SHAKEDOWN by LancesCaterpie

A game about leveraging overheard information, focused around a small set of characters with a glitchy art style.

Windows Exe
Source (GameMaker Studio)
V1.0.1 Sign executable, change icon, default to fullscreen and switch controls to arrow keys
V1.0.0 Initial release
Unfortunately no web release as the shaders won't compile for web :(
About Me
This is my second finished Ludum Dare, following up on the cult classic (I wish), Joustinator!
Leading up to the event I was eagerly waiting an excuse to create something inspired by this article on realtime graphics dithering. The rest of the game was came from following down the rabbit hole.
Follow me on Twitter! @SLCMB
Soundtrack
By popular request I have made a zip containing the soundtrack for the game.
Email - ds4314(at)ic.ac.uk
| Original URL | https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/38/shakedown-1 |
Ratings
| Overall | 55th | 3.95⭐ | 22🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 368th | 2.9⭐ | 22🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 129th | 3.55⭐ | 22🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 420th | 2.9⭐ | 22🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 14th | 4.476⭐ | 23🧑⚖️ |
| Audio | 11th | 4.25⭐ | 22🧑⚖️ |
| Humor | 157th | 3⭐ | 21🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 25th | 4.1⭐ | 22🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 15🗳️ | 20🗨️ |
NICE!
The graphics and the audio really come together to make a very unique and interesting aesthetic. I liked the little mystery story too, loved trying to get to the bottom of it.
The controls and initial experience needs a little bit of work, though. At first it's pretty difficult to know where to go or what to do, and later on I kept wanting to press space because I can read a lot faster than the text's appearance speed, but when I skipped forward the text I only got like half a second to read it before it went to the next piece of text. Basically, either add the option of turning off the auto-continue for the text, or at least remove the option to make the text skip the typing animation because that feature is useless when it anyway auto-continues right at the end of the typing animation.
Really enjoyed the game though, very unique and full of your own style.
The rasterization effect could be a bit easier on the eyes - the same idea, bit with slightly smaller dots would help during longer gameplay :)
Opening is awesome, although a bit confusing the first time (took me a while to understand I'm the inspector, not the father), game plays well later. I'd merge ctrl and space button to operate (it would resemble an atari game then :D ), since it would be more convenient and I can't really see a reason not to.
I didn't manage to beat the game in my playthroughs though. I've seen (I think) all the scenes that play out during the day, searched the room while they were empty, but still I didn't manage to avert the death. Got two bad 'endings'. I somehow cannot replicate the dialogue with Pizzeria owner about the mob boss situation, and I get the feeling that to complete the game you have to be either extremely precise, or really frantic about your actions :)
Overall, a solid project, and well executed. With a tad more development it could easily become a bigger game.
Cheers!
I had a lot of issues playing this, the scrolling-dithering art style made me very sick. I don't know if others have had this issue before. I REALLY enjoyed the mood / Atmosphere and I'm really sad I can't get thru more of it as I'm a huge noir fan.