LudumData

Upheaval by bentglasstube

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

A lone villager on a quest to lift a curse. Find the magical amulet and escape the cave where it rests.

ss4.png ss3.png

How to Play

Arrows or WASD to move, Space to interact. There is no peril in the game, so there is no way to lose. If you wait on the title screen for a bit, the game will tell you the lore. I tried to explain the purpose and story within the game. If you need more explanation of how to play, I'll include that at the end.

Note: If you are stuck trying to exit the screen, try walking away and approaching again. This is a bug in the collision detection that I never got around to fixing.

How the Sausage Is Made

The game was written in C++ using SDL2 and my game framework gam.

The art was drawn in Aseprite with a Wacom Bamboo tablet and sometimes a mouse.

The music was made with my Piano, Arturia Drumbrute, and my modular synthesizer. It was arranged and mixed in Ardour.

Detailed Explanation (Potential Spoilers)

The cave is a randomly generated maze you must navigate to find the deepest area where the treasure is. After you find it, you have to return back to the entrance to win. There are no enemies that will get in your way, but the cave is geologically unstable and periodic earthquakes will drastically change your surroundings.

Link https://git.sr.ht/~bentglasstube/upheaval
Link https://build.eatabrick.org/upheaval/v1.0/upheaval-web-v1.0/
Link https://build.eatabrick.org/upheaval/v1.0/upheaval-windows-v1.0.zip
Link https://build.eatabrick.org/upheaval/v1.0/upheaval-macos-v1.0.dmg
Link https://build.eatabrick.org/upheaval/v1.0/upheaval-linux-v1.0.AppImage
Original URL https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/49/upheaval

Ratings

Overall 366th 3.283⭐ 25🧑‍⚖️
Fun 505th 2.609⭐ 25🧑‍⚖️
Innovation 342th 3.152⭐ 25🧑‍⚖️
Theme 335th 3.386⭐ 24🧑‍⚖️
Graphics 368th 3.205⭐ 24🧑‍⚖️
Audio 50th 3.905⭐ 23🧑‍⚖️
Humor 299th 2.571⭐ 23🧑‍⚖️
Mood 272th 3.214⭐ 23🧑‍⚖️
Given 30🗳️ 17🗨️

Feedback

Arash Ghorban
03. Oct 2021 · 23:42 UTC
I like the concept of changing the surrounding... cool idea!
DDesignDude
08. Oct 2021 · 05:18 UTC
I love the addition of the cutscene at the title screen. I wish more compo games gave the option to read over the initial premise/story before starting their games. The lighting system is pretty impressive too since it doesn't go past the walls unlike other rpg games that just use a vignette to cover the outer edges of the screen. Kind of wish there was a run option since there can be a lot of ground to cover, but then again, it might then be too easy to find the amulet.
All in all good job on this game!
JPGFG
09. Oct 2021 · 18:04 UTC
Big fan of the fact that this is all scratch made, written in c++ using your own framework adds technical prowess in my eyes, there really should be a category for technicality and programming prowess. Great job!
Barney25052
09. Oct 2021 · 18:44 UTC
Really like the idea of the changing surrounding.
LogFlames
09. Oct 2021 · 18:45 UTC
Really impressive game, both the lighting with fog of war, and showing the areas you had already seen grayed out. The cave generation felt natural but maybe lacked a bit of visual variance. Being able to walk diagonally and maybe have something else to do would take this to the next level.
The music was nice, especially that it changes when you entered a new level/elevation.
figueroass27
09. Oct 2021 · 18:55 UTC
I like that if you hold up/down you can go directly into going left/right while still holding up/down, but this doesnt work the other way around which kinda sucks cause it makes moving around a little stiffer. That being said the rest of the game controls great and i love the pixel art you did. The characters walk cycle looks crisp and exploring a changing level always feels pretty cool.
arkinrev
09. Oct 2021 · 23:27 UTC
At some point, I think I stopped looking for the amulet and started jamming along with the soundtrack. Good work!
sslees
10. Oct 2021 · 02:11 UTC
This was the most engaging game I've played so far. It was very cool how each section needed to be illuminated to be discovered, and that the walls moved (took me way too long to realize that...) but I was able to beat it in about a half hour. Having the music change as you got closer to the amulet was such a rewarding mechanic and is what made me keep searching for so long.
3mpty
10. Oct 2021 · 03:16 UTC
I think a key problem a lot of jam games have is not respecting the player's time. This game is an excellent example of that.

The core concept is good, the line of sight system is solid, there's nothing wrong with this idea of exploring a deep cave to find an amulet, it's perfectly good, but each room is huge, empty and nearly identical to the last and you have a gigantic endless maze for the player to navigate.

It took me 15 minutes of holding the up key to find the amulet and 15 minutes of holding the down key to get back out, during that time I wasn't engaged doing anything, there were no obstacles or complications, just walking.

It's ok to make a simple game, like I said this concept is totally fine and neat, I like the moving cave parts and I like the dynamic los as you venture in and out, but what I don't like is doing the same boring thing for 30 minutes straight. Please in future test your game, and make it the length it deserves to be, I would enjoy a game like this much more if it wasn't wasting my time.
goldey2
10. Oct 2021 · 05:03 UTC
It's really impressive you made this from scratch in c++, especially because of the amount of content and generation present in your game! Also pretty unique, this is the first top-down game I've seen so far. Good work!
David price
10. Oct 2021 · 11:05 UTC
The procedural generation was very well done! :slight_smile: As noted before, that controls were smooth for up and down, but did not mesh correctly for going left and right; but it did not detract from the experience. Music was good company along the journey!
c64cosmin
16. Oct 2021 · 14:44 UTC
![asdfasdfasdf.PNG](///raw/be6/14/z/482c9.png)
This was a good play, I would have loved to see a little bit of variation in the tile set. The procedural generation was really nicely done, Loved that the music got darker the further I went in the cave. Also the ending music is so nice, really fits the mood. Good entry!