Towering Inferno by tenpn

[raw]
made by tenpn for LD21 (-)
You are a fireman trapped at the top of a burning skyscraper. You have only your axe and some water.
Get to the exit, taking as many helpless bystanders with you as possible. The fire is already spreading...

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Towering Inferno is a roguelike firefighting game where water and fire interact in interesting ways. You can never extinguish the flames, but maybe you can control them, and escape the building.

It was written in C++ with libtcod. You can find me on twitter @tenpn, and the devlog for this game is online at http://tenpn.tumblr.com .

To run, you'll need to install the Visual C++ runtime: http://www.microsoft.com/download/en/details.aspx?id=5555

EDIT:
Man! A typo on the GUI suggests that you should use the A key to activate it, but it's actually the X key.

Ratings

Coolness 1% 311
Overall 3.63 46
Audio 1.00 371
Community 2.57 231
Fun 3.40 59
Graphics 2.32 352
Humor 1.33 389
Innovation 4.20 9
Theme 4.00 14

Feedback

Frimkron
22. Aug 2011 路 22:00 UTC
Really neat idea. I like the decisions the game has you make. Great use of ascii, too.
zazery
22. Aug 2011 路 23:25 UTC
I really like the concept, especially the water bombs. Oh and the changing tips at the top of the screen were extremely useful and a great way to ease players into playing the game.
Edsploration
23. Aug 2011 路 06:11 UTC
There's really a lot of gameplay here for having just a few key elements. Couldn't get the axe to work but it's a fun game without it. Many levels are created too easy, or too hard, and I often wonder which decision is the best one, so I think a level save feature would be great addition. That way I could collect levels which are just barely beatable.
馃帳 tenpn
23. Aug 2011 路 12:18 UTC
@Edsploration:
What about the axe didn't work? It should take 3 hits to dismatle one wall tile, and you need to stand next to the wall tile.
Thanks for the feedback about difficulty - the only concesion to the random nature of the procedural generation is that fire is not allowed to appear in the exit room. Didn't have time for any thing else there. Something to work on.
siebharinn
24. Aug 2011 路 03:00 UTC
This application has failed to start because MSVCP100.dll was not found. Re-installing the application may fix this problem.
馃帳 tenpn
24. Aug 2011 路 09:03 UTC
Sorry, you probably need to install the Visual Studio 2010 C++ runtime. http://www.microsoft.com/download/en/details.aspx?id=5555
Please can you try again with that and let me know if that fixes it?
kavs
24. Aug 2011 路 15:59 UTC
I loved this game! Played it for probably 30 minutes beyond my normal review time. :)

I wish you had more time to add some fire spawn logic, as I found it was totally random if you could beat a level or not. There were instances were I spawned in a room with all of the fire start locations, and relinquished them with a water bomb and I could walk wherever I wanted. On the other hand, there were times where both fire spawns were in rooms adjacent to the exit and I spawned across the map, so there was no hope of me ever making it out.

Anyway, I love what you did with it and had a ton of fun. I liked making decisions about how many people to save before I got myself out instead. Felt bad to leave them behind. ;)
Pierrec
24. Aug 2011 路 17:52 UTC
I just loved it! Gave me a Desktop Dungeon feeling...you know...when you can't stop playing until you've beat the game more time than he beated you (yeah...sorry for that english)
summaky
26. Aug 2011 路 19:04 UTC
I love it!
Benjamin
27. Aug 2011 路 08:04 UTC
Fun game, but despite the axe option, and after 45min testing, it looks like the generator luck is 50% of your final score. Work pretty well in any case.
Shigor
29. Aug 2011 路 16:08 UTC
Very good idea, very original setting for RGL. It would need some finetuning (generator especially) and bug hunting (at least I consider burning walls completely surrounded by the water from hydrant a bug) for me to be completely satisfied, but i'm rating high anyway.
PaulSB
31. Aug 2011 路 21:15 UTC
It did feel like each level was either easy or impossible. But nice idea!
ratking
03. Sep 2011 路 16:01 UTC
This one is really great! Just some minor complaints: You use the Axe with X, but it is marked as "(A)xe" - this may be the reason why some people think it doesn't work. Also, the orange @ is nearly invisible on the gray tiles, and at the beginning of a level I have to search it with eagle eyes. This is a bit frustrating.
But altogether a great idea. Please work on it some more, so it isn't just luck if a level is beatable or not. :-)
ratking
03. Sep 2011 路 16:02 UTC
Oh, and it would be nice if the movement wasn't so slow. It would be cool if you could move faster by holding the key.
馃帳 tenpn
05. Sep 2011 路 11:19 UTC
@ratking good feedback - that (A)xe thing is so obvious yet I hadn't noticed! I'll make a note of your other points, including the movement thing.

I have been continuing work on it and you can get a latest version at the source link above. This has rewritten civilian AI, and some work on stopping fire being generated too close to the exit.

I've also made the new level generate the entrance at the same point as the exit of the previous level, which should make it easier to find the player but am planning at some point to make the exit flash so that's not so hard to find.
wally2069
05. Sep 2011 路 20:29 UTC
The map generation was pretty swingy but this was a nicely done game. Could have used some music as well. Hope to see a post compo version.
Martoon
11. Sep 2011 路 18:53 UTC
Very cool experimental game. Took me a while to figure some things out, but I got the hang of it after a bit. Only downside seemed to be the amount of luck involved with the random level given, but that's part of what makes it interesting on replay.