Department of Fire Deferral by Remco
- (way too) EASY start immediately when the game launches (it will take a long while before the fires start)
- NORMAL? wait 90 seconds before moving in game
- CHALLENGE wait 2.5 minutes before moving in game
Run around trying to prevent burn-downs. Which will get harder and harder. Controls WASD or arrow keys (tank controls).
Don't like this map? Press refresh! Procedural generation :-)
(Only) When moving, water spews forth from your fire-engine. There are power-ups to (temporarily) widen the angle or lengthen the reach. (Those won't respawn.)
You lose when the burn percentage is > 50% Try to get the best time.
Space-bar toggles an accessibility-mode.
- Burns: Grass, Wall, Bridge (will fall into water)
- Won't burn: Water, Road (it will look worse though), (Complete) Rubble (is already burned).
- Drive: Grass, Road, Bridge, Rubble
- Can't drive through: Wall, Water

| Link | https://remco.itch.io/department-of-fire-deff |
| Link | https://remco.itch.io/department-of-fire-deff |
| Original URL | https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/50/department-of-fire-deferral |
Ratings
| Overall | 529th | 2.982⭐ | 30🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 540th | 2.696⭐ | 30🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 340th | 3.232⭐ | 30🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 334th | 3.607⭐ | 30🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 514th | 2.875⭐ | 30🧑⚖️ |
| Audio | 328th | 3.107⭐ | 30🧑⚖️ |
| Humor | 426th | 2.269⭐ | 28🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 465th | 2.889⭐ | 29🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 15🗳️ | 33🗨️ |
It would also have been nice to select a difficulty from the start which immediately puts you into a situation of fire as it took me awhile to even notice the fire spreading at first.
I really appreciate the alternate contrast view of the tiles; I found it easier to see the fire even though I have no color perception issues.
As described in the description, the game felt a little bit easy when just driving around from the start.
Perhaps an escalation thing that will ramp up fiercely?
The powerups felt really powerful, and then I realized they were one-off, so welp, I used them all in one go.
The blippy music is nice and frantic, and the bitart is neat!
Neat game! It took me a while to get the hang of what was happening, it would have been useful if some part of the map started with some fire, so there was an initial goal and the player could see what "fire" looks like. I like the procedural generation, nicely done there! Audio was also really good, I liked the music.

I do wish that things happened a little quicker. It took a good while before the burn % went up, and driving around before that, I didn't get a strong sense that I was doing any good. You know?
I think it was a really good concept for the game, and all that polishing is hard for a compo! I think it's really neat that you included an accessibility mode :)
The oly problem I found is that it takes a lot of time for the field to burn although you do nothing to water it.
The idea is a good one (and I like the name) but I think the gameplay needs a little refinement. The ability to shoot water being separate from movement would have been good, maybe in a twin-stick-like fashion?
The procedural map generation gives it a lot more replay value than it would have had otherwise, even if I did get a map with what I'm pretty sure was an inaccessible section in the bottom left when I played...!
Overall, well done. :smile:
I'm sorry I couldn't do the usual back-rating (and write-ups) that I usually do, work has been _really_ eating my lunch lately :sweat_smile: (the launch of Cura 5.0-BETA was today!)