Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → Users → alts
| Year | LD | Theme | Game | Division | Rank | Ov | Fu | In | Th | Gr | Au | Hu | Mo | Co | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2013 | 27 | 10 Seconds | Terminal 10 | compo | 142 | 3.57 | 3.73 | 3.58 | 3.78 | 3.26 | 2.38 | 4.05 | 3.24 | 100 | |
| 2013 | 26 | Minimalism | qob | compo | 619 | 3.11 | 2.92 | 3.83 | 3.67 | 2.63 | 1.58 | 1.62 | 2.38 | 100 |
I don't personally see the minimalism <-> OCD connection, but I find this entry really amusing. The actual feel of pushing the furniture around feels a bit clumsy, but I feel like this game is more about the scenario than the actual mechanic, and it plays that well.
I would have liked to play more than I did, but I was blocked by what appeared to be some performance issues. As soon as the fireworks went off, my framerate dropped from ~66 to 15, after whcih things seemed not to work as expected. The blocks that have to be pushed all but refused to move. I managed to budge it just enough that I could clear a wall, but the next level asked me to do the same, and I couldn't do it.
This is a wonderful game, well done. It isn't often that I think this, but this game would benefit a lot from a joystick/analog stick. Mouse controls in a windows setting are frustrating at best. I also felt like occasionally loops would send me backtracking, which, because of the controls, felt a bit unfair. Other than that one nitpick, I found myself really engrossed by the game. Great work.
I really like the idea of matching audio cues to progress, and even the platformer mechanics wrapping it. I found process of deducing the right tone to be frustrating though. It had less to do with backtracking, and more to do with the process of manually searching. It's akin to playing the card game Memory (which I'd argue is a negative). I'm sure there are ways to present this mechanic where it can fully be explored. I just don't think this is it.
Had some performance issues with the game on OSX 10.6. Also couldn't manage to place any blocks.
Good to see another multiplayer game submitted. I think these sorts of games have a lot of potential, but benefit a lot from frantic action. The force bar here changes the pace of the game to be much more methodical, and I'm not sure if that suits the mechanics well. A bug note: it looks like player 2 doesn't need to colorize the ball for it to register as a goal.
Really impressed with this for only 4 hours of work. Some of my playthroughs would be strangely devoid of certain resources (like cannonballs). Never felt bad about "losing". Nice game. I imagine you were hoping for Pirate Life to win the theme?
I don't think I've ever seen a one button game quite like this. Well done. It took a little while to understand quite how it worked (as your point #2 mentioned).
You've acknowledged issues about the controls, so I won't say any more. I would definitely like to see more maps bundled with the game. I think some clever level design could really dive deep into the more interesting consequences of the charge / door mechanics.
This is incredible. I managed to created the perfect painting, and refused to sell it. After a few near perfects, I explored the depths of the irredeemable. Couldn't manage to get 3 full red bars. There is something here that works very well, and I can't quite pinpoint it.
This is fantastic. Well done. I was confused at first about how to play, but a couple of attempts and I figured it out. The audio cues are spectacular. The only thing I'd change is that once the screen starts to fill up, it becomes hard to see the projectiles, since they're obscured. The audio cues let you know the spacing between projectiles, but not the moment that the first on will arrive, and often the speed paired with the small clearing makes it really easy to miss that first one. Otherwise excellent entry. Good luck!
I'll echo the comments about the commands. I just remembered what keys were used, and cycled through them when I wanted to find something. I'm not too hung about about the fact that it isn't a game. It doesn't really claim to be.
I was baffled by the game for a little while playing it. I couldn't manage to get anything interesting to happen. It was only by chance that I decided to make the two blob strike eachother. The premise, once discovered, it really interesting, and I can imagine much more interesting and complex puzzles (conflicting with the theme perhaps) to be build around this mechanic. Good job.
This is excellent. It took me a while to figure out the controls, but once I got the hang of it I really enjoyed navigating the maze. I'm still not sure how I feel about the static movement. On one hand, it helps to be so audio focused, but without directions, and without helping guide the player in the direction of static = wall, it's easy to get lost. Fantastic work.
The game is minimal in all senses except that help screen. I think the help screen elevates this to the status of performance art. Well done.
Interesting world. The visual effect of having all of the walls be the same color regardless of direction provided a nice sense of disorientation (in my mind, a good thing). I started to get some performance problems (macbook pro) around the point where the twist occurs, and that made executing some of the jumps trickier than it was intended.
I'm a little embarrassed by how long it took me to realize what the silhouettes were. I appreciate the extreme approach the the theme. As others have mentioned, some framework for meaningful interaction would have been nice.
The premise isn't very original. The implementation does fit the theme well, and I was a fan of the icons used. The jumping felt floaty, which isn't a good feeling when, at later points in the game, precise jumping is critical. I couldn't tell at first if the sound was generative or not. I think it might be interesting to use the sound to telegraph upcoming obstacles.
The jumping powerup doesn't quite work as expected. I could jump even without picking it up. While playing, I noticed that the jumping is a bit unorthodox, and though it might be interesting to base the game around that. Particularly mid-air jumps and multiple jumps per fall. I think that you could build some really interesting levels around what you have now.
I really like how the crushers provide "music" for the game, and how some screens seemed to, perhaps inadvertently, use polyrhythms. The one pixel character was confusing at first, and I had to clean my screen to figure out what was actually happening.
Congrats on your first Ludum Dare entry. I have a few comments that I wanted to make. It asks the player to do the impossible: create black on black. The best a player can hope to get is orange, and the screenshots are misleading. Was that intentional? Also, it feels weird to offer a score when the maximum possible score is based primarily on the granularity of the grid. Scores can't really be compared if the configurations are not consistent.
Congrats on your first Ludum Dare. Nice groundwork here for something more developed. I really liked the aesthetic of the intro screen. Something about the color choice and font. I was taken aback by my square hitting the top of the screen. I guess I've always taken for granted that in platformers the character can rise above the screen.
Interesting game. I appreciated that, with the exception of the first switch, the player's progress is never impeded. I was very confused for some time, and even now after having completed it, I think I'm still confused.
There are two classes of findable objects in the game. Invisible ones and purple ones. I don't know what unique properties belong to each, nor what the consequences of finding them are. I had four visible pieces at the end of the game, so I guess all of them were pieces? If so, I don't know how I feel about searching the world for invisible blocks. Strikes me as a bit unfair to ask that of the player.
Cool to see another game about pivots and rotation. Finished the game. I didn't feel confident until the end of the last puzzle about when or why a move would work with X nodes. Up until that point it was quite fun working through the puzzles. 9 I ended up winning just on a desperate guess. I suppose I didn't properly figure out the rules by that point.
Fantastic game. As others have said, it's only marred why weird unresponsiveness. i found myself having to use multiple keys because rapid key presses weren't being registered as distinct. Other than that, great visual presentation, and great embodiment of the theme.
Really impressed with the animation. The polish around the RPS mechanic simultaneously hides it, and eliminates potential grievances against it (especially with the attack pattern breakdown after death).
Fun game. The addition of double jump greatly expanded the number of strategies for actually surviving in the game. I'd be interested to see how the game plays if you could jump onto a block while it's falling and not be hurt. Additionally, a way to give up when you get stuck in a pit would be nice. Good work.
I like the idea of making a game around simplification of the control scheme. I feel like the game really shined when all keys were eliminated but 'up'. It just felt like it took a long time to get to that point. I also feel like there were some consequences of 'no left' that could have been explored that weren't. Lots the expand upon here. Great work.
Thanks Ragzouken. I had though about highlight the stones that would potentially be moved. I worried that that would encourage players to just click around. I think it's ultimately the right idea, but I need to think of a way to incorporate it without changing the flow of play.
Very fun. It's nice to see the chaotic nature of physics systems highlighted as a game feature. I'm pretty terrible at the game, but it plays great.
I'm impressed by the game given the 1D constraints. Well done. I, like a couple other people, it seems, was confused by the rapidly toggling switches. The audio when stepping on those pointed more towards it being a bug or a broken button than undoing previously pushed buttons. I think there is a lot of potential to be explored in a 1D sidescroller
Wow, this is a great take on RPS. I was stupidly just trying to keep the cycle in my heart. Took me a few turns to notice the color cues. Great entry.
I think this game has an interesting premise. Unfortunately it's opaque to anyone not familiar with the subject matter. I think this game could, with appropriate concessions, help instruct the player to instinctively understand what is being sought. The first change I'd make is to remove resetting to level 0. I think it's overly punitive. Then I'd preserve the original row built at the beginning so that the player has something to refer to. On level 1, when they see one color (the first color) match, I think they'd understand what is being asked, and the pattern of levels referring to the original will be established. I think with some more time, this could be made into a really compelling experience.
Wish I had a mobile device to play this on. Enjoyed it quite a bit. I like the idea of a navigating a maze with imperfect information (limited view and direct distance measurement). I think the bomb might actually be extraneous, so long as levels are generated in such a way to ensure that all tiles can be reached.
Cool game. The only hitch that I ran into, that's especially bothersome in timed mode, is that the selected block is very sensitive to collisions, which sometimes made navigating tights spots difficult against the clock. Otherwise, great work.
Congratulations on your first solo LD entry. Even if it didn't go quite as expected. I think this can serve as the basis of something rather good. I'd imagine there being some sort of goal object you need to pick up (in a similar way to how reds are picked up), but the player would have to scope out the area and lead reds away from the escape path before making an attempt on the goal object.
Well done. I jumped into the game immediately (HTML5 version) without reading your description, and was baffled by the "folding" mechanic, since all it seemed to do was freeze the player. Once I was forced to use it in the fifth puzzle, it all came together, and made the standard sliding puzzles far more interesting. Do wish completing a level took me to the next one rather than the first page of the menu screen.
Interesting game. Best I've done is 18/19 lit. I feel like there are two distinct games in here, and they combine strangely. At first it's unclear whether the goal is to survive longer, or to light the world. I feel like both sides can be developed further in isolation, but when merged, certain attributes can never be explored.
This is a fascinating inversion of Twine's "place" in games, and when paired with the theme really harkens back to Hypercard. Really excellent work.
I like the idea of rides at a theme park each being its own mini-game. Unfortunately, I was rather terrible at all of the games, and couldn't get too far.
The graphics are excellent. They're probably the most minimalist aspect of the game. To adhere to the theme, I'd personally remove the shop, and try to make the skill element of defending the castle more engaging.
Fun game. Impressive how just switching between two colors for two objects can be so tricky. I appreciated the keyboard controls. I wonder if switching the left-right mapping would have made the game any easier.
Very interesting idea. I'm pretty terrible at it, though. Made me feel like a cultural outlier.
Congratulations on your first LD entry. Things get easier the more games you make. I like the idea here. I feel like once static arrives, though, it's basically game over, and the player can only do so much to help. Perhaps that's the goal, but I was left feeling like I didn't have much of an impact once I'd let a tile fail.
Congratulations on your first Ludum Dare entry. I really enjoyed the premise, and the symmetry present, particularly making your enemies' weaknesses your own. I played for a while before destroying every enemy (close quarters explosion) except for one. I actually found that a rather poignant ending, given that I couldn't overload or absorb the enemy without succumbing to the opposite fate.
The instructions screen passed by very quickly, so my first few sessions were failures. I had to read the instructions here to figure out how to play.
This is fantastic. Great job, and well done given this is your first try with Lua and Love. The controls took a while to get used to, and the visuals don't match the controls. That aside, the game is run (if frustrating) and an excellent manifestation of the theme. I've yet to actually complete a level, but I'm trying. Great work.
Congratulations on your first Ludum Dare entry. I liked this quite a bit. I was confused at first by the notion of mixing, but once I understood that the gates had two "keys", and that I wasn't mixing my own color, it came together. I think that the mechanics in place are solid, but worry that there might not be much more to the mechanic than what you've explored in the updated version. Play with this a bit and see where it can go. Good job.
This is fantastic. I drifted aimlessly at first, very wary of throwing my spear, as I was told I only had one. Decided to follow some of the sound queues and stumbled upon what it seems is the true objective of the game. I don't want to spoil anything, but the audio was haunting, and hurling my spear into the "dark" to the side of my boat, and hearing it land, was a really exciting moment. Very well done.
Congratulations on your first Ludum Dare entry.
The game is rather simple, but controls quite well. That's often the downfall for game like these developed in a short period of time. Something to consider without adding more things to the game (in conflict with the minimalist theme), would be to increase difficulty more rapidly. Either by increasing the atom speed (as already occurs), or by "minimizing" other features, such as shortening platform sizes, or worsening speed/jump abilities. Something to inspire a sense of challenge in the player.
Congratulations on your first Ludum Dare entry. This is a good base from which to expand. The game visually feels complete, but mechanically isn't quite there yet.
I liked the way that the improving enemy would force the player to reestablish a pattern to solve the level. While I think restarting from the beginning is a bit harsh, I wouldn't mind it if I felt that losing was fair. I found myself wrestling with the controls more that with the enemy. Changing the control configuration away from the default helped greatly.
I like the central mechanic here. I think it can really be expanded upon to make something great. I don't understand why I can empty small block, but not large blocks. Am I missing something? Also, I wasn't able to quite grasp how squares would end up within my frame. I think that if they became bound to the frame as soon as they were enclosed, there would be an additional element of planning to make sure you filled up correctly. Anyway, good job.
The game takes a little while to get into. The early stages of play aren't particularly exciting. As the player starts learning more about the systems in the game, and the fight on the virus gets more frantic, the game really shines. I worry that, because of the short play time a lot will give for LD games, many might not get to that point. The only suggestion for change that I'd make is for controls. I don't necessarily mind the "tank" controls, but it's be great if the snake stopped turning when I left go of left or right, rather than continuing to drift. It made it difficult to target pickups.
Nice work. Good to see a fellow Love user. I was a bit surprised when I beat the third level and found myself back at the third level. I think that a win screen at that point would probably be preferable to potential confusion. The level design (paired with fast respawn) worked well in communicating how the game functions.
105470. Fun game. The theme seems to be arbitrarily inserted into the narrative of the game, and not manifested anywhere else. Regardless, it plays really well. There were only a couple things I encountered that hurt it, in my opinion. The powerup that regenerates terrain necessarily has to be shot for the player to get out, which seems to turn it into a hindrance more than it helps. Was that the point? I also got stuck in a really unpleasant loop where I kept getting frozen by an enemy mid fall.
Really solid game. You're right in that it does play very similarly to a Rubik's cube. Made it to the fourth level, and just couldn't manage. I personally don't feel like Rubik's cubes are very good "games". I found myself progressing through the stages by mentally backtracking. I'm not personally fond of games that effectively ask you to run an algorithm in your head, but I can appreciate that this one is very well made. The lines (vertical and horizontal) as well as the rings communicate things very beautifully. Well done.
Congratulations on having something for your first. This compo is my third attempt, but only my first time completing something. Looking forward to seeing it complete. The only feedback I'd provide has to do with movement. The invisible wall would sometimes mess up my jumps, as I had no visual indicator of where it was, and I'd just recently jumped to get an emerald. Maybe some kind of signal?
I really like the interpretation of the platformer. It was exciting to see the gaps that could only be cleared with short hops. I liked exploring the consequences of the mechanic. I do wish I could "lean" after inhaling, so that when I did jump, I'd jump in a direction. Too many times I accidentally walked off of the ledge.
Beneath the humor, Dream City is a legitimate stripped down interpretation of SimCity. Well done.
Made it to day 19. Amusing game, and I was surprisingly engrossed in it. It seems that Papatofu is never a good business plan though.
This is a rather interesting game. The game rules seem simple enough here that I'm quite interested in building a bot to find strategies. I'll be bookmarking this and playing it for quite a bit.
Just a note, respawning doesn't seem to work in Firefox. Switched to Chrome and it worked. Might want to look into that.
The audio in the game is stellar. The yellow fish is rather difficult to get, and I'm sure catching it would reveal some insipid tidbit about dealing with exactly that kind of adversity. Well done.
Cool game. I stumbled upon the radar effect as well. I thought it strange that the supply pickups are never actually needed (at least not after health has been upgraded to a certain point). There are two orthogonal goals, surviving and picking up supplies. If survival is the player's goals, it's really easy to just turn radar on and sit around. I did that up until day 15 or so, and quit. I think making supply pickups a necessity can be done without the upgrade system (which has a cap on each stat anyway). It'd make the game more fun, and more minimal, I think.
Great game. I haven't gotten past level 5, which seems to be the last level. I think the game really shines when the time sensitive elements are added. As a purely puzzle game, it isn't nearly as engaging. Despite all that, the game doesn't strike me as terribly minimalist. Regardless, great work, and thanks for all your work on and around LOVE.
I appreciated how this game taught me just how long five minutes really is, and how much can be done (or thought) in that period of time.
Interesting game. I was confused at first about how to actually play it, but with some desperate clicking I managed to figure it out. I was a bit disappointed that the lose scenario is so much more interesting that the win scenario. While I don't necessarily want to watch the mouse get mauled by the cat or caught in a trap, it'd be nice to offer some kind of "reward" to the player for having solved the puzzle. I'll be reading through the code to see how you programmed the mouse's pathfinding. Well done.
The combination of being stuck in the lower left corner, and the too generous hitboxes meant that I was annihilating quite a few fish before they'd had to chance to fully swim on screen. It also feels like the incentives to not kill fish aren't strong enough. I managed to get pretty far without "losing" a fish to a fisher by massively depopulating the ocean and then destroying the boat. So long as I killed less than 15 fish before the fisherman, I'd come out positive. Excellent work for one day, though.
As someone else said, the mimetic interactions are great. Hopefully that was intentional. My forearm burns a bit from the rapid keypresses. Got to 10 points before I let myself lose.
The screen shake is incredibly satisfying. The game does begin to feel repetitive after a while. There are two factors at play here, I think. 1) the session length is pretty long relative to the "content" to see. 2) Losing doesn't feel like a failure on my part. Often I'll feel like I got stuck in a situation that I couldn't escape from.
Very serene. I'm still unsure of how I feel about the drift of motion (and bouncing) in a game that demands precision of location. The game looks and sounds wonderful. Well done.
Nice work for your first time with LOVE. The mechanic isn't very novel, but you executed it well here. Besides some occasional visual glitches the game feels very complete. I think you might even benefit from removing the red tiles, and instead make them pits. Makes the game more "minimal" in the sense that it is decluttered, and I'd argue that the red tiles don't add much anyway. I appreciate the gentle ramp up. I think it's just enough so that the player can get into a groove, but is still capable of making a mistake. Good job.
Very pleasant experience. The addition and implementation of checkpoints felt very nice. Reduced some of the frustration due to the movement and collision detection. Those two issues are really the only things that mar this. Otherwise it's quite enjoyable. Good work.
Did you update this? My session didn't look like your screenshots. Fun game. I don't think that mouse controls work all to well for a rotational system, especially where the player moves. I could have my mouse in an "up" position, but then jump, lowering my shield in a way that makes me vulnerable. Given the small set of obstacles, I was expecting to get tired quickly, but the difficulty ramps up at an appropriate pace. Maybe could afford to be a bit faster? Good work.
Interesting application of the theme. I think it's probably the best example I've seen so far of reducing a concept down to its essentials. I was a bit surprised by the ending, as I just had the "omedetou gozaimasu" sound loop as the level kept playing.
The game has potential, but based on my experience, and the comments I'm reading here, there are some usability issues that should be looked at. The concept of minimizing a score while completing some objective (that would typically be in conflict with minimizing score) is intriguing. I don't know that exploration of mandatory powerups is the right angle for it.
This is a really polished and beautiful game. Doesn't feel particularly on-theme, but well done anyway.
Had some difficulty grasping the controls and interactions at first, but once that fell into place things went well. I initially tried flicking the shapes (to no avail), which might be worth considering if you put the game on a touch device. I would add some kind of end screen, so that the player can see their score after they lose. I thought I did well, but had nothing to gauge that by once I lost.
This is a good game, and given different circumstances I feel like it'd be a really excellent entry. Given the minimalist theme, though, I don't know that the game quite fits. Take for example the controls. Four different keys for various spells, and one of those spells is a variant of the main attack. This is the basis of a fantastic game. Just not a minimalist one.
Really enjoy this. At first I was playing it like a survival game, which was satisfying in its own right, but once I discovered the ability to destroy the obstacles, it really impressed. The game is beautiful and constrained in really interesting ways. Great application of the theme.
I like this LD meta-game idea. It's just a shame that it doesn't really incorporate the theme into the primary mechanics of the game.
This is a really interesting game. I haven't actually seen very many timing games yet.
I do think that a score should be visible while playing. Without it it's hard to determine what the best course of action is. Is it always better to type, for example, or should I only type as much as I need to heal? A visible score would help give some feedback to the player. I also don't know if this was just my machine or not, but the timing felt off. I'd press and release the space key with about a half to a quarter second left, and it'd tell me I lost. Perhaps some issue with frame rates?
Really enjoyed this. Other people have mentioned checkpointing, but one thing that I noticed is that we only ever see this robot character from behind. How much more difficult is play if the robot moved in such a way that we saw its face? Things might sometimes be obscured, but that problem already exists now.
I really like the idea of having mechanically distinct play segments like this. I was actually a bit disappointed that the fourth stage was similar to the first (hold down to shoot continuously). I think this would be a good candidate for expansion with some novel shooting mechanics for each stage.
One thing that did confuse me for a while was that the health gauges for you and your enemy appear to be one. Putting the hearts next to the life bar communicates a relationship that doesn't actually exist, and it took me some time to realize what it was that my endurance was measured in.
Like others have said, it's a bit hard. I think it might be made easier by making the camera move faster during the "peek" stage. I felt like I spent too much time trying to find the donkey, before even getting the chance to memorize a path.
Similar to the other critiques, it felt weird to not distinguish between winning and losing. Also strange was that it seemed like I never permanently won. If I tried shooting instead of clicking on a button time would start passing again and more enemies would spawn.
All I could think of while playing this was "Supermarket Sweep". And then I read your journal, and sure enough, you were thinking the same thing. Thank you.
I feel like this game has two ideas that would work independently, but when combined feel a bit weird. The dropping game doesn't need the narrative of the supermarket nor the distinct foods to work well. And the supermarket spree is hampered by the dropping mechanic, which puts limits on how frantic the shopping portion can be. I might split these up into two separate games, and consider how to fill in the gap left by the other in a way that accentuates the strong aspects of each.
This is a really great game. I loved the graphics and really enjoyed the premise as well. The connection to the theme isn't terribly strong, but it works in the end. Fantastic job.
This was really cool. I was only able to make it 9 levels. The puzzle design in particular is nice. There are a lot of different mechanics thrown into the blocks, though, and I wonder if there are more areas to explore for each block type before mixing them up. I feel like this could be easily expanded into a much larger game. I hope you do. Nice work.
Cool game. The controllers felt a bit strange (keyboard and mouse) at first, but I got used to it. Played it solo, but I imagine it'd be a lot of fun with more people. And it'd help since I'm pretty trash at tower defense games.
Calls to mind The Price is Right, and a "game" I'd often play as a child of trying to stop a stopwatch at some exact number of seconds. Something that surprised me was that I found it hard to internally count down seconds because of the strong beat of the background music.
Nice game. Not a very strong usage of the theme, though.
This is the first game to ever give me the sensation of motion sickness. And I didn't even play it on the oculus. I think I "won" insofar as the game is "winnable". Nice work.
Wonderful game. The graphics and audio are excellent. What really makes this game is the block cycling. Block lifting and cycling are both orthogonal actions that can combine in a really complex way to give some territory for mastery (similar to Lift & Kick in Wario's Woods).
The game is great as is. There are only a few recommendations I'd make. Combos (both in the sense of sequences greater than 3, and cascading matches) should provide some benefit. A combo mechanic that I really like is that of Kirby's Star Stacker, where temporary blocks fall after combos, allowing for greater chains, but then not persisting if there was no match. I'd also like unbounded movement speed. I felt like at times I couldn't escape from falling rows because I couldn't move fast enough.
Really nice game. Great work.
I really like the idea of the enemy evolution mechanic. I just wish I lived long enough to see what was after dinosaur level 2.
Cool game. I "beat the tutorial" and got a score of circle, which I suspect is way worse than a decagon.
I never ended up remembering what combination of elements did what, so I would end up just bashing keys. I also never totally learned how switching atoms worked. That is, I was never sure what would happen when I pushed on of the number keys (which would be swapped with the number I'd pressed?)
I think this element combination system could be really fun. A problem is that the way that the powers are taught to the player doesn't require any sort of comprehension. As a result, I think it might be less effective than just listing the powers up front, because combining it with play in this way distracts from learning the rules.
I'd like to see a version of this without the time limit, and with more levels. Bravo on the level editor, by the way. Not an easy feat in a jam.
I'm impressed that you had time to port the game to Python. I am, however, surprised that the game performs better in Python than AS3. I wouldn't have expected that.
Despite being incomplete, the primary interaction felt nice, and the potential for "herding" games with it seemed interesting.
I really like this assassination system. A couple suggestions I might consider:
Gentler transitions between stages. It was very abrupt, and I was surprised the first time I killed the wrong person, since I'd never had time to see a body fall.
There is a draw order problem, where sometimes people will appear behind the face of your target. This made it really difficult for me to find someone once.
Nice work, and I'm really impressed with the face generation.
This is a great way to give a narrative to a time limit that is so arbitrary in other games. The music and graphics are also strangely misplaced (in a good way) with a game about hunting humans. Great work, and I love the voiceovers.
I like the idea of converting these strategy games into digestible 10 second segments. I think with very clear tactical decisions (even if simplified to something like Rock-Paper-Scissors), this could work really well. As it stands now, I have no clue as to how to devise a better attack plan, and the third battle seems impossible.
Excellent work. This feels really great. My only suggestions would be to drop the concept of lives, and to change the font in the center. On my first play through, I got the character "O", which in this font is a square. I had no clue what to do.
Also, just so you know, I got to a stage where both circles were the same letter, which made the level impossible.
Excellent game, otherwise. Nice work.
I really enjoyed this. I haven't seen logic circuits "gamified" before, and this really nails it. I made it about 12 bombs in before I messed up on a NOT gate. Very well done. The only problems I had were with regards to precision of cutting. I wasn't sure how to best input those actions. Great work.
Game played really nicely. I do think it could have benefited from a rating system of some kind beyond the binary "you got it" vs "you didn't". Something akin to Pokemon Snap's breakdown based on Size, Pose, and Technique. Nice work.
Ignoring the character's speed, it's apparent that a lot of effort has been put into making motion feel really good in this game. It's just a shame that that motion isn't put to use towards something a bit more engaging. A potential idea might be reducing the number of scrolls to just one, and focusing on _escaping_ with the scroll. Perhaps lay traps on the way to the scroll, and grabbing the scroll triggers the appearance of enemies? Just some thoughts about how to better highlight the movement you've created.
I like the narrative device of a "I'm still alive" button. I don't think the mines are an effective obstacle, since they don't seem to be predictable at all. That results in deaths being a matter of luck more than actual failure, and that's sometimes frustrating.
Nice premise. I also really liked the clean visual style. I do wonder if mouse controls were the best option for this game. I feel like mousing over the tile I wanted to jump to was more difficult than the decision of where to jump.
Wow, never would have expected a haiku generator. Really appreciated that all of the menu elements were themselves haiku, and that the countdown was a usable element. The game, unfortunately, isn't very fun until you finally do manage to succeed, and that's not an easy feat. "Phenomenology dog" indeed.
High score of 13.
This game is fantastic. Besides the font choices, I loved the visuals. I played a couple rounds not focusing on the chopping bar, because I wanted to watch myself chop. I wish that the chopping bar were closer to the visual action. It's one of the only flaws in this game. Excellent work.
This game is adorable. It's got a very EYEZMAZE-style feel to it (eyezmaze.com). The only drawback is that sometimes the trial and error nature of the game becomes very obvious. Great work, I'd really like to see this built upon in some way.
Hm, dropbox was having some issues. They seem to be resolved now, though. Sorry about that!
I am terrible at RTS games, and got wrecked by the AI. I'm sure bad players like me would have appreciate either an introduction to the mechanics, or a more gentle difficulty curve. There does appear to be quite a bit, mechanically, going on in this game, and I'm really impressed. The sprites are all also really nice.
I didn't read the instructions, so I made it past the castle walls without knowing how to shoot. Even now knowing how to shoot, I'm not sure I know how to get much further than that. I also want to echo was josefnpat said. All of the controls are keyboard based. Requiring mouse interactions for (re)starting feels strange since nothing else requires it.
I'm not sure how I'd categorize this, but I'm happy to see any work that's inspired by Melt Banana.
Great game. Ignoring the theme integration, everything about this game was really well done. I would have appreciated more variety in the campaign cards (and maybe more wood puns), but considering the time constraints, I'm really impressed.
This is a beautiful game, and it's a shame that so few people have played it. I made some windows builds so that there is one fewer reason.
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/160744984/formscape_win32.zip
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/160744984/formscape_win64.zip
I also had some technical issues with the game. When I would pick up a bullet, the game would momentarily stall. One time it hung the game completely. I was able to trace it to the `play_touc` function. Not sure why, but if I comment it out, the game runs perfectly.
Personally couldn't get beyond Level 3. I'm just not very good at this kind of game.
I think the game might be made a bit more interesting if there were a trade-off that the player had to make with respect to getting more time and killing enemies. Right now, killing enemies is the obvious best approach, since it makes it easier to survive, and will provide extra time. Might be interesting to mix that up a bit.
Defused 6 of 12. I enjoyed all of the more atypical riddles. Some of these riddles were really difficult to read/solve in the allotted time. I'd also drop the mouse control requirements, and just use the keys you already depend on (arrows & space).
Wow. This was really great. I had some difficulty understanding how things worked (and that I'd "lost" at first). The stress from trying to type things fast enough while reading really seemed to enhance the text. This felt incredibly unique, and a great example of some atypical interactive fiction. I really enjoyed it. The only critiques I could give are more writing critiques, and I feel like I'm not really capable of doing that. Well done, and thanks.
Mechanically very simple. I really live what you're doing with the blend modes in the background. It looks really nice.
Nice reading of the theme. There is at least one other dueling game out there. I did find it a bit difficult, in that the random jittering of the cursor seemed to be greater than the size of the head at times. Made winning (after several tries) feel more like luck than skill.
Was able to get a perfect score through a bit of an exploit. Otherwise 18 seconds is my best.
I really appreciated the unification of controls here. Specifically, that everything was controlled by the mouse. That and that the balancing between speed and hitting mines felt really good. If it weren't for the exploits, thi would be mechanically really solid. Nice work.
This is an excellent entry. I feel like its biggest failing is the lack of a simple "restart" button. It took me several tries to finally get it to work, and something about manually restarting felt wrong. The graphics and audio were great, and the puzzles were refreshingly different from the completely improbable things you'd encounter in other point and clicks. Nice use of the theme, great work overall.
First, both the hand drawn style of the visuals and the music are wonderful. The absurdity of the situation is really amplified by the cheesy spy music.
The mechanic at the heart of the game is certainly unique. I did find myself getting caught in a loop where I'd flood a room that happened to be near a spy, they'd leave their room, and then I'd finally have time to fill that one. Eventually lingering just long enough for my sharks to catch up. Oh, and I couldn't resist flooding my own room at my first opportunity. I have SCUBA gear!
Nice work.
Excellent premise for a game. Nice way to incorporate the theme. Can you actually collide with the stands? Only suggestions I can think of are a satisfying splat sound if you hit the train after the doors close, and maybe replacing the green tiles with slow crowds. Well done.
I did appreciate that changes to the maze would persist lives, and that the game wasn't punitive at all with regards to death. Nice work.
There is a solid core of a game here. Because this is such a well explored area in games, though, issues that would be small (e.g. upgrade balancing) become more apparent since there are so many examples out there to draw from. Made it to round 50 before quitting.
The game world was very pretty, and the fail/death animation was actually a lot of fun to watch. I might keep the arrow (or some other indicator a la Pixeljunk Eden) to let me know what direction to head for more time. Once battles start, I get a bit distracted and forget which direction I should head.
This game is really cool. I love the idea. Reminiscent of Trine. Well done.
The only problem I had is that I ran into quite a few bugs. Characters falling through platforms (sometimes to my advantage). One time the wizard just couldn't shoot magic, which ended up ruining the whole run. Polished up I think this could be a really great game.
The flat visual style is quite nice. I do wish that there was a bit more feedback into how I was doing. The face at the end really only seems to reflect where I end up at the end of ten seconds, ignoring all that preceded it.
I love the idea of sports game as tactical strategy. I'd only seen it elsewhere in Frozen Endzone. The biggest thing missing here is some polish. Moving from one stage to the next, for example, and maybe the ability to queue moves (or automatic pausing once a player reaches an endpoint). I'd love to see this developed further. Nice work, and congrats on your first LD.
Given the fast-paced nature of the game, and the likely short attention span of ludum dare players, I think it might have been good to vary the enemies/rooms earlier in the game. Things pick up considerably one you get past the first 6 rooms or so, but I worry that most players won't ever find that. This is a cool game, there are just a couple suggestions I'd make. First, don't make the blue markers (the ones that extend time) fade away. There is often a cost to going after them anyway, since it takes time to even reach them. Second, I'd sometimes enter rooms that had a laser shooting down right past the entrance I'd come through, and I'd die. Having those really can kill the pacing of the game, since it forces me to cautiously enter rooms. Long comment. Sorry. Good work.
Nice music. I really appreciated the rhythmic consistency of the elements in the world. From what I could tell, the game lacked any sort of difficulty ramp up (of perhaps I'm just not good enough to make it that far) which can result in things stating to feel a bit stagnant. Nice work. High score: 59.
Congratulations on your first Ludum Dare entry. That's quite an achievement on its own.
Others have talked about the controls, as predictable and responsive controls are critical to this kind of game. A different observation of the controls was that I had quite a bit of difficulty mentally unmapping WASD from movement, so I'd start to shoot in the direction that I actually needed to move. I'm not sure how twin-stick shooters typically handle keyboard input, but perhaps something to keep in mind?
To expand upon what wally said, I feel like the "space to pass time" is sort of unnecessary. Time is only allowed to flow in order to interact with things. I feel like it could have been streamlines by deducting only as much time as is necessary to complete an action. Perhaps you did want to explore the challenge of timing the space-click-space gesture, but I feel like it doesn't illuminate anything within the game.
Outside of that, really nice work. Far more puzzle game than roguelike. I don't think I'd ever seen "10% slower passage of time" as a bonus before.
Game doesn't work for me. The problem seems to be that 1280x1024 is not a valid resolution for my screen, and Love aborts after failing to find a screen mode. I changed the conf file to not render fullscreen, and finally I was able to get into the game, but because of the forced 1024 lines of vertical resolution, I couldn't play (buttons are beyond the end of my screen).
Wow, this feels really polished. Made it to wave 56 with 5 lives left before I quit. I feel like it could use a bit more challenge or a faster pace to keep me really interested. One other recommendation is having a dedicated HUD area. Having enemies and bullets behind text is kind of upset.
Other than that, this is a really well executed game. Good job. Really impressed with the bullet patterns too.
I was confused at first as to what ship was actually mine. There were a few mechanics that weren't clearly explained, and some even now I still am not sure about. The movement of the ship, once I understood who I was, felt nice.
The walking motion started to feel weirdly natural after a few levels, which was a big surprise. Had some flashbacks of playing Spin Doctor. Really like the spin-walking mechanic. Nice work. The game feels mechanically pretty complete. Only recommendation is to revisit it for a visual/audio upgrade. Nice work.
I really like the idea of corruption or infestation every 10 seconds (rather than a hard time limit). The puzzle design got frustrating at "Everyone loves barrels" and the level before it. That's around when I quit. Barrel pushing wasn't fun, and I didn't like the trial-and-error aspect of the level before.
I love the graphics. The only thing I might change is for the world to be similarly hand drawn. Its lines are too straight.
The mechanics itself aren't terribly innovative. It's a memory game. And it's unclear what you're supposed to do at first, but the game has enough charming details to really lift it. The faces of the characters. The way they jump into the pit if you fail. This is a really cute game. Well done.
Rather confusing. I couldn't tell what would trigger failure nor what would trigger success. I figured that the blue square was the goal, but it wasn't at all generous with deciding when you're on the goal or not.
The sprites are wonderfully absurd (Lancelot's high kick!). Well done. I do feel like asynchronous fighting games, as a while, are missing something to make them engaging. It ends up feeling very rock-paper-scissors-esque, which isn't the most exciting of systems.
Congratulations on your first Ludum Dare entry. This is a really cute game. As others mentioned, there are a few "timeline" oriented games (e.g. http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-27/?action=preview&uid=17708), but this one seems to be a bit more flexible than the others I've seen. Nice work.
Interesting game. It took me a while to figure out which end to point at the planet. Felt a bit dumb.
This game has the unfortunate property of the optimal strategy being the least interesting one. If you barely use any fuel, and simply wait to arrive near a planet, not only do you guarantee that you'll have enough time to scan, but you'll have done so with minimal fuel usage.
A way I thought of to make the optimal strategy a more interesting one is to add gravity. Satellite trajectories are often plotted to use gravitational slingshots (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slingshot_effect). These allow for velocity changes without the use of external power supplies. This would nullify the old strategy, as drifting objects wouldn't have enough speed to take advantage of the slingshot effect, and would just be dragged towards to planet (or waste fuel escaping).
Enough rambling. Congrats on your first LD. Nice work.
Nice to see another person made a game about falling out of an airplane without a parachute.
Once I understood the mechanics of the game, it played well. It wasn't obvious to me what the stars did nor that the clouds would slow you down (since there is very little to gauge speed by). I think if those were more clear, it'd be easier to get into.
Nice work, and nice voice acting.
Nice game. Reminded me a lot of Echoshift. I made it to the 11th puzzle before I stopped. I probably would have played longer if there were a way to skip to the next "play" rather than wait the full 10 seconds.
While the mechanic may not be novel, I was really impressed with the quality of the levels. It didn't take long to reach ones that had really elegant approaches. Well done.
Congratulations on your first LD entry. I'm impressed you've managed to make something that feels so complete. It's at the point now where the difficulty curve needs some attention, but well done getting that far.
Nice work. One thing I would consider is adding some degree of punishment. The flashlight only having ten seconds of battery isn't too bad since you can just grope your way around the world to win. If there were things that had to be avoided (pits, etc.), that'd make the battery life more precious.
I really like the mechanics in this game. Is this a known game or did you make it up? Either way, great work for your first LD! This sort of game would really benefit from a 2 player mode, and in fact it might be easier to program that than a rudimentary AI.
The two half circles meeting, and becoming one whole purple circle was such an effective representation of a relationship. I feel like the writing (especially when it reaches particularly self-loathing bits of monologue) could use some work, but the whole narrative constructed around this world really gave it life. Well done.
Very pretty game. I never developed an intuition of how much "tentacle" would be used by moving a certain distance, which made some things difficult, but once the aggressive enemies showed up, I pretty much dropped all regen strategies I'd had. Nice work, and congratulations on your first LD.
The game isn't exactly scary, but the audio is really unnerving. Even the success "sign" sound is creepy. Really well done there.
The matching mechanic would probably work better if I had less technical issues with the game (framerate). I'd often drop several frames and find myself up against a doll that I would have noticed had the framerate been smoother.
One touch I did want to specifically mention that I really enjoyed was that you can't "remember" what color doll you touched if it isn't lit by a lantern. I liked that a lot.
Congratulations on your first LD (I think?). Great work on the music. I liked the premise of the game, but I ended up beating it without ever dropping a light (except for the switches that needed it). I think that perhaps if platforms weren't solid unless illuminated, it'd force the player to use that mechanic, as well as introduce a time element, since lights fading after 10 seconds could be fatal.
There is something about the way the plugs respond to hover and clicks that's just very satisfying. The early hand crafted levels are good. Thing get tricky with the overlapping in the later stages.
The duel at sunrise scene is just beautiful. Not at all what I was expecting from the name and title screen. I found the game a bit easy in that I could try pretty much every option, but I guess I'd rather have that than die and have to start over (beat it on second try after losing to second duelist).
This is a really cool game. Nice work. Everyone else has mentioned the desire for single character replays already, but I think that's really the only thing missing from this game. I did have one weird issue where the Demo failed to kill a turret at the first player, yet when I played through the shield guy's turn as the second player, the shotgun spray was just different enough to kill the turret. Worked out in my favor, but I could imagine it going the other way.
I think this would have been a much better "Parallel Worlds" entry and a "10 seconds" entry. The maze switching is interesting. You're effectively adding a third dimension to the maze.
There are a couple changes I'd consider. First, allow the player the ability to zoom out and _see_ the maze. Traditional mazes typically let you see the exit. This would allow the player to think up a strategy and really engage in the switching mechanic.
Another change I'd consider is to allow the player to select which maze to enter at the next switch. It was frustrating sitting and waiting for a particular maze to come up, and instead get one I don't need.
Nice work.
I think the idea of convincing a player than only ten seconds have passed in some activity is interesting, but would have to be more subtle than this. Time should stretch out much more slowly. I eventually just felt like I was moving through molasses, which is a very different feeling. The long "introduction" is also discourages additional attempts.
I like the mechanic of grinding for money to buy additional time. Given the nature of the game being time constrained, I probably would have added two additional buttons for [use mana potion] and [use potion] rather than having to fiddle with the menu. I wasn't nearly good enough to get down to the lower right corner. Cool game.
Really great game. Also rather hard. I ended up waiting during the feeding stage until the very end, and would just feed one item. Maybe not the best strategy, but the satisfaction level decreases so fast that it's not worth wasting food earlier. Fantastic music.
This is awesome (in the sense of inspiring awe). Thanks.
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/160744984/art.png
Game seems well put together. I don't know how I feel about the combination of a strict time limit and a word game. I feel like the time limit restricts the player form ever getting a sense of what they might be able to do with the board.
This is a really interesting idea. I think it might be more effective if there were rounds (say 5 rounds of 10 seconds). It'd give players a chance to adjust to opponent play styles rather than throw something out there and hope for the best. And as someone else mentioned, this would be perfect for async multiplayer. Looking forward to seeing what comes of this.
Fantastic game. The bugs kind of made it better. Others have mentioned that there is no good stance on "null", but I especially liked one citizen who never had a dialog box, so I just agreed to things, which wasn't dissimilar from what I was already doing. Great work, and really beautiful style.
This game is really difficult. It requires an almost perfect execution of each level. I've managed to beat 2 levels, but never sequentially.
This game is really engrossing. I'll be honest in that I didn't think there was much to it at first, but then I got sucked in and ended up with 159200 points. One thing that stood out was that I was never sure when my player would stop in midair, or push on through another square. A bit more predictability there, and maybe some more polished graphics and I could really see this getting an audience.
I liked taking the theme literally and placing it on a clock. As others mentioned, there are technical problems in the game that prevent it from quite being as good as it should.
Nice instance of a Smash TV-like game. The mechanics, while not particularly innovated, were well executed, and the whole game felt very solid. Nice work.
I really liked it when the game became more puzzle oriented than purely collection, but it quickly got to a point where it was dominated by trial-and-error (levels 7 and 8), after which I quit. If the order of potion requests was known in advance, it'd give the player some ability to strategize, since I don't get the sense that this trial-and-error sensation was an objective of the game.
Wow, this was frantic. I managed to save 3 civilians in the end. I like the limits and onthogonality of the units (mapbot and doorbot). Quite a bit of fun. It takes a bit of easing into it, and I feel like I may have gotten very lucky with my randomly generated layout.
I can't claim to know what I just did, or what happened. Unique approach, at least. I tried to not eat any cake, ended up accidentally eating a piece at the end because you have to hold a key to move to the next second, but that same key press can be registered later. Maybe require a key up between segments?
One comment I do want to mention is that there is a sound effect when time runs out, but not when you win. For events like this, if you're strapped for time, I would focus on embellishing the path that most players will likely take (in this case, victory).
As for the glitchiness, I think that some deserve to be fixed, but others might be better cultivated. Game Title: Lost Levels (http://www.glorioustrainwrecks.com/node/2268) for example, was inspired by a glitch. In this case, the nature of the glitch seems to be that blocks change properties based on the direction that you approach them from (the right side of blocks can be climbed, the left side can sometimes be passed through). When phrased like that, that sounds more like a mechanic that you'd build a game around than something you'd want to eliminate.