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Harvester
Harvester
By noobman64
View on ldjam.com
| Category | Rank | Score | Count |
|
|---|
| Overall | 287 | 3.03 | 30 | |
| Fun | 297 | 2.75 | 30 | |
| Innovation | 141 | 3.42 | 30 | |
| Theme | 209 | 3.48 | 30 | |
| Graphics | 331 | 2.25 | 30 | |
| Humor | 189 | 2.56 | 25 | |
| Mood | 185 | 3.19 | 28 | |
Comments
Nice to see a different approach. I got to both endings :)
The instructions might not have been too elaborate, but I got going pretty quickly - I'd say there was relatively little confusion as to what I need to do compared to other games.
The cell with the person in it got me thinking when it said the scanner can confirm there isn't a person in there but at the same time it destroys whatever is in there. I couldn't figure out how it would make sense for something like that to exist in a reality xd
@mihkelroomet Hi!Thank you for writing that comment. It always feels great to find out somone else has taken the time to play with my game. Im also flattered that you took the time to finish the game too :)
Regarding the scanner, I have an explanation that makes sense in my mind, which may or may not make sense to you. I am going to share it with you here, but feel free to come up with another explanation yourself. I'd be happy to hear what others think
The scanner was not originally designed to be used by the harvesters. Its more like a civilian self-defense tool. If the device is turned on and detects the organism nearby it automatically tries to protect its user by destroying the hostile organism (without wasting time asking the user). A more sophisticated tool intended for the job would probably just incapacitate the target or let the user decide what to do. The harvesters are using these low-quality scanners in the field because they are low on supplies and don't have any better equipment left. One of the 'secret' documents implies that the facility has trouble contacting their central office, so i don't think they can get new material in anymore.
Didn't expect am approach like this. Got stuck for a second on a second screen, it wasn't clear that you need to find a right position for sliders in every room, but in the end I got all two endings ;) Love secrets like this with a hidden story
Glad you played the game, and thanks for sticking with it despite the initial confusion!
Cool concept!
At my first try the window was too big that 1 slider went out of my screen. So I couldn't find way to activate the harvest button. XD
@xlores-liang Oh no! I'm sorry you ran into that issue. Does this happened in both full screen and windowed modes? When i test it, the game starts in windowed mode, and the window is resizable to accommodate a variety of aspect ratios (You can hover your mouse over the edge of the window and drag it to change the size). Then again i only have my own monitor to test it on so your results will vary :(
@noobman64 just windowed mode. I resized it and everything's good!
Thanks to (?) that issue, I tried hard to find everything that can interacte on the screen and reached the scanner. I have to say the real issue is I did not notice some UI even they are in the screen.
Found both endings - very interesting! Even with the lack of audio, the game had an atmosphere to it that I quite liked. The premise is very SCP which I will never complain about. Things were kept vague enough to be creepy. Good job!
simsax
2023-01-09 10:46
Definitely an unexpected use of the theme, good job with the story telling!
natiki
2023-01-09 15:33
The story was super interesting and creepy! The lack of audio really helped with the eeriness too, great job!
apg
2023-01-09 16:51
It was unclear to me what the sliders were adjusting... Were they keyed to the target's position or something?
Otherwise, neat game! Thanks for sharing!
@adam-gould I like the comparison to the SCP stories. In my head, the organization the player character works for is like "the foundation", but is also a publicly traded company obligated to maximize shareholder value.
@simsax Thank you! I was looking at all the farming games and was beginning to think I'm crazy, but when i started reviewing games i found out quite a few people went with organ harvesting, soul harvesting, etc. I might still be crazy but now i know there is dozens of us out there :P
@natiki Im so happy that you found it engaging. I'd like to claim credit in the bold move of not including any audio, but to be honest i was completely out of time, haha
@apg Thanks for leaving that message, let me tell you how the sausage was made! To be honest, its just "smoke and mirrors". Except the 0.5 at the start to familiarize the player, all the other numbers were arbitrary. The player was supposed to trial-and-error the finite possibilities and come to the correct one. It gets worse! For a while i was thinking about randomizing the correct values each time but A) i thought it would get frustrating for the player and B) i was low on time anyway.
Before you judge me too hardly (or perhaps as a cause to judge me even harsher), let me say I used to love playing with analogue radios. slowly turning those dials until a station came on, made me feel like a code breaker. I thought the players could get a similar satisfaction out of this mechanic :)
The most original entry I've seen so far. I'm impressed! That certain level was genuinely stressful, even without any sound... and the storytelling is well contained too. Always love seeing a "simple" implementation work out. Congrats! (also did go for the secret ending ;) ).
@fusionnist Wow, thanks for the kind words, they mean a lot! I still haven't figured out how to animate things, so that scene is me replacing sprites using "invoke" on a timer and messing with the colour values. My "monster" looks pretty goofy but I'm fairly happy with the scene in general :)
matank
2023-01-10 09:32
I enjoyed this game a lot!! It's very refreshing to play a game that's different from anything else. It took a while to figure out what you do with the slider but it was pretty fun, and I enjoyed the mood and the set-up, thinking about the mystery and finding the two endings. Thanks for the game!
@matank Thank you for the kind words, I'm glad you enjoyed it!
I was kind of worried that the drab greys would be too off-putting, but I wanted the place to look soulless and cold. Going with that colour pallet was that was the best I could do with my limited artistic abilities :)
I really enjoyed that! For a game where you just move a few sliders around it was really engaging! Kind of reminded me of Portal, with its "keep following instructions, you're doing great, don't check behind the curtain" vibe. Made me think they're lying about what you're doing - I bet the scanner is just a flamethrower with a screen that flashes up "enemy detected" every time you press the button.
Edit: I forgot to tag the person i was talking to >.<
@stormharrier I'm so glad you enjoyed your time with the game and found the narrative engaging :D
I believe that the “truth” is in the audience’s head, not the author’s. I'm going to write something regarding the story in case you are interested in what i think, but feel free to ignore it too because you decide what the story should be.
As small as my scope was, I still had to cut corners to get the game ready in time. There was supposed to be at least one other cell and it had a real person inside. The scanner Would identify them as a human and knock them out, instead of killing them. The situation when the game starts Is that everyone in the facility, except the NPC (that’s cut out of the game) and possibly the harvester (player), Is compromised by the organism. Yes, even the guy on the CCTV and speakers. If you’ve read the ‘secret’ files they refer to an incident where a guy named Yuri died and something almost got out. The first chamber you see in game is empty, except for a small puddle of blood… The overseer guiding you is already carrying the organism, he just doesn’t know/remember it yet. But again, that’s just my version :)
I got kinda stuck on the second level, I wasn't sure what buttons to press to move on? I see other people saying there were two endings, I'm sad I missed them!
@therealjtgill Im sorry the instructions were unclear. If you decide to come back and revisit the game later, this may help you:
Every level essentially uses the same mechanic. You move each slider till the green light next to it comes on, indicating that the slider is in the correct position. After the green lights come on, then the player clicks on the button that says "lock in". When all the sliders are locked in, there is a "harvest" Button that lights up. you can then click on it to proceed. The correct position of each slider changes from level to level but is consistent between play-throughs
The tasks get a bit harder as you play, because the sliders start to have a narrower range of accepted values. Additionally one of the levels has a timer so the challenge comes in completing it quickly (or finding a way around it)
The game will (theoretically) try to run in a 1920x1080 resolution/aspect ratio, but that doesn't work out all the time and some UI elements may not appear correctly for you, but you can compensate for that. The game starts in window mode and the window is resizable, so you can drag the screen to change its size. The following should all be visible in every level: 5 sliders, 5 lock-in buttons, 1 harvest button
I hope that helps
3ggplant
2023-01-13 02:00
Very interesting spin on the theme. I'm not sure what the fuseboard at the top right was for, though. I found the controls to be quite intuitive from just messing with the sliders, but I guess more could be done with the NPC giving a quick description of the tuning process, like "just move those knobs and lock them in when it's green".
@3ggplant thank you for taking the time to play my game. I'm flattered every time I find out someone has done so. I will leave some info below in case you are interested, but the short answer is that the fusebox is just there to provide something visually interesting on that side of the screen.
I don't know how everyone else operates, but I am really slow, and so I finished my last build about 15 minutes before the 48hr time limit. I think by the time I had added the links here I was just 3 minutes to the deadline. All that is to say I was flying by the seat of my pants. To be honest, the fusebox is yet another cut corner. The plan was to have a fuse randomly pop off every once in a while when the player least expects it, and have the player reset it in order to proceed. I realized fairly early on that I wouldn't be able to implement it in time, but I liked having more "gadgets" on screen to add to the "smoke and mirrors" and hopefully keep that sense of wonder and exploration going just another minute or two. My game is very short so I just need to keep the player engaged in the ride a short while. At least that was my assumption at the time. I hope this was informative/entertaining :)
milq
2023-01-14 01:23
As I said in another occasion, I really want to try the game. But I use GNU/Linux and it’s not for the web either. I have not rated it, if in the future they are published on these platforms I will be eager to try it!
@milq Hello, and thank you for your feedback. Developing games for Linux is something i am open to, but I don't currently have any Linux devices to test my builds on. Not a good excuse and i will try to find a solution for my next LudumDare!
In the mean time, if you are feeling adventurous you can head on to my itch.IO page where i have uploaded an experimental Linux build. Its just the folder unity spits out when you ask it for a Linux build. It can work great or not boot at all. https://meidaniaryayahoocom.itch.io/harvester
zirrrus
2023-01-15 12:01
That was neat! Great job at setting a mood. Having to fiddle with the sliders with that creature breaking out was really stressful!
@zirrrus Thank you for the kind words, I'm glad you found it compelling (and sorry for the stress!).
I was really worried that without sound, that scene would completely fall flat. Fortunately, it looks like a lot of players still found it engaging :)
Wow, that last part was scary until I realized what I can do. Neat concept, could make for a really cool story if it was worked on more. Though it was mostly sliders, it was pretty neat.
@burnedkirby Thank you for playing my game and taking the time to type in your feedback too! I'm going to include some additional info below in case you're interested :)
Ludum Dare compo is challenging to everyone for different reasons. I'm at the very low end of skill and knowledge required to participate, so the main challenge for me becomes "can I even make a game?". Harvester came about partially because I wanted to learn more about Unity UI. The plan was to have a variety of tasks for the player like sliders, radio buttons, toggles, drop downs etc. I ran out of time to do most of that stuff but now I think I know how sliders work!
Regarding the scary bit, I'm glad you found the other way to handle it. I tested it a few times just to make sure you can do it the normal way but my hope was that most players would realize they have another other option. I think I ended up making the time limit too lenient but I didn't want the player to feel like its impossible and give up after the first try.
As I had mentioned in another post, the scary bit's "animation" is just a timer that switches which sprites are active. I knew I didn't have time to learn how to animate, but still wanted to give the game a little flair. It took time away from other parts of the game, but I think in the end it was worth it. At least people are commenting about it