Fight the Power by |||||||||||||

[raw]
made by ||||||||||||| for LD25 (JAM)
Story:
In the near future, technology has soared far beyond what we in the 21st century expected. Leading the charge, the world wide web has grown even more expansive, encompassing almost all fields in the future era and becoming the centerpiece for development. In the process, Piracy has advanced and created an arms race between publishers and hackers as each strive to one up in the other in an effort to further their agendas. This is but one small struggle between the two, as a common pirate fights the security system for access to free goods, ask yourself, who is the hero here? A woman who enjoys the tears and labors of another without just compensation, or the greedy publisher who seeks to bleed the customers dry with draconic, inane systems within the market?

Game:
This game is a shoot 'em up that changes based on the music you load in. Included is one song but try it out with any mp3, ogg, etc that you have on your computer. Dodge the bullets for the entire song and win. Key to note is that the hitbox, as in most shoot 'em ups, is much smaller than the character sprite. It only takes up the small red circle on the center of her body.

Controls:
Mouse- Movement
LMB- Select

Ratings

Coolness 100% 1
Overall(Jam) 3.32 105
Audio(Jam) 3.67 30
Fun(Jam) 3.19 84
Graphics(Jam) 3.32 143
Humor(Jam) 1.94 260
Innovation(Jam) 3.75 26
Mood(Jam) 2.85 155
Theme(Jam) 1.86 318

Feedback

Rex Peppers
18. Dec 2012 · 02:42 UTC
Can't play windows games :-(
Sim
18. Dec 2012 · 03:00 UTC
Hah I had a feeling what tune this would be from the mp3 name :)

Interesting game although really hard, I can barely last a minute let alone finish the song. The beat detection seems good, but for the sample song at least the pulsing is very strong and makes the bullets harder to dodge.

If you move the mouse to the very left of the screen then you can't get hit, which I exploited to watch the rest of the game. I like the way the bullets dry up during a soft part in the song, although some more variation in patterns would've been nice.
bitwise-constructs
18. Dec 2012 · 04:35 UTC
Very nice execution. I noticed, however, that with some quieter songs no bullets were being spawned.
LucaPavone
18. Dec 2012 · 04:39 UTC
I downloaded the version with music, but it doesn't seem to want to play. I press Start, it flashes to the screen but fades back to the title, even though there's music in the directory next to it.

What do?
OU GDA
18. Dec 2012 · 04:41 UTC
rhythm based games are truly the ultimate. beat detection seems like it works a lot better on more fast-paced songs. it would be nice if i could close the game with x
blob
18. Dec 2012 · 04:42 UTC
This is really awesome. Love the concept and love that the music even affects the current speed of each bullet, giving a nice visual flow to the game. I really hope you re going to flesh this out into a complete game because there's a lot of replayability in this. I wouldnt mind refighting the same bosses over and over with different musics to see how they change.
You could have something really good if you add some attack pattern change depending on the general mood of the music or something like that.
My only complaint is that it doesnt really fit the theme.
Played the game on " murderous desire at-nen mix", I find it works really well with that game. Interesting speed changes along the song. The original song was too brutal for me.
TwilightFlandre
18. Dec 2012 · 04:50 UTC
@LucaPavone: You have to actually select the song in the directory when you hit start and the game will begin after that.

@bitwise-constructs: Yea I'm aware that some slower songs suffer from that problem. In a later version down the road I'll probably add better bullet parameters.
LucaPavone
18. Dec 2012 · 05:00 UTC
Still not working. I've tried dragging the song onto the EXE, keeping it selected in the directory, but nothing's working.

This should've come with clear instructions on how to get a song in, because I clearly haven't been able to figure it out by myself.
kewry
18. Dec 2012 · 05:22 UTC
Cool game
dansludumdare
18. Dec 2012 · 05:31 UTC
This is a really excellent idea. I wouldn't be surprised if music visualizations evolve into games like this.

@LucaPavone -- it really isn't hard. It's probably some error.
KWL_TW
18. Dec 2012 · 06:47 UTC
Music generated bullet!!
so coooool!!
Luca Pavone!
18. Dec 2012 · 11:09 UTC
@Dansludumdare: You're probably right. Oh well - I really wanted to see what F-Zero music would do to it. :<
Digiraze
18. Dec 2012 · 14:12 UTC
Really cool idea.
zimra
18. Dec 2012 · 20:58 UTC
Excellent idea !!
Blodyavenger
18. Dec 2012 · 23:24 UTC
Nice idea behind the game but it was too hard for me - those beats weren't good for my movement flow :)
Shugor
18. Dec 2012 · 23:56 UTC
I really like bullet-dodging games, and I've made several songs, so this was a really entertaining game to play. It would be great if there were more bullet patterns to choose from/be randomly selected, as this one gets somewhat predictable. Also, some quieter or less percussion-heavy songs don't work very well. All that aside, though, I like this game very much~

Cool Border of Life arrange, btw
VonZippenstein
19. Dec 2012 · 01:41 UTC
There's some great gameplay when you load up Ratatat.
Tyren
19. Dec 2012 · 02:37 UTC
Interesting, this is the first jam game I've played where it interacts with the music.
goulding57
19. Dec 2012 · 03:39 UTC
can't play windows. But the screenshot looks pretty nice.
MrEvilGuy
19. Dec 2012 · 05:24 UTC
Dude! So trippy and hypnotic!!! I put on Welcome to the World of the Plastic Beach by Gorillaz and it was nutty! Put on another song and when the bullets go in slow motion I know when they're going to speed up because I know the song so I can make it appear like I'm dodging bullets skillfully like in the Matrix. SOOOOO good. The music you guys included makes it really cool but shows it off well. In any case, absolutely fantastic work! :D
arch.jslin
19. Dec 2012 · 17:01 UTC
I appreciate the effort you made to make the bullets match the music, I think for certain kind of music it plays out pretty well, and the mapping scheme is something I haven't seen before (like in Beat Hazard), but I still have to say the game itself really doesn't fit the theme IMHO.
moomoo112
20. Dec 2012 · 05:23 UTC
certainly an interesting mechanic, but incredibly vague on the theme
StoneMonkeyStudios
22. Dec 2012 · 03:46 UTC
Great take on the music-generated bullet hell mashup genre. As previously stated, the Ludum Dare theme is thinly overlayed onto the game when taking the flavor text into consideration, and is actually nonexistent when assessed strictly within the confines of the game.

The music's affect on the gameplay is interesting and challenging, though possibly overly challenging in some cases (with the exception of the bottom-left corner exploit).

Personally, I find that the allure of most bullet hell games comes from finding a tiny path within the dancing wave of bullets, fighting back within tiny pockets of space, and the intensity of narrowly dodging imminent death from the oncoming curtain of fire.

In Fight The Power, because the bullet's movements adhere to the beat of the music, it can be difficult to find a visual pattern in the wave, and as a direct result, it can be difficult to plan an approach or an escape into or from these pockets of space, making the dodging mechanic more frustrating than thrilling or entertaining. If the bullets left some sort of lasting visual cue, or if the music only affected bullet generation and enemy movement, I suspect the player would be able to determine a visual pattern in the bullet's movements, or at least be given time to react (as the bullets themselves aren't moving erratically).

Otherwise, a solid entry, and a game I would be interested in seeing further evolved. Great work.
sclark39
22. Dec 2012 · 04:23 UTC
This is really hard, and the music reactions were very effective but I think would have worked better with me if I was less sleepy. :)
Dark Acre Jack
22. Dec 2012 · 04:44 UTC
Full points for coming up with a reactive audio entry. Not sure why I'm the villain but that's cool. Great work!
EdoMiyamoto
24. Dec 2012 · 15:27 UTC
Wow that's a really good game, i tried several mp3 to see if it was really working and it is ! Piano songs was a challenging boss ^^ good job !
BlackBulletIV
26. Dec 2012 · 03:11 UTC
Well this is a very interesting concept. I had fun testing out various songs with it. One problem for me is that it's too hard; I had a really even getting to the good bits of the songs, and when if I did get there, all hell broke lose and I lost. This could be helped by having a replay option, so I don't have to browse to my music every time. I'd love an invisibility option, just to see what it does with various tunes.

I don't see much relation to the theme though. Yes, there's the description on this page, but nothing in the game itself.
netgrind
29. Dec 2012 · 02:59 UTC
That was really cool. I played to a bunch of Flying Lotus. You should add shooting/enemy waves, but even with out that I think I'll revisit this game now and then.
hannardynamite
02. Jan 2013 · 22:36 UTC
I really like this! Makes my eyes hurt after a while. But other than that, it has a lot of potential for replayability.
farmergnome
03. Jan 2013 · 05:38 UTC
Okay, first things first, cool take on a shmup, I loved the variance based on the music I selected, very cool. I think the game could do with some more effects and prompts (when you get hit for example) to better portray what is happening in-game, I struggled with that but overall a well executed idea.

I think you could take this well beyond your competition build and add all the bells and whistles and have a very solid game with an awesome mechanic, either way good work :)
CoffeeOnimal
04. Jan 2013 · 12:34 UTC
I like the way that the bullets pulse to the beat of the music. Very interesting idea there.
RawBits
06. Jan 2013 · 14:57 UTC
I love shmups but I miss shooting back badly in this. It lags a lot for me but I still think that the collision area is too small for the player. Nice misuc though. :)
azurenimbus
08. Jan 2013 · 00:37 UTC
Whoa, now that's a game with high cool effect :D

Really great job, you guys. I'm definitely going to try messing around with some songs and recommending this!