Project Orpheo by zondarg
-- TOP SECRET -- Welcome, volunteer! The extremist organisation H.A.D.E.S. has placed nuclear devices deep in sleeping volcanoes and threatens to cause a new ice age by detonating these! You have to go down there and defuse the bombs! To protect you, we will provide the prototype of the ORPHEO suit. This will keep you safe from the heat and enable you to fly using a jetpack. Downside is, it is very heavy - so you won't be able walk in it. But beware, the extremists have placed many traps in the volcanic caves!
GOOD LUCK! -- END OF MESSAGE --
Made for LD48 Compo in less than 48h (did not have much time this weekend..), so I went for a classic, short, retro, 80s inspired platformer (my first, actually) with a cheesy story. :rofl: I hope it is playable and has not too many bugs.
Created using Godot Engine, Pyxel Edit, Audacity, Bfxr, OpenMPT and my Miniak Virtual Analog Synth for this 80s sound.
Playable in browser via itchi.io, but the windows version runs better, as usual.


Ratings
| Overall | 378th | 3.551⭐ | 51🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 328th | 3.51⭐ | 51🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 694th | 2.765⭐ | 51🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 370th | 3.713⭐ | 49🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 375th | 3.551⭐ | 51🧑⚖️ |
| Audio | 186th | 3.635⭐ | 50🧑⚖️ |
| Humor | 405th | 2.569⭐ | 38🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 434th | 3.273⭐ | 46🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 55🗳️ | 77🗨️ |
@rhoff95 Actually, I tried a parallax cave background, but it was not pretty and made everything less visible, so I disabled it (its still in the code though) and then had no time left to rework it.
I will say that it does feel weird not being able to walk as an astronaut. If that was intentional, I would have probably used a small ship or a rover as the character instead. I also think the checkpoints should be permanent instead of collect-them-and-disappear gems, as if you get hit when you're going back up the top you can easily get sent back all the way to the bottom.
Overall, great game! I had fun with it.
@thewinrawr Actually thats why there are two ways to go down (and up again), so if you take the other one on the way up, you get an unused checkpoint crystal.
@jamr Glad you liked it, I wanted to recreate the feel of some very old games only dimly remembered from childhood days. Fort Apocalypse anyone? :slight_smile:
@alexey-kuzovkov Good idea, maybe for a "high difficulty" mode?
@spydercrawler Yes, I noticed that too, but only after the deadline. I think the collision box on these edges is slightly sharper than 90 degrees.
https://youtu.be/joQCxT9jLww
Flying around in the jetpack was fun but it definitely could have used some more mechanics. It would be interesting if you added some mechanics that were used to counter specific traps/obstacles instead of just relying on the jetpack for everything.
great job putting this all together for the jam
My only complaint is that backtracking isn't fun so the way back could have been something else (unless I missed it)
* I think you can fix the tilemap seaming by turning on "pixel perfect" in the options
* The camera margins mean that it's occasionally tricky to see what's ahead
And who uses volunteer workers to prevent nuclear winter...?
I have 2 suggestions:
- There should be a way to walk on the ground, but I understande this is difficult in a game jam, as it requires resources on animations and programming.
- The lives system seemed unnecessary, as it just added frustration to me.
Good game overall, good job!
https://youtu.be/DHfy_7ZtjHk
Some replys to comments:
@jupiter-hadley @barelyevengames Thank you both for playing my game and giving it video coverage! :slight_smile: :vhs:
@alaah yes, that was the idea behind the two paths, so at least half the way would not need to be backtracked exactly the same.
@john-gabriel There certainly is, at least there are several games from the 80s era that build on a similar but not quite same type of flying mechanics. Some of them I played a lot at that time so they probably served as source of inspiration somehow. Just to name.. Dropzone (C64), HERO (VCS2600), and the aforementioned Fort Apocalypse (C64). Thanks for the hint with the pixel perfect switch, will try this out!
@goutye @cogcomp Glad you liked it! :slight_smile:
@breadstix Oh nice, didn't test controller support at all :grin: but yes, I think there is a default controller mapping for the D-Pad in Godot, so ..happy it does work (but probably only in the Windows build, not HTML?).