Perpetual Motion by gabtoschi

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

Perpetual Motion Logo

Scientists often classify perpetual motion machines according to the thermodynamics law they violate. However, you, an aspiring revolutionary mechanical engineer, do not believe in this sort of stuff. Your goal in Perpetual Motion is to try to create an eternal self-charging electric circuit by moving around your ideas and projects as long as your energy levels allow it.

Perpetual Motion is a print-and-play card game for 1 player. You just need to download the PDF, print 2 A4 sheets (+ rulebook) to play. The rulebook is available in English and Brazilian Portuguese.

The theme "Keep it alive" was the inspiration to the perpetual motion theme and to the mechanic of creating an eternal self-charging electric circuit using loops. Good thing machines like that can exist in a card game, at least...

:zap: :zap: Download Perpetual Motion :zap: :zap:

Ratings

Given 4🗳️ 3🗨️

Feedback

Pagetb
21. Apr 2020 · 16:27 UTC
cool game
ToC
21. Apr 2020 · 16:34 UTC
Nice idea for a card game! Will definitely save this for later. Bit hard to playtest during a pandemic though :sweat_smile:
d1str4kt0r
21. Apr 2020 · 16:34 UTC
Its a cool concept.. i have no printer tho, and nowhere to print this on this lockdown... but i get the idea, cool cool
ssh.randy
21. Apr 2020 · 16:37 UTC
that's really cool! unfortunately, no access to a printer :( but i think it's a super novel idea, fits with the theme well
hollebecq.baptiste
21. Apr 2020 · 16:39 UTC
Nice! Will definitely play it again later with friends
Luke Perkin
21. Apr 2020 · 16:41 UTC
Bookmarking this to remind me to print this off later. Maybe you could also figure out a way to get this into Tabletop Simulator?
mlkvr
21. Apr 2020 · 16:45 UTC
Writing rules preparing handbook wow thats too much effort, good job definately will check it out deeper
IronStudios
21. Apr 2020 · 16:54 UTC
Although I couldn't play the game since my family's printer is black and white, it looked pretty interesting and the graphics looked cool too.
niterich
21. Apr 2020 · 18:22 UTC
Why would a mechanical engineer be concerned with electrical circuits? We'd be more interested in one of those offset wheels with the marbles in them.

I don't have a printer either, so I drew up my own cards and played that way. Maybe it was just the luck of my draws, or I misread one of the rules, but I had no problems building a 4-tile circuit plus a battery recharge with only 3 energy used each turn. I ended up with 24 energy at the end of the game with no real thought on my end. And, if I read the rules correctly, I could set up a 4-tile loop with the power source in the first round, then keep it for the next two rounds for an easy +8. I think some actions need a bigger penalty - perhaps swapping cards on the field has an extra energy spent per swap (adjacent = 2 energy, one tile over = 3 energy, across the board = 7 energy)? Or maybe rewarding the player additional points for setting up multiple complete loops? Either way, it's a very interesting card game and I'm glad to have played it.
Sciman101
25. Apr 2020 · 15:56 UTC
Finally got around to playing this, kudos to you for putting together a card game for the LD! I thought it was a neat concept, but ran into the same issue as niterich - once you have a decent loop setup, there's no incentive to change your system, since it generates the same amount of energy each round. Maybe it was lost in translation, and I'm supposed to shuffle the cards that _do_ make up a loop. Either way though, this idea has potential, and I think you pulled it off well aside from that one balance issue. Great job!