steveofstevesgames 2026-04-20 15:00
I just could not figure out what to do. I hit the ear quite a lot and it went red at one point. I missed a lot and it went even redder. Still kinda cool. Sound was quite intense.
Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → LD59 → Terminal Transmitter 6000
By dis0rder
| Category | Rank | Score | Count | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Overall | 217 | 3.18 | 21 | |
| Fun | 231 | 2.86 | 21 | |
| Innovation | 35 | 3.90 | 22 | |
| Theme | 98 | 3.97 | 21 | |
| Graphics | 262 | 2.71 | 21 | |
| Audio | 110 | 3.44 | 21 | |
| Humor | 85 | 3.00 | 21 | |
| Mood | 189 | 3.23 | 21 |
I just could not figure out what to do. I hit the ear quite a lot and it went red at one point. I missed a lot and it went even redder. Still kinda cool. Sound was quite intense.
A fun sandbox to play around with sound signals. I was curious about the flashing you were talking about, I could not get it to flash though
Fun fact, this runs on a Windows 7 VM, and it runs pretty smooth!
Terminal Transmitter 6000 is a very interesting study of frequency and amplitude. You have what feels like infinite adjustment of the various numbers in the center of the screen. I'm not sure what said numbers meant, so I played it by ear (no seriously, play this by ear its interesting).
I managed to get to a point where the big number in the top right was ascending by a lot, and the pitch of the sound was increasing. I had a feeling we were approaching critical mass when the number was approaching the six digits... and I managed to either have a successful, if violent transmission or I've discovered the limits of what the 6000 is capable of.
This is like, the exact fun I get from messing with cool synths. Initially obtuse, but with some finagling you find some cool sounds in there.
A fun sandbox with simple design, instead of a oscilloscope simulator, it is more like a "Hearing Impairment Simulator".
For those feels confused, here's what will those button do(just my guess):
1. Frequency Modulation(+ acceleration, - deceleration) 2. Direction Speed Modulation(+ right acceleration, - left acceleration) 3. Amplitude Modulation(+ right acceleration, - left acceleration)
The position of the sound source and the ear can also be changed, to get a balanced output, put the ear in the middle of the screen.
I'm not sure what software the `*.mfa` file was written with, thus I have no way of reading the source code. When the red flashes, indicating hearing impairment, the visuals will become noticeably different.
Honestly I had no clue what I was doing but I made some cool sounding things. Took a lot of fiddling, but a nice little audio sandbox to play with frequencies. Good job in the Compo :)
It took me a while to figure out that the game is actually a sort of painting game? Like, you set the pattern you want with the arrows / dragging the emitter around (or placing the ear to intercept), click the "heartbeat" button, and then press "x" when you want to clear.
The audio design was awesome. Didn't figure out what all the numbers meant, but it was really cool just experimenting and trying things and learning piece by piece how the game worked.
Can't play windows games...
I'm not entirely sure what's going on, but I liked playing around with it lol. It's quite interesting.
I have absolutely no idea what was happening here. But it was a lot of fun playing with it anyway!
no clue what the numbers mean just started mashing buttons and turning knobs until my ears hurt lol the red flashing freaked me out but in a good way
It fit the theme very well. Good.
This is quite unusual! I tried playing the game myself and watched the video you attached, as well. I'll admit I had only a vague idea on what I am doing, but it was fun to play around with it anyway. I liked the little graphics, it looked very cozy. I am not sure if the ear on the right was pleased with my efforts or hurt though :) It seems like an interesting sound experiment! I understand what you meant when talking about choosing "digital" audio for the game. Very on theme, too! ^^
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@steveofstevesgames @gecko64 @galareteg @aflatthrasher @kanity @valb-soares
A lot of people seemed to share a common sentiment of mild confusion, yet having fun!
Leaving out the "manual" of **TT6000** was both a concious decision and partly a way to save time. I thought that without any defined objective or instructions the player might be encouraged to experiment. It also perhaps made the device feel a bit more enigmatic. I'm glad to hear you enjoyed playing around with it!
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@akuta-zehy seems to have a fairly good grasp on how the three main pairs of knobs work apart from some minor technical aspects. Basically you can increase or decrease three different values which in turn affect the way the transmitted signals behave. At the core principle it's very simple, but some of the elements are rigged to each other in convoluted ways which might trigger additional events or alter some the values at certain thresholds.
I don't even remember all the specifics myself since things got a bit wild in the final hours of COMPO! :sweat_smile: I had to scrap all of the pre-planned concepts I didn't have time to implement and stitched together everything I already had in a very experimental fashion.
I had a handful of very well-thought out concepts and *actual gameplay-logic* up my sleeve, but they didn't make it to the current iteration. One of the scrapped features would've been a **Transducer** which would alter the **Signal** when put in between the **Transmitter** and **Receiver.** The **Receiver's** "frequency-band" would've also been adjustable.
The **.MFA** -source is a project file of [Clickteam Fusion.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clickteam#Clickteam_Fusion_2.5) I might make a more in-depth post regarding technicalities and the planning process later.
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@mavvy @alexandr-gerya You guys played it exactly the right way! Mashing buttons and turning knobs is the way to go. The comparison to synths isn't that far off, even though Fusion can't generate raw wave-forms. :musical_keyboard:
Under the hood there are three very short waveform-samples looping and their frequency (Hz) is altered by turning the knobs. :speaker: I thought of an additional feature where you could load your own audio-samples or perhaps record them at the fly. :microphone2:
Originally the displayed numbers were hidden indicators to help myself in testing and debugging, but I decided to put them on display in their own panel. If I'll ever decide to touch the project again I might add proper explanations or perhaps even overhaul the whole interface.
BTW: There's a hidden **DEBUG-**feature you can access by pressing **ยง.** It makes the hidden "anchor-signal" visible, and spawns a red cursor you can control by arrow keys. When you press **TAB** all the signals start following it. I think I had an actual purpose in mind for it in the early stage. But in its current state it only servers as a fun curiosity.
Signal2_B_Short2E.gif
This GIF is a capture from an earlier build before the end of COMPO.
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@wouter52 Good to hear you managed to run it on a VM. I'm a Linux-guy myself, so I use [WINE](https://www.winehq.org/) and [Proton.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proton_(software) Fusion doesn't have a native Linux-support yet, but I hear it's finally on the horizon!
@rexpeppers might also want to consider a Virtual Machine or WINE if you ever want to run Windows-software on a macOS.
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@sudocoffee You're absolutely correct that the signal-graph can be used as a kind of a "painting"-device. The basic functionality was quite easy to implement, but I didn't have time to tweak, polish or utilize it in a very meaningful way. Glad that you took note of it!
I have a few ideas how it could be improved and perhaps utilized further.
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Thank you everyone who came by and tried my weird creation! :radio: :ear:
Never stop (signal) jamming!
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