Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → Users → AlmostCthulhu
| Year | LD | Theme | Game | Division | Rank | Ov | Fu | In | Th | Gr | Au | Hu | Mo | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2018 | 41 | Combine 2 Incompatible Genres | Ludum Dare 41 | unfinished | ||||||||||
| 2017 | 40 | The more you have, the worse it is | 👥 | Ludum Dare 40 | unfinished | |||||||||
| 2017 | 39 | Running out of Power | 👥 | Battery-Powered Business | jam | 343 | 3.48 | 3.07 | 3.33 | 3.74 | 4.22 | 3.33 | 2.13 | 3.04 |
I think the game could do with a bit of balancing because I found it hard to get over about 20 citizens, but the game is good otherwise. It might be worth adding some more ways to get money, or increasing the amount of coal a processing plant produces so it can provide for 2 coal plants. The music is well made, the concept is interesting, and it's fun to replay.
I loved the retro graphics of this game. Although the camera is a bit too low in my opinion and some sound would have helped to make the game more interesting, I found it fun either way. Good work.
The atmosphere of the game was very nice and I think the music really helps to create that. The concept of wizards in space is quite unique, which I liked. I managed to upgrade everything fully, but I couldn't discern an end goal. The graphics could have done with a bit of work but other than that, the game feels quite satisfying to play.
I think the simple style of the game really worked in it's favour. I initially thought that the game was a bit too easy, but the last 2 levels were fairly challenging and quite engaging. Whilst the theme is definitely present, it wasn't the most unique implementation that I've seen, the game was fun to play all the same.
There may be a slight issue with the WebGL version of the game in that it runs out of memory during the pipe minigame. I would rebuild it, but it's 2:30am UTC and I'm getting pretty tired; sorry about that.
If the game still interests you, I'd suggest you download one of the other builds of the game so that you can see KubaP's models in all their beautiful low-poly-ness. (And access the cheats that I may have accidentally left in...)
I might post the source code if this project gets enough interest, but for now we're leaving it out because we think this book should be judged by its cover. Or rather, its gameplay. *Please don't judge us by the pictures, we took them with 10 minutes to go until the deadline...*
If not, then leave a comment; what did and didn't you like? We're just 2 British college students looking to make good games and we'd find it helpful if you gave us some feedback
Thanks everyone for the positive feedback, we’re glad to hear that you enjoyed playing our game as much as we enjoyed making it; it was fun, but slightly confusing.
@reizoukin, we were going to add a tutorial level, but we only had 4 hours left and decided to add an extra music track instead. Also, the pipe game isn’t randomly generated, so you do end up playing the same levels a few times. I tried to implement some random generation, but my knowledge of pathing algorithms isn’t quite good enough yet. Good to hear that you found it fun though; I’ll definitely be expanding it a bit in the future.
@mr-houdini, I will admit that the pollution mechanic doesn’t quite work properly. It acts as a small modifier to reputation, which modifier the amount of money you make per second. We think a tutorial level would have helped with this, but we lacked the time to make one.
@articnet, was this on a standalone version or the WebGL version? We know this happens in the WebGL version (I blame @KubaP for not configuring the build), but this shouldn’t happen in a standalone.
@juin, all the pipe game levels do have solutions as we didn’t randomly generated in the end. Sorry that it felt frustrating, but we thought it added a nice extra layer of difficulty to the game
@timps, we’re happy to hear that you found it fun. We would have added a tutorial level, but we ran out of time; sorry. The puzzle game wasn’t the best programming ever done, so this does happen sometimes. I think the collision boxes may need some adjustment. The camera controls were something that we added last minute, so they’re not perfect either. In terms of menus, we would have had them floating above the tiles, but this is our first Jam, and our time management went out of the window a bit towards the end when we were doing the UI.
@ferran-benavente, thanks! I know @KubaP worked really hard on the graphics. We do regret that we weren’t able to implement some tooltips or something which explained what various things did, but we’re happy to know that you enjoyed playing it.
@tyler-miller, I will say that @KubaP‘s models are very nice in my opinion. We do think that the game could have done with a bit more explaining, and the pollution mechanic probably should have been removed because it doesn’t work properly, but we think its great that you found our game good.
@pdg Good, glad you liked it. The pipe game doesn't give you money, however, as it's designed to make play faster.
@wareification, sorry that the game is a bit confusing, we would have added a tutorial level but we ran out of time. I'm happy to hear that you like a music, though. As someone who's primarily a programmer, I'm surprised that the music I made is any good at all.
@littlelegend, we do know this is an issue. @kubap has said that he'll try to rebuild it at some point later today. If you're still interested in playing our game, there are also standalones available.
@filippy, that's not actually a bad idea, thanks. We were originally going to go for filling the grid with pipes, but that was too easy. Tiles, however, look like a nice alternative.
@arkthalohs, it is true that the pipe game only has one solution per map, but we tried to make them relatively easy to solve. It's good to hear that you like the art and mechanics though because we quite liked them too.
@huvaakoodia, we will admit that we took a lot of creative liberties with the game, and the lore at the top of the page doesn't really fit too well into it. This is our first Jam and we're still trying to find out what works and what doesn't, so thanks for the feedback. In regards to the nuclear reactor, it is true that one could power an entire city, but we chose to use it anyway as we thought the shape of one was quite distinct and recognisable. We would have use wind farms, but any models that were produced didn't fit into the style. As for the power generators, labs were an idea we toyed with, but we ultimately decided against it because we wanted to keep the game simple. In retrospect, it may be a bit too simple, but we also didn't have time to implement a tutorial, which I think would have been required to add more complicated aspects such as research to the game. Immersion wasn't too much of a concern for us however, and the game isn't meant to be realistic, although it is a fair point that it likely would have gone a long way. The timings of the pipe puzzle do need some adjustment, or we are considering integrating it into the event system. The pipe puzzle is something that we implemented much later to help the game progress faster though, so we didn't have time for proper integration. Events are random, and the code is there such that when you reach certain milestones like 10 low-tech factories, an event will trigger. We didn't use this though as we felt that, given the length of a game, the player would never reach them; if they were adjusted, they'd likely be too soon as well, and slow down the game. We would have liked to have added some decisions to the events, but like many things in our game, this was last minute addition we didn't put a lot of thought into aside from the prerequisites. We added them to add a bit of random factor to the game. Either way, we're not taking this personally, this is good feedback and we've found it quite useful, thanks.
This was a pretty unique game. Whilst I think that the theme is somewhat lost, the mechanic to advance is interesting and the sounds is good as well. Overall, a fun game to play but I think using a power meter as a time limit would have helped to create more tension
It took me a while to figure out what I was meant to do, but the game was pretty fun otherwise. The controls felt a bit unresponsive, but they still worked. The elements of humour were also nice, as well as the very meta concept.
Nice interpretation of the theme. I thought the mechanic was quite unique, and the fuel / health balance was definitely challenging to try to maintain. The controls seemed a bit awkward and unresponsive, but I think that added to the challenge of the game. The menu could have done with some work as well, but it's functional, which is good. The enemies definitely did seem to pile onto you, perhaps a bit too much, but the game was fun to play otherwise.