Keep I.T. alive by CrashApe

[raw]
made by CrashApe for Ludum Dare 46 (JAM)

Your are the new Intern. Your task is to keep the I.T. alive!

Make sure that the programmers always have enough coffee and that a duck is always around.

As you know programmers convert coffee into code and use the wise advices of ducks to debug https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rubberduckdebugging

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Ratings

Overall 653th 3.737⭐ 21🧑‍⚖️
Fun 805th 3.526⭐ 21🧑‍⚖️
Innovation 267th 3.842⭐ 21🧑‍⚖️
Theme 332th 4.1⭐ 22🧑‍⚖️
Graphics 2189th 2.605⭐ 21🧑‍⚖️
Audio 1226th 3.026⭐ 21🧑‍⚖️
Humor 160th 3.975⭐ 22🧑‍⚖️
Mood 499th 3.789⭐ 21🧑‍⚖️
Given 40🗳️ 10🗨️

Feedback

Lintfordpickle
21. Apr 2020 · 09:46 UTC
Well done, a solid little game with a nice mechanic. The balancing was just about right that it was not too difficult at first, but then sooner or later the downfall was inevitable.

This game stressed me out playing it though lol :(
Deluxe Duck
21. Apr 2020 · 10:00 UTC
I'd really like to see any Controls or at least a tutorial ;)
zyapimstudios
21. Apr 2020 · 10:02 UTC
Loved the game. I love the way you used the theme. Generally an amazing game. I will play this when I'm bored. I would love it if you could make an android port. Maybe you can play my game aswell?
JAsonsumm1
21. Apr 2020 · 10:02 UTC
Ah a really cool take on the theme, I like what you've done here :)
Furfel
21. Apr 2020 · 10:04 UTC
You should have named it "Scrum Master" :rofl:! Sounds are great but I would also appreciate a quacking from time to time. Graphics could be animated. Overall the gameplay and idea is fantastic!
cles
21. Apr 2020 · 10:04 UTC
i had trouble finding the place to stand to fill coffee
Ducky
22. Apr 2020 · 13:52 UTC
I approve this game!
Jay Berlin
22. Apr 2020 · 13:54 UTC
Very challenging, but I really enjoyed it. Definitely gave me flashbacks of a few places I've worked where the only way to debug the code was to use a duck, LOL. I think an automation/upgrade mechanic would be great for this game. Something where you'd use the money you make to upgrade their coffee pot into a caraffe and then maybe a coffee machine, and maybe you could expand on the duck to add an army of duck-wearing interns. Even if you don't like that idea, I really hope you expand on this game.
Game_Coder28
22. Apr 2020 · 19:05 UTC
Very difficult game! i like it though, the concept is great and really makes for an enticing game that is really fun to play! great work!
VernalBehemoth
22. Apr 2020 · 19:12 UTC
Awesome, that was very enjoyable. So good that I want more! Maybe have some role assignments for the developers that you have to manage as well :D nice work!
frompdx
22. Apr 2020 · 19:30 UTC
Fun little game with a lot of potential to add on to.
heyycap
22. Apr 2020 · 19:55 UTC
Funny! I wish I could hire more interns. It wasn't clear what effect the duck had, if any.
OndraSej
22. Apr 2020 · 19:59 UTC
I think the general idea works, but you'd need to work a lot on tuning the game. The main issue is that on difficulty 1.0, the programmers consume coffee much faster than the coffee machine produces it, so you're always doomed to fail after a certain amount of time.

The main thing to fix is to always keep the production of coffee greater or equal to consumption, and then set difficulty by tuning how much faster it is produced than consumed. Easy == coffee is produced much faster than consumed, hard == the speeds are about equal. The idea about upgrading the coffee machine also sounds good, and sounds like a way to turn this into a much bigger game.

With proper tuning, this could be a fun and replayable game.
🎤 CrashApe
22. Apr 2020 · 20:07 UTC
@ondrasej the idea was that you ultimately has to fail. even on diffculty 0.5 the coffee production is not enough. you just have more time untill it happens.

@heyycap if the programmers get a red head (because they are angry about their bugs) you have to pick up the duck and help them debugging. (press space for 5 seconds, you will see a second bar which fills slowly)
Weine
22. Apr 2020 · 20:08 UTC
I wish we had an intern like that when making our own game. A solid implementation of a simple idea. You got a surprisingly strategic gameplay for the extremely simple mechanics.
OndraSej
22. Apr 2020 · 20:21 UTC
@Crashape the problem with this approach is that in the end, the game will feel unfair, because there is no way to win and you can even compute the maximal time you can play. With my proposal, the players can play infintely only if they play optimally all the time, which is pretty much impossible. So, they will ultimately fail too, except they will not feel like the game screwed them up.
heyycap
22. Apr 2020 · 22:30 UTC
@crashape ah, see if you take the duck to them without a red head, a bar still fills, so makes me think I'm doing something.