Abstractio by loyance
💡 Idea:
What has no beginning and no end? One would say that's a doughnut, but to them I would reply "You do not understand the metaphysical structure of the universe".
To explain the universe, we cannot really start from somewhere, as there is no beginning. Actually, there is nothing at all. No space, no void, and no time. But that begs a lot of question "Can we really say that something exists or does not exist somewhere?" and "Where is that somewhere?". To that I would reply "Um, actually I do not like philosophy this much. Now please excuse me, I have some objective things to attend to".
Your goal is to create something from nothing. Maybe that something is everything, or maybe that something is a base for everything. Use the logic and atomic facts to shape that something.
✏️ Theme: Start with nothing
🏅 Features: - 2 base elements, they will shape everything - The great assembler, this thing will consume elements to create other elements. Technically, the assembler is there, but again, do not worry about the philosophy of this. It is very stupid - 31 craftable elements, they are truly something you have never experienced or seen before. It is worth every penny to see Singularity - Complicated and abstract themes, this says it all. Or does it? ~~Hey, Vsauce. Mich-~~ - Replay value, tons of it. You can play with your eyes closed, or maybe with your monitor upside down. Possibilities are endless, really - Responsive and aesthetically pleasing game play, there are no distractions in this game, and combined with smooth controls it is really brilliant - Inspired by Doodle God, shh-- do not tell this anyone
🎮 Controls: - Click and move mouse to drag element - Double click an element to duplicate it - Click and hold on element to destroy it - Double click on the assembler to show which elements can be combined - Escape to close the game
🎥 Timelapse:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=puoMumdfBZM
NOTE 1: HTML5 version of the game might have issues with audio levels and performance, as GameMaker:Studio's HTML5 export is pretty trash.
NOTE 2: It is actually confirmed that it is possible to beat this game on a phone, while playing in mobile browser, but you really should not attempt this as you will suffer. I warned you.
Ratings
| Overall | 238th | 3.45⭐ | 32🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 362th | 2.933⭐ | 32🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 186th | 3.483⭐ | 32🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 38th | 4.167⭐ | 32🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 161th | 3.583⭐ | 32🧑⚖️ |
| Audio | 58th | 3.733⭐ | 32🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 115th | 3.6⭐ | 32🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 39🗳️ | 8🗨️ |
The gameplay is interesting and strangely satisfying at first, but after a certain point, you eventually have to resort to trying every combination. This quickly becomes tedious and only grows worse as the number of possibilities expands.
I like the UI. It strikes a good balance between being intuitive while still forcing the player to experiment and work things out for themselves.
The audio is simple and utilitarian and suits the mood of the game well.
Ultimately, the game is well executed but the core idea behind it has inherent limitations.
Also the very start of the game. That completely blank screen almost made me think your build was broken.
Things to improve:
- "remove duplicates" button might be a nice addition: you can not "consume" an element - so what is point of having duplictes in game at all?)
- Adding colliders on elements so they do not overlap... and say, when new elements are created, they just push out all other elements to the borders fo the screen. Reason: half time spent just moving elements around, especially in the late game.
I also enjoyed how you mostly have to figure the rules out yourself, although this threw me a few times. I was frustrated when I was demonstrating to myself that the game is not deterministic because matching the same thing twice didn't produce the same outcome... sometimes it would work, other times not. Other times it would even DELETE something! Exploring this further, I eventually realized I was up against two rules I wasn't aware of: There is a max of 4 of an item, and there is a period of time of holding after which your command switches from "try to match this" to "delete this."
I think I was trying to dig into the mechanics of matchmaking because I was stuck pretty hard at this spot, and wasn't sure if my attempted matches were failing because they weren't matches or because I didn't understand how to even attempt a match:
So I failed real hard to click for quite a while. After I experimented enough to be certain how matching operated, I eventually broke through that spot to unlock progress, and had a bit of fun tinkering. I think I wasn't quite on the wavelength of the word usage either, so I was pretty poor at predicting how things would match, and was glad the cheat feature existed to tell me what matches, simply so I cold progress.
I guess this kind of puzzle isn't really my thing, then? Doesn't matter - the aesthetics are on point, the air of mystery is nice, and I think you achieved what you were after. Nice work!