deadcode 2025-04-08 09:31
Very interesting card game! Love how you have to defeat enemies in order to get further into the depths. Cool concept and very on theme.
Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → LD57 → Vs. the Deep
By life-lich
| Category | Rank | Score | Count | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Overall | 467 | 3.50 | 22 | |
| Fun | 404 | 3.42 | 22 | |
| Innovation | 539 | 3.10 | 22 | |
| Theme | 351 | 3.82 | 22 | |
| Graphics | 591 | 3.32 | 22 | |
| Audio | 1 | |||
| Humor | 514 | 2.63 | 21 | |
| Mood | 662 | 3.17 | 22 |
Very interesting card game! Love how you have to defeat enemies in order to get further into the depths. Cool concept and very on theme.
Cool entry, like the music. A bit unclear where the hull number is displayed given that at the beginning you cannot play a lot of cards other than the hull upgrade and it says something being at 100 and you gain an effect and perhaps a small torpedo with 2 points. Also not really sure what the blue bar on the left represents, is that the depth? The other thing is that the colours are the same for the cards, makes them hard to separate them visually, have to read every card. Also the enemies seem to have a lot of health which makes it a bit frustrating at the beginnig as there are not many useful cards that can be played. Other than that, I think the art is great and the music too, really sets the atmosphere =)
Easy enough to pick up without any sort of explicit tutorial which is pretty cool. There's a decent range of cards that mean the play throughs can go quite differently but without it being overwhelming. The crew cards provide a cool way of building up momentum if the draws go your way as well! The tentacle coming in to take cards off the top card stack is a fun little detail which I really enjoyed!
This is great, well done
Cool concept of deck builder. I think there aren't enough cards that give energy, or it needs to be restored somehow between turns. Fun art style, like it. Nice work!
@deadcode Glad you enjoyed the game! 😊 Though I think you might’ve misunderstood a bit — you don’t actually have to defeat enemies to progress.
@jhax Thanks so much! Really glad to hear you found there was enough variety without things getting too complex, and that it still felt approachable. I actually had a lot more plans for the crew cards, so it's great to hear they still let players pull off some fun combos.
@wyzal Thank you! I was hoping the “discard to gain mana” mechanic would work as a good stand-in — giving the player an extra decision to make each turn. But yeah, having some power restored between turns might be the better approach in the long run. Appreciate the feedback and glad you enjoyed the art style!
@r8teful Thanks you 😊 I noticed you’re a YouTuber, have you ever considered making a video of you playing jam entries? I’m always on the lookout for those after a jam ends
An excellent, addictive game. While it's not immediately clear how things work or how to play, once you figure it out you can discover unbeatable strategies and dominate.
Cool little card game. I wasn't able to generate enough power to keep up with killing the enemies. I like the combos potential with the crew members ! I lost at depth 5
i really enjoyed this game but at the end i seemed to never get any more power cards -- out of luck i guess -- it was very fun and a nice relaxing kind of jam game -- great job
- I think that the "play" card area could be moved so I don't have to drag my hand so far. - Kind of gave me an earthbound vibe, with the background, music, and layout of the enemies. I like the music. - I might be bad at card games because the enemies felt pretty tanky, and built up to 6 at the same time and defeat me because I couldn't keep them under control. - I reached depth 4 before dying. - I liked the art of the enemies, they were charming. Good game!
@gaspar It’s awesome to hear you found some strong strategies, even though it was a bit tricky to figure out at first.
@paulhocker I'm glad you enjoyed the game. Sry about the bad luck. Luck is a another good point for why restoring some power between turns might be a better design choice.
When I play, I try to avoid spending all my power in a single round. In concept, I only use high-cost cards like Big Torpedo if I’m sure I can afford it or if it’s absolutely worth it.
Thanks again for the kind words!
@cammin *I’ve been tweaking the layout a bit after the jam the “play” card area now appears right on top of the enemy area, which I think helps solving the drag-distance issue.
*Cool to hear it gave you EarthBound vibes.
*The enemies are definitely tanky. I wanted them to stick around so the board never felt empty. I lowered their damage to balance it out a bit. A lot of games handle this by spawning new enemies every round or having set encounters, but I went with the slow-building of chaos instead.
*Super happy you liked the enemy designs! I was honestly worried. I couldn’t quite draw what I had in mind, so I just went with what I managed to get down. Glad it worked out :smile:
Good game, nice visual style, I enjoyed playing, thanks
I always like card games! Felt a bit unsatisfying when you do not get any cards to gain power, wasting a turn. Nice game!
Very cool :) Had the feeling that the ratio of torpedo to power cards (or other ways to increase power) could get a litte more balancing. Overall solid entry! :)
Simple but fun card game loop. The mechanics felt fun and I gave it a few tries, but never managed to succeed, probably just need to adjust my strategy more.
I didn't appreciate that the upgrade buffs were permanent at first, so that lead me to value those cards poorly on my first runs.
Super fun entry, nice work!
What a jolly game! Good job!.
Awesome job! I did take a few runs at it to beat it, and I really like it, it's got Moonrakers (boardgame) vibes, I think in that one some more choices or decisions make it an interesting puzzle, with both power and cards holding over from each turn, it kinda was a lot up to fate as far as success. Great entry though!
Extremely good! I don't think I've really ever played a roguelike like this, where the enemies kinda stick around until you deal with them.
It does feel a bit *too* random at times, I've had runs end real quick because some scary enemies popped up early. On the run where I won, the first several depth layers were totally smooth sailing and I built up over a hundred power.
Overall very good, just wish there was more content!