Swamp Dojo by Yngvarr

[raw]
made by Yngvarr for Ludum Dare 51 (JAM)

2022-10-04-063326<em>1843x1080</em>scrot.png

_How much time have I spent in this swamp? I don't remember. Sensei found me under the rock when I was just a little tadpole. He taught me everything I know, from making my bed to hunting for food, from swimming to hanging on a cliff. He also tought me to enjoy the process of whatever I do.

But now it's my time to leave. But before leaving, I shall pass the ultimate test: sparring with my master. Yeah, the choice of the ultimate test is a bit underwhelming, but traditions are paramount. Especially for frogs! So, bring it on, Sensei, I'm ready to fight!_

You play as a frog in a traditional frog fight. The fight consists of several rounds, 10 hits each. Every round you either attack or defend, you can't attack during a defense round or vice versa.

As a younger frog, you attack first. After 10 hits you change to defense, then back to offence, etc. The fight lasts until one of the frogs hits the water. Your frog's intuition will help you decide which direction to block.

Attack and block with 'W/S' or 'up/down'. You can also use a controller, but I didn't test it.


Credits: * Yngvarr - programming, little music jingles. * Syudzius - every single piece of visual art in the game.

I'll provide the list of used assets later.

We were so close to making a proper tutorial and several fights, where did all the time go? Holy cow!

As always, thanks to Pixel Prophecy's community for cheering me up until the last moment.

Ratings

Overall 589th 3.5⭐ 24🧑‍⚖️
Fun 682th 3.273⭐ 24🧑‍⚖️
Innovation 627th 3.25⭐ 24🧑‍⚖️
Theme 773th 3.455⭐ 24🧑‍⚖️
Graphics 233th 4.136⭐ 24🧑‍⚖️
Humor 230th 3.545⭐ 24🧑‍⚖️
Mood 532th 3.5⭐ 23🧑‍⚖️
Given 4🗳️ 7🗨️

Feedback

LDJam user 237261
04. Oct 2022 · 00:17 UTC
As a fellow frog lover, I just had to check this game out. It's a really simple game but I think that works in its favor:) Love the little animation when the frog falls into the water!
OP Sidearm
04. Oct 2022 · 01:07 UTC
Really good artstyle :D Wish there were more enemies to fight though xD Kinda reminds me of One Finger Deathpunch.
Honestly deserves a full release!
🎤 Yngvarr
04. Oct 2022 · 06:47 UTC
@save-sloth-studios, thanks for your feedback! Sadly, we had not enough time to fine-tune the mechanic to provide any challenge. :sweat_smile: The art, though, is the thing that makes us proud!

@op-sidearm, funny enough, the code contains almost everything to add different combat styles. The plan was for sensei to do different combos from fight to fight, gradually increasing the difficulty. Wouldn't take more than a couple of hours to wire it. :thinking: Thank you for your kind words!
gagapete
05. Oct 2022 · 18:57 UTC
Nice game. The art and animations is awesome, especially the one when the player wins. I actually beat it the first try with button mashing so there is still room for improvement. I'm looking forward to any potential postjam version, which hopefully contains a round of Go after beating the main game. :grin:
🎤 Yngvarr
05. Oct 2022 · 20:08 UTC
@gagapete, haha, thanks for playing! :) I'm not sure if I'm good enough of a programmer to write a Go engine, but there is a Go-themed minigame idea I'd like to implement sometime in the future.

As for the difficulty, I wanted to create a sense of struggle with no side having a clear advantage, but then kinda broke it. :sweat_smile: At least it didn't break the other way around, as winning easily is more fun then losing constantly.
INCD021
06. Oct 2022 · 10:33 UTC
Well, that was fun :D I enjoyed it. Just had to learn defending, and I beat my Sensei no problem. Great game, nice work :thumbsup:
Cope
06. Oct 2022 · 19:39 UTC
I am a fan of the art. Nice work.
SeanSmeedComposer
06. Oct 2022 · 19:40 UTC
i got some good low kicks in! my game kept freezing on the 4 second marker after a few rounds. not sure if its my computer or the game. but i love how the attack buttons become the defend buttons. would definitely play more if my computer wasn't so dumb.
theheheo
06. Oct 2022 · 19:41 UTC
Really charming game! The animations and the feedback when attacking and defending were great. The defending mechanic felt the best to me while attacking felt more random. The art and the characters was really nice aswell.
FreeRunner
06. Oct 2022 · 19:41 UTC
Super well executed, runs well in safari. Sounds are spot on, the animations are great and when you loose your frog looks beaten with a sense of humor. It works very well. Audio; music is fitting, the fx leaves the player wanting a little more diversity, however in the time given, they are very fitting.
benskca
06. Oct 2022 · 19:42 UTC
The art is amazing, the animations are so cute :smiley:

I found the blocking really fun but the attacking a bit less so, reacting to the opponents attacks felt really satisfying.
Rlewins
06. Oct 2022 · 19:43 UTC
Good audio and art, really liked the frogs. Good stuff
Jaco van Hemert
06. Oct 2022 · 19:46 UTC
A really nice-looking game. I also really liked the low/high attacking and defending system. I would have liked to see some more variance there to help keep things interesting for longer (even just a high/mid/low). But jam limitations etc., etc.

I'll also note that the "frog-sense" was a bit confusing initially. Maybe having up and down arrows rather than sideways arrows that are high or low would have been more intuitive to parse quickly in your head?
MossGames
06. Oct 2022 · 19:46 UTC
Really well animated and good use of audio feedback. Quite easy to "cheese" once you've gotten the idea but really cool and could see myself playing a fuller version of this. Thank you for a Linux port!
W4YN3R
06. Oct 2022 · 19:47 UTC
Fun concept, love the artstyle and music!
Also pretty nice idea to move turn based actions to the 10 sec time slices :D
Nice entry!
fgamer99
06. Oct 2022 · 19:48 UTC
I really like the artstyle of the game. Had fun fighting the sensei.
5/5 would come back for a round of go.
Skyward4d
06. Oct 2022 · 19:49 UTC
The art in this one is fantastic! Especially the background, and the animation of the sensei once you throw him in the water. The blocking was really fun, but for the attacking it was to fast to tell where he was defending and I ended up just alternating up and down to consistently push him back.
It would be nice to have multiple difficulty levels, as the baseline is pretty easy and makes for too short an experience. I think you're really onto something with the core mechanic. Really nice work!
commanderstitch
08. Oct 2022 · 18:29 UTC
duuuuuude art is awesome and the button mashing for the win. Felt like i was playing street fighter or something but the chill levels and mood to the max. Nice! ![2022-10-08 14_27_52-Swamp Dojo by yngvarr.png](///raw/b24/z/52def.png)
Deniz ARAS
08. Oct 2022 · 19:15 UTC
Wow, This is quite a game. Really liked it. Defending was much fun. Animations and sound design were also a banger. Great entry!
Frank Gevaerts
11. Oct 2022 · 15:07 UTC
This looks and sounds very nice! I'm not sure if there's much tactics to it, it felt like just mashing buttons did the trick. Not that there's anything wrong with that, it allowed me to win :)