Goblinheart by ninjascript

[raw]
made by ninjascript for LD34 (JAM)
Goblinheart is an 8-bit dungeon crawler with unconventional mechanics. Instead of fighting, the player must travel through the dungeon armed only with the POWER OF LOVE!

Controls:
up, down, left, right - Move
spacebar - Charm NPCs

We didn't quite get to where we wanted with this one. The dungeon works, pathfinding mostly works, and the core mechanic (charming your enemies) is there, but we had loftier goals! Namely the player would have an "influence" counter and would only be able to charm low-level enemies until their influence counter got larger. Eventually you'd be able to charm the entire dungeon, effectively growing your posse (see, it fits the theme!) to an incredible size.

Oh but for more time and/or Mondays off work. Still, pretty happy with where we got this time. Resources are credited on the game page.

FAQ

I failed to see the theme
It's pretty loose but the original idea was that your influence would grow as the number of creatures under your influence grew.

Why are the characters blurry?
It's a canvas issue with rendering objects using floating point values rather than integers. Just one more thing we didn't get to fix due to time constraints.

I guess there is no end?
Well, I like to charm the whole dungeon and then try to run them into the lava (which won't actually work), but yeah, we missed the opportunity to finish the planned big boss endgame.

I was able to walk through diagonal walls
Goblin magic!

Too easy (holding space)
Game balance was another casualty of our shortened timeline.

I liked your art
The artwork came from Lucid Design. You should check out the other collections! http://luciddesign.tk/

Ratings

Coolness 46% 1507
Overall(Jam) 2.73 969
Fun(Jam) 2.73 839
Graphics(Jam) 3.36 560
Humor(Jam) 2.65 512
Innovation(Jam) 2.82 727
Mood(Jam) 2.55 902
Theme(Jam) 2.13 1090

Feedback

Blake_Lead
15. Dec 2015 · 07:48 UTC
Nice little game, congrats ! I like the pixel art you did. I failed to see the theme though
justinooncx
15. Dec 2015 · 07:59 UTC
Interesting mechanic, pity to see it wasn't fully complete. Next time, yeah?
TomenLuca
15. Dec 2015 · 12:31 UTC
The concept is interesting, shame it wasn't completed. Now I could just hold space and survive everything. Also, it looks quite nice.
Aelius
15. Dec 2015 · 12:40 UTC
Why are the characters blurry on the web version?
David Cookie
15. Dec 2015 · 12:43 UTC
Pretty nice and original! Too bad you didn't have time to polish it with audio and a goal, like charm everyone in the floor. I eventually walk with my entire army of charmed soldiers in this neverending dungeon, and just for that it was worth it :)
muffty
15. Dec 2015 · 13:04 UTC
I guess there is no end?
goodbadokay
16. Dec 2015 · 05:00 UTC
Nice game but has some issues
I was able to walk through diagonal walls
Weeping Rupee
16. Dec 2015 · 05:05 UTC
I loved the concept (especially since the main character is a goblin-- traditionally one of the least charismatic of the high fantasy races... I once rolled a half orc bard/warrior hybrid in a DnD-ish game my friend came up with and it reminded me of that. His name was Balthas Giggleberry and he was a gender-bending blast to role play).

Anyway, it's a shame you couldn't implement your full plan for the influence counter because I think it would have made this one really stand out. Nice job though! My only real complaint: all i have to do is hold down the charm button and then all I have to worry about are the harmful poison water tiles.
thecatspajamas
16. Dec 2015 · 05:11 UTC
I like the concept. It's too bad you didn't get to finish it.
Evergreen Games
16. Dec 2015 · 05:11 UTC
Pretty interesting idea. I like the pixel art.
Weeping Rupee
16. Dec 2015 · 06:43 UTC
I loved the concept (especially since the main character is a goblin-- traditionally one of the least charismatic of the high fantasy races... I once rolled a half orc bard/warrior hybrid in a DnD-ish game my friend came up with and it reminded me of that. His name was Balthas Giggleberry and he was a gender-bending blast to role play).

Anyway, it's a shame you couldn't implement your full plan for the influence counter because I think it would have made this one really stand out. Nice job though! My only real complaint: all i have to do is hold down the charm button and then all I have to worry about are the harmful poison water tiles.
Dalkor
16. Dec 2015 · 15:53 UTC
Great potential.
oparisy
16. Dec 2015 · 21:41 UTC
Liked your art style, and crawling the dungeon. I'm not sure I understand whic of the theme(s) you picked?
eruiz00
25. Dec 2015 · 20:39 UTC
excepting some bugs, good overall. Have a nice time playing. well done!