LudumData

DeadLyft by JoshH

[raw]
made by JoshH for Ludum Dare 52 (JAM)

Title.png ​ Take them for the ride of their life....

Moviepass, Theranos, FTX...they all failed faster and broke things as they monetized unicorn thought leaders that scaled the sharing economy by microdosing IPOs.

But what else do they have in common? That's right...

They're dead.

Introducing DeadLyft, the service designed to disrupt the collection and final judgement of the recently deceased!

No longer will you have to sit in a leaky boat while the forgotten memories of millennia pool around your fleshless ankles!

Ages upon ages of management by legacy enterprises have meant more and more of the dead piling up at their final destination, aimless and often with memory partially intact!

Instead sit back and rest your bones in heated seats, as our data optimization and proprietary Sins-sense technology identifies opportunities to keep our clients mindless and wandering in purgatory for thousands of years!

Objective

Drive your passengers to the ever after and ask questions to harvest soul points as they share their life story. More information = more points!

Controls

  • S to start
  • T for tutorial
  • Up/Down to select choices
  • Space/Click to confirm choice

Team DeadLyft

Story - @Fromage - @GrimPuppet

Art - @SARAHHHHHH

Music - @Dustinseth

Programming - @JoshH

Tools

  • Godot https://godotengine.org/
  • Dialogue Manager https://github.com/nathanhoad/godotdialoguemanager

Screenshot from 2023-01-09 10-57-46.png Screenshot from 2023-01-09 10-50-57.png

Notes

  • First time using Godot. Loved it!
  • Feature suggestions are welcome!

Dev Notes

  • 1/11/23 Posted an updated version fixing dialogue bugs.
Link https://github.com/herteljt/ludumdare52
Link https://herteljt.itch.io/deadlyft
Original URL https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/52/deadlyft

Ratings

Overall 498th 3.354⭐ 50🧑‍⚖️
Fun 589th 3.021⭐ 50🧑‍⚖️
Innovation 426th 3.25⭐ 48🧑‍⚖️
Theme 622th 3.304⭐ 48🧑‍⚖️
Graphics 481th 3.448⭐ 50🧑‍⚖️
Audio 458th 2.709⭐ 45🧑‍⚖️
Humor 205th 3.402⭐ 48🧑‍⚖️
Mood 359th 3.522⭐ 48🧑‍⚖️
Given 44🗳️ 78🗨️

Feedback

fc85057
09. Jan 2023 · 18:57 UTC
Very interesting concept and a fun take on the theme! Really like the art style and the subtle music fits the game.
Perhaps it's just me but it was a little unclear what the goal was even with the tutorial, although it made more sense as I played. I did encounter some bugs where text would skip or already selected options would repeat.
Aoxian
09. Jan 2023 · 19:18 UTC
This was fun! reminded me of choose your own adventure books. Lots of reading.
jaonewguy
09. Jan 2023 · 19:22 UTC
Lovely art. Agree with first commenter about the tutorial being a bit unclear.

Also bug reporting: In tutorial, hitting 'S' will bring up another dialog (maybe it restarts the first dialog?)
🎤 JoshH
09. Jan 2023 · 19:32 UTC
Thanks @jaonewguy! Yes, I need to disable that :D

Thank you for the feedback @fc85057 We'll keep working through to fix them!

Thank you @aoxian ! Choose your own adventure is definitely an inspiration!
LDJam user 141701
09. Jan 2023 · 19:34 UTC
Nice game!

I'm not big into dialogue games, but I played to completion; 21 points on Medium.

Suggestions

1) I think the Dialogue library you're using has support for "styling" the different characters. For example 'Mike' being on the right, 'Player' on the left, and "Story" elements being done in the middle. This would have been particularly useful in the tutorial, which I think was the most confusing part!

2) The tutorial probably should have sent you back to the main menu, not directly into the game. It wasn't clear when tutorial ended, and game began. In general the tutorial was confusing, and I probably would have understood more if I had just skipped it. It had some nice humor beats though!

Bugs:

There was a dialogue bug where a number of times there was nothing to say (just a blank field). After clicking it, he ranted about liberals. This happened 3-4 times during the game, and didn't really seem like intentional dialogue reuse to me.
kodingnights
09. Jan 2023 · 19:39 UTC
I managed to get 25 points on hard. That is some seriously good writing. Good job!
Fromage
09. Jan 2023 · 19:42 UTC
Thanks all!

@fc85057 Clearly not just you on the tutorial, heh. Gonna try and sharpen it up a bit for sure.

@aoxian Lots of writing too, and pathing...ye gods. It was a LOT of work. Thanks for playing.

@jaonewguy Thanks! Yeah, working on the tutorial, really appreciate the heads up!

@SirLich Solid point about making it clearer when the game is starting, and glad you enjoyed! I had the same bug and it's apparently been a bit of a nightmare to track down. Thanks for the feedback!

@kodingnights Glad you enjoyed it, really appreciate it!
🎤 JoshH
09. Jan 2023 · 19:49 UTC
Thank you for the suggestions @sirlich ! The dialogue system does support that kind of styling. Great idea. Will work on the other suggestions and bugs you mentioned!
LDJam user 315574
09. Jan 2023 · 23:55 UTC
Came for the awesome dead lift pun, stayed for the stylish artwork. Great job.
Fromage
10. Jan 2023 · 00:20 UTC
@slantyoj Glad you enjoyed it!
🎤 JoshH
10. Jan 2023 · 00:29 UTC
@kodingnights Woot! In the current build, I think 30 points might not be possible. When we have multiple characters added, that will change of course.

@slantyoj We do love our puns :D Thanks!
Fromage
10. Jan 2023 · 00:39 UTC
Sigh, mistype
togo sepultraut
10. Jan 2023 · 01:00 UTC
the way the dialog develops the character is nice.
i ran into a bit of an issue where there were no more options to pick and it just repeated an old one (playing with mike on medium difficulty)
very nice way to present a text driven game
Fromage
10. Jan 2023 · 01:10 UTC
@togo-sepultraut Thanks! Yeah, that one has been giving us headaches, appreciate the feedback!
Stejkrobot
10. Jan 2023 · 01:18 UTC
I think i would really enjoy this if i wasnt dyslexic. The art and visuals are amazing, the long strings of unbroken text is hard to endure. My oppinion in this matter is less valuable but i think bite sized text could be more enjoyable!
Fromage
10. Jan 2023 · 01:21 UTC
@Stejkrobot No, I actually keep meaning to mention that we should break them up a bit, you are very correct. Thanks for braving our game despite your dyslexia!
daitli
10. Jan 2023 · 02:08 UTC
Love me a good story- you guys put in the work and it shows! The graphics are very pleasing to the eye, thanks for sharing it, I had fun trying it out! :D
Fromage
10. Jan 2023 · 02:51 UTC
Glad you enjoyed! Thanks for the feedback!
MidoriMelody
10. Jan 2023 · 05:14 UTC
This game is amazing!!! I loved going through this game. It reminded me of NewCab and I love those types of games. Really good story!!! Make sure to @ me when you finish it.
SgtWeirdo
10. Jan 2023 · 08:38 UTC
I had fun playing through this! Ran into dialog issues like other but game wise it's a well paced story and it had me laughing and grinning on multiple occasions. great job!
bartalomew
10. Jan 2023 · 12:43 UTC
it's a very funny and engaging game, really glad I stumbled upon it. the textbox have a minor issue when I click it shows some different text for a few frames. It's not ruining anything immersion or gameplay-wise though. Well written characters (at least those who you could finish), would love to play with a bit more developed version later on.
Fromage
10. Jan 2023 · 14:45 UTC
@sgtweirdo Thanks so much, glad you enjoyed it!

@bartalomew Thanks! Hopefully we get to develop it further!
Derek Volker
10. Jan 2023 · 22:10 UTC
I'm not really into text based games, but this seems really nice.

The art and sound really sets the ambience of the experience and i'm amazed at the amount of content you produced, even with the Junie part incomplete. Also, nice touch with the wiggling letters to catch the attention to the details!

Congrats!
Fromage
10. Jan 2023 · 22:31 UTC
Thanks @derek-volker ! Thanks for making it through our game even if it's not normally to your tastes!
caeonosphere
11. Jan 2023 · 05:04 UTC
Really like the character art! I also ran into the problem with an empty dialogue box and getting stuck in a loop of previous text...
Fromage
11. Jan 2023 · 05:20 UTC
@caeonosphere Thanks! Yeah, I think our programmer has passed out, heh.
🎤 JoshH
11. Jan 2023 · 06:19 UTC
Thanks all! I spent some time working through dialogue bugs this evening. Hoping I caught them all, but please keep reporting if you find any.
🎤 JoshH
11. Jan 2023 · 06:19 UTC
@caeonosphere If you give it a try now, let me know if you run into the same issue. Thanks for playing!
beardywombat
11. Jan 2023 · 08:55 UTC
A very well executed game, it was interesting moving my way through the dialogue and discovering the story. It was a little un satisfying not figuring out the motive of the first story, but I suppose I'll have to try again :)
magicstunts123
11. Jan 2023 · 19:40 UTC
Normally i don't play those kind of dialogue games, but i really enjoyed the "interrogation" style and the plot itself.
I loved the fourth wall breaks!
Would really like to see more characters if you are going to expand on that game :)
Fromage
11. Jan 2023 · 19:48 UTC
@magicstunts123 Thanks for taking a look! Would have loved to do more! Mike was a lot of work, but next time it should at least be easier on our coder. heh
Adam Burt
11. Jan 2023 · 19:53 UTC
Really neat concept, and good execution with some very fine writing in there. Lots of little quirks and touches, and I like that it gradually fleshed the character out from stereotype into something more. Thanks for sharing!
Fromage
11. Jan 2023 · 20:13 UTC
@adam-burt Oh man that is good to hear, it was a fine line to walk and honestly writing this was rough at times, heh. Appreciate the feedback!
La bread
13. Jan 2023 · 02:09 UTC
Solid storytelling, I hope you guys get around to finishing the other characters after the jam!
Fromage
13. Jan 2023 · 02:56 UTC
Thanks La Bread! Me too!
Flying Dog Fish
13. Jan 2023 · 18:08 UTC
This is an interesting visual novel about Death posing as a Lyft driver. The art is great too.
Fromage
13. Jan 2023 · 19:33 UTC
Thanks @flying-dog-fish for giving it a try!
profan
14. Jan 2023 · 17:06 UTC
Interesting little game, this is probably the first one I've seen that is a straight up VN, but it was very welcome after going through god knows how many harvesting and farming games!

The dialogue itself was quite cool, I definitely found myself with a certain level of prejudice towards the character (Mike) initially, but then slowly learning more about them.. I still had some level of prejudice towards them, but at least now I understood the man wasn't just a one dimensional stereotype but came from a good place and of good intentions, even if it was deeply ill informed.

Nice work :)

And man. This final image was far too relatable :D

![firefox_h5SBEEOA98.png](///raw/321/2/z/566e3.png)
Fromage
14. Jan 2023 · 20:19 UTC
Thank so much for the amazing feedback @profan!

Yeah, I almost gave up on Mike about halfway through, but thankful time didn't really allow for me to do a whole new person, heh.
pianoman373
16. Jan 2023 · 18:59 UTC
I really enjoyed the writing in this. Some pretty emotional stuff learning more and more about Mike and seeing him realize he's dead at the end was really well done.
Fromage
16. Jan 2023 · 19:51 UTC
Thanks @pianoman373! Very kind of you to say.
Don Fouts
26. Jan 2023 · 03:30 UTC
As already mentioned in various comments this was a really cool take on the theme by using a visual novel. It may be just an issue on my side but I felt like I may have missed some dialog options when pressing space bar to advance the prompt. I would see a text bar at the bottom them flash to a new dialog box. This was on the HTML5 chrome player. Overall great work!
Fromage
26. Jan 2023 · 15:02 UTC
Thanks for the heads up @don-fouts! Appreciate the kind words.