I don't know much about XML, but I noticed you used it to, I think, define some interface stuff. What's the reason for using it instead of just hardcoding? Is it the output of some other tool?

Very impressive, and maybe a bit too ambitious.

My major complaint would be about the lack of control of the other team members while you steer your chosen one.

They seem to run off while I go searching chests and potions ;)

It was fun, but for some reason I got stuck on the second screen and couldn't move. It looks pretty cool and oldschool so I liked the general feel of it (including the music), but why is it called Combat Cubes?

@dansludumdare: After years of hardcoding UIs I finally decided enough! Creating them with XML this way makes it much faster for me to implement.

@Endurion: You're right, it was way too ambitious but I think that given the time constraints it turned out fairly well.

@Fireblend: Could you give me more info on that error? Does it happen every time? What steps do you take to get to it? I originally had a slightly different idea for the graphics (Which I still plan on implementing) hence the name.

Thanks a lot for the feedback everyone!

Crashed: had warrior, rogue, mage; warrior died, finished first level, bought priest, pressed start

Crashed: second level, I thought because I walked too far left

I'd've played longer if not for the crashing; it was fun.

@dansludumdare: Ah thanks. I picked those errors up yesterday. At the top of my post I've linked to a new version that is very much (I'm hoping crash free and has some new features).

Mournful guitar music combined with regret-filled interstitial journals?

It might be simple, but for me, it was worth five stars on Mood.

I actually really enjoyed plowing through things with six dozen thieves dispatching everything in sight before my warrior could trundle over, but then when I got to the maze level everything came screeching to a 2fps halt. Probably pathfinding.

@Rectifier: Thanks for the comment. Yeah the pathfinding was a but screwed up. At the top of my post you can find a link to the latest version if you should be interested.

Me and my merry band of 30 warriors fought our way through the thick forests full of goblins, skeletons, vampires, and goblin magis. When we entered the demon's lair, we found ourselves in a maze, but we were thrown apart through a time warp, floating through walls into a horde of vampires. I don't know how it ended.

Beautiful music by the way.

Its funny.

Uhhh, pretty sure you didn't make the character sprites during Ludum Dare. They're pretty well known, I think they were made for Assembly. That's a bit against the rules.

@Flyboy: As stated in the description above I used 4 sprites from RotMG as inspiration.All +/- 80 sprites were made the morning of Ludum Dare with my own sprite editor. It took me almost 4 hours and I am very proud of my work. Please don't throw accusations like that around.

Hi bigbadwofl (I copied and pasted your name)

In the good side I think that the way you've made the graphic part is so commendable, I love the big pixels (the pixels and the... errr... well, a clue: they start with B and end with oobs :P).
The music is well done but a bit repetitive (I know, I know, this is the way that the music loops work).
In the not so good side is the player interaction with the scene elements like rocks, trees, etc... when I have to loot I get stuck with them where apparently I could walk, I've just seen that you put another link to download with a version with a fixed bug, I'll download it and play later.
I don't use the other team mates I prefer to use one from the start to the end of the "wave" of enemies, I think that use only one character and make it grow is enough... but only is my opinion.
My global opinion of the game is thta is a good one with potential.
That's it!
Cheers!

This game has a lot of potential and has great graphics and music, but the first time I played it it crashed when my party died and then next time I picked one strong player instead of a whole party which I couldn't keep under control but after killing everything and looting all items I couldn't find a way to leave the first screen. In the inventory I could scroll down through the things I had looted, but unless I was scrolled right to the top of the list the item I clicked on didn't seem to match the item being selected. Then I couldn't find out how to close the inventory so tried [esc] and it closed the whole game and dumped me back to the desktop without warning or confirmation!! ... Overall this is one of the better games I've reviewed so far, it just needs a little more polish ;)

@cakemonitor: Thanks for the comment, I'm glad you enjoyed it.

Crashed for me as well, on the start of the fourth level.

It's pretty good and indeed rather ambitious, as people have noted, but I sort of got annoyed at the lack of information... what do the red and blue potions do? How much do the stats actually matter?

Music and writing were cool though!

Very nice music. Sadly you couldn't implement sound effects for fighting (sfxr would take you 5 minutes to create them). I enjoyed the game and the atmosphere (graphical style and the textes). I played a mage and skilled intelligence and strength... totally overpowered ^^. The inventory is well done, too.
You should improve your collision system. If you face a wall from the right with A and W, the character should walk to the top instead of get stucked.

@icefox: Thanks for the feedback. you're right; I do need to work a lot on letting the player know what stats do etc.

@Jeremias: Thanks for taking the time to test my game. I'll have a look at sfxr.

Overall, a fun play. It crashed each time I died and It was tricky to aim / attack with the melee characters. Very impressive for the time given.

very impressive indeed

Nice and fun, fast-paced rpg. I like the idea of buying stats and ppl for your roster. Good job!

very impressive

Quite enjoyable was quite hard to actually defeat the things with the game crashing when the last guy had 1 hits worth of health left.

I did like the music though!

I liked the music, and the speech at the beginning of the levels. However, it would've been good if you had added sounds for when you picked up items.

Looks cool! I wish I could play it, but I'm using linux. sorry :(

@brodavi: Sorry about that. It should work in wine though

link: http://www.winehq.org/

I found the game really easy but it might just have been because I spammed warriors and had a huge army to stomp down all the enemies. The upgrading didn't work but I think that's because I didn't click ok. Overall a decent game for 48 hours.

@Skulls: Thanks for taking the time to test my game and comment. You're right it is rally easy. The only stats that really count are Stamina (for HP) and Agility (for movement speed).

It was fun, but i got a fatal error (looting a chest at the border of the map).The music is good but it fails at looping.

@kasarun: Thanks for pointing that out to me, will be sure to fix that.

I wanted to keep playing, but it kept crashing - mainly seemed to be when picking up items and changing stats. I also got stuck in a tree when swapping team members and spawned on a rock.

I enjoyed the music and graphics but it wasn't clear what stats and items do (I had to hit every key on my keyboard to find the inventory screen :) )

Overall a very impressive entry.

Couldn't rate because I'm on a Mac. Sorry :(

Crashed twice, had some big problems with warrior hit detection. Was I meant to be clicking ON the enemies? Aim didn't seem to be bound to the cursor... Wish I could have gotten further. The screenshots look good but I would have been happy with less sprites if it had been more stable.

Bugs are evil. Lost most of my funds for nothing, inventory didn't work past the first 8(?) items, and I ended up not being able to move. Otherwise, good work!

Neat! I love the art direction. Specifically, how soft the landscape tiles looked. I like the idea of controlling lots of different characters. The stat management seemed overwhelming and pointless. The input choices were a little odd, when I hit ESC the game exited unexpectedly. Also, I had no idea that I could hit TAB to cycle through characters until I read the help screen. Lastly, it seems unecessarily complex to require the R key to loot -- why wouldn't characters just auto-loot?

The main combat gameplay was alright, except that the lack of theatrics really made what could have been explosive quite floaty. For example, there were no sound effects or visual cues when my attacks hit the trolls which made it hard to tell if I connected. There was the bloodstain at the end, but maybe if there were more of those touches combat would have felt better -- all without modifying the actual combat and game feel logic. Overall, nice take on multi-tab Gauntlet I would definitely keep refining this.

Ah forgot to mention I got a 0xC0000005 when madly tabbing through the store screen at the second store.

@racarate: Thanks for taking the time to give such useful feedback. I'll have a look at that error :)

I like the overall concept and feel of the game.
-The sprites were charming in their simplicity.
-The music while not bad, got annoying with such a short loop.
-I like the party members, but it was lame to spend points buying a party member and upgrading them only to have them die because they like to run into the middle of enemies rather than using their ranged spells (priest).

Great game I liked it! The only problem for me It crashed (possibly a seg fault) and hanged a few times. But I'm really impressed! Making a game at this quality in c++ AND in 48h is a real achievement! congrats

Impressive achievement in 48 hours. I played it more than once. It's pretty fun. The music is good too.

Indeed looks like rotmg. Was fun playing! great stat system.

@Sup Dood: You're right the party system needs a lot of work. I plan on adding some commands (perhaps F1-F3), for things like: 'Stay Here', 'Follow Me' and 'Contemplate Life'.

@bms: Sorry about the chrashes, working on fixing those.

it "works" under WINE but the mouse aiming is completely random, so the mouse is pretty much useless, can't give a full rating due to that.

Is it just me, or do these sprites look like those of Realm of the Mad God? For a second I thought they WERE sprites from RotMG

... Failed to read ALL of the description. My bad!!

No worries :) It is quite the wall of text.

Lovely little adventure! I love the music. quite adventure-y (apart from the vut-off at the end)

Thanks for the comment. 'vut-off' ?

Ah nvm, I assume you mean cut-off.

The sprites are ripped, the music doesn't fit at all, the attacking mechanism sucks... All I am trying to say here is better luck next time and develop a better sense of atmosphere.

zzForrest, please read the text I meticulously wrote regarding the game. Many people disagree with you about the music but you are of course entitled to your own opinion. Maybe rethink how you rate games?

All I am trying to say here is you are being unnecessarily rude and it might be time to develop some manners.

Oh also, it would seem you didn't even take part in Ludum. How petty.

Please do web, can't play :(

Pretty great. I'd like to have more control over my team. Perhaps you could make them attack the last enemy I was attacking or something like that?

Fun little game! Definitely feels like a lot of thought went into it. I, too, would agree that AI for your team members might need a bit of work, as I wasn't sure if they were supposed to be running off on their own or not! Music was amazing! Thanks!

I wish your game could be run in a window. I liked the idea of "buying" a team, instead of creating it. I haven't been able to get into Day 2 - I lacked some kind of guidance. Well done on the living world, though.

Nice game. The teammates are suicidal and increasing stats doesnt seem to do anything other than wasting money ( if you reselect your character after raising its stats they are back to default). The game turns into a monster genocide once you have at least 5 warriors with you.

The text sets the mood nicely though I think its mostly the undeads that were mourning their loss, none of my team member ever fell. So a bit too easy.

Doesnt seem worth it to create wizard AI controlled teammates as they charge into battle like some frenzied orcs despites their low health.

@blob: After clicking on the + and - buttons to modify stats, you need to press OK to spend your money. It's just above the start button. The only stats that actually do anything are Stamina for HP and Agility for movement speed. Thanks for taking the time to comment.