Spaceship Parking Simulator by fuzzybut
In Spaceship Parking Simulator, you try to land on planets to get more points before the time runs out. (You were originally supposed to start with 10 seconds, fitting the theme, but this made the game way too difficult). The game could use more polish, as we had a few other things going on this weekend, but we decided it was fun enough to still put out before the deadline.
Instructions, in case you skipped them in-game :)

Fuzzybut is two people, Ryan and Anna. Ryan did all of the gameplay, and Anna did all of the art and animations. Our friend Nick also playtested for us. This is our first time making a game together. Ryan entered the Ludum Dare competition a handful of times in 2013 and 2014, but has not made a game since 2015. Anna had never heard of Ludum Dare until last Thursday.
Song credits: A Journey Through The Universe by Lesion X | https://soundcloud.com/lesionxbeats Music promoted by https://www.free-stock-music.com Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en_US Nebula Sound Effect and Point Collection Sound Effect are from Pixabay
Ratings
| Overall | 794th | 3.302⭐ | 60🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 641th | 3.319⭐ | 60🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 721th | 3.172⭐ | 60🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 1206th | 2.172⭐ | 60🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 896th | 3.086⭐ | 60🧑⚖️ |
| Humor | 777th | 2.472⭐ | 56🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 906th | 3.07⭐ | 59🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 42🗳️ | 99🗨️ |
check out my jam game!
I found myself wanting planets to have some sort of gravity so when I boost just little too much, I would not just fly away XD
Definitely very tricky, but does make it quite satisfying when you get things right!
This is a really neat take on the Lunar Lander type game, though! :) Being able to land on a planet when coming in from any direction definitely makes things interesting! I also thought the nebulas were a neat idea to add some variety to the game.

This could definitely be expanded upon with some ship upgrades, maybe some other places to land on or stuff to pick up in the galaxy! Like hitchhikers :wink: .
I like the general mood and the slight music. And I love the art on the nebulas - very nice! Overall, very nicely done.
As others have mentioned I wish the valid landing conditions were more forgiving, or at least more clear. Even after playing the game for 10 minutes I don't have a good sense of how slow I need to be or how close to pointing straight up I need to be. I think the gameplay would be *significantly* improved with A) a speedometer that shows how fast you're going and has the "safe landing" speed range clearly marked, and B) some landing gear on the ship, so you can better gauge your landing angle (Also because landing directly on the engine bell is a little silly :P)
When I do fail, I wish it felt more dramatic. It's a spaceship crash! I would have liked some explosion visual & sound effects.
I wasn't a fan of the way the ship instantly snaps to planets on a landing. It made all my hard work bringing the ship down gently feel less valid. I think tweening into the position over a half-second or so would really improve the feel of gameplay.
OK this last point is the nittiest of nitpicks, but I wish the ship hitbox was more accurate to its visuals. As I got more comfortable with the controls, I started attempting various epic risky maneuvers where the nose of the ship passes very close to a planet. Unfortunately, this always resulted in a game over, because while I'm a good pilot and the ship didn't actually collide with anything, its hitbox did.
One last thing I want to mention -- the art is really lovely and charming! I'm very curious, were the red stars/galaxies in the background merely an artistic choice or do they imply that this game takes place in the far cosmic future, when the only stars left are red dwarfs and distant light sources in the sky are redshifted due to the ever-accelerating expansion of the universe?
Really nice little game, thanks for making it :)
P.S. I escaped the universe

I like the way that you kinda have to aim at a moon, then flip-and-burn to cancel out the velocity, it reminded me of when they do that in The Expanse, so in my head that's what was happening every time I flipped around :smile:
Anyway, your game was too difficult but fun enough.
Good job!