LudumData

Doubling ground crew by gilborn

[raw]
made by gilborn for Ludum Dare 54 (COMPO)

First things first:

The most important Key is "R" for restart ;-)

You are a crew member of a spaceship, getting beamed down to a unknown planet to search for the former, lost ground crew. Try to find out what happened!

Controls: - Move: wasd - Aim and shoot: Mouse 1&2 - "R" for restart - "F" remove monologue

You have to shoot every enemy before you can proceed a level. The rest: Play to find out and have fun!

This is my first game with Gamemaker, didn´t want to use Unity this time because of their current payment politics. All went smooth the 2 days, at the end it was a little bit of a downer to get no .exe and that you have to make an oracle account to be able to share the game with others...

Since it was my first time with the engine, I decided to make the game very close to a tutorial series I found on Youtube (Video is called "GameMaker Studio 2: Complete Platformer Tutorial (Part 1: Basics)" by Shaun Spalding).

Thank you @shaunjs, it got VERY CLOSE to your game, although by far not complete ;-)

Sound FX was made by "https://sfxr.me/". Graphics mostly done in Gamemaker, some with GIMP.

Focus was to: - get several enemys - several levels - have a good presented story in it Turned out to be very loose on the theme, I had in mind that the doubling enemys where filling the screen much further...

Despite of that, I like the Idle animation of the Player ; )

Link https://gx.games/de/games/2rjvvl/limitedspace/
Original URL https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/54/doubling-ground-crew

Ratings

Overall 205th 3.481⭐ 28🧑‍⚖️
Fun 120th 3.722⭐ 29🧑‍⚖️
Innovation 192th 3.352⭐ 29🧑‍⚖️
Theme 343th 2.537⭐ 29🧑‍⚖️
Graphics 229th 3.296⭐ 29🧑‍⚖️
Audio 204th 3.093⭐ 29🧑‍⚖️
Humor 103th 3.185⭐ 29🧑‍⚖️
Mood 177th 3.333⭐ 29🧑‍⚖️
Given 37🗳️ 34🗨️

Feedback

LDJam user 377546
02. Oct 2023 · 20:16 UTC
Interesting, I know it's part of the story, but I think the enemies could still look a bit more like enemies. It would be cool if there were a way to defeat the red characters. Also, I got stuck at level 2 or 3 at the stone wall. At first, I thought the walking sound was bugged, but I guess it's just part of the retro vibe :D
Zerbu
02. Oct 2023 · 20:16 UTC
It's a fun game, despite being a simple platformer. It shows that a game doesn't need to be of a rarely used genre to be good!
Adam Konig
02. Oct 2023 · 20:17 UTC
A solid entry very cool that you picked up a new engine to make this! It definitely got reallly really tough for me in the 4th level but controls were very solid and responsive and visually very readable. Strong work!
🎤 gilborn
02. Oct 2023 · 20:30 UTC
@kanagg: You can defeat them, the second mouse click also fires (It is also said in the monologue of the second level, till then you don´t need it) ;-)
henk
02. Oct 2023 · 20:38 UTC
Very fun, played to the end. I like how there's time pressure without an explicit timer because of the spontaneous multiplication. Platforming felt mostly solid. I like how it can get out of control if you're not careful, but I wish you could get to way more dudes on screen before that happened, since I think it'd be satisfying to clear them all out.
🎤 gilborn
02. Oct 2023 · 20:46 UTC
@henk: You are right, a planned a level with much more enemys, but in a field were you can shoot them easily. Unfortunatelly time ran out. Thanks for the feedback!
flowby
03. Oct 2023 · 09:17 UTC
Fun little game. I really liked the multiplying mechanic :)
kiv
04. Oct 2023 · 09:05 UTC
It's really fun to play, I like that feeling when you figure out what to do with reds and oranges.
LDJam user 280624
04. Oct 2023 · 16:22 UTC
Fun and brutal! Great job
Martin Bousquet
04. Oct 2023 · 20:46 UTC
Killed the old crew, crushed their skull with my foot :)
MozokEvgen
05. Oct 2023 · 16:28 UTC
Nice concept. At some point level became a clone mayhem))
GameDevTraum
05. Oct 2023 · 17:07 UTC
When the first enemy appears and after killing him (and smashing his skull xD), I started to hear a sound, the sound when an enemy duplicates, but I didn't understand at first, I was doing a little platforming right before the second enemy spawn point and didn't know where that sound was coming from. Sudenly the sound becomes more and more frequent, I move forward a little bit and then I saw them...

![2023-10-05 14_04_02-LimitedSpace.png](///raw/a40/43/z/5fc8a.png)

An ominous evil force, so strong, so inevitable xD

Nice game! Adding coyote time would be nice
silkworm_sweatshop
07. Oct 2023 · 16:09 UTC
Cool! Duplication mechanic was really fun and adds a nice twist. You can't take it too slow either (which would be less exciting) because they will multiply on their own.
stmate03
07. Oct 2023 · 22:13 UTC
This was a pretty funny game! it has a vibe similar to games I played before, made in gamemaker, the mechanics are simple and it's a fun little game, with some additions it will be perfect!

PS: I feel you on the Unity thing, I'm in the same boat as I started learning godot a month before the jam and felt like might as well try, I never used 3D godot before the jam and just winged it, gamemaker is a fun alternative, I also do recommend godot as it is similar to Unity, really hoping these smaller engines become true competition for Unity now...
Phlip45
08. Oct 2023 · 03:11 UTC
Great little game for the first time in an engine. The graphics were charming and the dialogue boxes were neat. The lack of music kind of hurt though. If you're like me, and terrible with music, I recommend https://beepbox.co , it lets you create very retro feeling music easily without having to learn all that much, just fun to play around with. Will you make a magnum opus? probably not. but it would be serviceable most likely.

Anyways, the duplication mechanic was pretty rad. I could see it getting really out of hand if there were a physics system and they could stack on each other. Something like tribbles where they don't really move but just keep getting bigger and bigger.
🎤 gilborn
08. Oct 2023 · 06:14 UTC
@phlip45: Thank you for the high quality feedback and the link!

I am always interested in where the participants get their music from. Normally I do it with https://musescore.org/de (I read a book about composing music), this time, time ran out.

The colliding (and therefore stacking) enemys where also in my mind, but, same thing as with the music...

PS: By the way: The best sound of your game where the falling enemys ;-)
BlueDandelion
08. Oct 2023 · 13:34 UTC
The game is very interesting. I like the idea of having to use different bullets to defeat the two types of enemies, even though there is no practical difference since all you have to do is press a different button. You did a good job with this one!
Harmadillo
08. Oct 2023 · 16:04 UTC
Lots of fun. The duplication mechanic and colour coded enemies/bullets was interesting. I got as far as orange enemies before being overwhelmed.
cheesepencil
09. Oct 2023 · 00:29 UTC
lol I couldn't get past the 3rd or 4th level but it was pretty funny. I love the old scifi tv show away mission vibe.
DSFAN
09. Oct 2023 · 06:06 UTC
Funny game, interesting concept with cloning and different types of enemies. It was a bit to hard on 3 or 4 level when if you don't manage to deal with enemies fast they just clone so much you can't outdamage that, maybe set a limit to cloning or increase time is some cases.
rasblo
11. Oct 2023 · 08:53 UTC
Fun concept with two types of bullets! Cool to see a story. Great execution especially for a first time in new engine. I also switched from Unity for the first time to Godot. How did you like Gamemaker? (I find Godot great if you're used to Unity)

It got hard pretty fast when there were reds and yellows together. I'd be interested to see what happens if you kill the enemies with 1 shot.. then increase the amount instead! Possibly give the player a couple of lives to play with.

One thing I find helps with audio, I don't know if it's easy in Gamemaker, but putting a small random change in pitch on repeating sounds like jump and shoot makes it feel different with little time spent.

Nice jam though, and good luck on your journey away from Unity!
milq
11. Oct 2023 · 14:11 UTC
Exceptionally enjoyable game! The fact that this was crafted in a mere 48 hours is remarkable! I adore how upon initiating play, you gradually come to understand the mechanics and, beyond that, there’s a story that keeps you riveted: why are they similar to me? I must underscore the level design because it is not only superbly executed but also poses a non-trivial challenge, and the variety in enemies and unfolding scenarios become evident as I progress. While the game may lack a touch of music, and the color palette sometimes doesn’t fully win me over, all that remains is to extend hearty congratulations for this game—a veritable hidden jewel. Splendid game!
Tygrak
12. Oct 2023 · 22:19 UTC
Nice game! I like how you gradually introduced the mechanics. The level with the guys switching colors was quite difficult, they got out of hand so quickly if you weren't fast, but I preserved and got through it and won :).
kr4ft3r
12. Oct 2023 · 22:46 UTC
Pretty good, smooth to play and the mechanics require some John Wick level of decisiveness, as trying to go slow will get you defeated, while at the same time you have to both aim and think fast to use correct attacks. I didn't think I'll get to the transponder as challenge gets real at some point, but I did it yay :P
Hakro
15. Oct 2023 · 14:05 UTC
Pretty neat ! I like it, not too easy, not too hard :) And very juicy. The sound effects and camera shake work great to convey the action !
The controls felt a bit rigid, but overall, I enjoyed the mood and game play.
Nice entry overall. GG.