FoonLudum Dare ExplorerLD44 → LIFEBLASTER

LIFEBLASTER

By gwinnell

View on ldjam.com

CategoryRankScoreCount
Overall793.7634
Fun453.8134
Innovation3382.8434
Theme1663.5434
Graphics993.8435
Audio463.7532
Humor2072.8332
Mood1483.4032

Comments

onnofal 2019-04-29 15:46

Cool custom engine! Character control feels natural and you get immediately into action. Music rocks. The rest gets repetitive but still pile of good job well done. Has some spirit

onnofal 2019-04-29 15:47

Also being fan of vignette implemented this way, maybe it is common practice in pixel arts but I would definitely not come up with this idea

fm-studio 2019-04-29 15:48

So nice game! Loved the speed of the action and the music fit perfectly. Great job.

silvervalegames 2019-04-29 21:23

Very well polished. The music, visuals, sound effects all flowed together very well. Good job!

sheepolution 2019-04-29 21:49

Fun little shooter. Really interesting how you need to keep a good balancing between shooting and collecting, and making sure you don't shoot yourself to death. Good job!

jharler 2019-04-30 12:26

Kudos for using your own custom engine. I've done so myself in past LDs, so I know the frustration that can come from that. I really enjoyed this game. The art was well done and the audio fit the game. Mouse sensitivity was a bit high which made control difficult and I didn't notice any indicator telling me an enemy was close by. I died a lot not knowing what actually hit me. I also don't know if it's possible, but having the game resize with the browser would be a nice feature to offer. I have a 4k monitor and the game was very tiny. Overall, well done!

gwinnell 2019-04-30 14:01

@jharler Thank you very much for the feedback!

* My previous Ludum Dare entries have been the same engine, but this is the first 3d game in it. Believe me, I spent way too long just getting the sprites to face the player/camera! ... and getting the 2d ortho overlay to switch correctly... and... well the list goes on! :laughing: * Sorry about the mouse sensitivity! I developed everything with laptop/trackpad. I'll see if I can research what values are more 'standard' in the post-ld version. Rotate is still available on arrow keys from debug but that's not helpful if shoot is still on mouse. :sweat_smile: * I would have loved to indicate enemy 'closeness' better. I guess turning around a lot with that high sensitivity mouse would work as a strategy. Otherwise there's a sound that plays on enemy spawn, but again it's not 3d sound so not the best. Maybe the enemy getting close to you, stopping, and then 'punching' on a delay would have worked better than simple, immediate x/z circle collisions. With experience gained and engine features from this entry, I'll have more time for gameplay next time! * The macOS version stretches to the fullscreen, that's a bug with my Emscripten export. I will fix as soon as I can. :slight_smile:

stev0o 2019-05-01 14:02

I liked the art of the zombies. Very fun.

lubaka 2019-05-01 14:06

This really had a Doom vibe. Its also very impressive that you did this all in a custom engine!

I could only suggest lowering the sensitivity or having an option for a slider but apart from that its a very well done game!

ougrouk 2019-05-01 14:07

So arcadyyyy, I love it. I love how the characters kinda slip like in iceskating, makes the game even more skillfull to play.

The sound is tip top.

Great submission

cozmic 2019-05-01 14:10

That's a fun game! Graphics and sound are a great composition in my eyes, and the collection aspect adds a lot to the classic shooter style!

schizoid2k 2019-05-01 14:11

Very well done... nice graphics, smooth movement. Impressive that you used your own engine! Had a nice retro "Doom" feel to it, which I enjoyed.

dk5000p 2019-05-01 14:21

The zombies were cute and the game fit the theme and played well. It was nice balancing between shooting and picking up the bullets.

toasteater 2019-05-01 14:28

That's a very catchy soundtrack! I enjoy the visuals, too. Pretty solid entry overall. Well done!

Also, your own engine? That's cool.

saering 2019-05-01 15:53

Congrats for using your own game engine. I feel safe using Unity and I think I could not challenge myself to build my own engine, and use it for a game jam in addition! I like the game, it's neat, funny to play (though french keyboards are not supported, but I'm not blaming you for that xD), the audio is great!

However I don't really feel the theme in your game, it just seems like a normal shooting game, is there something I missed ?

gaming-night 2019-05-01 15:53

Nice entry here, wish you managed to let the player use the arrows, playing wasd with azerty keyboard is hard :) btw I really enjoyed the music and the pixel style !

gwinnell 2019-05-01 16:00

@saering I've been making & using the engine for the best part of 8 years now, but only very recently been making it work in 3d. The bullets you shoot to revive the zombies are also your health! You have to go pick them up after hitting the enemies or you'll die a lot quicker. @gaming-night Ahh, I'm going to patch in controller support soon if that's any good? :slight_smile:

trozen 2019-05-01 16:02

Fun fast paced game that I had a good time playing!

Things I liked: * A well executed 3D game with cool billboarded 2d elements! It reminded me of Doom! * The high-tempo music was awesome and was an excellent fit for the gameplay. * The minimal art style was great, the particles bouncing on the floor looked neat, and I liked the color palette you chose.

Thengs I would have changed: * The player controls felt very "slidey" like I was running around on ice. It made it hard to play when it got harder. * The shooting enemy hit really hard and killed me a bunch. * Using health as ammo was a bit of a boring way to incorporate the theme.

Great job!

klianc09 2019-05-01 17:43

That music is really pumpin'! I found the controls a bit too slippery, but I got used to it. Instead of aiming I just kept strafing until the crosshair was over the enemy. Also I'm not sure if enemy projectiles are supposed to turn into ammo/health, because if you keep the red enemies around for a bit, you have more than plenty of ammo/health to never die again. Overall a successful step into the 3rd dimension :P

gwinnell 2019-05-01 21:53

@trozen I totally agree with you on all of that! A few other people have mentioned the slipperiness too. I've made it less slippery now in a new post-compo version. :ice_skate: :tada: @klianc09 Thanks! Yeah, the red 'bullets' turn into health too, I kept that in intentionally so you could recover being hit from enemies. I should probably have capped that player health value though! :slight_smile:

raphael-maia 2019-05-02 13:22

Great game and great art.

supergamersgames 2019-05-02 13:24

Pretty much, floors are slippery and the sensitivity is needs to be able to be changed. But I loved the concept! Keep at it!

gludo 2019-05-02 13:31

Cool game ! sensitivity is a bit hard (I tried the compo version)

majadroid 2019-05-02 13:33

Great game, great music!

hugzfnr 2019-05-02 13:34

hey there, wanted you to know that the gamejolt web version doesn't seem to work on Firefox, I do not know a fix tho x)

gwinnell 2019-05-02 13:41

@hugzfnr Dang - my Firefox version seems to run it OK. :slight_frown: Is that the compo or post-compo version? Does it otherwise work in Chrome or another browser for you?

hugzfnr 2019-05-02 13:59

Both give me the gamejolt background grey screen + the dark bar with "minimize" and "close buttons" at the top of the page for a long period of time and don't seem to be loading anything. But it works on Chrome, I've just setup an english keyboard to try it :)

hugzfnr 2019-05-02 14:11

After having saved 85 lives here are my feels that are similar to the others above : fun, great music, feeling a bit slippery. The mini map is really helping but is hard to use as it lacks an orientation indicator + it is quite small and out of the screen (but hey can't put it elsewhere). Maybe having some FX on being eaten + where a zombie gets close would help that. Also, I think an acceleration on the zombie's spawn could be a first easy step for more replayability. Cheers :)

pixelsplash 2019-05-02 14:36

Man, wow... your own engine, I learnt a little about that after a CG course and it is no joke. Loved the theme interpretation, the art and the feel/ overall mood, it was a little weird that the camera rotates only horizontally haha. Keep that cool programming going!!! Cheers!

borys 2019-05-02 14:40

Really cool, I love this type of games, one of my favourite! Gameplay is really smooth and audio with graphics suit very well. Movement is kinda too slippery, but I played the compo version. Good job overall!

chompdev 2019-05-03 01:07

This is a really enjoyable, bite-size shooter. Fun graphics, engaging music and gameplay, and no frills. I love it!

fenderbate 2019-05-03 07:46

The idea is a bit basic, but the execution is awesome! :smile: and to think that you used a custom C++ engine... very nice game :thumbsup:

deathbysnail 2019-05-05 22:54

Nice job!