FoonLudum Dare ExplorerLD59 → Send the Signal

Send the Signal

By pavel-goncharov

View on ldjam.com

CategoryRankScoreCount
Overall6783.1662
Fun5173.2562
Innovation8042.4662
Theme7962.4862
Graphics6913.0362
Audio5102.8661
Humor6252.1051
Mood7482.9360

Comments

takhomasac 2026-04-21 02:17

funky movement and fun sounds! nicely done!

kayrum 2026-04-21 02:17

The controls feel good and I love the screen looping. A great game of balance especially in the beginning.

mostlikely 2026-04-21 02:20

I really like this game. I think you scoped it very well and made the small amount of gameplay polished and fun. The controls are really nice, it feels great to move around & I instantly knew how to play.

theparticularpixel 2026-04-21 02:22

a couple minutes of fun! the upgrades were cool, i liked that it kept progression between runs. i got my bomb explosion nice and big :) i liked the screen wrap around, you had to be careful not to run into asteroids on the opposite side. music and sfx were simple but fit with the style. the secret level was a nice little addition, but some more variety to the level layouts and asteroid sizes would have been cool. also sometimes the asteroids would float off screen and take too long to come back and i would run out of time. overall a nice little game. i sent the signal!

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jianghekai 2026-04-21 02:24

The trailing effect is very good, but the mouse steering is generally excessive, the upgrade is enjoyable, and the content is slightly lacking.

ofoof 2026-04-21 02:26

This game ended up being really fun to play. At first I did have some trouble with knowing if the bomb connected or not, since it only clears the asteroids at the of the explosion frames when its in it, sometimes an asteroid would pass through the explosion without getting removed. I would also like to see a way to increase asteroid spawns/ have them spawn new ones from the sides, since after a few bomb upgrades I often felt like I was waiting around for the level to run out of time after everything was cleared. I really liked how the upgrade progression felt, and once I got the hang of things I wanted to keep going until I maxxed out all my upgrades.

matso 2026-04-21 02:28

Nice little Asterouge-like. I enjoyed my 10-15 min playthrough. Sense of progression with the max bombs by the end was satisfying! Good Stuff!

pipetto 2026-04-21 04:26

A simple and enjoyable classic mechanic—I really like it

tanjou 2026-04-21 10:16

I really like the movement! Gameplay loop is simple but good

mtwhateverest 2026-04-21 14:13

Great job on your first game jam! Game was fun to play

kintsugi 2026-04-22 00:50

cosy and sweet game! GJ!

pavel-goncharov 2026-04-22 05:51

@jianghekai - Thank you for the feedback, next time I will add steering settings!

pavel-goncharov 2026-04-22 05:52

@theparticularpixel Thank you for playing and reach to the end! Totaly agree with your suggestions!

pavel-goncharov 2026-04-22 05:53

@matso - Thanks for playing and reach to the end!

pavel-goncharov 2026-04-22 05:54

@mostlikely - I especially aimed for short, but complete game. Thank you for the feedback!

ufen 2026-04-22 07:11

I like your game so much! It’s a lot of fun. Well done!

pavel-goncharov 2026-04-22 07:59

@ufen Thank you for your feedback!

nadan 2026-04-22 08:48

Oooh, what a nice game! Really enjoyed this one (even though controls could be a bit more intuitive), congrats on first jam entry! :thumbsup:

splix 2026-04-22 09:32

The game is fun, with great music, cool visuals, and a really good interface too. On the other hand, I find the vehicle controls complicated— it’s hard to be precise. Wouldn’t it be better if, when you press to go left or right, the ship stays stationary and only the rotation changes, and when you press to go backward, the ship moves backward without changing its rotation? In any case, these are just details, but the game is still very good for a Game Jam, well done!,

nidoprince 2026-04-22 09:49

Enjoyable game with a really good scope. I will say that I found the controls a little off instinctually. Because the rocket takes time to rotate my mind kept wanting me to use a and d to rotate and w to move forward, and so I would crash because my mind would do the wrong inputs. Usually rocket games that have the direction inputs like this one don't have the turn time. I will also say that I found the time upgrade to not be very useful because it was usually a matter of either dying or getting all of the asteroids with 15+ seconds remaining, so I would have preferred to have an upgrade that gave you more asteroids, or let you plant more than one bomb at a time. Regardless, I had fun, and congrats on your first jam!

pavel-goncharov 2026-04-22 09:51

@splix Thank you for your feedback! I did the controls that way to add some challenge, but maybe I did too much 😅 Next time I will try to add alternative control scheme!

pavel-goncharov 2026-04-22 10:23

@nidoprince Thanks for your advice and suggestions!

eden-zorro 2026-04-22 11:09

Great game, and I liked the upgrade system!

(I should have thought of that for my game!)

I think with this type of game, we always think about shooting, so the use of bombs was a twist on expectations.

Good game!

rend 2026-04-22 11:54

At first I found the controls pretty clunky, especially with a keyboard. I would have go with steering+thrust, but in the end you start getting the grasp of it and the game is pretty fun. What I particularly like are the small game design decisions that make it always engaging: having a 3s extra timer to pick up all the resources when you've cleared the screen, the secret rooms, the luck upgrade. It's very well thought for a first game, I'd like to see what you come up with next.

ternarycat 2026-04-22 13:56

on 4th try i understood what to do :) it's really nice concept for long game i believe i will play all next week. p.s. would like more convinient controll, some times i can't move in the right direction

pentagrammal 2026-04-22 16:21

Simple and understandable. Like)

pavel-goncharov 2026-04-22 16:54

@ternarycat, @rend Thank you for the quality feedback! I really appreciate it!

pavel-goncharov 2026-04-22 16:57

@eden-zorro Yes, I thought exactly the same way: it's always lasers or guns in these types of games. What if all you have are bombs? 😃

abiral 2026-04-22 17:27

loved the game, classic art style and overall great experience.

desi 2026-04-22 20:28

super simple but also rly challanging! in a good way ofc :) thanks

2026-04-23 07:38

Cool game—it has the vibe of old-school mobile games. I really liked the well-thought-out upgrade system. For just three days of development, that's a very impressive result.

2026-04-23 13:06

really cute!

lllarso 2026-04-23 15:50

After getting the hang of the controls I really enjoyed this one. The lenght of the game is perfect for this kind of game. I played through the end.

It would be nice if the upgrades would also have a shortcut button like pressing "Enter" for continuing the run.

Nice mechanic, that you collect green "beans" for the upgrades and red "beans" for the signal. The magnet is a great power-up. :)

fassenberg 2026-04-24 14:10

I liked the overall 8-bit vibe of the game. The controls are quite difficult, but you can get used to them. In the end I got into it, and after a couple of upgrades it became really interesting to play.

If the controls were made a bit more comfortable, it would turn into a really great jam game!

schizoid2k 2026-04-24 14:48

I had a little issue with controlling the ship at first, but once I got it, it was very enjoyable. Loved the 80s retro graphics.

loveapplegames 2026-04-25 07:48

This game has potential, it's quite addictive. I think it can be much improved with some relatively simple fixes: - Using bombs instead of bullets is about guessing the enemy trajectory, then why have so many static enemies? - you have no upgrades to get more enemies. At one point you run out of enemies and upgrades don't make sense anymore - collision can be improved, I get killed without touching enemies, and the enemies pass through my explosions

pavel-goncharov 2026-04-25 11:16

@loveapplegames Thank you for the feedback! 1) I just want to make a game not so complex, this is why there is so many static enemies. 2) Agree, just not enough time for implementation 3) Interesting that I never seen this with my testing, thank you.

pavel-goncharov 2026-04-25 11:17

@schizoid2k, @fassenberg, @mariya-l, @abiral - Thank you for the feedback. Really appreciate it!

pavel-goncharov 2026-04-25 11:18

@lllarso - Thank you for spending your time and play through the end!

ditam 2026-04-25 13:06

I swear some of those asteroids were out to get me! I had lots of fun with this one, spent way more time than I thought I would after the first run. I really appreciated "luck" being upgradable :) The controls not rotating with the ship were a bit of a mind-bender, but still, a very polished, fun and all-around impressive entry. Well done!

geeni 2026-04-25 13:31

I love the visual style of this. Excellent retro graphics and audio which goes well with arcade style gameplay. Very good job on that.

Gameplay was fun but i felt like there were little balancing problems with upgrades where i couldnt find any reason to buy anything else than luck as it was easy tho annoying to clear levels even without any other upgrades and if the luck gives you more pinks its the only thing that helps you progress faster (if it doesnt, then well im dumb and made my life hard)

Good job, very nice entry!

2026-04-25 15:01

Nice little game. The signal could have been more expensive though, you can collect 9 pink coins relatively quickly, and it's fun playing the game with maximum bomb and luck upgrades. One thing that can be a tad annoying is that rocks can go off screen slowly, and you cannot see them or hit them until they reappear a few seconds later. That's why I started placing a bomb, collecting what I get and dying immediately. Very fun!

mcbaker 2026-04-25 17:46

Nice twist on the asteroids game.

I encountered some bugs that made the experience a bit worse for me related to asteroid movements: - they bounce off the screen edges, instead of appearing on the other side of the screen. - sometimes they change their direction suddenly in the middle of the screen for some reason. - they also fly out of viewport and become unreachable for a few seconds

I found the controls a bit unintuitive - in the games I played, the up/down arrows meant "speed up/slow down", while left/right were used to turn. The controls in this game took some getting used to.

anszwa 2026-04-25 19:36

Really great game! I had a lot of fun during the playthrough. The upgrades are very motivating and make you want to keep playing.

Most of my feedback is just suggestions for things I would have liked to try out.

- The controls felt a bit unusual at first. I expected W to always move the spaceship forward and A/D to rotate, but I got used to it quickly. Still, it might be worth testing with playtesters. - I would probably make the purple crystals only always spawn at the last asteroid of a level, so you are encouraged to progress through upgrades to complete it. - At the screen edges, its a bit unclear where the level ends because the borders are the same black as the background. Slightly differentiating the color would help make the loop boundary more readable.

But overall this is all high-level feedback. I think you have made a really great game!

discomorphine 2026-04-26 19:26

Good game, cool vibe!

1) Yes, borders... It`s awful and it makes me be scared of using advantages of wall-through moving.

2) I believe, controlls are quite funny, it doesn't have to be comfortable for weak people :)))

3) Music is quite repetative, but very nice.

Liked it!

kr4ft3r 2026-04-29 18:34

A bit odd that the only option in game settings is to turn the music off, for I do not know who would wish to stop these divine digital hums.

The controls are infuriating but hey a lot of things are allowed when making your own game. Good vibes.

pavel-goncharov 2026-05-03 15:51

@geeni - actually you are right, the most valuable upgrades is luck, magnet and maybe 1-3 lvl of bombs.

pavel-goncharov 2026-05-03 15:52

@gabrijel - yes, the offscreen asteroids was my mistake. Will do better next time! Thank you for your feedback!

pavel-goncharov 2026-05-03 15:55

@mcbaker, @anszwa, @discomorphine - Thanks for your feedback and advice!

rubixnoob13 2026-05-05 18:28

The controls feel really nice. I love the pixel art and the beep boop music track! I also was going to suggest making the timer get lower once all the rocks were destroyed, but then noticed it actually did that, so awesome job lol.

I *think* there was a time or 2 where I missed a rock with the bomb, but loot still spawned in the empty space anyway (maybe a rock that wasn't visible but still had collision on, or maybe I imagined it?)

Overall amazing job!

ao-85 2026-05-06 19:17

loved the game, classic art style and overall great experience.

pavel-goncharov 2026-05-08 15:22

@rubixnoob13, @ao-85 - thank you for the feedback!

oadt 2026-05-08 20:05

Cute game with some nice music! The consols were a bit unusual for me (I am used that WASD works relative to the current orientation of the ship in these games) but it was fun getting used to these controls. And the upgrade system was nice. Maybe the drop rate of pink resources could be a bit higher, but overall nice entry!

oadt 2026-05-08 20:05

~~Duplicated post~~