up!

By madbeagle

View on ldjam.com

CategoryRankScoreCount
Overall4373.2538
Fun5612.8338
Innovation2023.4837
Theme5513.1138
Graphics2633.4738
Audio2223.2538
Humor1722.9836
Mood2373.1936

Comments

triplefox 2018-08-13 00:48

I'm impressed that you put so much into this game! The quantity of UI plus the time pressure makes things very overwhelming and it didn't get better when I played for longer. There's a ton of things to track - 3 elevators, 10 floors, and destinations per person, and I can't come up with anything more than a basic pattern to handle that.

My suggestion would be to figure out what part of the UI adds the most complexity and either automate that away or make it user-programmable so that the player can focus their attention on a smaller set of things, and then add some characterization and day scheduling("rush hour") so that I have additional reasons to prioritize some guests or perhaps learn things about their lives. There are several different ways in which this concept could be expanded upon and I wouldn't let go of it just yet.

madbeagle 2018-08-13 08:48

Thanks! Yeah, all good points. The actual gameplay loop only came together in the last few hours so there wasn't much time to balance it, especially as there was still the music and SFX to produce. I gave as many control options as possible because I couldn't decide which was the most intuitive.

Given more time I wanted the option for different numbers of floors/lifts and little icons next to the waiting bar showing where the lifts are - all you have to go on at the moment is the display above the lift.

jackyjjc 2018-08-13 12:41

An interesting idea and great execution! It is very challenging to manages 3 lifts and 10 floors turned out. I died fairly quickly :P The visual is simple but effective. I can see that you put a lot of work into the visuals. The sound effect was funny as well.

It would be great if you can scale down the difficulty initially, for example, only have 1 lift and 3 floors or something until the player get better then you can scale the number of lifts and floors up.

Would be great if i can see all the requests all at once then i can better plan the lifts.

I also found it kind of hard to select lifts, left clicking doesn't work most of the time I don't know if it is a bug?

Despite these minor negatives I think you have done a great job on the game. I can see a lot of potentials!

madbeagle 2018-08-13 17:12

Thanks @jackyjjc . Yeah, the lift has to be there for you to click on it, I didn't have time to make the lift shafts clickable or test any dead zones on the lifts themselves. You can also use the arrow keys or A-D to toggle between them.

You're right it's pretty tricky. Right off the bat it was built to handle variable numbers of floors and lifts, but time got so tight in the end everything was being hard-coded with 10 and 3 to save valuable seconds!

chocolat-endive 2018-08-13 18:46

The interface is quite heavy, and it's no so easy to understand how to play at first, but once you understand it, it's pretty cool. I think it's to difficult at the beginning.

adroitconceptions 2018-08-13 19:11

Intresting idea, but overwhelming amounts of looking around to find things to that need to be done.

gamesplusjames 2018-08-14 01:20

That was a really cool take on the theme! It got stressful very quickly trying to manage all the different floors but it was fun! Nice work :thumbsup:

mike-inprinciple 2018-08-14 23:59

I started getting quite immersed and I was becoming more efficient, which is great, however, there were no mechanics to keep me playing after a bit. All I did is the same thing over and over, just facing what seemed to be an inevitable overwhelming end due to faster, more demanding passengers. I never unlocked the second and third lift. Quite a good entry, but it got repetitive for me fairly quickly.

madbeagle 2018-08-15 07:38

@mike-inprinciple All the lifts are available right from the start, you just need to select them either by clicking on them or using the arrow keys/A/D. This allows you to keep on top of thing by loading a lift up with passengers for different floors, and programming it to drop them all off, while you concentrate on sending a different lift to collect more guests.

I wanted to put more stuff in, like lifts requiring regular maintenance so they don't break down, but there just wasn't time. Due to travelling back from a wedding and football I couldn't really start properly until 5PM on Saturday :-$

historymaker118 2018-08-15 16:58

Oh this is challenging. I found it really hard to keep track of what floor I was on, where the people were, and where the lifts were, if I had one suggestion it would be to reduce the number of lifts and floors you have at the start and gradually add more to increase the challenge, as it is it throws a lot at you at once and doesn't give you much time to learn how to do it. The graphics and music are nicely done, and I found the concept quite funny. Good work for a jam game!

endurion 2018-08-15 17:53

Interesting idea! Like others said, it's really really overwhelming at the beginning. There'd need to be a smaller range at the beginning, and maybe even tutorials gradually adding new features (unlocking other lifts, etc.) Quite well done for 48 hours, good job!

sankacoffee51 2018-08-15 19:55

Really nice entry, cool and refreshing Good game

chloroplaste 2018-08-18 17:11

Great game! Like the others, I was overwhelmed by the amount of thing that I have to keep track. after a few replays, I kinda got the hang of things.

I tried the HTML5 (web) version and the D key didn't work for me, had to use the right arrow key. But then to chose the floor, I had to use the top row of numbers (num pad did not work), so it kinda forced me to put both hands on keyboard. Of course I'm just picking details since the time is limited.

Loved the idea of the game, just requires some balancing :)

ryanjavanshir 2018-08-18 17:11

Cool game! Liked the graphics and UI, though seemed to be quite overwhelming at the start. Great work for just 48 hours.

bloc97 2018-08-18 17:17

Nice and refreshing game but the controls were way too overwhelming, I feel this game would be better as a coop game where one person controls the people and the doors and another person controls the elevator floors.

GoingUp.png *Where did the virtue of patience go?*

madbeagle 2018-08-18 17:22

Agree with the comments about the controls, it's actually much easier just controlling using the mouse (or touch on mobile). As ever there was no time left for a proper tutorial.

madbeagle 2018-08-18 17:51

@bloc97 Not a bad score though, my best is 2,616 and that was on the Android version

yojammerjammer 2018-08-19 03:16

Trickier than it looks.

levidsmith 2018-08-20 01:44

I like the unique concept. Seems like the game has a little too much micro management. I wish the people automatically got on when the elevator reached their floor. Sometimes it seemed like the doors didn't automatically close either, so I just started mashing the close door button. I think it would also be nice if the camera automatically followed the elevator instead of having to manually select the floor level. I still think it's a really cool concept and would be lots of fun to play if the minor issues are fleshed out.

madbeagle 2018-08-20 08:56

@levidsmith thought about having the passengers get on automatically, but then they might get in a lift you intended for other passengers.

The doors close automatically after 6 seconds. You can leave a programmed lift to it, but if time is tight you can close the doors manually.

I tried the camera following the lift. It nearly made me sick and have to stop development, there was no elegant way to cycle floors in and out of view as the lift moved!

paulo-augusto 2018-08-23 21:01

i love this gameplay... awesome man

candlesan 2018-08-24 05:44

I thought the core gameplay idea had a lot of merit. I really loved the theme and I liked where it was going. I wanted to be making decisions about how to optimize the paths of my lifts but I found myself fighting the UI too much to really enjoy that part of the game and found myself instead micro-managing the elevators to a detail level that was a bit too granular to my taste. I think people being on multiple floors with them having different target destinations made it really hard to visualize where everybody was trying to go.

Would really love to see this concept refined and polished. The idea is fantastic just the gameplay and UI need to be refined.

zinski 2018-08-25 15:30

Really nice this game about elevator management! It took me a while to figure out how to play but I found it rather fun and nervous pretty quickly! I think some indications and feedbacks would make this game even better! Great job! :)

By the way please feel free to leave us some feedbacks on our game!

bradur 2018-09-01 15:16

The game looks and sounds very nice, and everything works. It's just so darn hard! Could have used a more gradual build up where we start with a small building with just one elevator and a couple of floors.