FoonLudum Dare ExplorerLD58 → Stealth Hobo

Stealth Hobo

By thoastbot

View on ldjam.com

CategoryRankScoreCount
Overall1093.3824
Fun903.4024
Innovation1163.2024
Theme463.9024
Graphics1453.1423
Audio753.4023
Humor483.4324
Mood893.4223

Comments

emojimaster 2025-10-05 23:18

not bad, the movement could be a little bit faster.

appoxgames 2025-10-05 23:55

Cool idea, i enjoyed it. Only feedback is perhaps having a smaller collider on the character since i kept getting blocked by different objects.

Well done!

d-omino 2025-10-06 00:00

Creative stealth-collector concept! Movement feels a bit slow and hitboxes could be tighter for better navigation. The core "desperate hobo" vibe works really well though - solid take on the theme!

thoastbot 2025-10-06 00:51

@appoxgames Oh damn, that is the simplest fix for that - never heard or thought about that :o Will try to remember for my next ld to make the hitbox a bit smaller than the character to make movement feel better, thanks! I was thinking about smoother movement, but decided it actually fits to be a bit clunky walking around as a hobo :D

thoastbot 2025-10-06 01:01

I think i understand why some people have pretty slow movement... I didn't limit fps for the game and tested with 144fps - so the game is configured for that frame rate - if people now play the game on 60fps everything is <50% speed. I would need to make an substantial change to the code to fix that problem, so i might upload a v1.1 in the next days for people that encountering this problem and want to play the game in intended speed.

Thanks @emojimaster and @d-omino!

For other users encountering that problem but curious about the game, leave a comment and i'll link you at a later time when i have a version 1.1 with a fix up and running.

jesus-gonzalez 2025-10-06 01:09

Pretty cool that this was made entirely in JS.

Concept is good and is fun already. Audio is actually good, nice tune and appropriate sound effects.

The hit-boxes are kind of annoying but since it is pretty short game, no big deal. In-game instructions would have been great.

bad-fetus 2025-10-06 02:01

Is the third level winnable? I reached it twice and got everything as far as I can tell but it was not enough.

It's a cool concept overall, wish the timer was more lenient though and failing the stealth gameplay more punishing - right now it's less about stealth and more about getting to every trash can as fast as possible since you get punished hard for anything else. Had a good time with it though, good work!

plastus 2025-10-06 11:32

Fun idea! I also liked the little comments about the trash that you collect :D

The characters speed was a bit slow for my taste but I guess that's just how it is for stealth games :sob:

Great entry!

zubspace 2025-10-06 12:53

Very interesting game! I like the atmosphere of the night city. The music and sound effects are really awesome. The sprites look very nice, except the player and other folks though, but that's only a minor nitpick. 😊 It's not an easy game though without knowing the best route, but maybe I'm not made for living on the street. GJ overall!

alex-mulkerrin 2025-10-06 13:20

Neat game which very much fits the theme. I liked the scenes if you did or didn't collect enough trash. It's cool to see another JavaScript developer and I appreciate having the source code to learn from.

Only feedback which others haven't already given is that a fullscreen button might be nice. The default canvas size is a bit too tall for my screen resolution.

indigowolf 2025-10-06 17:34

Good entry, quite enjoyed it. I did struggle to understand what I was supposed to be doing though as some containers open and others don't, not sure if I missed something.

thoastbot 2025-10-08 00:17

@jesus-gonzalez Thanks! Yeah, playing it a bit now and noticed that the controls are actually not just feel "clunky" as intended, but simply bad x.x going for a 2.0 version with fully updated movement feeling waaay smoother - thanks for pointing that out :)

@bad-fetus Yes, it is indeed win able, 4th level aswell (and then it loops) - but the trashbins have random loot (not totally random) and therefore sometimes with bad rng one cant get throu level 3 even with all bins opened - should have added another 1-2 trashbins to prevent that.

@plastus could be framerate issue, basically the game is made for 144fps but for some reason some people just get 60fps, didn't came up in testing but got it reproduced now, im working on a 2.0 version that handles that better but as i want to include more fixes i think it might take a few days to finish.

@zubspace thanks! yeah i totally forgot to redo the character sprites, i started with them before i decided on a "detail level" and then never came back to them - currently working on a Stealth Hobo 2.0, to fix a few things, i include new sprites in there thanks to your remark :D

@alex-mulkerrin yeah, fullscreen button would actually be great, but i struggle to get a simple "canvas size = 200%" or something like that to actually zoom - but i can recommend browser features, strg+scroll is the zoom, and that actually works for my canvas game - so you can get closer to fullscreen that way. Also F11 to have true full screen to begin with.

@indigowolf only thing that comes to mind would be a full inventory? The bar to the right shows your inventory, every level you have a set amount of space - maybe you tried to open a container as your inventory was already full?

bryceltaylor 2025-10-09 02:54

This was fun! I love how the simple shapes really evoke people, trash cans, buildings, etc. I think the stealth aspect kind of got lost once I realized that nothing seems to care how long I walk around the neighborhoods. But then it just ended suddenly on the third one and I don't know why. I'm not sure what "stealth level maxed" means or why it killed me. Also, I kept getting stuck on geometry that didn't feel like it I should have it it, like lamp posts. I love the art for the lamp posts, though.

Really good job over all!

bryceltaylor 2025-10-09 03:10

I realized I had gone straight to your site and hadn't read the instructions properly. I did so and then played it again. Some of the things made more sense, but I'm pretty sure the third level is impossible. I had gotten everything from every trashcan and hadn't earned enough to survive.

I think the stealth mechanic makes more sense when you understand the meter at the top. For some reason I thought I wanted it to be full the first time, and it would probably have made more sense if it depleted as you went.

Still fun! Kept me entertained for a while.

thoastbot 2025-10-09 15:56

@bryceltaylor Yeah, I definitely need to include an in-game tutorial next time. It was already on the ā€œmust-haveā€ list for this ludumdare, but I ran into a major bug during the last few hours and had to spend the time I’d planned for the tutorial (and some polish) fixing that instead. I’m still really happy with how the game turned out, but for the next project I’ll at least add a short intro scene that tells players to check out the tutorial first – so they don’t miss out on the core mechanics.

As for level 3 – yeah, it’s definitely not well balanced. It is beatable (I managed several times during testing), but I’ve also had plenty of runs where I got stuck myself since release x) Let’s just say: being a hobo surviving on trash isn’t easy, and sometimes you just don’t make it – at least that’s my excuse for the poor level design :'D

amiuke 2025-10-11 17:04

What an interesting theme! I love this smooth interactive experience.

coderaurus 2025-10-12 15:57

I was expecting more levels and more treasures to collect. I'm guessing that was the plan at least, looking at the inventory space. I liked how the direction of movement is indicated with the head tilting forwards.

The stealthing didn't really matter in my playthrough. Still, interesting idea on paper and would have loved to see it more.

Good work.

katastudios 2025-10-12 19:55

Well done, coherent smooth experience with a good take on the theme. Very impressive that you did it in raw JS under compo rules too! My one gripe is how the collider kinda gets stuck on corners, I want to be able to kinda 'slide' around them.

kallico 2025-10-12 21:04

It was fun! I played several times, but my run kept getting cut short when I ran into a car and would get stuck :(

The descriptions were gross but funny!

jim-jagers 2025-10-12 22:07

Felt like a classic flash game could totally see myself playing this in the computer lab at school, I had fun navigating the different levels and bumping my head against the cars

yarkin 2025-10-13 09:38

I liked the music and SFX. Most importantly, I had fun while playing! Well done!

wouter52 2025-10-13 17:24

What a fun take on the theme! Love the idea to steathfully collect items to get through the day First I was a bit confused why I could not open the bins anymore. I did not recognize the gray/red inventory spots

Graphics somehow made me think of GTA1

I had fun playing this one. It was challenging, but not too challenging

wouter52 2025-10-26 07:58

Whouw, most results sub-100! Congratz!