FoonLudum Dare ExplorerLD51 → Life is Fleeting

Life is Fleeting

By sarah-alexa

View on ldjam.com

CategoryRankScoreCount
Overall3153.2544
Fun2673.2644
Innovation3323.0744
Theme2263.6144
Graphics3043.2544
Audio2932.9244
Humor2072.7439
Mood2463.2141

Comments

minidavid 2022-10-02 23:37

fun

sarah-alexa 2022-10-02 23:44

Thank you!!

madeofst 2022-10-03 11:41

Pretty intense! Very impressive to get all those mechanics in there in such a short time. Before playing I couldn't imagine how this would work but I thought the 1-button approach was a smart way of doing it. The fact that you kinda ice-skate around was sort of equal parts frustrating and fun! I'm also not sure my relationship with Robin was the most healthy as I just disappear for weeks, then pop up with a gift and immediately skate off. Great work!

sarah-alexa 2022-10-03 19:27

Thank you so much! Yeah the movement is something I'd loved to have worked on more to make it more responsive because sometimes you just want to turn and you skid about. Maybe I should have added a skid effect every time you turn 😅. At first it was slow and much more manageable but then I realised you'd spend half the day just getting to a single place.

Wonder what the gifts you buy are too! They seem to do the job! 😂

I appreciate the kind words! I'm just glad to have improved on my dev skills a little!

turquoise-moon 2022-10-03 19:57

It's a fun little farming sim. I love the art style! It was a little difficult to select the tile that I wanted to interact with. Maybe selecting the tile under where the player is standing would be a bit easier? Also, what type of plant are we growing?

sarah-alexa 2022-10-03 20:33

Thank you! I did think of having the tile the player is on being the one to select but it ended up making things a little tougher to see what you were doing. Maybe next time I can add an option or make it mouse cursor and range based!

We are growing Turnip Cats! Only the best vegetables on this farm!!

m4ttu 2022-10-03 22:21

Would there be any inspiration from Robin in Stardew Valley by any chance ? It's probably one the most high-octane game I've tested so far but it was really enjoyable. Great job!!

milq 2022-10-03 23:00

Amazing art for the short time they give at Compo! I love the interaction with the characters and, although I found it a bit hard to handle the player, I'm hooked on the game! Great game!

sarah-alexa 2022-10-04 00:35

@m4ttu A friend said the same thing! It wasn't a deliberately inspired thing but the game itself was definitely going for that whole kind of feel Stardew Valley and games like it have. Maybe somewhere in the back of my head so I'll pretend I meant it! Thank you very much!

sarah-alexa 2022-10-04 00:37

@milq Thank you very much! The movement is something I'd definitely tighten up a bit if I'd had a bit more time to polish things up a bit more. Wish I'd thought to add skid marks when your character turns while I was making it!

ex3d0 2022-10-04 04:55

Definitely a neat idea! The art was pretty solid (honestly gave me strong RPG maker vibes) and the gameplay reminded me a lot of Stardew.

I found the player is a bit hard to control and selecting the tile to interact with was a little difficult but it was a really neat concept.

delpod 2022-10-04 13:38

I had fun playing it. It didn't have any danger, I knew I couldn't lose the game, it would just take me more time to do it, but the music and the fact that day resets every 10 seconds made me kinda speedrun it. The only problem I had was with selecting tiles, as it would make more sense if the selection was at the feet level. Nice game

sarah-alexa 2022-10-04 20:55

@ex3d0 Thank you. If I was working on it for longer I'd probably have gone over the art a bit more to make it all look a bit more natural and connected so things don't look so grid like. That's maybe one of my next things to practice at for tilemaps so I can throw stuff together a bit quicker!

@delpod Thank you very much for all the nice things said! Tile selection I'm just happy works tbh as it's my first time ever even approaching something like it.

I have been mulling around with the idea of making it mouse/floating cursor based with a range limit from the character to make it a bit easier and faster to select stuff so I think next time I have a go at this sort of thing, that'll be what I do. That or I might do some fancy auto selecting stuff so instead of having to move around so much, you can just mash space and it'll change to another tile.

The tile selection seems to be a common sentiment and when rushing I had the same issue! Ty for the feedback! :)

aaron-smith 2022-10-04 21:01

I shocked how you managed to get almost all of the core mechanics of a farming sim into a loop this small. Nicely done! It's so weirdly stressful until you get comfortable with letting go. It's like a nightmare about SDV or AC at first, but it turns out okay once you let go a bit.

muzakefron 2022-10-04 22:36

fun game!!! slippery controls on a grid-based game felt a little frustrating, but i rly enjoyed all the farming mechanics enough 2 make it 2 the end! great job!!

pixelydian 2022-10-04 23:25

Stardew Valley speed running! :laughing: So at first I thought the controls were a little slippery but as I played I thought, this actually fits really well with the high pace, get it DONE vibe. I like that I didn't have to put in an input to pick up objects or switch tools - with the high pace gameplay, that would have been frustrating. Pixel art is cute! And you had a good layout of the map. Very well done, and huge congrats on submitting a compo! 2022-10-04 18_18_51-Life is Fleeting by Sarah.png

vidarn 2022-10-05 10:58

This was wild! I love how the game is very chill and extremely hectic at the same time :laughing: I liked the colorful graphics and all the little details, like how the plants animate when you walk across them, or the screenshake when you forget to bring the watering can :sweat_smile:

Also, I think the music fit very well. It was groovy but energetic.

I didn't mind the lack of collisions. For some reason, I found myself avoiding the buildings and fences even though I guess you could technically walk through them.

waterfowler 2022-10-05 16:02

This is fantastic! The mechanics are great, everything works perfectly well (the slippery mechanics might feel a bit unpolished but I though they were quite fun), and Robin is life goals! The artworks is cute and the music, while kinda short and a bit repetitive after a while, still sounds great and fits the mood very well. Really enjoyed this!

quoclon 2022-10-06 05:08

I'm surprised at how much time I sank into this. It took me a minute to understand where all the tools an resources are, and how to farm, but once I got the hang of it I felt like Bill Murry in groundhog day. Honestly, what kept me going was was desire to win Robin's affection. Having Robin in the game really gave me that goal!

sarah-alexa 2022-10-06 15:33

@aaron-smith @muzakefron @pixelydian @vidarn @waterfowler @quoclon

Thank you all so much for your fe3edback! By far the most and the best feedback I've ever received for any game I've made! It's all very encouraging and has made my week!

All great criticisms too and stuff I'll hopefully manage to start nailing down faster in future projects! Thank you again!

juanrod707 2022-10-06 20:20

Wow you got so much stuff done for the game is amazing. The game itself it feels like stardew valley on roller skates, its challenging but fun. Nice work.

cyberfrank 2022-10-06 20:25

It was a lot of fun! There wasn't any sense of danger or other consequences with the 10 second mechanic other than walking a bit more each time. A counter to this could be that you need to deliver your harvest before a given day. But everything felt clear and nice, including what the final goal was. One thing I missed was the final physical action of selling your harvest instead of it happening automatically. Also, perhaps some simple sound effects for when you are planting/selling/watering etc. to make it feel more tactile. Good entry!

flying-dog-fish 2022-10-06 20:27

Pretty farming game! The controls are a bit awkward though, it's really hard to position in the right spot for tool use.

exaggegen 2022-10-06 20:41

It's good that the number of days is added as a kind of record that can be beaten. It really increases the interest when you realize you already have ideas for developing strategies to win faster than just growing a coin garden. Sliding seems uncomfortable, but it just forces you to try to react faster in order to plant more seeds.

sarah-alexa 2022-10-06 20:46

@juanrod707 Roller skates... I should have given the character roller skates! Thank you so much!

@cyberfrank Tbh that's entirely by design. I felt like having a lose state on a game like this would be a bit frustrating. I was thinking about making it so the relationship status decays every few days if you don't give another gift in time but I didn't have quite enough time at the end to add and see if it was a good fit. Selling the harvest was actually planned too but with the lack of time I wasn't too sure if that would be a step too many. Sound effects I just didn't have time for.

Great feedback and all very fair. Thank you for the very thoughtful comment! All stuff I think I'd throw in there if I had another day on it!

@flying-dog-fish Yeah it's a bit more frantic as is. The best way for framing is grab tools and tap away at that space bar like crazy row by row to get it all done in time. Thank you for playing!!

@exaggegen That was my hope. 3 stats you can use to try and beat your own scores!

excy 2022-10-06 21:39

Man it's really impressive how much you got done for the compo, great work.

sarah-alexa 2022-10-06 21:43

@excy Thank you! I will say though it's absolutely crazy what you and Cral achieved with your game!

arkinrev 2022-10-07 01:34

So I was jamming along to the music, speed-running my Stardew farm, and then I realized, I should have been buying gifts! Went shopping, and showered Robin with gifts. She liked it. Good work!

msplanlos 2022-10-07 12:10

Cute graphics and fun gameplay! (:

lisyarus 2022-10-07 12:13

Nice game idea! Found the controls a bit too slippery, hard to precisely aim at the farm, so I ended up just running around the farm and spamming spacebar :) Would be nice to have some visual effect when a new day starts, otherwise this instant teleportation looks a bit confusing.

2022-10-07-151201_894x542_scrot.png

lesinvisible 2022-10-07 17:48

Very impressive scoup for the compo game! I really liked the frantic gameplay and overall presentation. The only issue, as was mentioned previously, controls are slippery.

vipbasil 2022-10-07 20:14

A hardcore startdewwaley in a roguelike lite janra, interesting approach. 10 s is to short, but the mechanics a quite interesting.

shibaya 2022-10-07 20:40

Love those Stardew Valley vibes! Great game!

jimbly 2022-10-07 22:16

Fun vibes! I managed to accomplish my life's goal. You definitely succeeded in taking something relaxing and making it more frantic =). Would have liked a little more feedback on actions. Quite liked the visual style.

dis0rder 2022-10-08 21:17

Oh, wow... I think I might've eaten some seeds I shouldn't have! :cyclone: :small_red_triangle: :small_blue_diamond: :star: :snowflake: :large_orange_diamond:

farmmbbb.png

Don't know whether it's my browser to blame (I run Firefox 105.0 on a Ubuntu-machine) or some weird chaos magick going on...

But something is up! :sweat_smile: I think even the collision-elements were broken since I could walk through the buildings, but couldn't enter. (Either that or I was actually moving around in my astral body!)

At least I was able to dig patches and plant seeds but not much beyond that. :pick: :seedling:

---

This was quite a different experience! Probably should try the desktop-build later to see if my machine would deal with that one better.

But yeah, it's already evident that you've managed to create a lot for a COMPO-game! The graphics are nice and there's already a foundation of a game established here.

Good job!

jag 2022-10-08 22:55

This was a very interesting entry. I'm amazed you accomplished all this within 2 days, that's really an achievement. I really like the Stardew Valley vibe this game has, and for me those games are usually a bit too slow, so I like this fast paced growth and relationship building. Felt almost like an action game! I think the player controller would have been better with less acceleration because at the moment it feels like sliding on ice. Also, I think it would have been nice if we didn't have to get the hoe and watering pot every single start of the day. All in all, a really great compo entry. Great job!

zioxindiedev 2022-10-10 04:36

It fits very well. I really like the concept to plant trees and gift robin! 10 seconds of Days kind of make the game harder to play but thats what makes the game fun. I would say the little details like the grass waving and many more proves that you really pulled off your effort on the game. Nice work!

sarah-alexa 2022-10-15 15:00

@dis0rder I suspect it's some of that crazy browser OS combo or something because I've never seen anything remotely like that! If those are just 2 screenshots spliced together to make it easier to view, it looks like the font just doesn't work or is swapped out on your system. Maybe some Construct 3 compatibility issues there!

Collisions to stop you walking through stuff weren't added as I just didn't have the time before the compo ended, I let that slide since the 10 second days let you focus on that stuff a wee bit less but you cannot enter buildings so no worries there!

Thank you for the nice comments and hopefully if you tried on desktop Construct 3 fonts treated you better!

poshdan 2022-10-17 10:51

I like that corporeal realm is more of a suggestion in this game. You kinda need to float through everything to get anything done within 10 seconds. That being said, I still felt like 10 seconds was just a little short for any 1 task. Perhaps targetting the tiles with the cursor would've helped, as I found i spent a bunch of time on moving into position. The amount of art in here is impressive for a compo game!

hekateras 2022-10-21 20:43

This is incredibly impressive for a Compo game. I didn't get very far, but I do enjoy the idea of "farming sim but even more hectic", and the graphics are cute. If I had to suggest a single feature that would drastically elevate playability of this while hopefully staying in scope, it would be if the game had isometric movement/movement was on a grid. I wasted far too much time simply sliding past the things I was trying to till/water/harvest and trying to target the correct tile, grid-based movement would have made that easier.