Riposte by pickens-inc
Defeat is inevitable when you battle perfection, but to fail is what drives us on!
Armed with your Parrying Blade, deflect the Asssassin's Lightbullet back at him (W/Up/Z). He'll deflect it right back, and with each parry the Lightbullet's energy increases, gaining speed.
As if the Assassin wasn't enough of a cheater, he can also call on backup, summoning enemies on the left or right. Parry the Lightbullet to the correct side to take them out! (A/Left/Q and D/Right).
Super lightweight game as it was made in about twelve hours! Please post your high scores and gameplay in the comments, we'd love to maintain a high score table!
Thanks for playing!
Xinput Gamepads supported!
Controls:
Parry forward: Top face button
Parry Left: Left face button/Left shoulder
Parry right: Right face button/Right shoulder
Start: Start button

| Windows | https://polyrogue.itch.io/riposte |
| Original URL | https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/50/riposte |
Ratings
| Overall | 166th | 3.974⭐ | 21🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 111th | 4⭐ | 21🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 232th | 3.763⭐ | 21🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 510th | 3.816⭐ | 21🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 79th | 4.5⭐ | 21🧑⚖️ |
| Humor | 754th | 2.833⭐ | 20🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 217th | 3.974⭐ | 21🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 8🗳️ | 12🗨️ |
Thanks for this entry I really enjoyed playing it.
The graphics are outstanding and the music is top notch!
Try to beat my score below :D

I only managed to score 3,337 so far. I usually lose at around the 1500 mark, as the speed of the volleys starts increasing. I think the increasing volley speed is a good mechanic, because, along with hitting the ball at an enemy, it means the rhythm is constantly changing--so you can't just get into a rhythm, you have to constantly be on your toes.
I was confused because for a while my high score was supposedly ~2000 even though I had never gotten above ~1500. That's when I realized that pressing buttons while on the title screen increases your score. That seems unintended, lol.
I did try playing with a controller and it is really fun. The one complaint I have, both with the gamepad controls and the regular controls, is restarting--you have to push the button twice, which I think is kind of annoying. Also, with the controller, I think it would be fun to be able to restart with the shoulder buttons, as then I would only need to use those two buttons to play (which seems like a very fun control scheme).
Overall though this is a really nice game (best one I've played so far!), just fantastic execution on a simple and extremely good concept.
@andidebob thank you for playing! Yep, it definitely takes some getting used to and can be awkward at times. The artist definitely knocked it out of the park!
@simon-rahnasto Thank you as always for trying my jam game Simon! Absolutely had a blast making the game and so far it seems like you hold the LD high score!
@honey-pony Wow, thank you very much for the detailed feedback! Very much appreciate all the kind praise, and also for discovering a bug I absolutely hadn't picked up on until you mentioned it. I'll see if I can push that as a typo fix! The shoulder button suggestion is also a super good easy win that would definitely improve the UX - I wanted to have it not require double tapping but that'd at least make it less painful to do so. Thanks again for putting all the time to playing it!
But the DA is working and the gameplay too GG
Simple but very fun concept, the graphics we're really nice too!
I heard that the creator had only one day to make this, that's why it doesn't have a lot of content, but I found a lot of fun playing it. Entry level is quite high, but once you get a feel on when to do the riposte it becomes a very fast, very smooth simple reflex based game. Restarting is super fast which is a great thing for this kind of game were you die very often. Visuals, audio and colour theme compliments each other greatly.
Definitely not a great contender in theme category, but it was engaging, replayable fun :crossed_swords:
My high score

But overall a very solid entry, nice job!
I was streaming my playthrough of your game. Here's a recording in case you'd like to see it https://youtu.be/P3HI-2edlag

The aesthetics and visual effects are some of the best I've seen in the jam so far!
very addictive game got some nice scores love the visuals and the sound design just angry at the guy constatly laughing at me when I loose
hey mate sorry to ask but you were in the danger category just like me can you please play my game and rate it before the 2 days end thanks
It's a very promising concept and the most immediate way I can think of to make it better is to greatly improve the depth perception. I missed a lot because the distance of the projectile is very hard to estimate.