Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → LD45 → No Control
By mosaic
| Category | Rank | Score | Count | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Overall | 226 | 3.47 | 22 | |
| Fun | 250 | 3.22 | 22 | |
| Innovation | 34 | 4.05 | 22 | |
| Theme | 64 | 4.02 | 22 | |
| Graphics | 250 | 3.30 | 22 | |
| Audio | 262 | 2.94 | 20 | |
| Humor | 235 | 2.52 | 20 | |
| Mood | 248 | 3.15 | 21 |
The concept of writing your own movement is insane! I have no idea what half of the instructions are trying to say, but writing out the actions for the buttons was novel. Once I was able to move and turn, I was able to play for a while, though I am sure there is something more to it as I stayed in a negative score. The pickup for a break was nice, and the other pickup was a good joke. A tutorial in game would help a lot to show the options available, good job!
I think commands need to be much more easy. This level of detail kills enjoyment I think
That's a great idea! Is it just me, or turnLeft and turnRight are inverted? Nice entry!
Very good game! But some DBG-tools could help.
@toppervideogames Thanks for your feedback! A simple strategy for having a positive score I used when testing is having a button which makes you go three steps. Tutorials always were and always will be my weakness :)
@despdair I thought about only using the 'commands' (step, turnLeft, turnRight), because these are really all you need. I just added the 'essential commands' (no idea why I called the bonus commands essential) for an extra dimension, because I thought it was a bit boring with just three commands. So now its kind of similar to machine language. As I said, nobody has to use them, but you can make loops and so on (as demonstrated in the menu) with them.
**If anyone has trouble with the commands, read what I just wrote to despdair.**
@rolly ... I didn't actually check this after implementing. Just pretend you are looking from behind.
@nikita-demidov I agree and I considered it, but no time. If I ever come back to this game, this will definitly be one of the first things on my to-do list.
It's a nice idea and a pretty wild one but it's a bit hard to understand at first glance even with the tutorial written. The system could be a bit less complicated, something more like in "Baba is you" game maybe? But it's a fun and very clever entry overall, just could be a little simpler ^^
Nice interpretation of the theme, and the coding aspect lets players explore different movement schemes (but the strategies are limited). I like how the incentive to press less buttons forces the user to optimise.
The line numbers need fixing. They shouldn't be part of the same text field as the code. Put them in another not-editable text field on the side and make sure they line up correctly (with appropriate line wrap). Maybe jumping to line numbers could be removed entirely because it's not done much in practice.
And the rotations seem flipped.
The script I ended up with: ``` #A# // Slide up. turnRight step turnLeft #B# // Slide down. turnLeft step turnRight // Step forward 1, 2, 3, 4. #C# step #B# step step #D# step step step #F# step step step step ```
Possible extensions: * _Must_ fix the line numbers * Highlight parsing errors (better UX) * Allow scrolling the editor * Consider removing the warped graphics around the editor for visibility * Add functions (better than goto line) * Add API with functions for detecting obstacles -- allows users to implement more advanced tactics * Consider more traditional coding syntax and keywords. (e.g. skipping letters in symbols like `st` and `jmp` doesn't help much with developer experience)
A power-user strategy would be to implement a script with pathfinding that plays everything for them, but we don't have the API for that.
@zuf Thanks for the detailed feedback!
The script looks good. Better than mine for testing :). What was your score?
``` #A# step
#B# turnLeft
#C# step step step ``` (my testing script)
The line numbers are really annoying, I know. I nearly wasted the whole first day on them and they are not what I hoped for.
Scrolling in the editor should be supported, that's why I got these in-text-field line numbers in the first place; I just couldn't get the scrolling to work right.
YES, detecting obstacles, that was my next big goal. Unfortunatly, no time.
I used `st` and `jmp` because I thought it would make it more similar to assembly language and I honestly didn't want to programm a whole complier. You are of course right nonetheless. It would have turned out way better with functions, error highlighting, better syntax and all that good stuff.
Maybe I'll make a post-jam version when I find time and then your suggestions are definetly in there.
This was really, really cool. When I saw the prompt, I thought it would be a more direct puzzle game- something like "here's a set path you need to execute", but this caught me off guard and was pretty neat. My biggest complaint was that losing causes you to reset completely, when you really just want to iterate on the code you made last time- so I think not resetting the script every playthrough would be a nice move. The fact that you added things well beyond the basic movement was also really cool, but I think difficult to convey to people unfamiliar with this level of coding. Perhaps a series of levels that show you how they can be used would be beneficial? Although, then we're probably getting into the memorization puzzle thing I mentioned before.
The presentation was also really clean looking, although it was a bit unclear at first. I couldn't figure out how to start the game, and when I first saw the button correspondence I tried to hit buttons on my keyboard rather than the onscreen ones, something that I think a little bit of walkthrough would also have made clear.
Still, for a compo game? This is hella cool. Awesome work!
Thank you for not using semi-colons
@selkkie Thanks! I always have problems with people not immediately understanding my game :). There is something to watch out for next time.
I actually considered having the button functionality linked with the keyboard, but then I was too lazy :P
Happy you liked it.
@envy-softworks No problem;
I love that kind of games which let you write your own command lines or codes. Also graphics looks really cool, especially that blur effects.
Well, turns out i had a solution quite similar to @zuf in the end, just with a +1 Step button and a +5 step button. All in all, just assigning basic control logic yourself does fit the theme. Maybe you can turn this concept into a full game, possibly with a simpler user interface (like link buttons to controllable things and pick actions).
Good job.
@mosaic Not sure of the exact score, but it was over 300. The important things are to have an easy way to get out of the way to avoid obstacles (like the sliding) and to able to step forward multiple times (so your net score breaks even).