Island Management by Pete

[raw]
made by Pete for Ludum Dare 50 (JAM)

Introduction

We are running out of time! We can't save our island! The world is changing; and it's happening quick. The weather is getting hotter and the ocean is rising. Make the most of the time we have on our small island. Create happiness, but also delay the pollution for as long as possible.

How to play

The game is mouse controlled. You click a card in your hand to select it and then click on a tile on the table to play the card to that tile. Right clicking deselects any card selected.

Playing cards

The game is played in rounds, and every time you press roll you end the round. The round start with you drawing 4 new cards. These cards can be played by selecting them and placing them on a tile on the table. Each tile can hold one card. Any card you place on top of a tile that already have a card will discard the card already there. The cards comes from 3 different groups housing (green), commercial (blue), and industrial (yellow). Housing and commercial buildings generates happiness together according to what the effect says on the card. The goal is to generate as much happiness as possible, before the world is too polluted. Pollution is created every turn from the power consumed not produced. You can minimize the generation of pollution by generating your own power by using industrial buildings. Each person consumes 1 power, and any power not generated by you needs to be imported and generates 4 pollution each. Power cannot be saved between rounds and producing more power than you use does nothing. Each round, a base 5 pollution is added from the world around you.

Roll

After playing all the card you want you press "Roll". This will discard any card remaining in your hand. Now a number of dice are rolled. In the first round a single set of dice are rolled. Each time you reach 50 pollution a new set of dice are added. Each dice represent disasters. The more pollution there is, the more disasters happen. Each dice pair is color coded, and the sum of the dice will destroy the card on a tile with that number. The most common combination (7) it a lucky one that don't destroy anything.

End game

The game ends when you reach 250 pollution. The small island is not longer habitable. Your final score is how much happiness you were able to create before the island met its demise.

Ratings

Overall 1219th 3.042⭐ 26🧑‍⚖️
Fun 1230th 2.792⭐ 26🧑‍⚖️
Innovation 223th 3.771⭐ 26🧑‍⚖️
Theme 479th 3.833⭐ 26🧑‍⚖️
Graphics 1099th 3⭐ 26🧑‍⚖️
Humor 1102th 2.045⭐ 24🧑‍⚖️
Mood 1308th 2.522⭐ 25🧑‍⚖️
Given 23🗳️ 0🗨️

Feedback

GeraldFIngBurke
05. Apr 2022 · 22:33 UTC
Unfortunately, I really didn't get it.
JM-Janzen
05. Apr 2022 · 23:05 UTC
This looks like an interesting game, but please add some instructions in the comments for newcomers, because I was really lost as to what I was rolling for.
🎤 Pete
08. Apr 2022 · 21:45 UTC
Hello @jm-janzen @geraldfingburke

Thanks for giving it a go. Without instructions I can understand it can be quite hard to understand what is happening. Hopefully the institution on this page can help you now if you want to give it an other go.
JM-Janzen
10. Apr 2022 · 15:32 UTC
@pete thanks so much for adding these instructions. That makes total sense now.

I'm not sure if it's just me, but your HTML5 game link doesn't load the game for me anymore. Which is too bad, because I'd like to try the game with the rules in mind now.

Either way, I've increased my rating of this game, because I now understand what you were going for.

EDIT: Never mind, it's loaded successfully for me now! I guess my laptop is just slow. :)
lletzgogames
19. Apr 2022 · 20:32 UTC
Quite an interesting concept, I think the game is a bit hard, but definetely there's a lot of enjoyment to be had.
ChickenChaser
19. Apr 2022 · 21:10 UTC
Really creative concept!
Showing the current population and power production / demand would probably make the game more self-explanatory.
SketchyGalore
19. Apr 2022 · 21:31 UTC
Managed to get to 218 happiness after tinkering with it for a bit. I like the ideas at play here! The dice-wiping mechanic is quite interesting.
potkirland
19. Apr 2022 · 22:58 UTC
it is a bit complex but defnitly playable. interesting take on the theme and i like the way you implemented it
Prakkus
20. Apr 2022 · 00:56 UTC
This is a great start! I'm a fan of tile placement games so there's a definite appeal to figuring out the best synergies between the different cards, and I like how the dice force me to mix things up. I do wish the board was a bit bigger and that _where_ they were placed mattered more than just what was on the board (adjacency bonuses), but maybe that's a different game.

The main thing it's missing right now is some kind of 'what will happen' indicator so that I don't have to keep track of my power generation/consumption in my head. Without seeing those (as well as maybe a preview of the effects of placing a card), it feels like too much math for me to figure out what's actually a better arrangement. More cards would be great too, of course, but it's a game jam so what can ya do.
lody_giving_teacup
20. Apr 2022 · 16:05 UTC
the game is good , even If i'm nott a big fan of this type of game , good work !
Mortiss
20. Apr 2022 · 18:06 UTC
Tried to figure out for ourselves what was going on and failed miserably.
Energy consumption/production balance seems interesting, but please make the game more transparent to players.
JOZGames
21. Apr 2022 · 15:37 UTC
achei meio confuso, acho que melhoraria se mostrasse o numero de pessoas e a energia atual
mirianbr
21. Apr 2022 · 16:14 UTC
Hey, nice game! Not really my type, but I liked the way you implemented it and after reading the instructions I very quickly could play it (kind of) successfully.

I missed a little engagement, though: there were no attempts of humor in the text (or I didn't notice?) and absolutely no audio or soundtrack, so atmosphere was not really a thing. At least for me, these tiny things can make a lot of difference on having me engaged in a game/story, and playing for a longer time. On the other hand -- I find it super hard balancing things and coming up with the variables/resources when developing this type of game, so congrats for having something playable in such a short time.

I hope you make to your 20 ratings! In any case, if you don't, don't let this discourage you: there's always LD 51, and you got a lot of nice feedback in the comments already. Good luck! :blush:
Lord Shulky
21. Apr 2022 · 16:48 UTC
Did not completely understand, but what I got was good. gj
kjscott
21. Apr 2022 · 17:38 UTC
Outputting the current turns happiness, power requirements, pollution etc would have been super useful and made the game a lot more intuitive to play. Also a retry button would have been good. After reading the rules was able to do a lot better compared to my first game, nice idea for a game.
zimny11
21. Apr 2022 · 17:51 UTC
Really interesting game mechanic! I wish there was music or some sound effects, but I get that time limit is merciless :) I was able to get 146 happiness. Good job with the game!
nardandas
21. Apr 2022 · 17:59 UTC
After kind of figuring out I had to think of it as a card game, I had a lot of fun with this. Sadly the game broke on me, but at 146 pollution I had 306 happiness. The break happened kind of oddly, I think one of the dice fell off the table and it never resolved the roll. The console didn't print the results of the roll either. I honestly don't think showing the states would make it better, I think having to figure them out yourself is really satisfying. Good job!
SasquatchBStudios
21. Apr 2022 · 18:09 UTC
Neat game idea. I think you matched the theme really well. Some sound would have really gone a long way, it can get a bit boring playing a game with no sound after a while, but I do understand the time constraint makes it tough to get everything in there.
Overall well done!
moi93101
21. Apr 2022 · 18:44 UTC
It was not understandable until I read the description :frowning2:
I think with some more indications (like "power consumed / produced power") and little animation that explain card destruction (like dices going to card before they disapear ?) it would be way more understandable !
Also, we don't have informations about the limit of pollution and if the happiness score is high or not. I mean, for example I did 250 happiness max, but don't know if it's a good score !

Anyway, card mecanics and dices rolls are clean and cool !