TerraPass

Vroom Vroom Kaboom by profan 2017-12-05T15:47:23Z

This is a good idea well implemented. The mechanic is solid and the presentation, while simple, is actually really easy on the eye. One criticism I have is that it's a bit tricky to tell in what direction each taxi is facing. A couple of times I've written my perfect "script" and pressed "Play", only to realise that the taxi, I thought would go up, actually went down and crashed into another taxi.

Also the choice of instructions syntax is interesting. I think that one could find a more conveniently placed triplet of characters than "<", ">" and "^" (such as "W", "A", "D", for example), but on the other hand, typing in something like ">>^<>^" does feel more "programmer-ey".

Overall I really enjoyed this game and will probably come back to play more.

Fear Of The Future by PUR3 2017-12-15T00:34:38Z

This is quite a profound take on the theme, especially coming from a 15 year old game developer (assuming the info in your profile is up to date). The platformer mechanics, though simple, do their job of exploring the theme perfectly well, with your level even going as far as offering multiple paths and endings. I like how the pits and invisible walls, the latter of which you occasionally place behind the player, help to express the idea that quite often the choices one makes in life are irreversible.

What few technical and gameplay issues there are have already been mentioned by previous commenters, so I won't dwell on them.

The audio and visuals come together to create a mood, which I would describe as thoughtful and somewhat tense (time is ticking) at the same time. This aspect of your game, I feel, is very strong.

I think the risk you took in using Unity and C#, which you admit is not something you have much experience with, has definitely paid off. The scope for the 48 hours of the Compo was selected wisely: there is nothing obviously missing from your game and no game-breaking bugs either. You even had time to create a custom icon for the game - now that's attention to detail.

My main criticisms have to do not so much with the game itself, as with the way it's presented on the site. Firstly, unless I'm missing something, I don't see a link to the source code anywhere, though I believe it is [required](https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/rules) for Compo entries. You should add a link to your Github repo (or even just a zip with your Unity project) to your game's page, so that there are no problems with the rules.

Additionally, despite using Unity, you only provide a Windows version of your game. Come on. :) I understand why you might decide to not have a WebGL build, since without additional tweaking of the game those often come out laggy and inferior to desktop builds. But you don't have builds for other desktop platforms either. I mean, I mainly use Linux on my laptop and I would've been able to try your game much earlier, if it just had a Linux build, and I'm sure there are even more people on Macs who love to play games. So do upload builds for other platforms as well - the rules allow you to do so after the deadline and your game will be available to more players.

Overall, I think you did a great job. If there's one thing I'd say, it's that you probably shouldn't have much fear of the future, if this entry is anything to go by. In fact, it will be pretty interesting to see what games you come up with in the future.

Good luck!

Desert Express by TerraPass 2017-12-08T02:29:52Z

Thank you all very much for your wonderful feedback. You've given us plenty of suggestions and ideas for a postjam build.

Desert Express by TerraPass 2017-12-08T02:36:33Z

@dom If you'd like to try the game, [there is now a macOS version](https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/40/desert-express/desert-express-arrives-onto-macos-mostly), though it comes with a caveat that some Homebrew packages need to be installed before running it, since I haven't yet figured out a way to properly package all of the dependencies.

If that's not a problem, check the prerequisites section and do give it a go.

Desert Express by TerraPass 2017-12-08T02:44:29Z

@Luther Thanks for reporting this issue.

As for the difficulty of each subsequent run, it is actually randomized in the jam version: the number of crates is randomly determined for each run, so the game can become easier as well as harder. Obviously, this was just a quick and dirty way to make the theme more apparent by getting the player to play with different number of crates to ensure that indeed the more you have, the worse it is :). In the postjam version we'll of course add some sort of proper progression.

Desert Express by TerraPass 2017-12-08T12:35:55Z

@moonlightbomber Yeah, it's a known bug, that I believe we have a fix for, but we can't actually apply it to the game yet, since we're not sure if this qualifies as a "game-breaking" bug or not (probably not?).

Anyway, on the machines we tested the game on, the bug occurred pretty rarely. Does it happen to you every time on the second run?

Desert Express by TerraPass 2017-12-08T23:59:15Z

@Luther @moonlightbomber Thanks again for reporting this issue. We uploaded a `bugfix` build, where it [appears to be fixed](https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/40/desert-express/train-crashes-are-much-less-likely-now-say-railroad-engineers).

Desert Express by TerraPass 2017-12-14T17:58:40Z

@lancejz @justin-toyo @siepiau Thanks for your feedback! We've constrained the mouse cursor to the window in the [postjam version](https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/40/desert-express/$71011) of the game, in order to avoid accidental clicks outside of the window.

Where ma Friends at?! by Sabuzri 2017-12-08T20:51:45Z

This looks very cute, I'd really love to try it. Since this is a Unity game, could you upload a Linux build as well, please? :penguin:

Where ma Friends at?! by Sabuzri 2017-12-09T21:02:11Z

@crdmrn Thanks for posting a Linux build. A very nice game with a novel mechanic and charming presentation.

Not sure if this is intentional, but I found that I was able to finish one of the levels without gathering all of the friends, if I got the 2 friends I did collect to hold hands, making a circle: https://imgur.com/a/wFjmv

Overall I think you did a very good job.

Soul Warrior Merope - Soaring Soul by Priom 2017-12-06T17:48:12Z

Hey, I remember your game from GMTK Jam! Nice to see the return of Merope. Will definitely try this one out when I boot into Windows tonight after work.

Soul Warrior Merope - Soaring Soul by Priom 2017-12-07T01:21:14Z

Well done. The idea is pretty innovative, as far as I can tell, and, given the time constraints of the jam, I'd say you've managed to deliver on it pretty well.

The indications on the UI were not entirely clear to me at the beginning, like what is "P:-25 F:15". Now I understand those are the price and the amount of fuel per purchase. Also I would definitely make the ammo, fuel and other status indicators on the right sidebar stand out a bit more. They don't come across visually right off the bat as the key piece of information for a player to keep an eye on.

But I think these small problems can be fixed easily in future development. So good job and good luck with your game.

Friends and Monsters by Killnaprimer 2017-12-05T11:01:00Z

Very good idea and graphic style. The lack of sound effects doesn't particularly take away from the experience for me, but some background music would definitely help.

Robbery of a Train by Yohoho Games 2 2017-12-11T14:42:56Z

A simple but interesting game, which does justice to the theme. I like how it becomes more and more difficult to juggle the bandits as more and more of them board the train.

It was not entirely clear to me what were the conditions for the guy with a rifle popping out of the engine room and shooting your guys. Does he appear regularly with a fixed delay and is there something the player can do to avoid him?

In terms of mood and mechanic I think you did a very good job.

It was especially interesting for me to look at your game since my friend and I also made a western-style game about train robbery, but one where you try to protect the train (basically playing as that guy with the rifle on the train engine). Maybe you'll also be interested in trying our game: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/40/desert-express

riskREWARD by Siepiau 2017-12-05T15:29:50Z

There is an interesting idea here. Would really like to see where you can take it with more time and the implementation of the stealth and hacking mechanics, which you initially planned to include.

For the staying-targeted mechanic, that you've implemented, I think that the level design is a bit too open in places and it could use a bit more maze-like layout. As it stands, it was too easy to always stay in the view of a single police officer, while keeping enough distance for them not to be able to shoot.

Additionally, I think adding a feature where more enemies get spawned ahead of the player to force them to improvize, instead of relying on the cheap tactic I described, would really add to the fun of your game.

This is a nice entry overall, I hope you'll flesh it out in future development.

Flesh Packer by nervous-composers 2018-08-22T17:32:13Z

Pretty bold choice to go the NSFW road. The absurd combination of the music you chose with the graphic style and the subject matter works very well to a establish an absurd darkly comedic tone. The writing is really good and, while it didn't make me laugh out loud, the game did elicit a guilty chuckle several times, which already puts it quite high on the Humor spectrum.

Unfortunately, the gameplay for me at least devolved into blind trial and error pretty fast, but then point-and-click is not my type of game anyway. The fact that I managed to complete the game at all is a testament to how strong the other aspects were.

Really well done!

Better Than Thanos by Vekstr 2018-08-22T21:38:17Z

Didn't realize it was possible to win until after returning defeated from my first couple attempts and preparing to start writing this comment, when I noticed previous commenters talking about some brush size. Brush size? Tried again, figured out I could make the brush waaaay bigger, cleaned up the whole planet in the first attempt.

The sphere shaving mechanic is interesting at its core, though I do wish there would be a bit more to it and that it would be a bit easier on my index finger.

What deserves all sorts of compliments, though, is the presentation and level of polish in your game. I feel that everyone in your team must have done their part to produce such a well-rounded :wink: game in limited time afforded by the Jam.

Well done!

Blocks by Anubhav Kashyap 2018-08-22T14:31:09Z

This is very impressive, considering you spent only 5 hours making it. I'm not sure I could deliver anything playable at all in such a short timeframe. Despite being very simplistic, the graphics are easy on the eye and one might say that not much more in terms of visuals is really needed for a game such as this. The controls deserve a rating of "good enough" but will probably require more work to be more precise, in case you decide to work on this game further. Music is definitely the strongest part: it creates the beat, to which one just wants to keep playing.

All in all, well done! Looking forward for more awesome games from you.

Gridlock by TerraPass 2018-08-14T00:37:09Z

@sankacoffee51 Thank you! That's a bug I didn't notice until now.

Beater by Velocity7 2018-08-22T10:35:10Z

Hi. Looks like the link to your game is broken: itch.io gives error 404.

War For Space by DrSkort 2018-08-21T19:53:00Z

This is a really nice entry, well done! I'm always happy to see strategy games at game jams. The idea is really cool and the visuals do just enough for it to shine. The background music fits really well and helps create just the right mood, in which one can spend a long time enjoying the game.

One gripe I have with the game is that the UI makes it somewhat difficult to keep track of where exactly your units are, since the player needs to select a planet to see how many settlers and soldiers they have there. It would be nice, for example, to have two small icons with numbers displayed next to each planet, so that the player could figure out where their units are at a glance. Also maybe highlighting the current colonization or attack destinations with lines or arrows might help to get a good picture of one's troops' movements more easily.

All in all, I think you have every reason to be proud of the work you've done. Good job!

Souls Panic by DarkGuiGui 2018-08-22T18:32:35Z

This is quite a strong entry, well done. I found the game pretty pleasing aesthetically thanks to both visuals and music; nice job executing them at such a high level under the constraints of the jam. While the core mechanic of sorting objects into different slots under pressure is not necessarily anything new, I liked your choice of theme: it's much more interesting to escort souls into the afterlife than to sort boxes or (to pick an entirely random examples :wink: ) to park cars. For me the controls seemed adequate and accomplished exactly what they needed to in order for the game to be enjoyable.

Good job!

Old Hag VS Cat by sankacoffee51 2018-08-14T00:45:35Z

Good job with the clever twist on controlling the character! Really drives home the point even while it does make the game frustrating to play.

The Gargoyle Landing by BoopsGames 2018-08-21T21:28:14Z

Should've kept "Humor" as a scoring category, if not for the game itself, then for presentation. "This stupid game is a submission for Ludum Dare 42" on itch.io had me in stitches. :laughing:

But the game is actually very clever in my opinion. You've got a really nice mix of genres, which manages to be fun to play, while also hitting the theme pretty much on the head. And the fact that you managed to even put in sounds and music despite only having 20 hours at your disposal is pretty impressive. Really well done!