Heat Shield by nander
This game is a simulation game, where you play the role of a space trader. The twist is that part of your ship is destroyed upon landing.
Gameplay
The Game has two possible stages: 1. Flight 2. Planetary stationing
Going from planetary to flying can be done for free, by pressing the launch button. Flight to planetary costs you dearly; one layer of your ship gets destroyed.
Flying
When on the flight screen, you can click around your ship (the red dot in the middle of the screen) to set the direction of the next burn.
The slider on the side is used to set how quickly the ship should burn it's fuel. There's a button to set the burn speed to zero.
Use the 1-5 keys to set the simulation speed, and use the spacebar to set the simulation speed to zero.
If you're near enough to a planet, the landing button will appear. There's no penalty to speed differences nor position differences, the landing computer on your ship ensures a decent landing. Well, not really decent, but still.
Landing
When landing, you have to choose which direction will enter the atmosphere first. Every part of your ship that's exposed from that side will burn, and you will lose those parts.
Ship Control
Ship Control is used to enable and disable specific parts of the ship. It serves little purpose within this version of the game.
Planetary
The planetary screen is a screen from which multiple other screens can be reached. It can also be used to launch the ship again. You can reach the following screens from the planetary screen: 1. Edit Ship 2. Buy 3. Sell 4. Refuel
Edit Ship
This screen is used to add parts to your ship. There's no punishment to removing and re-adding parts.
Buy
This screen is used to buy cargo. You click the cargo type you want, and then the cargo bay in which you want to place it. Every time you buy something, the price goes up by fifty.
Sell
This screen is used to sell cargo. You click the cargo bay you want to sell from. Look in the bottom-right to see what's in there. A fee of sixty is subtracted from the buying price. Also, every time you sell something, the price goes down by fifty.
Refuel
The refuelling button is used to instantly re-add fuel to your ship.
Prices on all planets screen
This screen is used to see what which resource is worth where.
What if I run out of fuel?
Then you have to hope you run into a planet. No other outcomes are possible..
Ratings
| Overall | 375th | 3.042⭐ | 26🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 377th | 2.875⭐ | 26🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 121th | 3.542⭐ | 26🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 344th | 3.188⭐ | 26🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 400th | 2.731⭐ | 28🧑⚖️ |
| Audio | 208th | 3.13⭐ | 25🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 299th | 3.021⭐ | 26🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 31🗳️ | 19🗨️ |
Would have been nice to have a little more feedback on buying/selling - I'd often click something and nothing would seem to happen (e.g. I think I have to click a cargo spot after clicking what to buy, but nothing indicates that).
Music set a nice mood.
The building stuff is too easy and only has one choice for your long freight ship.
Trading stuff is fine, and prices will probably end up similar enough someday.
Music is fine for this kind of game.
That's a lot of stuff you've made within 48 hours!
The biggest issue for me was that, when there are several planets nearby, I couldn't tell which one I was going to land at. Furthermore, when I hit land, it chose the wrong planet and I had no option to back out. Other small issues I noticed, in no particular order:
- seeing what's in cargo when selling
- more info about planet rotation
- indication that cargo needs to be clicked after buy
- indication that you need to click close to the ship to change burn direction
But, hey, every LD game needs polish. Overall this is a very cool game with some interesting systems, and I'm impressed at just how many of those systems you managed to implement!
It took me a while to figure out that clicking "Buy Hydrogen" didn't result in immediately purchasing Hydrogen until I click a storage compartment on the ship, some better instructions or more clear visuals could have made that part of the learning curve smoother.
Overall, there are a lot of pieces to this game, and I'm impressed that they integrate as well as they do.