Space Battle Zero by rumor
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About
Space Battle Zero is a strategy combat game that pits two orbiting battleships against one another in a beautiful barrage ballet. With limited energy at your disposal - and limited windows to strike your opponent - you must carefully balance your spacecraft's offensive and defensive capabilities. Will you sacrifice your shields for an all-out assault, or will you have to divert energy from your super weapon at the last second to fend off an attack? Maybe you can even trade your orbital high ground for faster energy gains? Choose carefully, but beware. Even the best laid plans can blow up in your face like a missile out of the black!
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How to play
If you've ever played FTL, you already know the basics:
This is your energy. You start with 3 points, and earn 2 more for every orbit you survive.
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Click on a system (like laser) to assign an energy point to it. It will take a few seconds to power up.
You can also click on already-assigned points to remove and redistribute them.
Assign another point to speed up charging time.
Adding more energy doesn't always speed up charging. Adding a third point to laser, for example, will make it more powerful instead of faster to charge.
A system is ready to fire when A) it's fully charged, and B) the enemy is within range. A + B = C, as in Click that fire button!
Some systems, like shields and sensors, engage automatically.
Bam, you've just fired your first laser! Keep it up and space will be littered with the shattered hulls of your enemies in no time.
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Hints
- Music too loud? Click X (top left) to Pause and adjust volume to your preference
- Press 1, 2, or 3 on the keyboard to change cameras
- Sensors extend the range of your missiles
- Pulse detonates nearby enemy missiles
If you encounter any issues with the WebGL version or simply want the best-looking experience available, please download the PC or Mac build (linked below):
Ratings
| Overall | 153th | 3.882⭐ | 57🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 289th | 3.555⭐ | 57🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 106th | 3.782⭐ | 57🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 738th | 3.127⭐ | 57🧑⚖️ |
| Humor | 690th | 2.5⭐ | 17🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 205th | 3.718⭐ | 57🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 69🗳️ | 63🗨️ |
I have to die 2 or 3 times before I can test every weapons and find how balance my energy point, but I appreciate it.
@kciwsolb, I'll look into making things more discoverable or adding a full-feature tutorial. Maybe start with an explanation of the subsystems and what their power levels do.
@royur, there are a few things you can do to improve your chances. Shields are always helpful. Beam weapons have a longer range - basically as long as you have line-of-sight with the enemy, you can use them. But accuracy drops off with distance. It's sometimes better to save your shot for when you see the "whites of their eyes," so to speak. Missiles have a shorter firing range, but you can extend this by powering up the sensors subsystem.
@craftlord, no aiming necessary! Missiles home in automatically but need to be within a certain range to fire. Beam weapons aim automatically but the accuracy can suffer a bit if your opponent is very far away.
The "fire" button is only enabled when a weapon can be used. Countermeasures are the exception. To use them successfully, you have to wait until missiles are very close. Hint: if the "incoming missiles" warning is flashing, it's time to use your countermeasures!
You pushed basically all of my buttons here. low poly scifi 3d graphics, space battles, power management, orbital combat AAAAAAAAA
I love this.
Please keep working on it.
I wish I could give you constructive feedback but nope. Just keep doing what you doing. But more.
One small thing, it would be cool if you could add a slider for audio volume.
@fireslash I wish I could like this more than once. Incredible to hear, thank you.
@cristiano-t The menu and battle music were both composed by Marcin Kłosowski. Since I got them from a Unity asset instead of a team member, I can't take any credit aside from recognizing it would be a perfect fit for my game.
@lathspell Sorry to hear that. I'll try to put together a native client soon, maybe that will help? My laptop is pretty long in the tooth and the game runs rock solid for me. It might just be the WebGL overhead causing problems.
@drakeny Good suggestion, noted!
On the con side, the goal is not clear at first and I missed the opponent spaceship because it was tiny on the screen - a UI marker or distance meter would be welcomed.
Good job though.
Overall experience is very good but I do still feel that opting out of both Graphics and Audio makes it a bit hard to judge the game overall
The graphics are great, especially the death animation (saw it a lot.. :Smiley:) and music is quite fitting. :smile:
The only thing that bugged me is the orbital direction didn't match the ship's perceived facing.
The graphics are great, and well done to whoever did the camera work.
The only negative feedback I have is to say the glare covers the weaponry selection at the bottom left from time to time and I struggled to see them. It's a very minor thing.
I did not defeat the other ship, but will be coming back to try again next time I play through some LD games :)
@archimagus There's a ton more streamlining I wanted to do (but ran out of time) and would like to do (maybe after the jam). I really appreciate all the valuable feedback though, it challenges some of my assumptions about what I should have done if I had more time and gives me some great ideas about where to go from here!
@neontropics I used some third-party assets in the development of my game, so unfortunately I had to opt out of Graphics and Audio as per the jam rules. But then again I've run into a bunch of games this jam that credited third-party work but didn't opt out, so maybe I misinterpreted the rule?
@hilvon It's definitely its own thing, yeah. I only bring up FTL to help people wrap their heads around the energy-assigning mechanic.
@renegadepunisher Yeah, the glare! I probably should have put the sun somewhere else. :stuck_out_tongue: I noticed that late and added a bit of shadow/shading to help the interface stand out, but it wasn't quite enough.
Thanks for playing!
Great job!
Pros:
- Art really fit the game, felt immersive
- Music was EXCELLENT, set the mood really well
- Trails for orbiting paths of ships were very helpful
- UI designed beautifully
- Lots of fun!
Cons:
- Gameplay seemed repetitive after a while, not a lot of randomness or replayability
- Instructions were a little confusing - what does each power do?
- Felt slow at times - energy boost from orbiting could have come quicker
Thoughts and Suggestions:
- The glare on the UI sometimes made it hard to see what the items were to choose. Just a small thing to improve.
- The sacrifice mechanic isn't as much of a sacrifice as it is a choice. (What should I choose to have the best odds of winning?) I don't feel that I'm losing anything by clicking on the energy tabs. Maybe you could reduce your HP to get more energy, or a faster reload? Just a thought.
- To improve the randomness, maybe each ship could start with certain random features, so that players can't just use the same strategy every time.
Overall, this game was lots of fun, and there's lots of places you could go with it! Nice job and keep developing!
The mechanical concept is certainly cool, although it lacked some transparancy (How much faster does my gun recharge with 2 pips? What's the difference between bolt and laser? What hits can and can't my shield take). Also, the idea of sacrificing orbital height for extra speed sounded like a great fit to the theme if it had had a bit more impact.
But this is certainly a wonderful game for a jam, and one I'd be interested to see further refined.
Hope you get good ratings!
However, the orbital idea with changing orbits and different weapons was really neat, and I played until I beat the AI. It reminded me a bit of Planetary Annihilation!
If you'd like to rewatch the playthrough, you can find it here: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/346058131?t=06h41m
Good luck on your ratings, see you next LD! :D
💜 Elysia Griffin AKA Button Feedback Lady
https://www.twitch.tv/elysiagriffin