LudumData

Pirates and Gorillas by Brucef

[raw]
made by Brucef for LD24 (COMPO)
Basic Controls:

- Pirate (player) moves towards mouse
- Click mouse to "Evolve" the entities inside any loops in the blue string
- Hold space to use a shield to be temporarily invisible (Edit: * invincible, not invisible)

Pro tips:

- Don't let big mobs of gorillas build up
- Use your shield to run through large mobs
- When shielding, watch your energy (green bar)


So yea. Here is my entry for Ludum Dare 24. This was my first time participating in a Ludum Dare. It was fun. Looking forward to the next one.

I would really appreciate any sort of feedback in comments!
And for more incentive to comment: I will make sure to play the game of everyone who comments and make sure to give you my feedback about your game!

This was fun. Long live the Dare.

Brucef

Web https://dl.dropbox.com/u/97642307/Ludum%20Dare%2024/bin-release/LudumDare.html
Source https://dl.dropbox.com/u/97642307/Ludum%20Dare%2024/Ludum%20Dare%2024%20Source.zip
Original URL https://ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-24/?action=preview&uid=14164

Ratings

Coolness 63% 3
Overall 2.97 375
Audio 2.22 432
Fun 3.15 192
Graphics 2.36 572
Humor 2.50 233
Innovation 3.30 175
Mood 2.64 369
Theme 1.94 664

Feedback

mappum
27. Aug 2012 路 06:04 UTC
This was actually quite entertaining.

When I first opened it I had no idea how to play, but when I read the description I went back and enjoyed it.

I'm not really sure why I am on a ship with gorillas, or what that has to do with evolution...
philosophistry
27. Aug 2012 路 06:08 UTC
Pretty damn fun. Like the mechanics. Got 290. I couldn't tell if there was actually any evolution on the "gorillas" (looked more like mice to me), but still, I liked it!
Fritzendugan
27. Aug 2012 路 06:10 UTC
sound effects were a little on the annoying side. Music was decent. Gameplay mechanics were great, simple, but fun. Could maybe have used a little more depth, but it is just a 48 hour competition
pjchardt
27. Aug 2012 路 06:21 UTC
I like the mechanic however the difficulty seems to escalate very quickly and I seemed to die very quickly even at full health. The wrapping of enemies in a circle to convert them is interesting. Have you considered modifiers like the tail growing longer? It does not grow longer does it?
馃帳 Brucef
27. Aug 2012 路 06:27 UTC
@ pjchardt Currently, the tail does not grow longer at all. That was something that I would have liked to added, but It was hard to impliment in the amount of time left and with the way I had my code set up. Maybe I'll ad that in the future. and for the difficulty thing, balancing games is not a strong suite of mine. Next time i'll get more people to playtest and give me feedback before submission.

Thanks everyone for the feedback!
robcozzens
27. Aug 2012 路 06:38 UTC
Pretty fun when there are just about 10, but then they reproduce so fast and it gets nearly impossible.
panzermancer
27. Aug 2012 路 06:49 UTC
That was momentarily entertaining. You die way too quick, though, and there doesn't seem to be any sense of progression, just more gorillas.
madpew
27. Aug 2012 路 06:54 UTC
I was able to evolve 1 gorilla, incredibly hard to get them into a loop (might be just me) Besides to that the game got a nice mechanic (but an annoying musicloop). Well done. Would like to see this mechanic expanded (like the already mentioned tail-length-increase)
J00nzu
27. Aug 2012 路 06:54 UTC
That was very fun and interesting game. Nice!
cacciatc
27. Aug 2012 路 06:58 UTC
At first I thought the pirate was a ladybug. I like the overhead view of the pirate ship.
Thurig
27. Aug 2012 路 08:24 UTC
I had great fun with running around. Love the green farts.. or shield.
hnjslater
27. Aug 2012 路 16:13 UTC
Pretty fun. A bit too hard and the music was certainly not to my taste. Not a lot of the theme in there either. Saying that, it did kill a couple of minutes!
kyyrma
27. Aug 2012 路 16:34 UTC
Your basic gameplay idea is really good. Makes me think something similar on touch devices (especially on tablets) could be amazing.

As others have pointed out, the music got annoying real fast. I'm guessing you are a programmer first and musician second, so you get a point for effort. The graphics could've been more polished too, given that there are only a few sprites and a simple background.
turnip
27. Aug 2012 路 16:36 UTC
Did you confuse 'evolution' with 'evasion' ? :S
FoxFiesta
27. Aug 2012 路 17:43 UTC
Cool mini-game ! (but the music is pretty annoying)
馃帳 Brucef
27. Aug 2012 路 20:43 UTC
I'm liking all this feedback! Despite all the many things I did wrong, I'm proud of this first LD entry, and I will now be able to make something even better for future LD's
levelbylevel
27. Aug 2012 路 21:04 UTC
I like it :) The game mechanic is fun and I liked the audio.
Amoaeba Junior
27. Aug 2012 路 22:30 UTC
Weirdest combination EVER XD made me lol a lot

They stopped spawning so i gave up :<
馃帳 Brucef
27. Aug 2012 路 22:44 UTC
yea they cap off at like 200 or so, your supposed to be killing (or evolving, rather) them before there become that many, but oh well, haha
pjchardt
29. Aug 2012 路 01:17 UTC
Brucef, I completely relate to the balancing issues. I thought my games had pretty solid controls, then I had someone play it and they could not jump from one platform to the next! I made some tweaks but there is so much more I could do. I don't know how else to fix such balance issues other than watch other people play it?!?
Ulixava
29. Aug 2012 路 17:13 UTC
I'm not sure what to say. First of all there is the sound which is really annoying. I had to lower the sound quite a bit in order to make my ears feel alright.

Another thing that needs to be changed is how you walk into an enemy and it drains all of your health straight away!
shinD
29. Aug 2012 路 17:19 UTC
It might be a bit of a stretch to find the theme in here, but gameplay mechanics I found pretty fun!
Cake&amp;Code
30. Aug 2012 路 01:05 UTC
Wow, that was fun! I have never played a corralling game before and I would never have thought of it myself. Great job! It sure does get too hard if you don't try and evolve them before there's too many but I guess that's something you learn by playing. Evolve and evolve often.

That being said, I only got a fraction of the score you've got going in that screenshot! (430)
dengzo
30. Aug 2012 路 12:57 UTC
crazy.. in a good way ;)