SOLAR CANDY by nethead

[raw]
made by nethead for Ludum Dare 49 (COMPO)

Screenshot from 2021-10-03 13-11-37.png

SOLAR CANDY is a tile-matching puzzle/arcade game made for LD49. Connect 4 of the same candy to pop them and score points - pull off combos for higher scores.

Be careful though: the board is unstable, and will flip if one side is too heavy. Specifically, if you have 6 more pieces on one side, the board will rotate in that direction. If you're clever, you can use this to pull off better combos :D

SOME COMBOS

solarcandies4.gif

solarcandy6.gif

Ratings

Overall 72th 3.935⭐ 25🧑‍⚖️
Fun 63th 3.935⭐ 25🧑‍⚖️
Innovation 44th 4.065⭐ 25🧑‍⚖️
Theme 18th 4.37⭐ 25🧑‍⚖️
Graphics 61th 4.087⭐ 25🧑‍⚖️
Audio 42th 3.95⭐ 22🧑‍⚖️
Humor 312th 2.525⭐ 22🧑‍⚖️
Mood 65th 3.818⭐ 24🧑‍⚖️
Given 20🗳️ 20🗨️

Feedback

Morris
03. Oct 2021 · 19:48 UTC
Really enjoying the vibe of this game. Great art, great music.
🎤 nethead
03. Oct 2021 · 19:50 UTC
@morris thanks :D appreciate it
enricomandelli
04. Oct 2021 · 00:03 UTC
neat idea
shellofagirl
04. Oct 2021 · 01:27 UTC
I played this for ten minutes without blinking. Loved the moody trip music and stackable rice balls.
lb01
04. Oct 2021 · 02:53 UTC
At first I thought this was just a basic matching game...and then the whole map started rotating. That added a whole new level of complexity, strategy, and general chaos to the game. Tough but fun.
SlimmerBurger
04. Oct 2021 · 07:59 UTC
This is such a smart idea, really enjoyed playing it :D
p-r
04. Oct 2021 · 13:59 UTC
Dope music
Its_Capp
04. Oct 2021 · 15:57 UTC
just noticed that the map rotates strategically to screw you up, great game
M A T
04. Oct 2021 · 16:33 UTC
I scored barely 36, it started to get hard when the map started to rotate left and right. :rice_ball: :rice_ball: :rice_ball: :rice_ball:
LDJam user 237913
04. Oct 2021 · 17:23 UTC
Really enjoyed this, especially once I started trying for combos and filling up the board more. Gets more exciting the more stuff in play. Thanks for submitting!
m11
04. Oct 2021 · 17:49 UTC
Love the rotating map!
Junebug
04. Oct 2021 · 18:28 UTC
I love the mood of this game, with the music and the background art. The sound effects are subtle enough to not disrupt it, but still be felt. The game mechanics were really smart! It's a good example of taking a popular genre and giving it an easy-to-understand twist that makes it feel fresh and new. It was fun to try and setup board rotations that would match a lot of colours at once! I got to a point in one run where I had so much stuff piled up in one corner that the board kept rotating between the two faces the corner was on no matter where I put the next block, which felt a little weird. Not sure if that was intended or if not then how you would fix it, though.

Great job!
🎤 nethead
04. Oct 2021 · 18:35 UTC
@junebug thanks for all the feedback :D the way the game behaves once one side gets really heavy is unfortunate, I find it kind of annoying myself but didn't have time during comp to find a way around it.

basically, each turn the game checks the total "weight" of each side, and if the difference is >= 6, it flips. so, when you end up with a bunch (7+) on one side and none anywhere else, it gets really hard to get back to an even state. i might try to come up with a solution to that as a post-jam change.
Derek Volker
04. Oct 2021 · 22:22 UTC
Thats quite the fun core mechanic in the game, however i don't think i'm smart enough to perform better combos by rotating the board.

Anyway, the controls work nicely and the concept is easy to grasp. I particulary think that the soundtrack is a bit too dark, but it fits somehow in the bigger picture.

Good job!
Schuster
05. Oct 2021 · 00:19 UTC
Great music and solid gameplay
candlesan
05. Oct 2021 · 05:29 UTC
This was a very cool and original concept. If I coudl make a suggest it's that I wish the rotation would happen relative to the weight on that side. Otherwise it just seemed random, like the square was rotating back and forth for no apparent reason. I thought it was going to be based on the weight but it didn't seem to be (unless it was a bug).
ZwodahS
05. Oct 2021 · 07:05 UTC
Great game ! I really love the game.

1. The block in the middle add so much depth to the game.
2. I like how when you concentrate the weight on one side by accident, the end is almost inevitable. The game almost split into 2 parts; the first being trying to get as much store as possible before the game become unstable, and the 2nd part of trying to get as much score as possible once it became unstable.
3. I wonder if it will be interesting to add a "weight" block that cannot be remove except via the bottom hole. This weight block will force the player to change their mental model slightly.

Added it to my collection. Will definitely play it more.

PS: WASD doesn't work =/
![Screenshot 2021-10-05 at 3.09.56 PM.png](///raw/9f2/72/z/46d12.png)
Chargrills21
05. Oct 2021 · 07:58 UTC
This game is so vibe and perfect for just chilling. Reminds me of games like tetris, but better. This could go far if you put in the work. Great job on submitting!
🎤 nethead
05. Oct 2021 · 12:56 UTC
@candlesan Thanks for the feedback! The rotation actually is based on the weight relative to the side. The problem is that when a "corner" is filled, the board rotates a full 90 degrees (instead of 45, which would be realistic). So, for example, if the "left corner" is full, after rotating 90 degrees left, that corner becomes the right corner... and it is still full, so it will rotate again next round if you can't balance it out by popping or adding enough candies to the other side. It isn't a bug but I'd like to come up with a way of making that situation feel a bit less awkward.

@zwodahs Thanks for the feedback, I'm glad you were able to figure out how to use the middle blocks :3 they can be really handy. It really does become a race to clear out as much as possible when a corner is full, I find that you pretty much have to set up the board such that rotating will cause the heavy side to clear out, or you end up kinda doomed lol. I like the idea of the weight blocks, trying to tilt stuff into the hole sound interesting.

P.S. I fixed WASD; there was a last minute export issue that I hadn't noticed, so I did a quick re-up with no other changes.

@chargrills21 Thanks for playing :D I'd love to do at least some minor post-jam updates, and maybe add some more levels or a story mode.
Chris Hay
08. Oct 2021 · 00:48 UTC
Great work! Seems like a simple idea with a twist and executed very well. Definitely "unstable". Actually after playing a bunch it felt like my screen was turning back and forth!

It seemed the best strategy was to try and keep things balanced - once I got a corner too heavy it kept flipping back and forth and I was done for. At first I couldn't make sense of the three dots in the top left - then I realized I was reading it backward.

Always cool when games use a smaller play space and the rest for general aesthetic - very cool! I especially liked the music & sound effects. Overall a solid game.
🎤 nethead
08. Oct 2021 · 14:51 UTC
@chris-hay thanks for the feedback :D hope the game didn't make you too dizzy haha
uvwar
18. Oct 2021 · 15:51 UTC
Really great game! I stayed balanced for so long that by the time I started rotating I lost pretty quickly, ha. Well done!
FDors2
12. Aug 2022 · 16:55 UTC
Enphase Energy is a well-known manufacturer of microinverters for solar systems. These devices allow users to produce more energy than they can with traditional string inverters.
[Site here](https://enphaseinverters.com/)