LudumData

Circuit City by firellon

[raw]
made by firellon for Ludum Dare 47 (JAM)

Cover.png

Theme and Idea

The game has been made in 72 hours for the Ludum Dare #47. The theme of the jam was "Stuck in the loop", which I honestly disliked. However, after a while of brainstorming, I came up with a simple thought:

"What if the goal is not to get out of the loop, but rather get stuck in it instead?"

What if being in the loop is the state you want to support and everything is revolving around that?

And if so, who's gonna be able to keep moving in circles without being bored, no matter how many times?

Thus, the premise of a loopy town that has robots functioning as blood in it was born. Enjoy!

Screenshot 2020-10-06 at 10.19.27.png

Controls

Mouse clicks to choose and place buildings in the vicinity of any road.

The robots will take care of the rest.

Screenshot 2020-10-06 at 10.16.22.png

Story

The year is 2127.

Facing a severe lack of resources, Humanity sends a remote excavation mission to a distant world filled with minerals. Since it's extremely hard to support an actual human, the autonomous robots are going to do all the work instead.

There's only one issue - the droids have to keep moving. All. The. Time. Otherwise, they will die and the circuit will break. Which leads to a very special kind of cyclic structure for the cities those robots will build.

...

So, guess what's the good news here?

You are assigned to be the Architect, the scheming leader of the droids in question! Congrats!

Will they be able to handle it or will they all perish into oblivion getting stuck in the loop? It's only yours to decide!

The fate of all humans is in your hands!

Screenshot 2020-10-06 at 13.16.15.png

Changelog

06-10-2020:

  • Fixed annoying bug causing robots to get stuck forever
  • Fixed Level #4 "Invasion" robots not coming out
  • Added "Skip Level" button for your convenience

11-10-2020:

  • Added sound effects
Youtube https://nebulate.itch.io/circuit-city
Youtube https://nebulate.itch.io/circuit-city
Youtube https://nebulate.itch.io/circuit-city
Original URL https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/47/circuit-city

Ratings

Overall 247th 3.938⭐ 26🧑‍⚖️
Fun 710th 3.413⭐ 25🧑‍⚖️
Innovation 148th 3.977⭐ 24🧑‍⚖️
Theme 237th 4.109⭐ 25🧑‍⚖️
Graphics 560th 3.833⭐ 26🧑‍⚖️
Given 32🗳️ 17🗨️

Feedback

dxk2294
06. Oct 2020 · 09:25 UTC
This is my kind of game! I love the concept, it's a really unique idea and lots of fun. I think the game would benefit from 2x/3x speedup, along with the ability to queue up roads/buildings along unfinished roads.
AppoxGames
06. Oct 2020 · 09:28 UTC
Cool concept and nice graphics!
Patsui
06. Oct 2020 · 09:30 UTC
+Artstyle is simple clean and goood!

+Love me a good factory management game

+nice take on the theme.

-Didn't really get the idea what I was supposed to do, so maybe give the player more feedback on what's happening.

Love the simple style, good job!
PsiBuck
06. Oct 2020 · 09:40 UTC
I really liked this game. Unfortunately however I got stuck on the "Invasion" level. When I got to it, no robots spawned so I couldn't do anything. Restarting in the top right didn't fix it either and I didn't want to play through again.

That said I would have kept playing if it was working. It's pretty fun, I thought long direct roads were the answer but then realised I needed more twists to extend the area. I would love a speed-up button as well.

Overall though a really solid game!
zacharieg
06. Oct 2020 · 09:53 UTC
Wow ! It's a really detailed game, I enjoyed it ! I didn't understood how exactly keep alive my robots and optimize my factory but it match the theme perfectly, and the graphics are very cool... You have a concept, keep it for after the jam !
🎤 firellon
06. Oct 2020 · 09:59 UTC
@dxk2294 Thanks! It took some time to figure out how to make the robots move well, and you're right, the speedup option should be implemented (probably will do as a post-jam version)

@patsui Thank you! The point of the game is to build up your system to support a required amount of robots (they will start dying without moving in later levels and get invaded by energy-sucking enemies too)

@psibuck Thank you! It's especially valuable that you've got to this point, I may have let some bugs in, will have a look and fix it!
**Update**: Fixed it, you should be able play Invasion level now in Web without issues. Also, you can skip right to that level as well. Thanks again!

@zacharieg Thanks for the feedback! The robots will start dying later on in the game, and then all the traffic jams you'd potentially have in your Circuit City will start biting you in the back :) Just you watch!
Macmist
06. Oct 2020 · 13:41 UTC
That's super impressive. For a theme that you disliked you did an extroardinary job! The objective is clear, gameplay is simple, but it's not so easy once you get to the levels with batteries and enemies.
The graphics are so cool, and the idea around the theme is great! I had a lot of fun playing this, even lost track of time while I was supposed to do some work aha, great job!
With some music and sound effect it would be perfect!

Also I've noted that if you do a loop with a road, for instance a road that is around a two buildings, some robots might get stuck and endlessely go around those two buildings. It makes sense regarding how the game works but it is a bit frustrating as there is no way to fix it. Perhaps a button to remove buildings would be a nice addition
🎤 firellon
06. Oct 2020 · 14:06 UTC
@macmist Thanks a lot for your kind words, glad you liked it!

Will add audials in the following days (as a post-jam version, ofc)

Speaking of the buildings surrounded by a road - seems like you've buillt a sub-loop? That's intended as a way to lock robots within a shorter route (make them do "patrol" duty, for example, cycling between Defender, Reactor and a Mine endlessly to protect the given area reliably. I imagine it could get annoying if those robots die and you can't access the buildings locked in the sub-loop.

In that case, it would make sense for the buildings to rust away and self-destruct without being activated enough, right?
Lachezar Hubanov
06. Oct 2020 · 23:30 UTC
Great work! Really enjoyed it and, actually thought it was the most polished LD47 game I've played so far! Plus quite original. I guess any feedback I'd give- I saw other people had mentioned, some extra info/hud would be cool, to maybe explain the bot behaviours a little bit, or to try guide players towards developing some sort of strategy to building. But, also, its a jam, so this is more feedback if you decide to build upon this idea in the future :)
nicardo
10. Oct 2020 · 16:58 UTC
Simple and neat. I will play again to try all unlocks. Well done :thumbsup:
Archimagus
11. Oct 2020 · 21:28 UTC
Very cool concept and pretty well executed. I would have rather seen more time spent polishing the mechanics rather than coming up with more levels. A few things would help a lot, like the ability to chose a buildings rotation, and the ability to remove blocks. Also, Maybe a speed control, at times it felt a bit tedious waiting for things to happen. Still I quite enjoyed the game and I think with some polish it could be really fun.
Nikolai Shkurkin
13. Oct 2020 · 03:53 UTC
The robots are so cute! The sound of them bumping into each other constantly does get a bit old though 0.0 I'm not sure sound feedback was needed for that. Maybe a little animated sad face or something above the robot would have been enough to show that they were being blocked. Different little reaction emojis that are color-coded will let the player know really quickly what is happening without even having to look directly at the little robots. Overall fun and polished! (was missing a "delete" feature but eh, you only have so much time to code these things)
Ryan Paton
13. Oct 2020 · 06:22 UTC
Love your use of the theme, hope to see this game progress beyond the Jam
saurterrs
16. Oct 2020 · 14:05 UTC
A pleasant puzzle, love the graphics and sounds. A good thing to play after hard work.

I would enjoy a mobile game like that
Ale
17. Oct 2020 · 14:32 UTC
Great concept, great execution, and lots of polish! The game was fun, but it was easy to get stuck without any more space to build. I got stuck in the invader level because I ran out of space, and it was frustrating because I kept getting super close to the goal, but I would lose a bunch of robots to energy loss whenever I hit ~70. If I had just one more generator, it might've been enough to reach the goal of 75. And the worst part was that I hit that wall with only around 60 deaths, so I ended up waiting a huge amount of time hoping I'd manage to win, but it was hopeless. I reached the death limit and lost :(

Being able to delete buildings would be helpful, but this was still a solid entry, and I had fun with it for a while. Nice job!
LTyrosine
20. Oct 2020 · 23:23 UTC
Really nice polished game, impressive for the given time frame. Entire game is built around theme in a brilliant way.

There is a lot of thought in its core mechanics and it's fun once you understand it. Graphics are simple and cool.

Overall this game deserves lot more attention that it's receiving. Really hope that you take it to a full project (maybe mobile?)
hgcummings
27. Oct 2020 · 19:56 UTC
Really interesting idea, and I love the art style. The mechanics are straightforward but it took me a while to understand the dynamics of the game. A really interesting system though. It was a lot of fun to play with. Reminded me slightly of Rymdkapsel.