FoonLudum Dare ExplorerLD47 → Loopy Orbits

Loopy Orbits

By ziamor

View on ldjam.com

CategoryRankScoreCount
Overall264.3162
Fun484.1762
Innovation244.3362
Theme404.4062
Graphics1954.2562
Audio1294.0260
Mood494.3160

Comments

eckkert 2020-10-05 22:57

This is very creative. I soon noticed that the orbits weren't geodesics , what's the math behind them? It kind of reminds me of Bezier curves. I liked variety in the planets, were they procedural?

ziamor 2020-10-05 23:05

@eckkert I intended to make accurate-ish, but for a proof of concept I decided I can keep it simple and all I do is go over every planet and get the direction of the planet relative to the ship and apply a fixed force value towards that direction. I sum up all those vectors and apply it to the ships velocity. I kind of forgot to go back and make it correct haha, I lost an entire day from a scrapped idea and got excited after my proof of concept worked that it skipped my mind.

cax 2020-10-06 00:41

Wow aren't you mathematician cuz this is very hard to implement, very cool idea and design)

raviolivs 2020-10-06 01:11

Beautiful graphics and a wonderfully executed concept. Difficult, but somehow relaxing.

bicheste 2020-10-06 01:34

Amazing, what else can I say? Everyone should give it a try.

dmac 2020-10-06 01:35

Representing 3D orbits in 2D with color gradients to indicate them.. very cool stuff. I dig the chill vibe and ambient music.

avatargreggles 2020-10-06 01:36

I absolutely love this!!!! Amazing job! It's really unique! You should be proud :)

simex 2020-10-06 01:41

this is the type of simple browser game I just love, if I were to give any feed back it's to make it a bit more intuitive how the planets affects the orbit (you know just simple, explain orbital dynamics in a way even a simpleton like me can understand! :D) lovely little game great job!

baconeta 2020-10-06 01:42

This may be one of the most exciting simple ludum dare games I've ever played. Nice work!

matt-swieboda 2020-10-06 01:50

stunning. I love the idea, very smooth and well polished. I agree with DMac genius way of denoting the trajectory with gradients.

freddyturbina 2020-10-06 01:59

wow! i love it, i think calculating the orbit was a bit hard.. but everything else is perfect

gilazarini 2020-10-06 01:59

I LOVED this game, the relaxing music and sfx and the mechanics are amazing!

Great use of the theme.

stefan-laimer 2020-10-06 01:59

This might be my favorite Ludum Dare game ever. I love making games with gravity but I never thought of steering a spaceship by moving the planets. This is so amazing!.

I don't even know what's more fun. Moving the planets around in a way that causes the rocket to just zoom across the screen or carefully trying to get a stable orbit.

The music is also very chill and fits perfectly to the game.

The comets can be a bit annoying but otherwise it would probably be too easy. Is their orbit also affected by the planets? Also do the planets all have the same gravitational force or is it different from planet to planet?

Once again I can't tell you enough how amazing this game is. Thank you so much for making it!

laorixu 2020-10-06 01:59

Great game, very innovative and smooth!

thebooksnail 2020-10-06 02:03

Those asteroids are out to get me! As everyone else said, great relaxing game. Superb music.

smiley 2020-10-06 02:14

Great idea of the theme! Music is very simple but relaxing and adding a nice touch to the atmosphere of the game all I'm missing is for a bit bass in the music.

nardandas 2020-10-06 02:20

Absolutely amazing game, I was hooked. Beat it all! Only criticism I have is the way the meteors felt kind of random.

comari 2020-10-06 02:32

Great game! This is very unique. So far I have seen a couple games that use gravity around planets, but so far this is the most fun implementation of the mechanic. Simple, but good visual and great sound. Thanks for sharing.

cameron-dunlap 2020-10-06 02:37

Very big fan of the concept, and the introduction of multiple planets adds a bit of complexity and urgency to the game. Asteroids feel less invasive, but I think that's good for the current balance of the game. Graphics are the best part of this game, it LOOKS like fun and the concept and execution does the look justice. Simple and great, you did well with this one.

ziamor 2020-10-06 13:38

@stefan-laimer Glad you liked it! Yea all the planets have the same pull, and the pull is the same regardless of the distance, so not exactly accurate orbital mechanics haha. The comets do use the same forces as the ship and in retrospect that's probably why collisions are so common even though I made the comets pretty small as they get attracted to the same spots as the ship LOL

solmir2000 2020-10-06 15:57

very nice game, the concept is good and well executed. great music.

auxc 2020-10-06 22:27

Polished game made around an intriguing mechanic. Great job!

kurt-roembke 2020-10-06 22:39

I think that the vibe of this game carried me quite a ways. Even when I couldn't quite figure out how the orbit was effected by the planet positions, I still felt interested in poking around. Nice music, sound, and art. Great vibes.

no-grapes-games 2020-10-06 23:42

A puzzle game about juggling constraints in a chaotic system ~ I love it. This game is seriously fun. It has good atmosphere, interesting mechanics, and it's also challenging without being unfair.

Fantastic job!

flying-basement-studios 2020-10-07 14:45

Very nice puzzle game! It is fun to play with physics and it is very well polished. Good Job!

thegamerasd 2020-10-07 15:46

Great game! I love the soundtrack, and the color gradient on the line makes for an intuitive and fun game!

caberu 2020-10-07 15:53

Nice concept! The asteroids are very hard to dodge because they move a bit fast but I really enjoyed playing your game!

karin-g 2020-10-07 16:06

It was an interesting concept, good job :D

animaster 2020-10-07 16:07

Really nice little game. Good job!

sam-minh 2020-10-07 16:07

This is an absolute gem. This concept of moving your 'character' around towards a goal is really different and fun to control. Moving the palnets around and seeing the new trajectory is really cool!

pschichtel 2020-10-07 16:25

The idea of controlling a spaceship by manipulating the gravity field crossed my mind as well initially. This game kinda feels like the inverse of our game. We went for the hybrid of physics simulation and keplers equation, but that [cost us a large chunk of time](https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/47/legendary-orbit-golf/legendary-orbit-golf-lessons-learned) and you see that in all the rough edges.

anyway onto your game:

The motion of the ship felt kinda odd, but I'm also very used to our game and you are aware of the issue. other than that a very relaxing little game. Visuals and acoustics are nice and work great together. It feels very polished.

gurpegui 2020-10-07 16:33

I really enjoyed the game! It's a cool take on the theme, congrats!

tamail 2020-10-07 18:13

Ohhh, this game is sooo good! I loved that you control the ship by moving the planets in such a clever way! The sound in combination with the graphics and gameplay created such a chill game to enjoy. Really nice work!

sirkovitch 2020-10-08 18:08

Really loved the idea, and I think it is well executed ! I also found it really relaxing to play with its beautiful music and visuals.

guimoliveira 2020-10-08 18:30

Very nice idea. I got to the end :)

tudvari 2020-10-08 18:42

At first I was thinking about a similar game because I love cosmology... This game is so good, so relaxing, yet so challenging :)

Congratulations!

jeff0029 2020-10-08 20:37

Soothing and good game mechanics :) I found that in the last 3 levels it made sense to space out 4 planets out of the screen and control with one planet. But nothing a quick bounds limitation could fix ;P Concept is creative and well executed!

kromeboy 2020-10-17 16:33

Great game, and also one of the best simulation of lagrangian points that I ever seen.

Good Job!

omarmobadr 2020-10-17 21:55

very great idea and you executed it very well with those amazing pixel arts

hawkin 2020-10-28 00:49

Missed your entry in the rating period, but I'm pleased that we arrived at similar moods :) I really like the competing objectives you have: gotta get the paths just right, but don't let the rocket hit the planets. It makes for a frenetic challenge. But the ambiance is still chill. Great job, and congrats on the results!