Eyes on the Prize by phearbot
Eyes on the Prize is a Top-Down Bullet Hell with Crafting elements created for Ludum Dare #41.
You won't make it far without crafting your own upgrades! (Bringing a friend or two along can't hurt your chances either!)
This game can be downloaded or played online at: https://planeteightgames.itch.io/eyes-on-the-prize
This was our team's first Ludum Dare and although we worked up until the eleventh hour, we regret that we were unable to get everything working quite the way it should. We hope that you will be more forgiving than the game-play!
Hope you enjoy playing it as much as we did creating it!
-Planet Eight Games

https://youtu.be/ui76W8o3thw

Our crafting system is a bit difficult to decipher...

| Windows | https://planeteightgames.itch.io/eyes-on-the-prize |
| HTML5 (web) | https://planeteightgames.itch.io/eyes-on-the-prize |
| Original URL | https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/41/eyes-on-the-prize |
Ratings
| Overall | 956th | 3.044⭐ | 59🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 891th | 2.938⭐ | 58🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 1070th | 2.658⭐ | 59🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 941th | 3.026⭐ | 59🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 805th | 3.098⭐ | 63🧑⚖️ |
| Audio | 559th | 3⭐ | 57🧑⚖️ |
| Humor | 882th | 2.333⭐ | 47🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 750th | 3.088⭐ | 53🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 69🗳️ | 85🗨️ |
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/41/stealth-farmer
Rating:
Crafting didnt work. You didnt see what you were able to craft.
Additionally, you didnt have time to see what different powerups did. This game should have had some kind of tutorial.
The game was a bit ugly. You didnt pick a style, and there where pixelart mixed with digitalart. You should pick a style, dont start mixing.
Still, this was a good game. I played several rounds of this too find the bads in it.
And its great that you made it singleplayer playable. Otherwise you wouldnt have gotten this rating
Thanks for your candid review! We appreciate the feedback, and will do our best polish out the inconsistencies you pointed out in our future work. I'll be sure to review your entry for the jam as well!
Thanks again!
Your game gives me gauntlet nostalgia LOL.
Gauntlet was definitely a major source of inspiration for this game! Glad you liked it, we are planning on taking this and trying to create something on a larger scale at a later date. Also, I reviewed your compo submission. Good work on your rhythm/racing game!
We focused on getting this game to feel smooth with an X-Box controller and didn't have time to code mouse and keyboard controls. Thanks for looking into our game though!
As a solo player, though, I feel like I wasn't able to explore much of the crafting because the difficulty ramped up too fast. It would also be nice if I was able to pause the game when crafting - otherwise it's a bit overwhelming
I agree that the difficulty is very steep if you are trying to play solo. Also, I think that providing the player more time to explore the crafting feature would be a great addition that wouldn't be too difficult to implement. How would you feel about a time slow mechanic when crafting instead pausing the game all together?
Thank again!
We had enough fun with this project that we might try to scale this into a larger game in the future! Also, I'll be sure to check out your submission as well. Thanks for the review!
Unfortunately, our team did not have time to get any other inputs aside from an Xbox controller working correctly.
I like play with gamepad at this type of game, but I think a maneuverability to the binding od issac would be better instead of using the right stick.
For a single player it is really too difficult, it would be necessary to put a mode 1 and 2 player and adjust the spawn of the enemies in function.
The function of craft would be more interesting between two waves in a kind of lobby so as to prepare his avatar for the next (the real time is hard to do better in the state).
Level graphics and sounds it works very well in the retro style of the time!
Good job continue and finish that game !
Would you be willing to go into more detail on what you mean by Binding of Issac maneuverability? Also, thanks on the tip! I agree that there should be separate modes of difficulty depending on how many players are in the game. Also, I'll be sure to leave your submission a rating, thanks for checking ours out!
outside of that its a solid little shot at topdown shooting but the art is very unfocused. a singular style would really help out the feel.
a bit more work on audio and this could be a fun little party game. good job!

It's a shame that the monsters appear much too quickly and we don't have too much time to craft.
Difficulty is obviously too high for single player.
I see now that you have gamepad support, this is of course really nice ! I would have liked to try it with friends but everybody here is asleep ^^'
The graphics however are very good and consistent. I had the impression of playing a top-down doom ! Which was honestly pleasant. The music fit that mood too ! Good job.
This is a solid first entry, continue making games ! You'll be proud of every step ! I hope my remarks aren't too harsh, I honestly tred to give you the feedback to improve, with love :)
I appreciate that you took the time to write out such a well thought out review! Thank you again!
Game seems very ambitious. There's lots of art, no bugs that I have seen and the gameplay is well thought. Where the game is lacking is some sort of balance. I played by myself and couldn't keep up with all those skulls spawning. They are very tanky for one person to kill. After one death I was just swarmed by wormeyes and couldn't do much. Maybe adding some limit to maximum enemies or adjusting spawning rate depending on how many players are on would work and not require much additional time and effort?
Also... after a few deaths I realized that your game supports and probably should be played with a gamepad. It would be nice if you included some information in description or the game about that ;)
Overall it's a very solid first entry and I hope to see you next time around! Cheers!
On the note of the gamepad, definitely a better experience there! We initially only coded it for the gamepad, but a lot of people weren't able to play the game so we made a WebGL build that had rudimentary keyboard/mouse support. The UI could definitely use some love for the keyboard/mouse players out there.
Thanks again for the awesome feedback.
Also, some feedback for when the player does hit things would be good. I had no idea the spawns were damageable until you told me, and thought eyes had tiny hitboxes when in fact they had health.
Anyways, congrats on such a complex entry! Really quite a bit of systems going on there.
it's good concept and execution.
After I got every shortcut to upgrade. than it's fun for me
I liked very much the graphics and the horror theme.
The movement of the character needs tightening, it feels like he slips constantly.
Excellent work!
I left my rating of your game, if you can leave your feedback in our game, Witch's Escape.
I hope you continue with the project.
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/41/witchs-escape
It should be right at the top of the page, if you missed it!
the game seems interesting just need some polishment and balancing. Good job!
The balancing needs a lot of work and it absolutely could use a lot of polish. We hope to take it further in the future.
Thanks again for the review. You Rock!