FoonLudum Dare ExplorerLD52 → Star ReaperZ

Star ReaperZ

By gurkenlabs and Steffen Wilke

View on ldjam.com

CategoryRankScoreCount
Overall6353.1331
Fun5103.1931
Innovation7992.2630
Theme7722.6531
Humor6242.2227
Mood6413.0130

Comments

amkingtrp 2023-01-10 07:16

Your itch.io link doesn't work. You might have left it in draft mode (you'll need to edit game and at the bottom of the page there's a radio button for making it public)

gurkenlabs 2023-01-10 23:37

Thanks @amkingtrp, we've had to take some rest after the jam before finishing up the site here and on itch. This has been resolved.

divyansh 2023-01-11 20:07

Star ReaperZ is a fast-paced, action-packed 2-D arcade shooter that offers a unique and challenging experience. The game's controls are tight and responsive, making it easy to maneuver the ship through the swarms of enemy ships and avoid incoming fire. The enemies come in two forms, "Agents" and "Defenders", which each require different strategies to defeat.

The game's core mechanics are simple, but the added layer of strategy offered by the energy harvesting system adds an extra level of depth to the gameplay. The player must decide when to focus on destroying enemies and when to focus on harvesting energy, and this adds an additional layer of complexity to the gameplay. The difficulty increases as the player progresses through the levels, with higher spawn rates and the addition of asteroids that block projectiles and destroy the player's ship on impact. To dodge shots and asteroids, players can boost or slow down their ship's speed at all times.

The game's visuals are simple but effective, with a sleek and futuristic aesthetic that fits the game's theme perfectly. The sound effects and music are also well-done, adding to the game's overall atmosphere. Overall, Reaper is a fun and challenging game that offers a unique and engaging experience. If you're a fan of arcade shooters, I highly recommend giving this game a try.

derpygamer2142 2023-01-11 20:30

Pretty good! I liked the art and sound. I don't really have any suggestions.

offdutyextractors 2023-01-11 20:32

Simple game that seems to work as intended. Not having bugs in a game jam game is a big win. I liked the ability to control the speed of your ship to help dodge some things. My only suggestions are more content, make the aliens spawn off screen, and please cut down some of the high frequencies of your audio because some hurt the ears.

taikinaaa 2023-01-11 21:48

Great game!

johnnysix 2023-01-11 21:53

The music and the pixel art was cool. After the 1st level, it'd be cool to have some more variety in the enemies, and with the parallax / scrolling / physics, to have more of a relationship between things. Like the energy should keep moving even if you're not hitting the harvest button, so you can fly past it. Also being able to blow up the rocks would be nice.

torban 2023-01-12 00:15

Great game! The feedback and polish of everything is great. Blowing up an enemy feels so good. Love the small things like minimap, dynamic camera based on speed, and responsiveness of controls.

thierry 2023-01-12 00:19

Cool game, it's fun to play. It looks very mature and polished, especially with self-developed engine it's a great achievement. Respect to you!

paulsams 2023-01-12 00:28

I would like to praise, but there are so many problems... Let's start listing everything: - Why are bonuses so slow move??? If you didn't know, then in shoot'em up they move bonuses at a fast speed to make a choice: either you play beautifully on the edge and get more points, or you just miss it. In this game, it turns out that you can collect 100% points without putting yourself in front of any danger and choice; - Why are enemy shots of the same color as bonuses??? It looks more like some kind of mockery, considering that you have the whole screen in bonuses; - Why the forward acceleration button? Why not make the same speed initially so that you don't have to clamp W? To have time to collect all the points at a calm pace)? Also with shots: why clamp it)? But as for the speed change, at least I can understand that it could be used if done correctly, but why not auto-fire? This game not there are different weapons and shoot/don't shoot puts you not in front of some choice; - Hp is hard to read. These are the lines on the character (or who is it at all?) they look too complicated for such a simple indicator); - Also, the character slides, which is generally unacceptable in such a genre, as for me).

But in general, well done, although you certainly pulled the topic very strangely, huh).

bloodfin 2023-01-12 00:29

Loved the art, and the feel of the gameplay and difficulty balance worked really well for me. Felt good to play. Music and the sound fit the style and mood great and was never grating. Good work!

hadik 2023-01-14 19:00

At first glance, it looked like an interesting game that could be fun, but in the end it was not that. Partly match the theme, maybe next time it will be better.. To be honest, the graphic processing of your game doesn't appeal to me.

One last note: I always write down honest review, because everybody need that, not just nice craps with some bullshit, but sometime I will appreciate very good games. So if this review insult you, but use it well :) Anyway every game is counting so :)

amkingtrp 2023-01-14 21:01

really glad someone made a proper vertical shmup game. :)

The controls and mechanics felt right, but obviously needs a bit more variety in the enemies / waves. I was seeing enemy craft spawning in the middle of the screen, which didn't seem right.

I'd recommend adding enemy movement patterns, etc, along with potential scrolling backgrounds with more detail which would help break up any repetitiveness.

gurkenlabs 2023-01-14 21:45

@hadik I would really like to use your review well for future improvements, but besides all your honesty, you forgot to write some constructive feedback :(

datagreed 2023-01-15 02:23

Nice graphics! Reminded me of Tyrian

globul 2023-01-15 10:37

Nice shoot'em up, but a bit repetitive. Good work anyway

aes1 2023-01-15 10:40

great game, while playing I couldn't come up with something that would be a easy change but clear upgrade, maybe cause I don't play these types of games personally. I really like the length of the game, not too long or short, I like the movement, it felt nice. I think I liked how easy it was to get into. :)

simone 2023-01-15 20:46

Solid entry, good job =)

pavel-tararin 2023-01-15 20:57

Passed all three levels. In general, the game looks interesting, because it is a classic. There was not enough variety of enemies - there are only 2 types, and they change at levels only by color. And I am outraged! Why don't these stupid meteorites explode! I wanted to quit the third level when I realized that the only difference was the number of enemies and stones, but I reached the end of the game on the fourth or fifth attempt. When there is a huge scattering of energy on the screen, everything begins to merge. Thank you for game in the classic genre! I got my piece of joy. Good luck with new projects.

pavel-tararin 2023-01-15 21:00

And I completely forgot! You are welcome! Don't make a slide when the player needs to dodge so many objects! It's creepy. The game turns into a convulsive pressing of the left-right keys.

almax 2023-01-15 22:31

A simple shooter, that is unfortunately plagued with some fundamental problems. As others have mentioned the pacing of the game, notably the pickup speed is very frustrating. The camera slide is unnecessary and adds more confusion/discomfort than tactical choice. I also found the speedup/slowdown mechanics quite difficult to read: the stars move quickly and the foreground moves slowly - this is very unintuitive as it's not how things work in reality, where objects closer to you appear to move faster than objects further away.

I did quite like the aesthetic though and the music/sfx was well chosen to match.

I think you have the beginnings of a cool game here, and it's easy to forget that even just submitting a completed game for Ludum Dare is a huge achievement. So I hope to see you back for the next one! Good work :slight_smile:

picttarge 2023-01-19 01:05

A java entry (write once and cross your fingers) wrapped in an .exe with only .dll files and no .so files for Linux? Aww... I got it partially working and heard the menu music before it hanged but I'll have to dig out a windows machine and give this another try.

picttarge 2023-01-19 01:19

Alrighty worked ok in windows - points for the Tyrian 2k vibe definitely :) Not really sure what harvesting the energy gives you other than points, I wondered if it topped up the 'health bar' image on the left but it seems to not have any effect or repair. Had a number of recently-offscreen enemies blow up the ship which seemed a bit brutal or buggy and I'm not sure what the map in the top right adds - it's everything that's already on screen by the looks of it as the map retains the same ratio as the screen from what I can see.

Anyway, it was fun nonetheless and kudos to linking to the others for the sound and gfx work. :)

sheng-mai 2023-01-20 07:48

This is a great STG, I really like the style you drew for the planes, when I got past the level I realized there was an inhalation system and it was really sad to miss it. I didn't realize that hitting rocks would hurt too, which made me restart a few games. I'm looking forward to adding more enemies and more attacks in the future!

oillen 2023-01-22 00:40

Ok jam entry, simple gameplay mechanics (shooting(effects&explosion) and evading) used well.

The harvesting and energy could have a deeper meaning in the game, e.g. you need energy to fire and repair your ship, or charge shields.

While the style is adorable, enemy ships appearing midfield instead of rolling in over the top border is a unnecessary taint.

There could be more of ... everything: one or two more weapons, shields, more enemies, and enemies that shoot more, destroyable asteroids ...

In conclusion your game is too simple & easy, looks & sounds pretty, you did mostly well in polishing, and I would like to see that your next creation is cautiously more ambitious.

hayricakir 2023-01-23 14:57

I wish there were more upgrades and faster paced gameplay. Other than that, I have fun playing it. I liked the visuals and sound effects. Good job mate!