SOLAR CANDY by nethead

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


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🗨️ |
Great job!
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.
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!
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 =/

@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.
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.
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