LudumData

Mars Initiative by greenbluebit

[raw]
made by greenbluebit for LD 42 (JAM)

In Mars Initiative, you're in charge of a newly established Mars outpost. Land as many industrial pods as you can, but be careful with the space you have available. If you run out of resources, it's game over.

Dev comments:

As I was writing the prototype I was listening to piano music and I really wanted to see if I could fit it in the game. To me, personally it feels very nice. However, since the songs are of course not mine and the audio is just playing with pitch, I've disabled audio rating.

Music:

Red Planet Nocturne (Theme to Offworld Trading Company) - Christopher Tin

Beethoven Moonlight Sonata (Sonata al chiaro di luna)

Audio:

https://freesound.org/people/heyim89yearsold/sounds/259892/ https://freesound.org/people/joseph.larralde/sounds/352493/

Font:

https://www.1001fonts.com/stentiga-font.html

Linux https://gamejolt.com/games/marsinitiative/361149
Windows https://gamejolt.com/games/marsinitiative/361149
Original URL https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/42/mars-initiative

Ratings

Overall 891th 3.105⭐ 21🧑‍⚖️
Fun 1110th 2.632⭐ 21🧑‍⚖️
Innovation 904th 2.868⭐ 21🧑‍⚖️
Theme 908th 3.079⭐ 21🧑‍⚖️
Graphics 983th 2.816⭐ 21🧑‍⚖️
Given 17🗳️ 19🗨️

Feedback

meatpudding
15. Aug 2018 · 05:32 UTC
This is a cool game. It's hard to get into and if there was more to it than one click then I didn't find it. It would benefit from some sort of tutorial to explain the mechanics.

Once you get into it, it's a really atmospheric and relaxing game. It's simple but challenging enough that you will come back for more.

The main problem with it is that there seems to be no way to progress past a certain point. It suits the theme but I was running out of space at about 6 months with no way to survive.
🎤 greenbluebit
16. Aug 2018 · 08:35 UTC
Hey @meatpudding thanks for checking it out.
To answer you, no there's no other button :D it's just a simple relaxing game. I agree and a lot of people have suggested to maybe remove destroyed factories or on hit remove them. But yes, I was jumping on the theme wagon :)
Void Productions
16. Aug 2018 · 09:55 UTC
The feel this game created over time was something else.So simple yet so elegant. Very well done.
Just one thing, if you keep the LMB pressed the piano key sound loops over and over again which is something that shouldn't be there just my opinion nonethelesss good job.
nikasxirtla
16. Aug 2018 · 10:00 UTC
Very simple, fun and relaxing game!
🎤 greenbluebit
16. Aug 2018 · 10:24 UTC
hey @void-productions thanks :D I completely missed that, will fix it and put it as a POST-jam build. Glad you liked it, I was really aiming to bring that in the game :)
🎤 greenbluebit
16. Aug 2018 · 10:25 UTC
@nikasxirtla thanks. I'll see if I can polish it a bit more, at the moment it feels like the user could use more feedback. Or maybe change the colors of the broken factories.
Skyc
16. Aug 2018 · 10:41 UTC
Sometimes when I pressed the left mouse button the factory just died out immediately. Like the game sometimes has registered my single click into pressing. I think it can be prevented if the game doesn't allow consecutive pressing.

The game reminds me of Missile Command which both with scarce resource.
🎤 greenbluebit
16. Aug 2018 · 10:47 UTC
@skyc not sure what you mean by that. But first of all, factories die after a random amount of time of working.
Did you mean that you shot a new pod(pre-landed factory) and you didn't hit another factory but it just died instantly?
Skyc
16. Aug 2018 · 10:56 UTC
Is it my mouse's problem? Looks like I got two shots after a single click.

![mouse.png](///raw/47c/31/z/19fb9.png)
🎤 greenbluebit
16. Aug 2018 · 10:59 UTC
Oh man, that's odd, could be hardware, but ok good point, I'll limit the click to once, it's just odd because I already have a delay on it.
Thanks
Kokonaught
16. Aug 2018 · 17:47 UTC
It's a very relaxing game, I'm not quiet sure I understood how it worked though. Ahah!
The music notes played when the player clicks could have been better implemented, it sometimes "broke" the melody rather than fuse with it.
I didn't understand why some batiments were destroyed sometimes, and sometimes not. I think some visual feedback or a short tutorial could help.
Good job with the atmosphere anyway!
walnoot
17. Aug 2018 · 11:06 UTC
I quite like the atmosphere of the game, very relaxing. I think if the mechanics were a little bit deeper this could be a very chill clicker-like game. Small nitpick: I had to clean my monitor before I was able to see the dark gray pod on the planet.
SuperEndeg
17. Aug 2018 · 11:17 UTC
Got the same problem mentioned by @skyc. Eventually got that factory can be destroyed if another factory land on it. Overall nice relaxing game.
🎤 greenbluebit
17. Aug 2018 · 17:25 UTC
@walnoot do you have any ideas of some mechanics I could work on? Anything you might like to see if you were to play it?

@superendeg I guess I have to give more feedback to the user, I agree. Thanks a lot for checking it out.

@kokonaught totally agreed, I also noticed the music can be broken by the notes when firing. I just couldn't figure out how to make it work and liked the idea of adding to the song so much that I went with it anyway. If you have some thoughts on maybe how to handle it, I'd love to hear.
Kokonaught
17. Aug 2018 · 17:45 UTC
@greenbluebit I can ask our musician @noojsan if he has an idea on how to handle it, I'll let you know!
walnoot
18. Aug 2018 · 08:58 UTC
@greenbluebit Perhaps also going to the moons of Mars and balancing out the resources between the bodies. Or having various kinds of pods that produce different resources, which you have to balance out.
Andrei9
20. Aug 2018 · 21:55 UTC
simple and relaxing, cool :thumbsup:
worai
24. Aug 2018 · 18:44 UTC
I love space. I love mars. I love orbit mechanics and Kerb- ... *physicist brain fizzle*
Great game! 11/10!