adrien-dittrick 2019-05-01 15:54
Buying humans is fun and exciting!
Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → LD44 → Slavers Market
By ranzor and thatsommes
| Category | Rank | Score | Count | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Overall | 803 | 3.17 | 22 | |
| Fun | 940 | 2.80 | 22 | |
| Innovation | 457 | 3.22 | 22 | |
| Theme | 297 | 3.67 | 22 | |
| Graphics | 524 | 3.57 | 22 | |
| Audio | 534 | 3.00 | 22 | |
| Humor | 479 | 2.94 | 21 | |
| Mood | 645 | 3.21 | 21 |
Buying humans is fun and exciting!
Interesting take on the theme. If you just focus on the mechanics there's a cool micromanagement game where your goal is to maximise profits, but in this case let's not forget we're dealing with human beings (well, pixelated representations of them, but still...). It had me thinking for a while.
Back to the game, I liked the graphics, but the trends and training effects weren't clear all the time, it was hard to spot the actual impact your choices had beyond the +1/-1 occasional feedback (I did like the training icons that showed up). For example, I wasn't sure if the "AGE" worked on direct or inverse relation, so most of the time I wasn't sure about which was the optimal choice.
Music was catchy, it sticks in your head after you've closed the game.
Good job!
I liked the graphics and the roman slave setting is always cool. Reminded me a bit of the game "domina", which is awesome. I wasn't really sure how time would pass, if it was just real time or time i visited the market. There could also be a bit morde differentiation on the 3 attributes, they felt pretty similar.
Good job finishing, i know how stressing it can be if you run out of time!
I don't see more and more money as the game progresses. Seems like the price ranges are always the same so you'd have to buy and sell a lot of slaves just to get anywhere.
Interesting interpretation of the theme. Really like that you can name your slave. The gameplay is very simple but enjoyable, the only thing I would like to see is a timer that shows how long the training of the slaves is going to take.
Interesting approach to the theme indeed. Sadly I couldn't really test your game as I couldn't go back to the market from "Home". The button "Market" didn't do anything. I tried using Chrome and Brave, same issue on both.
@oune That's weird and annoying... I've tested it on 4 different computers using several diffenrent browsers and am unable to recreate an issue with the button. Did the button highlight when you hovered above it?
@ithildin The market trends and training system were the next things we would have worked on given time enough to even playtest it ;-) Could probably have explained the age system in the description though. The ideal age for a slave is 25 yo, when the market favors age, they care less if the slave is older or younger than 25. If the market disfavor age, the further away a slave is from 25, the less they are worth.
@sky909 Thank you! An unowned slave has no name! Could have had something like a progress bar for training. But the more slaves you get the less you care about how long individual slave take to train ;-)
@bar Yeah.. Didn't have time to playtest. The value of the slaves should have been calculated as owned property in your total amount. And slaves should have increased more in value based on stat increases and market trends.
@rongo-matane Thank you! We actually have 6-7 stats, but didn't have time to implement them properly. But they are counted when setting the value for the slaves ;-) It is real-time, but that should probably be mentioned and visible in-game.
@adrien-dittrick Humans are the best merch!!
That's a pretty good concept you got there, but it felt really slow to progress :( I did felt guilty buying those slaves and naming them AAA, ABC, AZE & so, so I guess the mood was pretty good! Kudos to the graphics as well, nice style :)
@thatsommes Unfortunately, it did not. I don't know if it is related but the same happens with the "Options" button on the main menu.
@oune Yeah.. didn't have time to add the options menu, so that's not supposed to work ;-)
@nonimad Thank you! Yes it's insanely slow... didn't have time to play test :laughing:
interesting little game, needs some work on agraphics and UI, maybe some progressbars for training
I feel dirty about myself, but ... I definitely geeked out cost-to-value ratios here. "Come on dude, you're only 24, more strength training for you!"
Cool take on the theme! The art and music worked really well to sell the setting. I think the game just need a few critical quality of life features; i.e. showing the profit/loss for the slaves you own (depending on the current trend) and showing when a new trend has come in. I also think the goal is too hard (is that 1 million?!). I played for 10 minutes but after selling most of my slave I only had 20k (I hope it's not cause I was bad at the game). It would have taken me more than 8 hours to finish the game haha.
Good job overall!
@zchen Thank you for the praise! And thank you for the ideas! :heart: Yeah the goal is 1 million... It's actually taken from historical social structures. Problem is that we didn't have time to play test and tweak the value system :laughing:
@zchen Thank you for trying our game! :smile:
Okay, I've been playing for a few of hours, and I'm still only a tenth of the way to the goal, but I'm going to rate it now anyway.
Slavery really is the first idea that comes from "your life is currency", but I find it interesting that in many of the games that went with the slavery topic, the player isn't the slave, but rather the slave owner, or trader.
Anyway, it's a great slave trading simulator, and I love the mechanic of being able to train the slaves' stats. It adds a layer of strategy to an otherwise rng driven game. Two things I amn't sure of is how the aging system worked; when do slaves age, and the HP system; is it affected by training?
Edit: Also, I think that the hidden data age and hp should be somehow reflected by the characters at the market.
Interesting idea. XD
However, there is a shortage of tutorials at the very beginning, which would explain the rules of the game and what different icons, numbers and symbols mean. Perhaps it would be nice to add a visual display of the remaining time until the end of the workout and the change of trends.
And do not force me to enter the name of a slave, let it generate itself. XD