Parascythe X by Neonlare

[raw]
made by Neonlare for LD34 (JAM)
2nd EDIT - FOR EVERYONE PLAYING THE PRE BUILD
There was a mistake by one of our devs who placed one of the final rooms in the wrong order. This isn't a code error, but purely because of lack of sleep. This has been fixed now and the download replaced with the correct order, if you were rating the game based on this then PLEASE, PLEASE redownload it to get a better view of the balance of the game. We're sorry for the issues this may have caused.

EDIT - We fixed our Merger conflict issues, and did do some balance tweaking. about 90% of the content was ready before the Jam deadline but was phased out because we had to use an older build, we'll keep the older version up for reference, but if possible could folks please consider this 1.1 edition as aside from some sound effects this was the version we had ready prior to the merger issue. Sorry chap, hope you enjoy! Git can be a real git sometimes! ;)

THEME (Growing)


CONTROLS

Arrow Keys - Move
Z - Fire Projectile
X - Select Upgrade
C - Purchase Upgrade

STORY

When a research station on a distant colony uncovers a strange alien egg from the depths of an unknown world, they pilfer it for their own and return with it for experimentation. However, when they pry at it's surface they unleash a parasitic entity that begins to grow and spiral out of control. Piloting the SOLAR, a nano-biotic vessel with the capabilities of reversing bio-matter into mutating and evolving it's own form, you are sent by the Galactic Coalition to put a stop to this ever-growing menace and defeat this entity, known only as "Parascythe X".

Launch into a 5 stage Shmup inspired by C64 titles such as Delta and Cybernoid as you blast and grow your ship into the war machine necessary to defeat this ever-enclosing mass that is your foe.


POST-MORTEM

This game has been a ride for sure, we were smooth sailing until the final hours where a lot of git-repo issues started occurring, losing code and other things that just caused serious chaos on the code. We should have the bugs cleared out totally but if there's any issues we'll patch em post Jam.

It's been fun and stressful at the same time, we wanted to make a big effort for it and take a risk. We hope you enjoy folks! :D.

Some of the upgrade shop functions have issues (i.e not deducting score properly, etc). We'll fix this as soon as we can and post up the updated exe. These are functions that did work prior to Git-Repo merger issues and we just need our other programmer at the ready to manually transfer this over.

CREDITS

Art - Kyle Riley & Jacob J Ritz
Code - Kyle Riley & Emil Lindgrem
Design - Kyle Riley & Jacob J Ritz
Music - Kyle Riley

Ratings

Coolness 58% 3
Overall(Jam) 3.62 245
Audio(Jam) 3.97 75
Fun(Jam) 3.68 141
Graphics(Jam) 4.15 143
Humor(Jam) 2.53 592
Innovation(Jam) 2.67 814
Mood(Jam) 3.63 200
Theme(Jam) 2.68 1014

Feedback

rsf-krx
15. Dec 2015 路 03:03 UTC
Has a nice classic feel to it, and a good amount of difficulty. Overall pretty fun!
anael
15. Dec 2015 路 10:28 UTC
Whoa it's hard, but cool retro vibe
mokesmoe
15. Dec 2015 路 17:45 UTC
The game seemed fairly buggy (mostly the shop which you seem to know about); points carried over between rounds, weapon upgrades did nothing if you had no orbits, buying speed seemed to also buy an orbit at the same time. The price of orbits doesn't update properly on death.

Enemy bullets were hard to see against the purple background of the later area, and also were hard to see when the screen was full of rebound bullets.

The weapons seems pretty poorly balanced: laser rarely even fired (which is probably a bug) and assault killed everything as soon as they appeared on screen.

I know I've been pointing out all the flaws but I did really like this game. Good job!
馃帳 Neonlare
16. Dec 2015 路 02:00 UTC
Hey folks, we just threw up version 1.1 with the merger conflicts resolved. This should address some issues that -were- fixed for deadline prior to merger issues, hope this helps with enjoying the game :).
nuprahtor
16. Dec 2015 路 09:55 UTC
It plays really good, but the game lacks feedback from enemies when your bullets hit them.
Graphics and audio are superb.
YinYin
16. Dec 2015 路 12:18 UTC
Quite hard to tell obstacles apart from background sometimes.
windykellywyo
16. Dec 2015 路 23:52 UTC
Been playing this game for about an hour or more. I'm stuck on the second level. Furthest I've gone is up to the boss. Problems I'm having are I wish the spaceship in general moved faster. I'm often not fast enough to move around a projectile or enemy in time and there are many on the level which leaves me stuck. The power ups need tweaking too. Speed isn't fast enough. Laser doesn't seem to affect enemies much. Love the graphics. Love the music. Love the design and layout of the enemies and how they change once damaged at points.
windykellywyo
17. Dec 2015 路 01:02 UTC
Well after posting that I thought the power ups were weird I started using them repeatedly and discovered problem solved. I'm finally past the level I was stuck on. Maybe readme can mention that power ups stack? Just a thought. Thanks and sorry for confusion. Hope to beat the game now!
Weeping Rupee
17. Dec 2015 路 04:02 UTC
Love art! It really looks great.
freddyw9
17. Dec 2015 路 04:11 UTC
That brings me back
馃帳 Neonlare
17. Dec 2015 路 04:21 UTC
Ok, we're re-uploading the pre-build because one of our devs misplaced one of the stages in the wrong order. This is fixed in the post jam version, but because this isn't a code issue and just an issue with room positions we're over-writing the pre-version for this.

No wonder folks were finding it really hard at the start! Sorry folks.
ninjascript
17. Dec 2015 路 05:01 UTC
Looks great and plays nicely. I love me a good shmup, and this is pretty impressive for a mere 72 hours!
tribrain
17. Dec 2015 路 05:07 UTC
Nice retro touch, reminds me of old metroid games, cool game!!
JaCkJoKeZ
17. Dec 2015 路 05:55 UTC
Awesome music. Awesome art. Awesome gameplay, and amazing music. Only real complaint I have is a it's a weee bit difficult to distinct the bullets from the background color since the bullets are gold and the background is a blue and their saturations are very close. Other than that, this game is just a job Well done guys :D
TheMeorch
17. Dec 2015 路 05:56 UTC
Wow, this is a really nicely implemented shoot em up, with great art and music. I'm really intrigued by the upgrade mechanic -- it has a really interesting tension to it, though I think it has some issues in terms of usability, since the player has to look at the bottom of the screen to check their points and check the upgrade. Maybe there's a way to put that information around the ship itself or something, so that the player can keep their eyes where they need to be? Awesome work!
Crazi456
17. Dec 2015 路 05:57 UTC
Enjoyed the music. Fun stuff!
windykellywyo
18. Dec 2015 路 18:09 UTC
Well I replayed the game and I'm able to get up to the level where you navigate around the pipe walls which I think is the end, but am still not able to beat. I really wish I had an extra life available by the time I'm at the big boss. Because by the time I'm there I'm at one life. I think the difficulty on the other levels is perfect. May keep working on it to win as I'm so close, but still otherwise a really well put together game especially good for competitive players. Thanks for making this game.
xhunterko
20. Dec 2015 路 00:34 UTC
This is infuriatingly difficult until you figure the upgrade system. Even then it's hard! Great job!
Aaranos
20. Dec 2015 路 21:29 UTC
Feels like something you would find on an actual arcade machine. Fun game, but it does have a bit of a learning curve since there is no indication of what does what immediately.

I'd of liked to see the score not be related to the upgrades. Maybe just base it on "parts" taken from destroyed ships.
Jace239
21. Dec 2015 路 15:11 UTC
Thanks for leaving a rating and commenting on my game! I included your game in the second episode of my Let's Play Ludum Dare 34 series to show my gratitude! :D

Below is a link to the post with details, and you can find out my opinion of your game in the video as I play!
http://ludumdare.com/compo/2015/12/21/lets-play-ludum-dare-34-episode-02/
Kimau
21. Dec 2015 路 15:53 UTC
Love the look of it but the controls and feel were just a bit too sluggish and confusion. The art is mind blowing in its cool retro pastiche.
Jwatt
21. Dec 2015 路 18:10 UTC
Holy crap, this looks and sounds exactly like a C64 game. Not just vaguely retro, this is faithful stuff down to the title screen.

5 stages is a lot of content, with fairly interesting enemy patterns, an upgrade system and the whole kitchen sink. It's very much a complete shoot-em-up. Pretty impressive all around.
Acerio
22. Dec 2015 路 05:09 UTC
Whoa. This feels just like a game you'd play back in the day. The audio is amazing, and retro, graphics I can say the same with. Just amazing.
eruiz00
25. Dec 2015 路 20:44 UTC
Good game and retro inspired like those i play. Good done!
refreshgames
28. Dec 2015 路 22:17 UTC
That was a pretty tough game there! Made it to level 5 but couldn't get past that cursed maze of barriers!

Nice job on getting this much done in such a short amount of time. My only criticism would be that on some levels the background is tough to distinguish from the foreground, reducing the saturation on those tiles would have made it a bit easier to determine which is which, but aside from that, a quality shmup!
Tapehead
31. Dec 2015 路 09:28 UTC
very hard but also nice shmup!!! well done!