Globstopper by James Dunlap
Screenshots



Description
Blast your way through goopy aliens and moldy hamburgers as you fight for cleanliness. Beware the goop and slime that your enemies will throw at you to slow you down. The more gunk on your ship, the harder it will be to move!
We had a late start by 24 hours as I had a conflict on Friday through Saturday afternoon, but we did finish!
Controls:
WASD or arrows to move
Left Control or space to shoot
Hints:
Collect Goop-B-Gone to remove goop.
Don't collide with the enemies.
Please note that if you play the WebGL version, please play it in full screen. It did not scale well to the smaller window.
The work was divided up as follows:
James - Coding and Scripting
Anthony - All graphics
Cameron - Sound and Music
Ratings
| Overall | 968th | 2.969⭐ | 34🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 886th | 2.906⭐ | 34🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 1032th | 2.531⭐ | 34🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 1006th | 2.75⭐ | 34🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 909th | 2.844⭐ | 34🧑⚖️ |
| Audio | 573th | 2.855⭐ | 33🧑⚖️ |
| Humor | 757th | 2.534⭐ | 31🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 939th | 2.733⭐ | 32🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 33🗳️ | 35🗨️ |
Check out my game if you would like!
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/40/virus-detected
First, gameplay-wise, it was difficult to take damage if you simply held down space bar and dodged the telegraphed boss attacks, as both enemies and projectiles come in front, both of which can be removed by the ship's bullets that also shoot in front. As killing enemies is optional, this meant that anything else I did in the game felt very inconsequential, such as moving or getting gooped, since I could pass easily either way.
Secondly, the controls were rather difficult for me to use. I think you programmed something that stops all momentum when you hold a button in the opposite direction, which coupled with the slow acceleration, means that there is somewhat of a delay when players try to move in the opposite direction. As a fellow developer, I would recommend a solution where when player input is in the opposite direction of the ship's movement, the momentum isn't stopped, but rather, the same acceleration is applied, but at an increased proportion i.e. 1.5 times, which will make the controls seem a lot more responsive. Other things I would recommend are increasing the acceleration overall, increasing friction, and decreasing the player's maximum speed.
Finally, with the actual goop mechanic, with no goop, holding the button for not very long would make me travel across the entire screen, making it very difficult for me to aim, coupled with the already awkward control scheme. I found myself intentionally getting gooped in order to slow myself down, but then, the ship became too slow for me to actually reach any of the enemies. This is bad because as I mentioned, the game is very easy, and thus, the only sense of satisfaction is in killing enemies. Remove the ability to do that, and the fun decreases further. This problem was accentuated by the very rare occurrences of the gloop-be-gone, which I was actually unable to reach due to my ship's slowness, locking me in a state of slowness the whole game.
@bbrown, thanks for the comment on the transitions. We talked a lot about how we wanted to do it. My boys wanted to start a whole new scene, but I wanted to do it this way to make it more seamless and avoid loading mid-game. In the end, we were all happy with how that worked.
@annaad, thanks for the feedback. Glad you liked it. Trash Talk and the Gloppy Joes almost did not make it in the game, but I was able to get them coded to my and the artist's liking before the deadline.
@notspaghettigames, thanks for the feedback. I will take a look. In fact, if we have not already, one of us will be around to rate each of your games if not all three of us!
- Loved the smooth level transitions!
- Music was great!
- I would have liked more fire rate on the weapon.
- Respawning after dying takes a lot of time, why is that?
I liked this game very much. I played it until it started looping. Well done!
A lot of the issues have been addressed above but this is what I found needing improvement:
* The controls were way too touchy. Pressing a button would make me fly across the screen too quickly
* There was no reason to fight any of the mini enemies. I could just stay at the top of the screen for most of the game and wait for the boss.
* Goop actually helped because the controls were so finicky
* I had no idea if the game was ever going to end. I got to stage 5 and lost interest.
I think the game would be great if it was just bosses, with the bosses summoning mini enemies as you fight them.
music is nice.
There is room where you can expand on the game, like adding different kind of enemies or different kind of weaponry.
Good good, I enjoyed playing it, good job! :)
The movement was too loose and it was hard to move the ship where I wanted to. The player's bullets were too small, and there wasn't a reason to stop shooting, so I just held down the button.
i did struggle moving the ship around and i didnt feel in control as even the slightest movement or adjustment sent me flying
The goop system it's very nice, but the movement in the beginning is too fast :x
Anyway, good job!
Those burgers were pretty great though.