Obelisk

googlypoo 2023-10-02 22:25

The game looks and feels great to play. You have a cohesive visual style and some great animations. The music was good too.

I did not find the mechanics intuitive. Luckily you included a guide on the page or I would've been lost :sweat_smile: Even with that, the goal of the game was difficult for me to discern. I enjoyed pushing the mining blocks into the cracked walls.

I initially clicked on this one because of the aesthetic style, and you did not disappoint. Solid entry :slight_smile:

chusmimax 2023-10-02 22:57

Really fun once you get it. First time I opened the game I was overwhelmed by so many different sprites with no context whatsoever, but my perception switched once I read the detailed explanation in this page.

Everything in the game feels good, sounds and movement included, and the game loop is certainly innovative, they only thing I would love to have is a way to rotate in position.

captaindreamcast 2023-10-05 22:16

Very fun, I love building my base of slug-doom with zappers and doing pusher contraptions that automatically keep the zap-war-machine running.

Definitely high intensity building game! I was on my toes all the time trying to find another machine or spawn to keep my run going. Loved the illumination effect too, how it revealed more and more of the map, I thought it was cool how everything opened up over time (somewhat, you still had to break the paths after all). The color palette looked nice and made everything look distinct and color-coded, I liked the mood it set. Same for the music, it really gave that otherworldly quality to the game. Felt super polished, I really loved this game, great job!

goldenloser 2023-10-06 05:00

Very deeply organized game system. It's amazing to see such a system in a jam. Awesome！

jkazuk 2023-10-06 05:08

**The ~~Factory~~ slug-infested cavern must grow** :heart:

r2d48 2023-10-06 05:21

Really good game. Excellent Music, Excellent SFX. Innovative Game. Good graphics. Well done ! I think I will reply this game a lot

redoxeide 2023-10-06 07:19

Nice job! I had a lot of fun trying to figure out the best way to arrange all the tiles to automate farming crystals for the obelisk and the turrets. I can see a lot of potential in adding different types of machines and terrain. As is, I spent more than an hour playing. Got to tier 6 with ~350 crystals for next tier.

orangeoceans 2023-10-07 05:02

It's so fun and addicting and I am so bad. Couldn't get past tier 5 despite trying 5 or 6 times.

I think what's really difficult is that the tiers' crystal thresholds increase nonlinearly, but I could only increase my crystal output linearly. So while the tier 5 threshold was several times higher than the tier 4 threshold, I was setting up crystal production at the same or even slower rate as before -- existing lines of crystal pushers only ever got in the way of new ones. Even if I acted faster, the math would eventually catch up to me.

It's very possible that this is just a dandori issue on my part though! I'm curious if you were able to set up crystal pushers in a way that could scale up nonlinearly?

f1krazy 2023-10-10 15:14

Very fun! Most Ludum Dare games are very brief, so it's refreshing to see one that's geared towards a longer playtime. I did feel like it started off a bit slow - I didn't see any enemies until Tier 4 - but the game seems like it's designed to be slow-paced in general, so it works.

I like that you could expand the playable area instead of drilling, while also collecting items to help you at the same time. I've played a few games where there space gets *more* limited over time, so again, it's refreshing to see someone do the opposite. Moving around and understanding where/how you need to drill can be a bit tricky, but once you get the hang of it you can set up some very satisfying automation to feed your obelisk while you take care of other matters.

One question: I couldn't understand what the red-and-orange boxes were for. Are they just there to provide extra obstacles, or do they do something?

Overall, this has astonishing depth, quality, and potential playtime for a Compo entry, and I think you should be really proud of what you've managed to achieve here. Good job!

rasblo 2023-10-10 21:05

Thanks for this, played for quite some time! Wanted to go for tier 7, but I'm happy with halfway in tier 6.. frustrating yet satisfying. Difficult but really fun once you get the hang of it. Props for nice visuals and great sound design, music and effects fit flawlessly.

I can easily see this expanded into a hit, lots of potential when the simplest version is this addictive.

tetrapteryx 2023-10-10 21:09

I made it to tier 5, and very nearly got to 6. I'll definitely be giving it a few more tries. This is crazy impressive, there's so much depth packed into this little game, and a lot of replay value. The art and music are excellent too. Great work!

lcstark 2023-10-10 22:46

Wow, that took a long time to get through! And by get through I mean "reach tier 6". And by a long time I mean a bit over an hour, since that's about as much time as I've spent on it before realising I got addicted to digging walls and killing slugs.

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There's a lot of mechanics to unpack, so it takes a bit of time to understand it all and get in the proper rhythm to be able to play it, let alone play it well. It took me a while to expand far enough to find my first turret, but those have helped A LOT to survive for much longer time. Then I figured out better how to use combinations of pushers and boxes to send more crystals from farther away. One thing that didn't really fit the game for me is that crystals stop other pushed crystals - I felt it would have been better if pushed crystals gathered others in their movement line, so you could slowly expand into this crystal highway delivering them from multiple sources at the same time. If that would be too overpowered, limiting the travel distance for crystals would make for a good mechanic too, requiring players to plan relays / repeaters every X tiles. Or maybe making a special building that acts like a single-direction pusher, but embedded in the floor, so it only pushes crystals that enter its tile? Don't know which solution would work better here.

It was also great to see another game use the theme to create a soft limit of space instead of a hard one. Especially in a game like this, expanding your playing field is one of the better parts, and going out to find more machines adds a cool element of exploration. It could be a little bit toned down though - while upgrading the Obelisk to tier 2 opens up a rather small amount of space, tier 3 already unlocks more tiles than you can explore before reaching the next one, especially since the enemy amount grows fast too. I also agree with orangeoceans that the amount of crystals needed to upgrade grows too fast. I don't think I've finished the game below tier 5 after my first game, yet getting to tier 6 seemed very difficult in comparison.

The audiovisual side is amazing. I loved how the slugs looked and moved (at least the three types that I've seen, if there's more later), the building sprites look great too, everything is beautifully animated. The sounds and music are just perfect. Especially the music, it's giving me the same vibes as FTL soundtrack - it's not fast and hectic, but it does build the tension wonderfully.

Other than that, there's not much more for me to say but: amazing game! Doubly so, given that it was made in 48 hours. I hope you keep working on it after the jam, it feels like there's a lot of potential in it.

vfqd 2023-10-14 10:57

Really promising! I feel like with a little bit of work on the controls, this could be something amazing!

3mpty 2023-10-15 03:22

*psychically explodes your slug*

Interesting concept and very very polished, love the aesthetic and the music is a vibe. Great all around.

I do find it clunky mining and dragging and such, I know to some degree the sokoban-ness is part of the game but digging is quite a pain, it would be nice if it was slightly more easy to maneuvre and fuel up drills, but asside from that its a lot of fun.

Turrets seem rarer than gold and it wasn't obvious the player can just kill slugs by hanging out near them, I'd tweak those to make the on boarding process a little smoother and more interesting, but other than that it's really really solid. I had a lot of fun digging holes and pushing crystals, great stuff!

spaceylake 2023-10-15 16:36

Nice game! On my first run I got to tier 5. I did not like that you could not turn around on the spot but I would guess that you designed it that way and thats fine. Besides that the music was nice and moody, good sound effects, and nice pixle art and splat effects. Greate game! Good job!

durkagames 2023-10-15 22:42

Without the hint on the ludum page, I would never have figured out what to do here.

Despite this, the game is consistent and deserves attention!