Ten Seconds To Space by Arcana

[raw]
made by Arcana for LD27 (COMPO)
Game description: The Insects have found Earth again. This time, earth's prepared for the invasion and has the ability to launch a ship with their top Captain to space in ten seconds.

Move with WSAD, aim with the mouse, shoot with Left Shift or Space (and quite possibly the Mouse Button works now too since it was a minor fix). Select your weapon type with 1 or 2. (Oddly enough, you'll notice that your shots go faster the farther away the mouse is from the player). (There's a secret weapon 3 but I didn't really test it so effects are random!)

Yes, the game ends (it's not unlimited waves) but I haven't actually succeeded at it so it's kind of untested. Hope it works.

Background:

This is my second Ludum Dare entry!

I, again, decided to compete last minute and said, "I'm going to devote three hours to this because I'm really busy." So it turns out that about 15 or so hours later I'm submitting what I have, in its immature, unpolished glory, because I was travelling and couldn't put the full 48 hours to this.

As much as I would have wanted to make the gameplay more interesting, I was unfortunately very time-limited, so it's unfortunately rather sparse gameplay wise. I spent most of my time on assets this time around (made all of the artwork and all of the music and sound effects). However, I learned a lot about assets and style and about what things need to be done for game-making in the future.

I uploaded a Mac OS X app bundle here and a Windows bundle, but I really haven't tested anything as much as I would have liked so there might be problems. Please let me know if there are any issues!

Stealth update: I found out that enemy spawning wasn't working properly (I had my greater and less-than signs messed up!) so I fixed that up. There was also a problem with the game's "Retry? (Y/N)" prompt so I fixed that up too.

After a few days report: I think I'm probably most proud of the music (I like the game loop the best). I'm also reasonably happy with the artwork (quantity, not quality!). I'm not an artist and doing so many pictures in such a tiny amount of time for me is a pretty big thing. I spent a lot of time on the assets.

Ratings

Coolness 55% 3
Overall 2.63 943
Audio 3.14 225
Fun 2.39 960
Graphics 2.94 521
Humor 2.33 491
Innovation 1.83 1162
Mood 2.32 863
Theme 1.67 1178

Feedback

Endurion
26. Aug 2013 路 13:10 UTC
Not particularly on topic :)

Nice little game. I would've preferred fire on the mouse button instead of shift.
GaTechGrad
28. Aug 2013 路 00:37 UTC
Really like the unique art style in the opening story. I agree, it would have been nice to have gun 1 on left mouse button and gun 2 on right mouse button. I think my high score was 158.
馃帳 Arcana
28. Aug 2013 路 16:39 UTC
I do apologize for the mouse button thing. I didn't test with a mouse and was using the laptop trackpad, so it didn't even occur to me (as it's impossible to hold and move with the trackpad!)
lopiky1
29. Aug 2013 路 03:41 UTC
simple yet very fun :D
ramoncb
29. Aug 2013 路 03:50 UTC
I like the game!

maybe a option to shoot with the mouse would give the game a more fast pace
(sorry my bad english xD)
Malactus
29. Aug 2013 路 04:28 UTC
Gets pretty challenging after 15 seconds. Quick yes,
Unfortunately I do not see it particularly on theme, except at the start, which feels a bit restrictive as you do cant really do anything in those 10 seconds :P

I like the style of the watercolor styled background, and the music and sounds are decent
theholychicken
29. Aug 2013 路 04:36 UTC
Awesome concept to use combat for for music!
The enemies are spawning very close to me even in the center of the map, though. I am afraid of moving around because an enemy would spawn right next to me and instantly kill me.
The cutscene system looks great, and the main game's art style is very very good.
Definitely top marks for audio! Great job!
namrog84
29. Aug 2013 路 04:57 UTC
I liked the handrawn unique art a lot. But was a little disappointed in the gameplay :/
koe415
29. Aug 2013 路 05:43 UTC
The sound design is awesome on this game. From the small things like the keyboard strokes when you hit an insect to that great main menu theme, it's very solid all around. The game itself is pretty difficult after the first few seconds. I think removing the random spawning right next to the player would help ease the difficulty. Otherwise, very impressive what was accomplished in only a few hours!
Kragnir
29. Aug 2013 路 07:55 UTC
I am guessing the use of the theme is the rocket launch in the intro. Game is kind of interesting but enemies spawning very close to you make it difficult to play for long. Like the music.
Diptoman
29. Aug 2013 路 17:11 UTC
Its simplistic, but great fun!
I totally love the doodly art style to it.

Great job!
馃帳 Arcana
29. Aug 2013 路 17:49 UTC
Yeah I would have liked to put more "theme" into it. Initially I wanted to make your shots and the music fit into a 10-second loop, but I wasn't able to figure out how to make the timings tight enough so that they would synchronize properly.

Sorry about the enemies spawning. I was aware of this on submission but didn't have time to fix it.
loxo
31. Aug 2013 路 18:25 UTC
I like the art style, the music and the sound effects. But the game fits the theme only vaguely.
berkano
31. Aug 2013 路 19:29 UTC
Refreshing to see some hand-drawn (painted?) gfx and nice music!
Kharza
31. Aug 2013 路 20:39 UTC
Love the cute intro!
Empyrealhell
01. Sep 2013 路 06:43 UTC
Fun and easy to get into, and the art style is good, but as others have said, your usage of theme was cursory at best.
AidanAK47
02. Sep 2013 路 20:39 UTC
The random spawning in the middle of the screen really killed it for me. It makes the game more about luck than anything else. Also having the enemies disappear when you hit them is pretty unsatisfying. It would be preferable if there was a small explosion or something. It makes it look better and feels better.
PIXEL^3
14. Sep 2013 路 02:32 UTC
Cute little game with good audio too it, the sound effects mix with the music rather well. Though the enemies usually spawn too close to the center usually resulting in them ramming me with no time to react. Best I got was about 530 points or so.

-AlucardX60