The Worm

Fantastic game idea, love it. Unfortunatly I couldnt get my head around the controls. It feels like something that would be fantastic if you have the controls down pat but I didnt really know what I was doing unfortunately. Starting off in a simple area to reinforce movement would have helped.

Still, a bit disappointed I couldnt get the movement down because it feels like it could be really addictive when you nail it!

This game is dope, and incredibly hard to master! Hahaha. The graphics and simple but clean and appealing, and it's an incredibly original take on the theme. Nice.

the movement is a bit confusing, but i like the concept

I got 364 melange before I hit the water with the second native on my back, the controls were hard at first but got better. for anyone reading before they play, you just have to hold them down and be a little patient.

Thanks for the feedback @mickm @jellybean @pauljohnprogramming @parafactual ! And wow @jellybean :D Great job!

It seems that the tutorial I didn't have time to work on was a bit more important :)

The whole idea is that you keep the momentum from going up and down on the dunes. If you are going down a dune, you press down and go faster. If you are going up on a dune, and press down, you will stop and go back, but pressing up will take you even faster.

I really love the experience!

Even just worming around is a zen like experience and super fun.
The missions make things interesting and even the simplistic graphic style fits well.

Overall a very good game!

Controlling Shai-Hulud is indeed a hard task! It took me a while to at least somehow figure it out. I think the invader could be a little bigger. Nice take on the theme - very original! The game feels very fluid and is satisfying to play once you get used to it!

Nice Game but tough controls :D

Interesting game! I included it in my Ludum Dare 49 compilation video series, if you’d like to take a look. :) https://youtu.be/d0CZearFG8U

That's a nice worm, but dam is it a beast to control

I like the concept but I just couldn't figure out how to get the worm to do what I wanted. Controls definitely need some work.

Thanks @mordrick and @dzejpi ! It seems that to keep this playable I really need to work the controls as there's a chance it's actually something.

Thanks for the video @jupiter-hadley :) I'm glad you feature The Worm in it!

Thanks @brads-space! I literally just watched the recording of the stream! What a bummer :( Thanks for your attempt!

Once you get the worm going getting high speeds and high jumps is really satisfying! But damn is it tough to control. Turning around in particular is a tough ask, especially at higher speeds. Definitely something interesting!

bad controls

Really nice graphics! Loved the way the worm moved. Took me a while to figure out how the controls worked but once I did it was really interesting.

I think maybe the world is a bit big, or at least the invaders you have to get to are too far apart. The movement system is really interesting when you're navigating, but not nearly as interesting when you're just trying to keep moving the same direction.

Gorgeous minimalism, bold choice to make controls the hardest part, it didn't click with me but I really like what you were going for

Welcome to LD, pretty cool first entry I must say. I didn't find the controls hard at all, interestingly. It's a classic hill biking or being on a swing type of control. One sometimes have to go the other direction to get across a big hill. Finished on a second try, first one I died to water. Jumping out sand was very satisfying and that captures the source material so well.

Great great debut!

Looks fun and I liked the idea but even after a few minutes in the game, I'm still not sure whether I get the controls.

Thanks for the feedback @bridgeonastick @sceef @publicidadeba @belickim!

@3mpty I watched your stream and I was delighted to see your positiveness, even when the controlling scheme was causing such troubles :P A tutorial is a must if this game is going anywhere :) And congratz in going very far into the game, that also made me realize the game has something in it, but it needs more work. The infinite world not wrapping around is one of those :) Thanks for taking your time to play it!

That's great input and an awesome run @listonos! I'm having a delight over the controversy :)

@tattomoosa Thanks for time playing! I think the feedback about the size is that it should be smaller, but confirming the last piece, was it interesting to keep going in one direction or not? For me I know if I would work on it, that would be a place where I would definitely do something about.

> was it interesting to keep going in one direction or not?

All in all I didn't like going long distances in one direction. Getting up speed and going fast for long distances in itself was really fun, but the frustration of trying to turn around when you had picked up a bunch of speed was way too high.

It might be as simple as making the dunes much bigger, then there would be more time to react when you're going faster, and more time to push against your momentum... with the unfortunate downside that the worm wouldn't feel as big. Another thought is a button for brakes but I don't know if that would take out too much of what is interesting about the movement.

Thanks for expanding the comment @tattomoosa! Now that you mentioned, I indeed noticed that people got decentivized of getting really fast to enjoy the long runs, because they learned fast that they would overshoot if they were fast. I should fix this imbalance to make it more satisfying and not punish the fun!

The controls took a little playing with to figure out.
After that it was kinda relaxing.
Congrats on your first LD game!

I like the concept of movement! The relaxing art style is pretty good.

I guess I get the controls, it always follows the dunes, but I feel like it should be a bit more responsive to your inputs to be able to jump out when you want to and dive down deep. Otherwise the art looks great!

I love the art style. Very clean and minimal but conveys everything needed. As others have said the controls do feel a tad unresponsive. I would maybe have liked a quick surface button as I did find myself missing the targets a couple of times as I was too deep. overall a great game with a simple yet effective concept. Great work

Hi there! Thanks for submitting your game for me to play live during my Twitch stream!

If you’d like to rewatch the playthrough, you can find it here:

https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1173738676?t=0h19m36s

Good luck on your ratings, see you next LD! :D

💜 Elysia Griffin AKA Button Feedback Lady

https://www.twitch.tv/elysiagriffin

HI! I really really loved the art! I think the controls could've been better but remember this is your first LD submission, you will know so much more next time! :D I like how the camera followed the worm and I liked the general "flow" of it all. The controls could be more intuitive and snappy, but I think overall you did really good for one person in 48 hours! :D

I was able to beat it! The controls as far as I understood it: Up Down not only control how under the surface I am but also can speed up or slow down the worm if you're pressing in the direction of the slope (up will speed you up uphill and down will speed you up downhill). Left and Right can eventually make you change direction, but it takes a long time to do so especially if you've built up a lot of speed. I tried going around the planet to see if it was a wrap around, but it was taking a while so I just went the direction was pointing in. Since it's a zoomed out view I think it's nice the people and so can just be dots. Nice job!

finally after like 88 minutes I beat it very cool idea.

Hey there! This game was really a good premice but really hard to controll, sorry I coudn't manage to go far! Thanks for joining us live!

I finally had the time to come back and rate everything I played so far!

Here is a link to the vod of the review if you wish to see it again: https://www.youtube.be/watch?v=1gUA0Q2dn6I&t=11329s

Interesting movement mechanics! Kind of confusing to understand at first but fun once you get the hang of it, and love the graphics and how easy and small amount of colors were used.

@xeke-death @varundevs Thanks for the feedback and the playthrough!

@elysiagriffin @togis Thanks for streaming it live! Those are the best feedbacks one can get, watching someone play and give some thoughts about it!

@daivyishere @fear-games @maxkyckling @patrickrmc Wow! Thanks for the time playing and the feedback! In hindsight I actually didn't put much thought into the art itself, but it was more revealed to me given the way I wrote the game. I just picked the colors and it seems that it worked much better than I was giving it credit to!

@barrier I agree. I think the mechanic can keep it's style and be even more satisfying if there would be a way to dive directly into sand. Thanks for playing!

@aeveis I really appreciate that plenty of people figured out that it was a planet and their immediate thought was "does it wrap around?". I'm happy because it was working like this initially but I wouldn't have time to make the rest of the planet more interesting to travel :) The corners of the camera are doing the specific move such that feels like you are in a planet. I had even a fixed camera on the horizon, while the worm would be navigating around the planet, which I'm glad I didn't commit to because it would make the game unplayable. Thanks for playing and beating it!