Save the swarm by Ternarycat

[raw]
made by Ternarycat for LD 43 (JAM)

“Save the swarm” is a scroll shooter game. You control the swarm of aliens flying towards their home. You need to fly through the portal and avoid asteroids and parts of broken spaceships. If it is impossible to avoid, you may shoot your unit to destroy the objects. Note, that shooted alien who won't be picked up to the swarm again will be lost. How many aliens you will sacrifice to deliver the swarm to their universe?

control : wasd/arrows, space for fire

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Ratings

Overall 594th 3.35⭐ 42🧑‍⚖️
Fun 600th 3.163⭐ 42🧑‍⚖️
Innovation 437th 3.244⭐ 41🧑‍⚖️
Theme 455th 3.561⭐ 43🧑‍⚖️
Graphics 723th 3.085⭐ 43🧑‍⚖️
Audio 485th 3.066⭐ 40🧑‍⚖️
Humor 620th 2.645⭐ 40🧑‍⚖️
Mood 717th 3.064⭐ 41🧑‍⚖️
Given 154🗳️ 24🗨️

Feedback

figglewatts
03. Dec 2018 · 13:28 UTC
Great entry! I thought the idea was really innovative, although it was sometimes hard to predict where the member of the swarm you are firing would go. Really enjoyed this one.
Jackson_makes_games
03. Dec 2018 · 13:35 UTC
There was no real indicator in the game for when you lost one of your alien babies, so it didn't seem like it mattered too much, making avoiding space debris by firing your own babies at them feel unnecessary. Some sort of collision visual effect would be really nice to see. Also, a greater penalty for being hit/a lesser penalty for sacrifice would be nice to see, as it would feel like sacrific was really the best option.
OfirMa85
03. Dec 2018 · 14:49 UTC
It's a very fun and challenging game!
It took some time to get used to aim the units but its manageable.
anfaas1618
03. Dec 2018 · 15:14 UTC
challenging game liked it 5/5 similler to my concept game
Daniel_Abeleira
03. Dec 2018 · 15:39 UTC
Great game idea! Good job
Blodyavenger
03. Dec 2018 · 15:50 UTC
Simple and fun game although I wasn't sure how collision works properly. I could slip through tight holes just fine losing none or 1. I could then shoot 1 alien to get rid of space trash which yielded the same result.
It would be nice to add more openings and make tougher collision for aliens that won't just pass through them so you really need to focus which thrash to shoot at.

Anyway, good job!
f4kethis
03. Dec 2018 · 15:51 UTC
Fun concept! Was difficult to tell where I was going to shoot so I lost a lot of aliens to the void, but I enjoyed the playthrough!
KaisenTheGreatOne
03. Dec 2018 · 15:58 UTC
Great little game. I really love the soundtrack. Sometimes when I shot a small alien, the alien didn't move, but the asteroid just dashed away at godspeeds :D
Caspercaper17
03. Dec 2018 · 16:05 UTC
Wow, this is quite good!

The control is smooth and the art is amazing. I never got to the big guy though.
theBOSS12
03. Dec 2018 · 16:09 UTC
Great little game. Collision is great and also the game is just hard enough.
Cameron Borthwick
03. Dec 2018 · 17:18 UTC
fun little game, great job :smile:
Fat cat
03. Dec 2018 · 18:04 UTC
Cool game! Love the music. I had a bit of a problem though with trying to squeeze through holes, my alien minions moved around so much and killed themselves that it didn't matter how well I dodged!
angelnm
03. Dec 2018 · 19:34 UTC
The first game has been made a bit confusing by the collisions of the swarm, but once you understand how it works it is very fun. Being able to collect the aliens that you throw seems to me a very good idea that adds skill to the game. PD: I think it would be awesome that the game doesn't have an end, you play until you get without aliens.
Querk
03. Dec 2018 · 19:50 UTC
nice game, i like it :)
ElderDeveloper
04. Dec 2018 · 00:39 UTC
Its quite fun ant the art look realy good :)
Vinay Rao
04. Dec 2018 · 03:50 UTC
Looks good, difficulty is just right and the audio is nice.

I think the unit count display could be a bit bigger. But I made the display in my own game a bit too small perhaps too, so I'm not one to nitpick, haha!

Quite a lot of fun though, so job well done!
simonhutchinson
05. Dec 2018 · 00:33 UTC
This looks amazing. Any chance there'll be a web or Mac build? I want to give these hand-drawn graphics a shot.
Lex
05. Dec 2018 · 02:03 UTC
I think it's quite innovative for this genre to not have to just press fire all the time. Good job!
🎤 Ternarycat
05. Dec 2018 · 03:13 UTC
@simonhutchinson I added the Mac build, but I don’t know if it will work. I could not solve the problems with the web build, so I did not add it. Sorry( But this is my first attempt to use this engine and participate in ludum, in April this will not happen again.
Xarras
05. Dec 2018 · 11:10 UTC
For the swarm! Good game, felt like a true zerg, but now I'm stuck in real life again... It works perfect, without any flaws. Making the fire position random each time is confusing though, even understanding that is an add-on to difficulty and that you can preview it from the circle on your troops. Anyway great fun!
🎤 Ternarycat
05. Dec 2018 · 13:40 UTC
@xarras thanks! My partner and i were inspired by zergs))
Vlad Ilisan
06. Dec 2018 · 18:30 UTC
Cool idea but a bit repetitive. I had fun nonetheless :)
Edward Dassmesser
07. Dec 2018 · 00:32 UTC
Very infinirunner. Much music good.
Conduit
17. Dec 2018 · 21:29 UTC
My favorite part of this game was definitely the graphics. I liked the almost 90s inspired art direction (whether or not that was intentional is unclear to me lol). The music was pretty sweet, a little bit of a relaxing track that clashed with the frantic gameplay. The swarm noises or whatever you would call them were a little too loud imo but still made the cut! Overall I think it was really interesting how the swarm kind of floated around the mother alien and kind flew off on a different path each time. Definitely added an interesting layer while keeping within the theme. TLDR: This was a solid entry! Gameplay was functional and art/sound was good as well!