Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → LD44 → Watt Balance
By coda-highland and Obsequious Phosphorus
| Category | Rank | Score | Count | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Overall | 767 | 3.21 | 25 | |
| Fun | 837 | 2.95 | 25 | |
| Innovation | 882 | 2.76 | 25 | |
| Theme | 521 | 3.39 | 25 | |
| Graphics | 758 | 3.18 | 26 | |
| Audio | 299 | 3.47 | 26 | |
| Humor | 907 | 2.00 | 21 | |
| Mood | 588 | 3.27 | 24 |
Overall, this is a solid game.
Here a some of my thoughts: - It's hard to navigate. I played it for about 15 minutes and only managed to find two power stations. Maybe a minimap or some kind of objective indicator would help. - The environment seems large but feels somewhat empty. - Sitting around and waiting for the batteries to recharges isn't fun. There should be a proactive way to recharge. - The sounds and music were really good.
@noodlemaster Thanks for the feedback. :) I completely agree with all of your points, and it's mostly because I ran out of time. This was a really ambitious project and I bit off more than I could chew. I'm working on a post-jam version that will really flesh the game out.
I'll point out that while the extra batteries are randomly placed, the power stations are always in the same place every game. Should help with replays, though of course there's not much reason to want to replay in this state.
Added a web build!
If the WebGL build has memory problems, you can also try the postjam version:
http://xmpps.greenmaw.com/~coda/stuff/WattBalance-postjam/
I only noticed the issue after I started working on a post-jam graphical update, so there's a lot more to the postjam version than just the fix.
Movement felt really neat, I liked being able to fly.
**Don't forget to play and rate other games - you'll get your 20 ratings a lot faster that way**
Nice to be able to fly in a 2D platformer. Something new and refreshing. Good job!
Pretty good game ^^ I liked the mechanics of the recharge. The game got quite frustrating after a few attempts because I was dying in the caverns D: The idea and system are great but the game feels maybe a bit too long because there is not much to explore. The world is gigantic but it is just empty and filled with the same enemy over and over. Some variety or a smaller world would have been maybe better ^^ I really liked the enemies from metroid and also kind of the style of the world. Also the controls felt nice. Graphics and Audio were pretty nice even though I maybe would have liked more different environments. Just another color doesn't make it more interesting :c To sum it up: Some variety really would have been nice but it's a really solid prototype. If you make your zones a bit more vivid and add more enemies it can easily become a great game. And if you are really interested in making it a metroidvania you can add "doors" and upgrades. You even have a great foundation for that kind of system. Great game ^^
You have a really solid foundation there! All points on what to improve have already been made in the first comment.
I really liked the movement. It felt really fluid and responsive. Music and sound are fitting. The graphics are super simple, but somehow still pretty charming. With a bit more going on I can totally see this as a pretty cool world you build there. The premise is quite cool, too.
So yeah, maybe the project was a bit ambitious, but one can see the direction you were going for and that's a good one, so still a good job :)
@drskort If you want to see more vivid zones, check out the post-jam build. Variety was planned but I ran out of time; I have several powerup ideas and at least two more enemy types i wanted to include.
Hey, clever entry here :) Liked the music a lot :) Sound effects were a bit too loud but htat's a detail.
Gameplaywise, the main mechanic was pretty neat, original and interesting. But, at the same time, having to wait to recharge was a bit boring. Don't get me wrong, it was nice to go with the lore, but in the actual gameplay that's dead time. (I'm actually writting this comment while my robot is charging haha)
I super liked the level design. It's **amazing** to see that much content for a jam entry. That's maybe too much actually. Maybe you could have reduced the scope of the levels and added more features like ennemies, powerups, environement mechanics and such.
The levels were a bit Nintendo inspired I felt and worked very effectively (batteries not far from power stations, several more ennemies meaning there's something around).
Having to loose batteries to progress in the game was also a very clever idea, in my opinion.
Oh and unfortunately, one time I clipped into a floor while coming down from above and it made me die (I had like two more batteries full). :/
Don't forget to rate and leave feedback on other games to get yours to be more reviewed too. If you get 20 people to rate your game you will score to be in the final ranking list.
Yes, folks, I know about rating other games to get eyes on mine. I've been doing that too. >.>;
@pl4typus The recharge mechanic was a last-minute hack to give you SOME way to actually finish the game. I had meant for it to be more active, with defeated enemies dropping partial power cells that let you quickly recharge.
When you clipped through the ground, had you been falling from a distance? That's the only case I can think of where you can get enough velocity to confuse the hitbox detection. I need to slow down the terminal velocity, I guess.
The world is procedurally-generated, so it actually only requires tweaking a couple lines of code to change how big the world is. Making it smaller wouldn't have given me any more time to work on powerups, or I WOULD have.
Overall, I really appreciate the feedback!
@coda-highland hey, yup it was the case. Not from the actual ceiling but a bit of velocity yeah. However I was surprised because it wasn't from very very far away. But anyway, must have been enough to confuse the hitbox detection.
Ok I see for the procedural génération. Now that you've said it it becomes more obvious. Great job for having it be so nicely done then.
I loved it! Yes, the recharge felt slow and it would really benefit from a map, but it's still an amazing game, especially for such a short development time! I was only able to find one extra battery and one power station, but I absolutely plan on coming back when I have more time, especially if you've got an updated version. The art style is delightful, I especially love the way the enemies look when they go around corners. And the background music fits the atmosphere so well! I'm also very impressed by the movement, it just feels right in a way that's hard to describe and to achieve. Fantastic job all around!
@acearcher There's a map in the postjam version, linked in the comments thread. There are more batteries in the postjam version too because I was working on adding some more powerup types and needed places to put them.
I'm really glad you like the corner animation. That took a lot of work to get right. Honestly I should have probably hacked up something to work around the problem instead of taking the time to fix it, that was like three hours of debugging when I could have spent that time adding another enemy type.
I liked the music a lot and also the looks of the game where quite nice. However, I was not able to find something to reload my batteries.
Maybe some directions or something similar would be helpful. (as already stated by others.)
Overall, I liked the game, especially the possibility to fly, but I would also have liked some way to destroy the enemies.
It is a really cool game and I like it. The idea is amazing, and the execution is pretty good but there are not realy any instrictions and that frustrates me.
I like the exploration driven gameplay. There's something satisfying about just navigating environments and finding stuff. The audio and particularly music were really great!
I did feel like it was frustrating to find a powercell and then have to back track to recharge.
The robot is so cute!
Nice game, the movement felt really good and I see quite the potential for a cool exploration based game, but the screens are just really big and I got lost quickly, maybe a minimap or some landmarks could help with that. The audio is pretty damn good!