Riftrunner by Ming Zhu

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

Description

Play as the Artifact, a speedy anomaly able to tear open space and time. Your mission is to escape your own reality by literally running away from it. But time waits for no one...and your fate is inevitably bound to your own reality.

Mechanics

You cannot stop (unless you hit a wall), or voluntarily change your own direction.

Space - jump/wallhop. Wallhopping increases your speed slightly and reverses your direction. Left Shift - teleport. This warps you a short distance at the cost of your speed force. Q - bullet time. This slows down the time around you at the cost of your speed force. Right Shift - phase. When you reach a high speed (50), summon an energy blade to cut open a rift, phasing through all terrain while moving at max speed. This ability cannot be used consecutively. Right Shift while phasing to cancel prematurely.

When your speed is below a threshold, a timer (the green wheel) will start to tick down. Once the timer runs out, well, you know what happens. The wheel will recharge if you remain above the threshold.

The stage is ephemeral - moving past a certain point may cause the past terrain to shift, meaning you can traverse forwards or backwards

Disclaimer

Our team consisted of 3 people - 2 of whom are programmers, and 1 a composer. We originally had an artist, but they didn't show up. Thus, all animations, art for the platform and the player are original, but the background of the main game and the text fonts are imported (we really didn't have time). We did not opt out of Graphics for that reason, since the Artifact's anims took a significant chunk of our time to implement.

When voting, Please keep in mind that the background is not original (adapted from the Warped City Unity asset pack)! We would like your input on the style and animation of our player (even though it's a stick figure) as well as the post-processing effects, since we tried really hard to make them look smooth and presentable.

This is team 1's LD50 submission for ACM Studio at UCLA. Made by Alex Stavedahl, Austin Burkett, and Ming Zhu (ld accounts to be added)

Ratings

Overall 1008th 3.278⭐ 20🧑‍⚖️
Fun 1025th 3.056⭐ 20🧑‍⚖️
Innovation 882th 3.111⭐ 20🧑‍⚖️
Theme 954th 3.417⭐ 20🧑‍⚖️
Graphics 1154th 2.861⭐ 20🧑‍⚖️
Audio 626th 3.278⭐ 20🧑‍⚖️
Mood 907th 3.278⭐ 20🧑‍⚖️
Given 16🗳️ 3🗨️

Feedback

psutarjo
05. Apr 2022 · 02:27 UTC
I really like the concept of gaining speed to continue playing. For some reason the game ended even though I still had time left according to the pie-counter. The music is also super catchy! I also that the animation for opening a portal was very well done, it almost looks like the player is slipping/diving into it. However, in terms of phasing, I think the speed penalty is too much.
the neon shark
05. Apr 2022 · 05:53 UTC
I like the core mechanics here, but I had a hard time controlling the character in a fluid way.
- The jump mechanic felt inconsistent or sometimes unresponsive.
- The teleport mechanic was awesome and responsive, but I'd lose so much speed that it wasn't really worth it.
- I'd sometimes experience my character slowing down to a halt and seemingly having no way to recover from that.
- I wasn't sure what to do with bullet time :/

Overall, I like the foundations you have here, but there's some more tuning necessary to make this really shine.
sprunth
05. Apr 2022 · 06:08 UTC
You asked about the style and animation -- I liked it! Although the controls were difficult, the actual character movement was surprisingly fluid. There's definately areas for improvement, but where you did spend effort, I think it shows. Well done!
🎤 Ming Zhu
05. Apr 2022 · 06:31 UTC
@the-neon-shark Thanks for the feedback! Yeah all of your points are valid; we should've spent a little less time on the programming and more on tuning the game. If only we had a bit more time...but time waits for no one ;)
🎤 Ming Zhu
05. Apr 2022 · 22:57 UTC
@sprunth Thank you for the comments! I've always doodled stick figures but never thought they'd come in handy. Glad you like it!
gamescodedogs
13. Apr 2022 · 18:19 UTC
Unusual funny game! I like cyberpunk style and your mechanics. Teleport is a really interesting decision! Unfortunately, I dont understand what right shift and key Q do.
Thank for making this game!
Aolriki
15. Apr 2022 · 07:05 UTC
Me interessante. Apesar de ter tido alguns problemas de gamedesign e polimento, a ideia é de certa forma criativa. A movimentação é o maior diferencial do jogo na minha opinião. Acho que falta algum tipo de desafio mais dinâmico no jogo. No geral, bom trabalho!
4ahizon
21. Apr 2022 · 02:53 UTC
interesting game. I had difficult understanding the controls but figure out later. Art design was simple but fits the style which was 2d sprite animation. Audio with punk or techno feel that gave a good vibe.