Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → LD59 → Midnight Transmission
By liam
| Category | Rank | Score | Count | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Overall | 230 | 3.14 | 23 | |
| Fun | 243 | 2.81 | 23 | |
| Innovation | 226 | 2.95 | 23 | |
| Theme | 138 | 3.73 | 23 | |
| Graphics | 212 | 3.11 | 23 | |
| Audio | 132 | 3.33 | 23 | |
| Mood | 83 | 3.71 | 23 |
This was fun! It had that childhood bicycle adventure feel to it. I glanced over the instructions too quickly and didn't realize you need three scans before you can find the transmission, so I ended up cycling around the neighborhood for a good while. :D
Nice little game, the triangulation mechanism is quite fun and the overall mood of the game is quite well done too!
@manabreak Thanks for playing! I've bolded that part in the instructions to help others, I knew I should have added something to the feedback like "Scan line locked! 2 more to go!"
Great atmosphere! The music and color scheme create a nice mood.
Appreciate the comments @xwilarg and @oadt, thanks for playing!
I like the mood of this one. On Azerty keyboard, you have to press "," to open the map.
Thanks @julienlussiez, mood praise coming from someone who is very good at creating feelings in their game is nice to hear.
@liam : yes I think it's such an important part of a game. Your game reminds me E.T. or Stranger Things, I like those vibes!
I really like the mood and the music fits perfect. I did notice that I was consistently finding the signal at the intersection of my first two lines, and then I would have to actually get further from the point to send another line. It felt a fully packaged experience though and I enjoyed playing!
Cheers @helslo , I did think the scans could probably be knocked down to 2 since it's a fairly small map but wanted to keep the triangulation vibe going :laughing: I experimented with having two tracks, one with the weirder droning sounds and then the chiller pads, idea was that when you're scanning the drone track intensifies but just didn't have time to get it working.
Very nice game! The visuals and the audio work really well together. You really feel like you are sneaking around town, trying to solve the mystery.
But after collecting 2 transmitters I ran into an agent, and I didn't want to do all of it again.
Really solid and complete entry!
The mood was on point, with the music and graphics very fitting. I spent a lot of time being super slow because I didn't know you could be faster, but enjoyed the game anyway!
Nice concept! Music is cool, and the mood is well done. It's a little bit weird to need multiple lines given that you can just go into the correct direction from the start, I believe it would need something like not being able to locate the signal when too close. Congrats!
Thanks @drtizzle , perhaps I should have made it so the reset just repositioned the transmitter rather than the whole reset (or allowed the reset level to be a difficulty setting). Something to keep in mind for future games. Thanks for playing!
@pimeko This was something I worried about at least once, if I'd had time I would have added a timer that checked if the player was just using the slower speed and sent a tutorial message :face_palm: wish I had now but appreciate the time you spent playing! Cheers!
@yorsh Thank you :grin: Yes, maybe it would have been better if the transmitter was always there and the scan was just a tool to point you in the right direction, then the bg music volume could help pinpoint and use the transmitter visual at the collection. Benefit of hindsight! I need to get playtesters other than myself into my dev timeline :laughing:
Create job setting the mood! The art is really evocative and I think you nailed the atmosphere! The detection radius of the men and black felt a little bit off. I could have sworn I was outside the circle but still got caught? It would have been nice to have an indicator when I am sufficiently far away to scan again! You really nailed the vibe of sneaking around a city you know well taking the backroads and dodging the evil corporation really great work!
Nice game. The music is great, works well with the art style.
@domenixius Cheers! and appreciate you playing :grin: Investigating a little, I should be changing the hitbox when the sprite changes size a bit more, I didn't run into that when playing but I can see how it can happen.
Thanks @harmadillo, not so long ago music was my absolute worst aspect in these jams so glad you think it works.
What a fun game! To be honest, at first I thought "is this all?" but then it became harder and harder when the black-coated men started spawning all over the place! I think you made the right choice there
If I may give a suggestion: maybe the buildings could have been the transmitter-containers where the player actually needed to identify the correct building, instead of placing a green marker on the map?
The music is very well done, it gives the game the right vibe for such mid-night activities
@wouter52 Ta! Always a tough balance, I didn't want to make things too tough because people only have a small amount of time to give to play but felt it needed to ramp up. I hope it's the right degree for the majority for 1 or 2 plays. I really wanted to give the Men In Black a bit of movement as well but had to put that one on the chopping block.
I think the building idea would work and I will explore it a little bit post-jam, I know the game isn't the best but I've got lots of ideas for improvements to try out for fun so will make a post-jam version :smile: Cheers!
Please tag me if you released your post-jam version! I'm intrigued
The atmosphere is really good! However, I couldn’t figure out where I was on the map. I moved around using the arrow keys to try to find where to go, but I still couldn’t get there. The graphics and music are very good!
Nice little adventure. I like the shady men in black catching you (would have been good if they moved around a bit or something, but as you said, you were time constrained). For now, it's at least good that they seem to spawn more over time so they end up being a bit of an obstacle near the end.
The "triangulation" is a bit funny if you think about it - triangulation is normally required to determine a point in space given that you know its distance (but not angle) from three other points. In this case, you know the angle, but not the distance, and it's in 2D, which means you can find the point with just two scans. The third is just a confirmation (and helps narrow down the inaccuracy of the first two scans). But I did find myself getting a bit annoyed having to find a spot for the third scan, given I already knew roughly where it was from the intersection of the first two. Perhaps only require two scans, but reduce the tolerance for the angle (so I am required to be quite accurate on the first two scans). And also build in a middle colour which is "close but not good enough to lock in".
Cool story about kids on bikes trying to make contact while avoiding authority! The vibe of the music and art fits with the theme, and I liked the walkie-talkie sound.
I didn't quite understand at first that I needed to lock in the lines, and I manually triangulated the first one. Standing on the spot, I then realized about locking in, but the game told me that I needed to move further away to scan, so I had to leave the target area in order to re-discover it from further the way the game wanted me to.
Otherwise a really smooth experience! The bike was much nicer than walking. Nice entry!
@frowsyfrog Yes, I think that's a potential problem for players. I think in a more developed version it would be good to have landmarks and such to help align the map with the world, in the compo it would have been good to just get the shapes of the buildings on there + the roads. Thanks for playing!
@matt-giuca Yes, 100% agree on those points. I'll be totally honest, I didn't really think to much about the real world triangulation. I sketched out the idea and knew you need three checks for real world triangulation, I did have what must be a more realistic algorithm running initially but when playtesting I realised that it was such a small play area that I needed to put some constraints about where the player could scan to mimic how it would work if this was a real challenge. Of course it really breaks down, has flaws and I think it can done better! Appreciate the ideas and comment!
(and I do really wish I'd gone with 2 scan lines or 1 + audio clues but hindsight is 20/20 :laughing: )
@pkenney Thanks! Walkie talkie sound your finest Audacity noise generation + tweaking :grin: Definitely think the feedback from the other members of the gang could have added a few extra bits in place of a more involved initial tutorial so agree it was a bit janky with the map.
Hi. Here's your 20th rating :) It was easy to figure out what to do, and a nice little puzzle. I was way more exited when the puffs of dust appeared behind the bike when going fast than I would ever admit openly, haha! Same advice about the triangulation than Matt Giuca.
@gideongriebenow :tada: Cheers! :tada: Gotta add a bit of the ol' particle effects if it makes sense :grin: Thanks for playing!
Pretty nice, managed to beat it. I liked the music, it was very thematic.
Pretty cool little game! Triangulation feels like a pretty good mechanic, and it's executed well too. Those damned Men in Black managed to catch me a couple of times (I risked too much and I paid for it :P), but I eventually managed to go around them.
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Artstyle is great, and the creepy background music reinforces the mysteriousness of it all. Mechanically it's also pretty good. One thing I think I might have changed is adding some more granularity to your speed control, but since the game isn't too difficult as it is, it's not such a big issue.
Overall, it's a pretty solid compo game, nicely done!
@quackqack Thanks for playing, super half the theme resonated!
@LCStark good stuff! Yup, early on I wanted to have more acceleration/deceleration and it would have added a little magic for sure. Ta!