The Keep! It's Alive! by minibobbo 2020-04-24T23:04:03Z
Oh god, a pun. Nice take on the theme!
Foon → Ludum Dare Explorer → Users → Justin_C
| Year | LD | Theme | Game | Division | Rank | Ov | Fu | In | Th | Gr | Au | Hu | Mo | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2023 | 52 | Harvest | Body Harvesters | compo | 118 | 3.61 | 3.73 | 3.13 | 3.76 | 3.08 | 2.77 | 3.01 | ||
| 2021 | 48 | Deeper and deeper | Ore Hoarder | compo | 329 | 3.60 | 3.58 | 2.73 | 4.35 | 3.12 | 2.28 | 2.18 | 3.10 | |
| 2020 | 46 | Keep it alive | Unnamed Space Game | compo | 568 | 3.38 | 3.52 | 2.93 | 3.15 | 3.02 | 2.12 | 2.82 |
Oh god, a pun. Nice take on the theme!
Nice game. Really fast and satisfying to play.
@ldd Yeah, sorry about that. I spent WAY too much time playtesting the game and started to feel like the difficulty after several levels didn't ramp up enough to keep it challenging, so I made a last-minute change to how the difficulty scaled. My changes were a bit heavy-handed and I accidentally made the early game much harder than I intended.
@macdoom Thanks! Yeah, that capturing ships mechanic was the idea that kept me motivated throughout this project. It was a rough 48 hours, for sure. If I wasn't in love with the idea of the game I never would have gotten as far with it as I did, that's for sure.
@ursagames Hey, thanks so much for playing my game, and for as long as you did! I watched the whole playthrough and threw you a follow on Twitch. I'm glad you enjoyed it!
The dithering effect was really cool, but there was a lot of flickering that really took away from it. But over all it was a solid game.
@chainedlupine Oh, I'll give the game another go in a different browser then. I already beat it during my first playthrough, but I want to see what the game is supposed to look like.
I love everything about this game! The art is freakin' adorable, the premise is unique and hilarious, and the sound is simple but still adds to the game.
I also really appreciate the flocking mechanics of the ducklings.
Solid game. There aren't enough games about pirate ships.
Cute little game. Adorable art and really good level design. And you did a great job introducing new mechanics to the player.
Interesting take on tower defense games. I like how you have to trade off between defending and collecting resources. I wish the enemies came in waves instead of a constant stream at the end, because you eventually reach a point where you are so overwhelmed constantly that you have no time to collect resources, and it just snowballs from there. Solid game, though.
I love the look and feel of the game. The art style, sound and gameplay were all so simple but they worked really well together.
I like the art style and the theme. It's a fun little physics game.
The reverse tower defense was a good idea. And I love your take on the theme.
The controls were rough, though. Moving in the direction you're facing just doesn't feel right with the fixed-direction camera.
It's a cool idea, and I love the artwork and the level design. My only complaint is that you leave very little room for error even on the first level. Maybe ease the player into the game a bit, first.
Great game! I love the art, the music and the level design. I typically don't like platformers, but I found this one satisfying to play. My one complaint is that the wall jumping was a bit clunky, and the game really relies on wall jumping.
The snow tracks showing where I've already been so I remember which areas are all cleared out was a good touch.
I have no idea what I'm doing but it sure looks really nice.
Fun little physics game with a funny theme.
I did it. I saved the species.
I have no idea what all those zoos have been complaining about for decades. I just pegged them right in the head with a few bottles of wine and it put them right in the mood. Easy.
I really liked everything about this game. Very well made.
Nice little game. Loved the art and the lighting effects. Wish there was more to the gameplay, though.
Interesting game. I liked the idea of transferring health from yourself to the heart to keep it alive. Having to run around to collect the health pickups meant that you weren't just camping the same place. I also liked that the bullets were syringes, and the knockback and cartridges flying out were nice touches that made the gun feel a bit more impactful. The pathfinding was a bit broken, as enemies kept getting stuck on the walls, though.
I really love the art.
Really nice game. Interesting movement and storytelling mechanic, and I love the art and the whole atmosphere.
Interesting take on the Tamagotchi idea. Definitely the best one I've played so far.
I loved this game. Couldn't beat it after several attempts, though.
That losing scene is brutal.
Fun little physics sandbox. It could really benefit from mouse controls.
The game looks great, and I really like the theme! Unfortunately the gameplay is a bit clunky. A small amount of polishing could really go a long way with this one.
Everything about this game was satisfying to play. Hilarious.
Nice little game. It looks like you ran out of time for the art but what was finished looked really nice. The difficulty ramps up right away so I lost quickly the first couple attempts, but it made me want to keep trying. I think the should be centered on the planet rather than the plant, but I can see how view distance might have been what drove that decision, and I think it's a valid reason.
I like the style, the sound and the theme. I thought it was a cool little game, but it's really hindered by the fact that it's about 30 seconds long. I beat the game twice and still didn't clock a full minute of gameplay.
Awesome game! It was a bit short with only one level, but it was a very highly polished level.
The movement felt a little off at first. It looks like the direction of the wind is determined by the mouse position on the ground when it's pressed to where it is when it's released. Before I noticed this, it felt like the wind often wasn't moving in the direction that I intuitively felt I was dragging the mouse. It would also not do anything at all if I released the mouse when the cursor was pointing at the sky, which I was doing a lot when I was frantically dragging and releasing the mouse as fast as it would let me. But once I understood how the mechanic worked it was really satisfying to play.
The art was good and the sound effects were funny. Solid game.
There should be some way to block shots from the big ships, and maybe a way to heal your planet/ship.
Love the theme. Love the art. You kind of combined Missile Command with The Avengers, and it works.
I love the art style.
If you press any keys during the countdown for the start of the game, the game still takes them into account and when it starts the shark gets rocketed into space. That little bug got you an extra star for humor.
I downloaded and played this despite the submission page having absolutely no information about the game. I'm not sure why that is, because you clearly put a lot of work into this submission. It was more ambitious than most of the submissions I've played so far, and it's in a pretty polished state, too. Good job.
Solid game for a first game jam. The art style is nice, and the mechanics are simple and fun.
Murdered by a vicious rabbit. Is that a Monty Python reference?
Interesting movement mechanics. I took me a while at the first difficult part to realize I had to double jump before shooting, to warp, to double jump again. And then once I figured it out, it took me several attempts to pull it off. Really satisfying game to play. But frustrating. The yellow orb was in view when I ran out of time, and I really didn't feel like starting all the way from the bottom again. I'm not into rage platformers, so checkpoints after the difficult parts would keep me playing longer.
Really nice sound and aesthetic, though. Great job!
Fun little game. I love the art style and the music. The game almost gets easier as it goes on, because when the map is absolutely full of enemies your health is just constantly being refilled. My high score was 298.
Decent little idle game. I wish there was more to it. I beat it in about 3 minutes.
Thanks for the feedback, guys. Purebe, I created an oil tile that was going to give you a bit of fuel when you mined it, which would have helped to make it so you don't have to resurface quite so often, but I never got around to implementing it despite the fact that it would have taken literally 3 minutes. I was focused on other more important things and then ran out of time.
Love the art style. The core mechanics of the game were unique and interesting, but the timers made it a bit frustrating at times.
I enjoyed it. It was a bit of a grind to get that last upgrade for line length, but I did max out my upgrades and catch the million-dollar fish.
I beat the game when I played it last night. I thought the art was pretty good for being done at the last minute.
What the game is really missing is feedback. I am swinging my sword in the general direction of the enemy, but how can I know I am damaging it? I pushed a button in the shop, but did it do anything? Etc.
Over all I think it's a fairly solid LD game.
Interesting idea.
I tried waiting until the colony filled up to see if the ants would expand the colony or something, but the game ground to a halt at around 700 ants until a bunch of them died off. At that point there are so many ants you can't really tell what is going on.
I really like the art style. And the buoyancy mechanic is unique and interesting.
Really well made game, and fun to play.
I love this game. I'm as bad at this game as I am at real mini golf.
The holes are all really well made. I found myself constantly impressed with how much thought went into many of them.
Love the art style and animations.
Interesting idea. You really don't start with enough fuel, or get enough fuel from mining the asteroids to keep going for long. The ship is difficult to control and it's really hard to tell how fast you are moving or in which direction.
I really enjoyed this game for the few runs I put into it.
I'd say the difficulty is a bit too high early on. The enemies move and shoot too fast when you are starting out, so it is really difficult to take them out with the staring weapon without taking damage yourself. I'd say slow them down a bit, and make them shoot less frequently.
Nice game. I found the power level a bit finicky. Really hard to find that perfect strength.
Really fun physics game. The arrow shooting is so satisfying.
I wasn't a huge fan of the enemy that I couldn't do anything about.
And the lack of a health bar meant I died without realizing I was close to death. When the game made me start from the beginning, I just quit. The thought of having to do it all over again from the beginning seemed way too tedious. Maybe add some checkpoints after levels.
I've played a bunch of Vampire Survivors and Brotato, so I really enjoyed this game. I was so broken by the end that I could just stand still and occasionally go around collecting coins.
One thing this game needs is the reroll from Brotato. I was collecting so many coins that I had hundreds left over after each round. I could have become even more overpowered with a reroll.
Really great game. Awesome job!
By the way, I found this one through chompdev's post of recommendations.
It looks like you planned on making an idle/clicker game? That was one of the ideas I had before my final idea popped into my head.
I wish it were more obvious when a fruit is ripe. After 5 minutes or so of playing, it still wasn't clear how points are calculated.
What game engine did you use?
Interesting and ambitious game!
I got all of the unlocks fairly quickly, but from there it wasn't really obvious to me how to win the game.
That intro was really well done.
I got over 1500 on my second attempt. The game doesn't seem to get progressively harder, so I just kept dodging the scarecrows like Neo until the physics engine had a fit and my tractor started spinning like a top.
Solid game.
Interesting concept. I really love the idea of swinging the scythe yourself. Really fun idea for a physics game.
However, I felt the smoothing of the character when you moved really took away some of the fine control you need to swing the scythe and avoid the flowers. It made the game difficult and frustrating to play.
Nice game. Simple and fun. I really like the look and sound of it.
It's really hard to hit them near the top when there are multiple carrots out at once.
Haha, yeah, I was joking in the last hour of development that the game feels too easy right up until it feels impossible. It definitely needs a balance pass. The truth is that I didn't get a chance to do an entire playthrough until after the game was submitted. I just didn't have any time to spare.
Thanks for the feedback, guys!
@sdelay I prioritize buildings in the center when adding to the capacity, so the cities will look more developed in the center and less developed on the edges.
You're definitely right that having timers is more suitable for a game jam like LD, where most people will only play your game for 5-10 minutes and they really like having an end in sight. But I've always been a fan of the classic "keep going until you lose" style games. In this current version it's impossible to survive past about 17 minutes, but that is still longer than most people will play.
@hayricakir I would love to shred some zombies in slowmo with a tractor.
Really well-made game. Especially for compo.
It's kind of annoying how boxes can't be moved back into place. It takes so long to grab apples that I usually lose a box before I can get around to defending them. And even if I save a box, it's just easier to steal for the next thief.
Interesting little game. It's a fun core mechanic that I wish you were able to do a little more with, but I definitely sympathize with you for running out of time. I cut more features than I implemented, including sound.
I originally chose the Normal difficulty, beat it in about 20 seconds, and then was ready to criticize the game for its length. But then I noticed that the difficulty settings are actually distinctly different levels that use the same mechanics, rather than the same level with difficulty ramped up or down. What you really should have done is split the game into levels. Then your average reviewer would get more playtime out of the same content.
Solid entry. I enjoyed it.
It looks and feels really nice, but you didn't add any actual game to your game.
Really well done. The art and sound is really nice, and the puzzles are challenging. I'm really terrible at them.
Well, I set a new high score of 18.
It's an interesting take on Snake. But having a target length instead of just aiming to be as long as possible really just results in a whole lot of waiting for the timer to run out. And the target length stayed between 4 and 6 for most of the game, so it didn't feel like it was getting progressively more difficult as I went.
Since food and... anti-food(?) keep spawning, I can imagine a scenario where RNG punishes you and spawns something right in front of you, not leaving you enough time to fix it.
I also found the title amusing, because the game mechanics force you to stay small instead of growing as big as possible like classic Snake. I finished first (globally) by staying exactly as mediocre as the game wanted me to be.
Solid entry, over all. And it looks like this is your first compo entry, so welcome!
I see what you were trying to do, and I think it could have worked. In these jams it's really important to prioritize getting a minimum viable product working as soon as possible.
I keep a list of features sorted by importance and work on the most critical ones first, and then cut the less important ones as I start running out of time.
Interesting little resource/customer management game. I love the art. I forgot to water the hand plant, and 10/10.
Really well done game. Everything about it is well made.
You can cheese the game by only growing a few things at a time. In the end I died by growing like 10 roses at once, and my frame rate absolutely tanked.
Great job, though!
A fun little game that's hindered by its control scheme a bit. Arrow keys should never be used for movement. Or anything. I'd honestly spend an hour playing this game if I could use my left hand for movement, like I do in every other game, ever.
I played for a bit with my arms crossed, and it was better until my arms got tired.
Solid game. Fix the control scheme. Or make the keys rebindable.
I had a ton of fun playing this game. Very well-made, fun physics game. I like the art, and the fire ball is really satisfying to use.
My biggest criticism is that you are limited by the gold you can carry. I frequently found myself wishing I could explore more of the levels, but I filled up too quickly. I think the game could really benefit by changing the goal to inflicting an amount of damage on the towns, and having collecting gold be a secondary objective.
Also, I wish the fire breath felt more impactful. Definitely up the number of particles.
But apart from that it's a very solid game. Very impressive.
Neat little resource management game. I beat it in about 16 minutes the first time. I took a break and made a second attempt, and still only beat it in 11 minutes. I'd be curious if anyone but the devs could get gold.
I played this game for a lot longer than I expected to play a deck-building farming game. Everything about it was well made. Enemies were a bit easy to deal with and there were no consequences for losing all of your plants, but it's a jam game.
I "won" and then kept playing for another 15-20 minutes anyway. Solid game.
Interesting little game. I'm really bad at it, but it's well made.
I made it past day 52, which seemed like an appropriate stopping point for a LD52 game.
Really well made. And I'm glad to see more people using Godot in LD.
I enjoyed the hell out of this game. But as Tommy and I were trying to find our house, I considered just leaving him behind to save myself. Shut the hell up, kid, do you want to be eaten? The monster is 10 feet away and Tommy is shouting "Mom I can hear them!" loudly into the cornfield.
I had to download the PC version because the web version is almost unplayable without spatial audio.
Fun little game for what it is. It could use a balance pass because some of the mid-range weapons cost more to use than they can make. It could use a bit of juice, too.
That mouse sensitivity was really high. I beat it in about a minute flat in WebGL, and then went back and played the PC version just to see if the mouse sensitivity was any better. It's a little better, but still way too high.
The framerate in the web version is almost unplayable, but the desktop version runs well.
Very interesting concept. If you swing at a few bushes on your way to the boss you will already have more than enough wheat to finish him. Maybe reduce the collection so you have to collect and attack him a couple times before winning.
I really enjoyed this game. I made it to level 19.
After a while it kept giving me two options for point efficiency, despite the fact that I hadn't taken any of the upgrades to make me turn better. I don't know if that's a bug, but eventually I lost because it stopped giving me options for upgrading my corn production.
Really nice game. That swing is so satisfying.
This game feels like that carnival game where you have to shoot the star out of the card. It always feels like you are one round short.
Really well done. The art is fantastic.
This is an interesting entry. Kind of like Papers Please, where you have to remember to check for a bunch of things, but with kidnapping and organ harvesting. I really enjoyed it.
Really well done! Both the game and the devlog, which I watched before playing. Having the organs work as your health, and allowing you to get them back, was a really interesting and unique idea. The animation, sound and mood were all fantastic.
And I love seeing so many Godot entries this LD.
Great game! Really unique and interesting gameplay. And the art is really fun.
I didn't manage to beat it because it started to feel a bit grindy, and I never really felt like I was getting ahead. I think the game needs some smaller objectives to keep me interested, instead of just the single long-term goal of reaching 30 aliens. Maybe unlockable upgrades, abilities, buildings, etc.
And the combat could feel a bit better. Whenever a game combines directional abilities controlled with WASD and dodging, it always feels really tedious and clunky to me. Dodge away from the enemy, then try to turn around and attack without walking into their attack, then turn around and dodge away again, etc. Combat would feel a lot more fluid if you moved and dodged with WASD and attacked with the mouse.
But over all it's a really solid entry.
This game is super fun and satisfying to play. And the music is pretty great, too.
I did 5 or 6 runs. The Big Boy seems to be bugged because I keep taking damage from zombies that are already dead. But the other 2 tractors are very satisfying to use.
Really nice game. I wish I could full screen, because the window is very small.
Do the fish not do anything?
I played until I won. I hate that stupid bird.
Also, sometimes the baskets would be pretty synched, so that one basket was blocking the one I needed for a long time. There should be a bit more variation in their speed so they don't synch as much.
beets.PNG
Eventually I died because of a boss that was so bullet spongy that I couldn't kill him before I ran out of beet juice.
Solid game.
Cute little game. Short and sweet. I really enjoyed the feel of the birds. It reminded me a lot of Joust.
I honestly have no idea what to do about the orange cells. They show as empty, so even if I check in front, I always grow into them. I can't see a way to avoid them.
Nice little game. I died the first time because an enemy spawned right on top of me.
The glow effect on the bullets is a bit too big. I'd like some more contrast between the bullets and the floor.
Awesome game! It's almost like the inverse of my game, except yours is way more polished.
The first time I played a single mouse ate all of my crops at once, so I was left with no seed and no money to buy new seed. I had to restart.
The second time I played I bought a gun and just robbed the store over and over and over again.
Really great first entry! I love the art, and the atmosphere is perfect. Making the enemies get faster over time was a nice touch.
As soon as I noticed the zombies had gotten much faster I started looking for the exit. I managed to survive my first run with 62.
This game really needs a more in-depth tutorial. It's not even clear to me which things are clickable. Most things that look like buttons do nothing when I click them.
Great little game. I loved the visuals and the audio.
I felt the sidearms were a bit pointless. And most of the time I didn't notice zombies until they were already on my combine, due to the wheat.
Honestly, if my farm were overrun with zombies I'd probably just give up on harvesting the wheat.