My Little Planetoid by matthias_zarzecki

[raw]
made by matthias_zarzecki for LD23 (COMPO)
Build an outpost on your own little planetoid. Gather resources and get access to new buildings, and launch satellites and ships into space!

Features:
- Real graphics. That's it. Nobody can ever surpass this.
- Beautiful environments
- Serene and fitting soundtrack
- SPACE
- A failure-state (no call-of-duty-esque handholding here)
- Challenging & cerebral gameplay (may differ from person to person)
- Possibilities for emergent gameplay
- Multiple ways to play
- Space-ships! Space-objects. Space-PLANETS

You control the entire game with the mouse. Everything else is self-explaning within the game.

Also available for your convenience: A timelapse-video, and windows- and mac-standalone-files.

Have fun!

-Matthew

//Updates!
Fixed a highly critical bug. Just a single line in comments caused the Destroy-button to not appear.

//Music!
I uploaded the "space-banjo-theme", for all your soundtrack-related needs :).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=suTOZUyYKcs

//Review! (sort of)
Dogbomb made another Ludum-Dare-review, My LIttle Planetoid shows up at 9:50
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oCpFY0_Ygqg

//Thoughts!
I wrote a post-mortem. Read on for insight into my brain.
http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/2012/04/30/thoughts-on-my-little-planetoid/

//Awesome review!
My Little Planetoid appears on RockPaperShotgun. According to them it "has stupidly impressive graphics given the timeframe it was built in." It's also being likened to Spore :P
http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2012/04/30/tiny-world-tour-ludum-dare-23/

Ratings

Coolness 100% 1
Overall 3.66 85
Audio 3.28 124
Fun 3.25 185
Graphics 3.78 116
Humor 2.20 437
Innovation 3.30 256
Mood 3.40 94
Theme 4.10 24

Feedback

schizofunky
23. Apr 2012 · 09:26 UTC
You've done a great job of the music and atmosphere!
Ishisoft
23. Apr 2012 · 09:39 UTC
Quite fun building things and seeing what comes next!
the8donut
23. Apr 2012 · 09:47 UTC
Very neat and smooth gameplay, cool graphics! Music is very well done as well :) Liked it a lot
SFBTom
23. Apr 2012 · 09:51 UTC
Incredible work!
Exorph
23. Apr 2012 · 09:53 UTC
The game is extremely unbalanced and the camera is difficult to control. That being said, it's very atmospheric and has potential to be a lot of fun.
datahaven
23. Apr 2012 · 09:57 UTC
Great game - loved the exploration/development aspect.

Found rotation controls a little frustrating, though - plantoid sometimes moved when I didn't want it to.
Bezza
23. Apr 2012 · 09:58 UTC
Absolutely brilliant considering the amount of dev time you had. Good work!
Bei
23. Apr 2012 · 10:52 UTC
Found the camera difficult to control when selecting the buttons, but other than that, great game. Music really fit's the game, pretty good graphics, and the game progressed at a good pace.
Danik
23. Apr 2012 · 10:58 UTC
Impressive amount of technologies to build! Nice work!
Lidfrid
23. Apr 2012 · 11:09 UTC
Cool stuff, very relaxing.
There are some buggy controls, though.
rustybroomhandle
23. Apr 2012 · 11:21 UTC
Not bad, except for perhaps the rotation that gets in the way a bit.
Tumaini
23. Apr 2012 · 11:23 UTC
It looks very nice, but unfortunately not runnable on Ubuntu 12.04.
There's no Unity Web Player for Linux and the Windows executable doesn't work in Wine.
ncannasse
23. Apr 2012 · 12:01 UTC
Nice ! the controls could be a bit improved and I couldn't see my moon base :)
steamgirl
23. Apr 2012 · 12:05 UTC
Very nicely done! I had a lot of fun with this one. Like Ishisoft said - it's fun seeing what comes next!

*spoiler alert*
Although it took me a little while to figure out that I was supposed to build the moon base by clicking on the moon, I kinda liked that I had to chase it. ^_^

Good job! Well done!
Suese
23. Apr 2012 · 12:48 UTC
Graphically appealing but not quite a complete-feeling game. The fact that there was music was a big plus, but the music loop seemed repetitive and there didn't seem to be sound effects. This game could have been improved by: 1. added gameplay elements, deeper gameplay, 2. improving the UI, 3. more sound effects.

Thank you for this.
mastazavr
23. Apr 2012 · 13:00 UTC
Great game! Love it!
aaronsnoswell
23. Apr 2012 · 13:02 UTC
NIce job - interesting concept for a game. Love the graphics - looks like some really good work.

Not sure if I agree that the music fits :P Nice to see some original content though! It was a little annoying on kongregate having the planet rotate every time I tried to select Farm, Factory etc. What engine are you using? Unity? And are you using blender for 3D content?
iFred_QC
23. Apr 2012 · 13:07 UTC
I had to mute the music. The guitar sound (Was it one?) was making my ears bleed while the rest was almost mute when I lowered the volume to account for that sound.
bms
23. Apr 2012 · 13:17 UTC
Really nice game, kind of reminds me of spore.
Tifu
23. Apr 2012 · 14:07 UTC
Good job. Playing the web version I had the same annoyance as others with the camera scrolling when purchasing a building, but aside from that, great stuff :D
Zener
23. Apr 2012 · 14:08 UTC
Playing it is a nice experience, congrats
🎤 matthias_zarzecki
23. Apr 2012 · 14:38 UTC
Thanks for the nice feedback so far!

I made this using Unity and 3dsMax. I've thought long about the rotation-feature, and in the end decided to go for screen-border-scrolling instead of "hold button to rotate". I've seen a lot of people become instantly disoriented that way.

...should've put in both...
Pierrec
23. Apr 2012 · 14:38 UTC
Sweet! Too bad farms and factory look alike (same colors). Great feeling.
Zed
23. Apr 2012 · 18:37 UTC
Absolutely beautiful. Need this as a full game, thanks.
chinchang
23. Apr 2012 · 18:43 UTC
liked the graphics and effects but gameplay was quite confusing. Also the game rotation coming in the way of buttons was a lil annoying.
AlwaysGeeky
23. Apr 2012 · 19:46 UTC
Fits the theme realyl well :)
Jacic
23. Apr 2012 · 21:07 UTC
Very nice game, great graphics and music!
Danvil
23. Apr 2012 · 21:11 UTC
Really like this one - especially the exploration of what you can do! Controls where a bit annoying (rotating when mouse is over the build icons and planet rotation).
mattchu
24. Apr 2012 · 01:11 UTC
Simple, fun strategy game. Nice work! :)
Hazard
24. Apr 2012 · 01:28 UTC
Great game! Seeing the tiny world progress is really enjoyable. I also like the space banjo a lot. :) I noticed a deadlock-bug: Clicking the moon with a building selected or a ground tile with a moon base selected locks the tile, making it impossible to progress. Happend to me the first time and wondered why i'm not able to build the moon base.
Rybar
24. Apr 2012 · 02:31 UTC
The controls drove me crazy. reaching for any button causes the globe to spin... the more obvious tried-and-true solution would be to click and drag in any empty space to spin the globe. Great graphics, good feel overall, I enjoyed it except for my gripe about the controls.
Aaron San Filippo
24. Apr 2012 · 04:19 UTC
Nice work! Agree with most of the comments - but I'd love to see this game developed more!
gregdevice
24. Apr 2012 · 06:45 UTC
Clever! Fun to play. I wanted to keep trying but there seems to be a bug where you can't build new structures after destroying them. At least on my browser. Nice work!
🎤 matthias_zarzecki
24. Apr 2012 · 09:41 UTC
I now do wish that I extended the mouse-range without causing the screen-rotation. Then again, I never would've reacognized it myself (as I didn't). THis is a testing-thing, which b< necessity means it was tragic and unavoidable.
Daniel
24. Apr 2012 · 13:22 UTC
Brilliant!!!
Daniel
24. Apr 2012 · 13:23 UTC
Definitely a all 5-star game
Gremlin
24. Apr 2012 · 14:14 UTC
Great concept. Found myself withing for different camera controls--too slow, and kept moving when I was near the build buttons. Had a bug where I couldn't build anything on a plot after I deleted one of the labs--just that one plot, not any of the others. I won anyway. Would like to see a bit more of strategy or branching paths, but had a fun time.
Ghostik
24. Apr 2012 · 19:21 UTC
I really like the variety of structures from farm to base on the moon :D. Funny little game. You dont have to think a lot when you are building something but that doesnt matter because watching your little planet expand is the most exciting thing ;)
Good work
marudziik
24. Apr 2012 · 22:49 UTC
Feels very much complete, and a great LD entry. People already wrote about mouse control, and I didn't find any more flaws. Music is great.
deejorg
24. Apr 2012 · 23:25 UTC
Very interesting game!! I enjoyed it for a lot of time
Evil Cult
24. Apr 2012 · 23:51 UTC
[Comments and ratings from this account come from various team members]
Not too keen on the gameplay but the look and feel is fantastic and it matches with the theme very well. Camera was also a bit clunky.
MurrayL
25. Apr 2012 · 00:41 UTC
Loved the graphics! Reminded me of a PS1/MS-DOS game.

I think the soundtrack could do with being a bit more atmospheric, and a bit less, er, 'space-banjo'.
Shigor
25. Apr 2012 · 01:34 UTC
Good concept, good game which is hurt by the controls :/ moving cursor to building button rotates planetoid away...
it reminds me one sf indie strategy game I player year or to ago... can't remember the name :)
derrickdool
25. Apr 2012 · 04:39 UTC
Great game, one of the best I've tried so far. Played through to completion a couple times. You should consider continuing development and launching on mobile.

Loved that theme music, would have liked some sounds on the building actions.
Also would have preferred if arrow keys controlled the cam, and mouse just for HUD (my opinion)
NefariousZhen
25. Apr 2012 · 05:13 UTC
World kept spinning when I went to select what to build next.
strega
25. Apr 2012 · 07:35 UTC
Cool game! I could see this being a very interesting spherical Settler's of Catan if you added multiplayer.
Robert Swan
25. Apr 2012 · 11:42 UTC
Great! I did get one zone that after I trashed I couldn't build on - but only a minor point when the rest was raelly interesting.
chambers
25. Apr 2012 · 16:20 UTC
That was actually pretty fun! Though I had to play it twice, in my first playthrough I died right at the start and didn't find the game that fun. I felt that the buildings at the start of the game weren't very well characterized. For example: why is the farm grey?

Luckily in my second attempt I was able to finish it. The planet gets really beautiful by the end of the game, with all those sattelites revolving around it.

Anyway, good work!
tripleVisionGames
25. Apr 2012 · 17:55 UTC
Awesome! Great graphics, loads of fun, neat mechanic. Also the music is really great. Reminds me of the banjo theme in Hitchiker's Guide to The Galaxy
blob
25. Apr 2012 · 21:21 UTC
Nice finished little game with a nice music. Good use of the theme. Would have been nice to have more explanations, it was confusing in the beginning.
Arowx
25. Apr 2012 · 22:22 UTC
Great job, well done!
fatSquirrel
26. Apr 2012 · 03:02 UTC
Really enjoyed the building progression element of game play. Amazing work for 48 hours, well done all around.
leafo
26. Apr 2012 · 05:01 UTC
It's a cool concept but the game doesn't seem to go anywhere. Also it's really frustrating moving the camera around. It's also frustrating that the camera moves when I am hoving over any of the buttons. Other than that though, great job.
Cake&amp;Code
26. Apr 2012 · 06:34 UTC
I didn't have nearly as many issues with the camera as most did. I thought it was pretty straightforward, and I got as far as a space station. (But dammit I closed the window right before Moon Base! Fool of a Took!) I rather liked the gentle guitar strumming, I felt like it really added a nice melancholic spacey atmosphere to your game. My only gripe is that there isn't a sort of feedback system for the buttons. When I clicked on farm and move away, I wasn't entirely sure if I had clicked it or not, so I ended up going back and clicking again to make sure. It's nothing big, nor is it anything I rated you against. Just a musing!
dukope
26. Apr 2012 · 09:23 UTC
I liked the simplicity and the visuals fit well. The progression is also well done; it was really satisfying to have all those satellites flying around. Biggest annoyance was the world rotation while mousing over the ui.
Toast
26. Apr 2012 · 10:53 UTC
I've played a couple of game like this (with the exact same food/material house/factory/farm mechanic) for this Ludum Dare. Good execution though.
Raptor85
26. Apr 2012 · 14:18 UTC
Unity web player doesnt have a linux version and the native crashes under WINE, so sorry, cant test :/
divillysausages
26. Apr 2012 · 19:43 UTC
really excellent, well done! minor let-down with the controls, but i loved it
Codexus
26. Apr 2012 · 19:47 UTC
The first time I played something happened and I couldn't click the moon (it wouldn't highlight when moused over). The second time I totally made it! ;)
Tinco
26. Apr 2012 · 22:38 UTC
What a great game, I totally made it :) No real challenge though, just a nice experience!
Kitch
27. Apr 2012 · 04:26 UTC
Game play was just a lot of "wait for the next thing"... but it was wrapped in a great presentation.
FredericRP
27. Apr 2012 · 08:08 UTC
Absolutely Great Game ! The screen border scrolling is confusing, but the entire game is well done and feature complete (what a cerebral gameplay ! ;) )
raarlac
27. Apr 2012 · 15:01 UTC
This game is awesome!! But controls needs improvements, the camera thing is very annoying.
Valeour
27. Apr 2012 · 17:01 UTC
Couldn't create a moon base, it just took that piece of land and did nothing. Couldn't do much after that.
Other than that, I enjoyed it.
ratboy2713
27. Apr 2012 · 19:17 UTC
I love it. The buttons are too close to the edge, the planet kept rotating when I tried to select farm, but still a beautiful game.
SusanTheCat
27. Apr 2012 · 23:19 UTC
Awesome game! Good work.
Muu? (lanoiadimuu)
28. Apr 2012 · 13:59 UTC
Amazing graphics with amazingly annoyng UI: Everytime i wanted to click a button my camera started spinning around. Aside from that, it is great entry.
Jiggawatt
28. Apr 2012 · 19:07 UTC
Surprisingly fun considering gameplay consists basically of waiting for resources to grow. But it has an abrupt ending common to LD games. A post-compo version should expand it to have multiple planets to control and more variables to twiddle with.
gritfish
29. Apr 2012 · 02:02 UTC
Got to building a moon base... You said there was a failure state, is there a win state? A bit slow paced, but not by much...
Great: Locking the lighting to the camera - games with a similar camera set up didn't do this and I wish they had.
Not so great: When you mouse over the buttons, the world just keeps spinning, and I lose track of where I was going to put the tile I was thinking about.
sythe
29. Apr 2012 · 03:00 UTC
It looks very nice, but unfortunately it's not runnable.
There's no Unity "Web" Player for Linux and the Windows executable doesn't work in Wine. And to top it off, you neglected to package it for Chrome's Native Client, (That's an option in Unity) which would have been the only other way that Linux users could enjoy it!
AdventureIslands
29. Apr 2012 · 21:21 UTC
Whoa, this was really cool game, bit confusing at first about what different buildings did but it was fun to watch the planet grow. This could be very interesting big game if developed further, good job!
ilo
30. Apr 2012 · 01:34 UTC
Loved how I assumed the moon was just an aesthetic part of the game, and then turned out to be part of the mechanics.

It did seem rather linear though. I don't know how other people fared, but after a certain stage I didn't have to worry about food and materials. Maybe it would be worth exploring real-world problems like running out of finite resources, food shortages and overpopulation, once the player has developed his/her planet far enough?
Christina Antoinette Neofotistou
30. Apr 2012 · 11:04 UTC
I think they music could work some humanizing. The banjo is too mechanical. But of course it's a 48 hour compo, so yeah :) Melodically it was very good. Gameplay was great, graphics were very cute. I could have used a "what comes next" icon. Otherwise, full marks!
levelbylevel
30. Apr 2012 · 12:51 UTC
I really enjoyed this one, nice amount of polish :)
vigrid
30. Apr 2012 · 17:23 UTC
Nice game, I have completed it, even though I had problems with building on one tile I have destroyed. Your game reminds me of "Millenium - Return To Earth", which you should definitely check out if you haven't seen it: http://www.abandonia.com/en/games/871/Millenium+-+Return+to+Earth.html
smvilar
30. Apr 2012 · 18:24 UTC
Awesome game but it's lacking some kind of conflict to add difficulty.
dick_claus
30. Apr 2012 · 20:13 UTC
Amazing game.
Wyzfen
30. Apr 2012 · 21:22 UTC
Wow. this is the kind of thing i was aiming for with my game, with the simple tech tree and resources. Very nicely done.
KevinWorkman
01. May 2012 · 01:50 UTC
Pretty, simple in a good way, really well done all around. It might have been interesting to just have everything available all at once (I mean the buttons would all be visible, not that the resources should already be accumulated) and then have the player figure out how to accumulate resources to work the way up the creation chain. Now you wait for a new button to pop up, wait to be able to afford it, then click it. I really enjoyed it, but maybe making it less obvious would quell some of the critics?
ronsho
01. May 2012 · 03:11 UTC
Much of this is satisfying, and the look and sound are wonderful. It doesn't feel very open, though, and I imagine that every player progresses in pretty much the same way. Eventually I seemed to run into a bug that prevented me from putting a moon base.
jeffz
01. May 2012 · 03:32 UTC
great music
HybridMind
01. May 2012 · 04:55 UTC
Really, really enjoyed this and was quite surprised by this. I had no idea the game would provide so many upgrades. I was quite pleased to play through and win. The music soothed me while I awaited to launch my colony ship. Great job!

Only minor thing I found was that the UI buttons at the bottom cause the planet to scroll when you don't want it to.
davidpeter
01. May 2012 · 05:35 UTC
Totally made it! Nice little game, aside from the bug that made me build an undestroyable moon base on my planet which just ate up land. Would play again :)
otaviogood
01. May 2012 · 05:47 UTC
Helium 3! Scientifically accurate!!! Nice.
Thotep
01. May 2012 · 12:51 UTC
Great job! Good design, interesting gameplay, nice graphics. Controls (esp. camera rotation) are extremely frustrating though.
Fireblend
01. May 2012 · 17:18 UTC
Really nice! Loved the concept and the whole atmosphere strung together by the pace and music of the game. Nicely done :D
firstrowgames
01. May 2012 · 19:15 UTC
nice music and fun game.
Great work
Gornova
01. May 2012 · 20:15 UTC
best game of the compo, even with camera problems
jwolf
02. May 2012 · 01:54 UTC
This is a nice short game with pretty good graphics. Maybe it's probably starting to sound like an echo-chamber in here, but yeah, the camera rotation occurring during button hover-over is pretty annoying. It's probably the only flaw with the entry worth mentioning.

I don't think you need to make the game difficult. Sometimes, it's the experience that counts.
Jigxor
02. May 2012 · 05:12 UTC
Awesome game! I played through until the end and really enjoyed it. It was a lot of fun to see my planet advancing and exciting to see what new build options I would get. My only suggestion is to remove the camera rotation when you hover over the UI elements/buttons because it was quite annoying to try and build something in a particular location, and have the world rotate away when you went to choose it.

Overall, I really enjoyed this game. Great job! :)
orangepascal
02. May 2012 · 09:44 UTC
the navigation and interface works surprisingly well
amodo
02. May 2012 · 18:53 UTC
I totally made it. Very cool models. I had something similar in mind at first but couldn't think of a proper scarcity mechanic. Well done!
galman
02. May 2012 · 19:44 UTC
Amazing work! Great concept :-)
It would be awesome if you'll add some more buildings and more gameplay
angrygeometry
02. May 2012 · 20:55 UTC
nice!
netmute
03. May 2012 · 21:43 UTC
Let my repeat what I already told you on Twitter ;)

Controls are annoying at times, everything else is ABSOLUTELY PERFECT. So cute, lovely music, so much content! After the first 3 buildings I thought thats it, but they kept coming :)

I love it!
Oye Beto
04. May 2012 · 01:10 UTC
Maybe you want to give it some uncertainty but I'd like to have a goal. I was playing without knowing what I had to do :P

I'd also recommend adding hoykeys for buildings or maybe separating the controls for the planet movement (rotate with WASD) and button clicking.
Madball
04. May 2012 · 14:37 UTC
I liked everything, from planet to spaceship. If you are going to continue working on it, make people on planet :)
j0n
05. May 2012 · 15:46 UTC
Superb!
Jan Willem
06. May 2012 · 17:31 UTC
Great game, nice graphics, I didn't get bored the whole way!
Naouak
06. May 2012 · 21:48 UTC
Good concept but the camera and the lack of reactivity from the buttons are very annoying. I built several time things that I don't wanted to build because of that.
villhest
06. May 2012 · 23:09 UTC
Awesome!
ilikescifi
07. May 2012 · 09:11 UTC
:)!
Datamosh
07. May 2012 · 13:49 UTC
Some camera problems, but GREAT entry! It does have a "Spore" feel in it, hehe. Congratulations!

Check out game if you have time to spare! :P
Matt Rudder
07. May 2012 · 20:43 UTC
Great pacing! My only nitpick would be with the camera controls, but that's a pretty easy fix. I could see this being expanded into a bigger game easily. Great work. :)
Zillix
08. May 2012 · 07:12 UTC
Great ambiance! A super chill trip through technological enlightment
Derek
08. May 2012 · 17:19 UTC
Fun, although some more depth would be nice.
DDRKirby(ISQ)
09. May 2012 · 13:10 UTC
Nice! Needs some work here and there, but this is pretty great overall :)
Evil Sandwich Studios
09. May 2012 · 20:14 UTC
I can't play your game because I don't have Windows nor OS/X (this means I can't install unity web player). Perhaps another member of my team will find and rate your game.

- Inês Almeida from Evil Sandwich Studios
BenW
10. May 2012 · 01:34 UTC
Really enjoyed it but I felt like there was too much downtown waiting for resources to build up.
Tomalla
10. May 2012 · 18:54 UTC
Neat idea. If only the sectors of the planetoid didn't block ( I couldn't plant buildings on them ), the scrolling wasn't so annoying and HUD was a bit clearer, it'd be quite a good game I suppose.
TyrusPeace
10. May 2012 · 19:03 UTC
The music certainly helps, but there's less game for the player here and more just watching the things you made build up to each other. That said, I enjoyed watching those things and I wanted to see what'd come next.

The bug where you can accidentally "fill" the moon with something besides a moonbase got me good my first time through, but this was a thoroughly pleasant experience, otherwise.
Krisjet
10. May 2012 · 20:41 UTC
Pretty cool. I like how you took the time to make a 3D game given it's only 48 hours!
tomhunt
11. May 2012 · 05:04 UTC
Aside from the camera controls being along the edge of the screen along with every single button to do anything which resulted in a lot of unwanted camera movement, I'd say this is really well done! The 3D models are impressive considering the tight timeframe, the gameplay is tight, and there's always this sense of what comes next, which is great. And it even plays into the replay with the "colonize another world" bit at the end.
Lotsa
12. May 2012 · 16:26 UTC
Really fun, nice one.
caranha
13. May 2012 · 01:16 UTC
This is very nice, I enjoyed playing it a lot!

A few comments:
- When I tried to place my fourth farm (after I was phasing out factories to get more people), the game wouldn't let me, even if I had enough minerals -- is there a hard limit for the number of any certain buildings?

- Sometimes trying to click on build buttons would spin the planet around :-P That was a bit annoying.

- I would be cool if the build buttons were stateful.

Other than that, awesome game! I look forwards to seeing what else you will implement in this game :-)
ghRibacki
13. May 2012 · 15:26 UTC
Really nice concepts! I enjoyed developing the nation on this tiny world from farms to moon bases! Graphics are awesome and the music really adds to the spacey mood. Good work! =)
KinoftheFlames
13. May 2012 · 19:52 UTC
Awesome! Could use a little more hinting that you have to build up resources, but I enjoyed the atmosphere a lot. Check out my playthrough: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ck_jhzQLrBM