Acorn Rush by MrPiedPiper

[raw]
made by MrPiedPiper for Ludum Dare 45 (JAM)

Thanks so much for checking out our entry! After you’re done playing, please share your high score in the comments. (our high score is 3300)

Current non-creator high score: @tygrak with 1600 points!

Lore

You were too busy participating in game jams to gather acorns for winter! Now you have to start with nothing and collect enough acorns before it’s too late! Oh! -and watch out for the other squirrels trying to steal your acorns!

How to play

  • You can deposit the acorns into the tree by either shooting them in, or putting them in directly (clicking when you’re in the hole)
  • Make sure to watch out for the thief squirrels, they take the last 2 things you deposited and make a run for it. If you knock them down, the points are added back automatically. Plus, they leave a golden acorn worth double a normal acorn!

Controls

  • Movement - WASD or arrow keys
  • Pick-up - Right-click
  • Throw - Left-click
  • Pause - Esc key

Credits

  • Programming and music by @MrPiedPiper
  • Art and animations by @StinkyKitty

Also, there's a bug right now that sometimes causes thieves to get stuck after falling. Also the thieves always run to the right :P

Title.jpg

Gameplay.jpg

gameGIF.gif

Ratings

Overall 885th 3.088⭐ 42🧑‍⚖️
Fun 801th 2.974⭐ 41🧑‍⚖️
Innovation 926th 2.679⭐ 41🧑‍⚖️
Theme 963th 2.705⭐ 41🧑‍⚖️
Graphics 530th 3.563⭐ 42🧑‍⚖️
Audio 350th 3.385⭐ 41🧑‍⚖️
Humor 533th 2.77⭐ 39🧑‍⚖️
Mood 720th 3.145⭐ 40🧑‍⚖️
Given 20🗳️ 28🗨️

Feedback

pinosaur
07. Oct 2019 · 23:35 UTC
Cute graphics! Perhaps you should increase the viewport size on itch.io however.
Madbarron
07. Oct 2019 · 23:36 UTC
Got 600. Solid game! Played on the web and the size could be bigger. Good music, sound effects, art, everything. Had to watch the GIF before I understood how to score. Great job, you should be proud!
SBrianZ
07. Oct 2019 · 23:38 UTC
The squirrels are incredibly polished. I love the cutsy vibe to the game. Definitly a wholesome one from the selection.
Cybikitty
07. Oct 2019 · 23:40 UTC
A super fun and adorable game - I love it! Great job guys :D
Fredbernardo
07. Oct 2019 · 23:43 UTC
It was hard to understand at first that enemies stole points from you. But when I realized it the game became really fun and challenging! Cool entry!
🎤 MrPiedPiper
07. Oct 2019 · 23:50 UTC
@pinosaur @madbarron I had no idea that was even an option, thanks! :sweat_smile: Glad you liked it!

@sbrianz @cybikitty Super happy with how it turned out, Thanks for taking the time to try our game! :D

@fredbernardo We could definitely improve that if we do any post-jam updates. Thanks! Glad you had fun ^^
velvetlobster
08. Oct 2019 · 05:33 UTC
![Screenshot Capture - 2019-10-08 - 02-32-30.png](///raw/0e4/e/z/28a7d.png)

Ops
adorable sounds an music .... not sure if i got the way to play corerectl
mimusangel
08. Oct 2019 · 08:15 UTC
The game is fun, very relaxed
yokuday
08. Oct 2019 · 12:28 UTC
the game is SO ADORABLE!!! i got lost playing it good job!
psychic_ash
08. Oct 2019 · 16:50 UTC
it's adorable.
MarcoMing
08. Oct 2019 · 20:18 UTC
love the graphic! good job :D
Vaibho
08. Oct 2019 · 20:54 UTC
I liked the graphics and the audio. The game was very cute and relaxing. My high score was 0 but nice game.
djee
08. Oct 2019 · 22:19 UTC
Nice music but the audio effect on moving get annoying fast. I couldn't understand what to do once I collected some acorn, so ended up with a score of 0, which is quite frustrating.
🎤 MrPiedPiper
08. Oct 2019 · 23:05 UTC
@djee Sorry we didn't make that clear enough :grimacing: We'll have to work on that for a post-jam version.

You can deposit the acorns into the tree by either shooting them in, or putting them in directly (clicking when you're in the hole)

Make sure to watch out for the thief squirrels, they take up to 200 points and make a run for it. If you knock them down, the points are added back automatically. Plus, they leave a golden acorn worth double a normal acorn!
organicpencil
09. Oct 2019 · 06:43 UTC
Pretty solid! Took awhile to figure out where my points were going. Nice aesthetic, soothing musics. High score: 100
T-Bo
09. Oct 2019 · 18:33 UTC
So cute ! :heart_eyes: Nice pixel art and fun game ! Amazing job ! :clap:
QuietGecko
09. Oct 2019 · 22:53 UTC
Nice concept, it wasn't clear when I got stolen and sometimes I ended up walking in the sky.
I like the relaxing music as well.

We also created an entry for the jam in case you wanna check :)

https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/$172916
ropedog
10. Oct 2019 · 01:11 UTC
Really liked the music! It fit well with the cuteness of the game, which added to the overall mood. It took me a little while to figure out what to do with the acorns once I picked them up, but I did eventually get it.
Nice work!
Imphenzia
11. Oct 2019 · 21:22 UTC
The environment, animals and music was cute and relaxing so it was a nice experience to play. It took me a while before I figured out that collection process as I thought it would push the acorns and not pull them behind me =) Nice entry.
🎤 MrPiedPiper
11. Oct 2019 · 22:27 UTC
I tried just pushing on the heart, but I like responding to comments more soooooo

@velvetlobster Glad you liked the music! It was fun to make. Ukulele is a blast :D

@mimusangel Cool that you found it relaxing! I find it rather frantic myself, really want those high scores.

@yokuday Yayyyy adorableness! @stinkykitty did such a good job on making things cute and bubbly. Thank you!

@psychic-ash <3

@marcoming :D :D :D

@vaibho Thank you! We might have made it a bit too hard. Whoops :P Maybe a difficulty option would be good :thinking:

@djee We should probably work on the sound effect to make it less annoying, yeah. Maybe quieter too. Thanks for the feedback! Sorry how to play wasn't clear enough :< We definitely need some kind of in-game instructions. Maybe a "First time playing?" tutorial or something.

@organicpencil We should definitely add some clear way to show when you get/lose points so there's no confusion. Thank you! ^^

@t-bo @stinkykitty did an amazing job on the graphics ^^ Thank you!

@quietgecko Flying squirrel XD Thanks! And your game is 100% on my list of games to try out. Yours was made with Godot too, if I'm not mistaken :eyes:

@ropedog Thanks! The music was great fun to record. Late at night the day before the jam was done, recording with Audacity. Glad you enjoyed :D

@imphenzia Quite glad you enjoyed playing our game. Pushing the acorns is an interesting idea we might have to explore later :thinking: Thanks! :D

Hope I didn't miss anybody.
StinkyKitty
11. Oct 2019 · 23:48 UTC
Thanks everyone so much for taking the time to play and review our game! Your comments are super helpful! :smile_cat:

@pinosaur thanks for the tip! :thumbsup:

@madbarron thanks for sharing your score! I'm glad you liked it! :smile_cat:

@sbrianz thanks so much! I'm glad you liked our game! :smiley_cat:

@cybikitty thanks so much for playing, I'm glad you had fun! :smiley_cat:

@fredbernardo hopefully we can make that clearer in future updates. Thanks for playing!

@velvetlobster @mrpiedpiper did an amazing job on the music and sounds. :thumbsup: Thanks for taking the time to comment and play our game!

@mimusangel I'm glad you had fun! I play the game way to frantically trying to get new high scores. :joy_cat:

@yokuday thanks so much! :heart:

@psychic-ash thanks! :heart:

@marcoming thanks! :smile_cat: Thanks for playing our game!

@vaibho thanks! :smiley_cat:

@djee I'm really sorry we didn't make it very clear! :grimacing: We'll definitely work on that. Thanks for taking the time to play and review our game! :smiley_cat: It really helps.

@organicpencil we're going to try to clear things up in future updates. :smiley_cat: Thanks for taking the time to play, review, and share your score for our game!

@t-bo thanks!!! :heart: I'm so glad you had fun playing our game! :smile_cat:

@quietgecko we're going to try to clear things up in future updates. Thanks for taking the time to play and review our game!

@ropedog credits to @mrpiedpiper for the awesome music! We're going to try to make it clearer how to play in future updates. Thanks for taking the time to play and review our game, it helps a ton! :smile_cat:

@imphenzia I'm glad you had fun playing our game! :smiley_cat: We're going to try to make it clearer how to play in future updates. Thanks for taking the time to play and review our game! It helps a ton! :smile_cat:
Xenoxygene
12. Oct 2019 · 01:44 UTC
Heard about another squirrel, had to check for myself ;) Nice game overall, hurt my fingers on the arrow keys but I managed to get 1k points :D I have no clue how you reached 3k xD Music is super chill and the pixel art is nice on the eyes!
🎤 MrPiedPiper
12. Oct 2019 · 09:09 UTC
@xenoxygene We should probably make it so you don't have to repeatedly press the button to move. Would improve it quite a bit. Congrats on 1k points! That's pretty good. 3k took a few tries :sweat_smile: This game is a bit unforgiving in its current state.

The music was quite fun to record, ukulele is a blast. And @stinkykitty did great with their art. Really happy with how the game ended up!

Glad you liked the game, thanks for trying it out! :D
zubspace
12. Oct 2019 · 21:13 UTC
Nice relaxing game! The main menu looks great. Love the simple idea of a squirrel collecting acorns. The squirrel animations are well done. Shooting needs a bit of getting used to and it doesn't work, when you want to shoot while you're above your hole. But when you know this, it works ok.
Simon Rahnasto
13. Oct 2019 · 14:32 UTC
Cool idea, I enjoyed the nice pixel art and soothing music. I kept getting 0 score over and over until I read that you needed to knock the squirrels down and get the golden acorn. After that I managed to get a whooping 800 points :smile:

I love score-attack games, thank you for linking your game in my post!
Tygrak
13. Oct 2019 · 20:17 UTC
Nice relaxing music, cute art, fun arcade gameplay, great entry overall! My best score was 1600 after quite a few tries, I'd love to know your secrets to get a better score :D, after a while I figured out a strategy that was basically just going on trips up and down, trying to shoot down all the thieves, going for down for the gold acorns and depositing as many as I can when going up.
🎤 MrPiedPiper
14. Oct 2019 · 02:21 UTC
@zubspace Great feedback! Very happy with out the menus came out, they add alot to the game. Thanks for the comment :D
🎤 MrPiedPiper
14. Oct 2019 · 02:29 UTC
@simon-rahnasto 800, nice! So you got the good end screen, congratulations! Really glad you enjoyed playing our game :D
🎤 MrPiedPiper
14. Oct 2019 · 02:34 UTC
@tygrak Glad you had fun! I think 1600 is the highest non-creator score I've seen so far. Nicely done!

As for how to get a higher score, here's what I do:

-----

The main idea is of course to get as many points as possible in the shortest amount of time. And the fastest way to get points in this game, would be the Golden Acorns.

The main idea I go for when trying for a high score, is to get rid of the bad squirrels as quickly as possible, so I can gather Golden Acorns. Of course, any regular Acorns you can gather while doing this is helpful.

Also remember to keep an eye on the timer, so you can take out whatever squirrels are holding your points in their bags before time runs out, and so you can make a last second delivery for extra points.

-----

Hopefully this isn't just a bunch of stuff you already know :P
itsdanidre
17. Oct 2019 · 17:30 UTC
It was hard to grasp the mechanics at first without the indicators, but I soon figured out how to do it. Nice game :grin:
🎤 MrPiedPiper
18. Oct 2019 · 00:22 UTC
@itsdanidre Thanks for trying it out! We'll definitely have to make it more intuitive. Much work to be done. Glad you liked it :grinning:
PhilStrahl
21. Oct 2019 · 20:26 UTC
Adorable squirrels (Even the thieves!)! Had fun figuring it out on my stream, thanks for the help! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2u3BIVgcKdQ