Sender by toranoko

made by toranoko for LD30 (COMPO)

**Chrome users** if you're having trouble downloading LD games, turn off anti-phishing and malware, in advance settings.

Instructions
Seal off all portals with fully charged sealing blocks. And kill the remaining gelatins to make progress.

Arrows - movement
Space - jump
R - Restart Level
F - to fire. fight off the invading gelatins
D - Energize blocks. collect energy from fallen gelatins to power sealing blocks
S - to pull Sealing blocks. Move Sealing blocks over the gelatin portals.

*post jam version*
Mostly balance fixes:
-monsters have a jump cooldown, so they are easier to hit
-you can now jump off blocks
-starting enemies have been removed
-portals can only generated a set amount of monsters
-floor 2 level design fix

keo @ idiotson.tumblr.com | vagantegame.com (kickstarter)

Windows	https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/46434785/Sender.zip
Source	https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/46434785/Sender_src.zip
Post-Jam (8.25)	https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/46434785/Sender_Postcompo.zip
Post Mortem	http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/2014/08/25/sender-post-mortem/
Original URL	https://ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-30/?action=preview&uid=8696

Ratings

Coolness	46%	1364
Overall	3.21	555

Fun	2.91	668
Graphics	4.42	19
Innovation	2.70	891
Mood	3.16	411
Theme	2.50	991

Feedback

vicious_br

25. Aug 2014 · 02:39 UTC

Excellent game, very exciting. I think the screen should not shake when the shot hits it.

jomomomo

25. Aug 2014 · 03:02 UTC

Can't play windows games. :-(

ShadowStryker

25. Aug 2014 · 03:13 UTC

Chrome refuses to allow me to downloading it, stating that it is malicious.

ShadowStryker

25. Aug 2014 · 03:20 UTC

Turned off the chrome setting and played it. Pretty enjoyable, and I like the graphics.

Nsmurf

25. Aug 2014 · 03:21 UTC

Fun :D
There's a bug where you press up at the top of a ladder for a while then press space, you'll jump super high...

hyouko

25. Aug 2014 · 03:30 UTC

Turned off Chrome's malware detection and checked with two standalone app (Avast, Microsoft Security Essentials). It looks good. The game itself looks absolutely beautiful, and I like the concept (farming the gelatins for energy to seal them away). Physics glitched out on me a couple of times, with the blocks getting stuck/unwilling to move. I also found behavior at the top of a ladder to be a little unintuitive - maybe make the character auto-jump?

Miziziziz

25. Aug 2014 · 03:39 UTC

read the title as Slender at first, was kinda excited to see a 2d version of that :p .
Anyways, looks cool, but Chrome is giving me a warning that it's malicious

theholychicken

25. Aug 2014 · 03:42 UTC

I definitely underestimated the damn gelatins..
Awesome enemy AI I guess :D
Very challenging, I need to keep trying.

🎤 toranoko

25. Aug 2014 · 03:52 UTC

thanks everyone for the feedback.
There's a level design bug in level two, also a mechanical bug, where the player can't scramble upwards.
@theholychicken, :) the enemy ai was pretty simple, if player is above me jump, but because the shooting kicks the player up a little bit, they end up dodging :P
@hyouko, yea I had other things to worry about then fishing for passwords w/e : ) The auto-jump is a good suggestion, I'll see how it plays.
@nsmurf thanks for the find, I was wondering how that happened.

Added a disclaimer for chrome users.

Ludipe

25. Aug 2014 · 09:06 UTC

I loved the graphics, specially the main characters. Though enemies were a bit frustrating; not hard but annoying and frustrating.

Ludipe

25. Aug 2014 · 09:09 UTC

I knew the art style was familiar. I've seen Vagante on TiG forums, looking great, good luck with the kickstarter campaign!

AdventureIslands

25. Aug 2014 · 09:15 UTC

Cool game, nice concept and the pixel art is great. Little rough around the edges, but that's understandable. Controls take some time to get used to and the game is pretty difficult because the enemies are quick and tiny and your bullets are small.

coffeemuggames

25. Aug 2014 · 09:25 UTC

I like the dark moody graphics :)

Geti

25. Aug 2014 · 09:39 UTC

Liked the graphics but the controls were super frustrating, I couldn't do "what I wanted to" a lot of the time (jumping off blocks or shooting enemies being the major culprits). Interesting concept.

🎤 toranoko

25. Aug 2014 · 10:20 UTC

@Geti forgot to parent the block to an object. Fixed in the Post Jam version

Uploaded some quick fixes I didn't get around to during the jam, in the post-jam version:
-monsters have a jump cooldown, so they are easier to hit
-you can now jump off blocks
-starting enemies have been removed
-portals can only generated a set amount of monsters
-floor 2 level design fix

KeyMaster

25. Aug 2014 · 10:38 UTC

Parts of this were really great, such as the pixel art and the feel of the game while shooting. Especially cool was the feature that when you shoot blocks, they slide away and crush monsters. However the monsters were really annoying at times and often just so difficult to avoid that it got really frustrating. Also I wish it had music, just because it would be even better with that. Still a really great entry!

burgerdare

25. Aug 2014 · 14:57 UTC

The art style here is superb. I think the movement and combat feels a little floaty, but everything seems to work as it should, and this is overall pretty fun.

DragonXVI

25. Aug 2014 · 18:58 UTC

Found the controls a bit awkward, and the enemies too jumpy, but graphics & animation are excellent.

Canyon

26. Aug 2014 · 03:19 UTC

Very challenging. I played for ever but couldn't beat the first level. I really enjoyed it though. I liked the world design too!

panurge

26. Aug 2014 · 08:49 UTC

Awesome graphics and a really nice crunchy feel to the combat. The little jellies are really cute until they start jumping all over you! Good work.

Franklins Ghost

26. Aug 2014 · 13:10 UTC

Great art and was quite fun to play and pass the time. Did notice a bug where some of the blobs would jump up from a lower floor and then would just stay floating against the roof.

PriorBlue

26. Aug 2014 · 13:28 UTC

Very nice pixelart style!

dickpoelen

26. Aug 2014 · 15:19 UTC

Great graphics/animation!

GraveyardPolice

26. Aug 2014 · 17:12 UTC

Really love the character design. Great Pixels. We did slimes coming out of portals too ^-^

Tom 7

04. Sep 2014 · 01:51 UTC

I liked the graphics the best. The basic idea is good too, though I think some of the roughness makes it too hard in a way that just feels unfair. For example, sometimes the blue monsters that jump pile up in some hole and you can't go down there without taking damage. Sometimes monsters push blocks off ledges in parts of the level you can't even see, and then you can't ever get them back up. Looks like you addressed some of these in the jam version, though. :) Physics around walls seemed a bit odd, and climbing up into the bottom of a block kills you. But, I did enjoy it and tried my hardest to beat level 2 even though it seemed stacked against me!