Wormholes by themushroomsound

[raw]
made by themushroomsound for LD27 (COMPO)
WORMHOLES is my 1st attempt at any solo jam !

It's a Unity project, and primarily an exercise in generating meshes from audio data. The game starts by recording 10s of audio through your computer's mic input, so you have to allow access to your mic. A hundred levels are generated from these 10s, but you'll be lucky to even reach level 2.

You play as the pilot of a small spaceship, folding space to return home after years of space travel. The tunnels of space/time are long and narrow, and haste is your worst enemy, so make sure to use the hyperbrakes once in a while. They charge in 10s.

The music was made around a 51.2Hz bass, which is the 1st audible frequency to be a multiple of 0.1Hz, a frequency of which the period is... 10s. Also, the time signature being 10/4 and the tempo 120bpm, 2 bars last... ok fuck that, enjoy the trip.

__________
CONTROLS:

Up/down arrows: navigate
Space: hyperbrakes!

______
NOTES:

On Win7, some laptops are set so the mic is inactive when running on batteries. If you're getting flat tunnels, you might want to check that.
Linux version lacks the executable flag, just chmod it.

___________
MAKING OF:

The timelapse video is now available ! :)
>> http://vimeo.com/themushroomsound/making-of-wormholes

Ratings

Coolness 48% 1156
Overall 3.26 356
Audio 3.92 17
Fun 2.65 795
Graphics 3.25 352
Humor 1.69 877
Innovation 4.27 7
Mood 3.48 111
Theme 2.93 765

Feedback

rylgh
26. Aug 2013 路 08:20 UTC
Very neat! Not sure if my ambient audio was loud enough for a tunnel it was flat for quite awhile. Made a few snapping noises, which probably coincided with me hitting the first jagged peak that appeared. Oh well, going max velocity was really exciting, especially with the drum n bass. Great music :)
馃帳 themushroomsound
26. Aug 2013 路 12:54 UTC
Hey, thanks! :) Yes, the recording is normalized prior to generating the level, which means the highest peak will be the highest edge, and anything that's low level will look flat in comparison...

That was probably a poor design decision, I realize only now it didn't have to be so (but then I would have had to allow for vertical scrolling).
Ghostik
26. Aug 2013 路 16:07 UTC
Really cool idea!
TeamQuadratic
26. Aug 2013 路 23:57 UTC
Really cool! Difficult, but enjoyable.
fdevant
26. Aug 2013 路 23:57 UTC
Here testing on OSX... It works :)
takes a while to start getting bumps on the level but its nice :)
Sometimes it gets stuck on the first wall and nothing moves until it gets some speed and Booom! ship explodes.
BloodJohn
26. Aug 2013 路 23:59 UTC
Interesting style.
olafurw
26. Aug 2013 路 23:59 UTC
Cool idea for the mic capturing to generate levels.
lulzfish_4
27. Aug 2013 路 00:01 UTC
The music is really cool.

I got bored, so I let my ship drift in the center of the screen. I got to maximum velocity and cruised for several seconds before crashing into something.

I never did beat the first level. (That I'm aware of) The levels are just way too long.
BradleySmith
27. Aug 2013 路 00:02 UTC
Not too shabby. :)
blopit
27. Aug 2013 路 00:02 UTC
Very cool concept
doctorscientist
27. Aug 2013 路 00:17 UTC
I didn't know unity could take microphone input. I'm definitely going to play around with it now that I know.
SkyTheCoder
27. Aug 2013 路 00:23 UTC
Really cool game. Works fine on a Mac. Amazing sound, too.
borden
27. Aug 2013 路 00:23 UTC
Stylish graphics and audio. Impressive tech. Nailed the theme.
馃帳 themushroomsound
27. Aug 2013 路 01:25 UTC
@fdevant: yes, the 'crash at the start' issue happens way too frequently, I'll have to fix that. In the meantime you have to make sure the recording is nice and quiet at the start (ah, the hazards of folding time and space).

@lulzfish_4: yes, the levels are too long. I'm actually thinking of changing the way you clear them: it'd be nice if the ship entered hyperspeed after 10s at max velocity, which would bring you straight to the next (more difficult) wormhole.

Good to know the game runs fine on a mac!
Yakka
27. Aug 2013 路 10:37 UTC
Clever idea! Unfortunately, I didn't generated great levels... Maybe my voice is too boring :(

Very good sound design, as usual ;)
馃帳 themushroomsound
27. Aug 2013 路 12:19 UTC
Ok, then the next version will have to show a preview of the waveform, so that you can choose to play or record a new one. :)
lordjosephdeburg
27. Aug 2013 路 16:51 UTC
I like how you create the random landscape mushroom. Hard game but cool
Emilien Gorisse
27. Aug 2013 路 18:29 UTC
Those brakes O_O
Very nice idea, I really enjoyed the game - very hard though.
lopiky1
30. Aug 2013 路 06:21 UTC
:D
kazukishida
30. Aug 2013 路 06:36 UTC
Now this is a very interesting take on 'randomness', giving the player some form of creative control over it. Nice! It was definitely challenging as well haha!

Maybe you could allow the player to restart the level with the same recording in future iterations of this game. :D Repeating the recording again and again seemed to break the pace of the otherwise intense and fast gameplay.

Great game man! :D
馃帳 themushroomsound
30. Aug 2013 路 12:52 UTC
Nice suggestion, thanks kazukishida !
kristof
31. Aug 2013 路 21:32 UTC
Generating the levels from audio is a great idea. Pretty easy to cheat though :-P The controls were a bit too extreme in my opinion.
yagiz
11. Sep 2013 路 15:49 UTC
Great entry! Having less drag on the controller would make it more playable.