Defend The Apple Harvest by jaywoody

made by jaywoody for Ludum Dare 52 (COMPO)

Defend The Apple Harvest

In Defend The Apple Harvest, you play as a farmer trying to gather as many apples as possible from your orchard. As you collect apples, you must carefully place them into apple boxes to keep them safe. But watch out! The mischievous Thieferinos are always lurking, trying to steal your hard-earned boxes of apples. Use your quick reflexes to throw apples at the Thieferinos to fend them off and protect your bounty. Can you outwit the Thieferinos and become the top apple farmer in the orchard? Only you can find out!

Controls

Use WASD to move and Mouse to look. Left mouse button fires an apple if you have any. Left mouse button held down gathers apples and puts apples into boxes if you are near an apple tree or an apple box. Left Shift runs.

Beat playthrough times

Developer: 193.15 seconds

Durka Games: 109.15 seconds

EDIT: fixed a game breaking bug

Link	https://drive.google.com/file/d/1MYDKVerQjxEMD1bgJu6AVqUQCwA-hryg/view?usp=share_link
Original URL	https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/52/defend-the-apple-harvest

Ratings

Overall	141^th	3.538⭐	28🧑‍⚖️
Fun	208^th	3.212⭐	28🧑‍⚖️
Innovation	188^th	3.231⭐	28🧑‍⚖️
Theme	80^th	4.038⭐	28🧑‍⚖️
Graphics	97^th	3.885⭐	28🧑‍⚖️
Audio	83^th	3.6⭐	27🧑‍⚖️
Humor	46^th	3.708⭐	26🧑‍⚖️
Mood	184^th	3.212⭐	28🧑‍⚖️
Given		25🗳️	34🗨️

Feedback

pushmepullyu

09. Jan 2023 · 08:28 UTC

The Thieferinos were pretty funny :D

Justin_C

09. Jan 2023 · 13:56 UTC

Really well-made game. Especially for compo.

It's kind of annoying how boxes can't be moved back into place. It takes so long to grab apples that I usually lose a box before I can get around to defending them. And even if I save a box, it's just easier to steal for the next thief.

🎤 jaywoody

10. Jan 2023 · 10:38 UTC

@pushmepullyu The Thieferinos were the best part for me, too. :) Thanks for playing!

@justin-c Thank you so much! And I totally understand your feedback, although if I would've let the player move the boxes freely the game could've been too easy to beat. There probably should be some additional mechanic to make it more interesting, but as always in these compos I just ran out of time. Thank you for the feedback and trying the game!

Nougato

10. Jan 2023 · 11:18 UTC

Very fun game ! mechanics are simple and efficient ! the player is maybe a little too slow, but really fun to play !

simsax

10. Jan 2023 · 11:33 UTC

Nice entry, I really enjoyed the gameplay. I only find the soundtrack to be not super fitting, maybe I'd have
chosen a more casual/happy tune, given the vibe of the game. But I know it's highly subjective, so good job overall!

🎤 jaywoody

10. Jan 2023 · 13:18 UTC

@nougato Good point. It's true, the player might indeed be a bit too slow. I wanted to add a stamina meter and a more powerful sprint but ran out of time. Maybe I should add a post compo version where this is fixed. Thanks for the feedback and playing the game!

@simsax Valid point as well. The game kind of morphed into what it is now in the middle of development and I had already done the music. Hopefully people still like the composition. Thanks for playing the game!

Ysendrin

10. Jan 2023 · 14:54 UTC

Pretty cool entry. Maybe the spawn should not be as close as it is to the apple tree, so you can see where all the boxes are. Also it is not clear where the thieferinos are going with the box which does not really help defend.
Finally and I'm being picky here, maybe use the other mouse click for gathering and dropping apples, so the player would not have to move to be able to shoot. It feels not natural.

Overall it was fun but I gotta admit I gave up on the last level.

DurkaGames

10. Jan 2023 · 15:00 UTC

Our GameDesigner made it 109.15! Hope it's a world record now!

🎤 jaywoody

10. Jan 2023 · 15:30 UTC

@ysendrin Thanks for the feedback and playing the game! There's a lot room for improvement in the compo version for sure.

@durkagames Wow! Well that is superfast. Don't know how you pulled that off! Kudos for the world record and thanks for playing the game!

fnelix

10. Jan 2023 · 17:17 UTC

Some impressive graphics/animation for the compo, and fun to play for a bit. The player really moves frustratingly slow. I actually liked the chill music.

Leon Oost

11. Jan 2023 · 10:46 UTC

Love the trowing apples soundeffect!

🎤 jaywoody

11. Jan 2023 · 13:18 UTC

@fnelix Thanks for the feedback. I'm glad you liked the game. Thanks for playing!

@leon-oost Glad you liked it. Thanks for playing!

LDJam user 251967

11. Jan 2023 · 18:13 UTC

Great game!

limered

11. Jan 2023 · 18:23 UTC

Nice game. Like the others already said, it is too hard to know where thieferinos are coming from and what box will be attacked next. The player is just too slow to be at all the places at once. Especialy in the third lvl.
I must say i exploited a bug to even get to the third lvl: When you start collecting apples and then move away from the tree, you get instant 50 apples.

Besides some flawes, it is a really good entry for a compo. Funny audio and nice animations. Plus, graphics are very good.
Keep it up

🎤 jaywoody

11. Jan 2023 · 22:08 UTC

@taikinaaa Thanks for playing the game!

@limered I guess there's some balancing issues still left to be solved. And thanks for letting me know about that bug! Also thanks for the feedback and playing the game!

hmrpf

11. Jan 2023 · 23:08 UTC

The art is impressive, those mean thieves are perfect ! Great job on so little time. First run my controls were inverted i don't know why -_- After that it went ok ! Hard to beat lvl 3. Again good job !

stephen321

12. Jan 2023 · 08:32 UTC

Like the animation and particle effects

jk5000

12. Jan 2023 · 10:31 UTC

A sweet and very funny little game. Love the visuals and the music. The gameplay felt a bit slow, and it is a bit difficult to see if you appels into the boxes or not. But overall a pretty well made and fun little jam game. Well done.

🎤 jaywoody

12. Jan 2023 · 11:25 UTC

@hmrpf Thank you very much! I noticed the inverted controls happening on couple of occasions in my testing and I tried to pin it down but ultimately couldn't pinpoint what exactly is causing it and why. It seemed to happen at random for me. Thankfully your second try worked out. Thanks for the playing the game!

@stephen321 Thanks for playing the game!

@jk5000 Thanks for the feedback and playing the game! There definitely some room for improvement.

bezbiletnym

12. Jan 2023 · 12:49 UTC

Very fun game! It feels so great when you hit a thief from a long distance!

evil23

12. Jan 2023 · 20:25 UTC

First round was a bit frustrating, you put in the hard work and walk so slow... You can't keep an eye on all these boxes... Then I noticed, when you're at the tree and hold the mouse button down, you can just walk away, and the apple counter jumps to 50/50! This made it much easier :D

bentglasstube

12. Jan 2023 · 20:58 UTC

Excellent work on the audio and visuals in this one. The thieves were adorable. The main mechanic was fun if a little simple. As some others had said, it was sometimes hard to find all the boxes to avoid them being stolen, and it was hard to know where the thieves were going with them. These are pretty small complaints overall though, nice work.

LDJam user 280036

13. Jan 2023 · 03:27 UTC

Impressive graphics. The thieferinos are adorable :grin: Feels good to throw the apples.

I had trouble figuring out how to harvest and deposit apples, but I was able to get it after awhile.

🎤 jaywoody

13. Jan 2023 · 09:50 UTC

@bezbiletnym Thank you! It indeed feels good to nail one from a far. Thanks for playing!

@evil23 There's apparently a bug in the game such as you mentioned. I'm probably going to leave it in for now so if the game feels too hard people can exploit that. Thanks for playing!

@bentglasstube Thank you so much! There probably should be some kind of fly-through the map before starting or a mini-map or a radar to show the location of the boxes. I'll address that in a post compo version, if I have the time to make one. Thank for the feedback and playing the game!

@googlypoo Thank you very much! Yeah I guess I should be more clear about the way apples are gathered. Maybe have the "guide text" show up in a more central area or something. Thank you for playing the game!

island-jam-2-group-3

13. Jan 2023 · 22:47 UTC

Very polished for a compo entry! I hate the Thieferinos now xD As someone already said, is a shame that you can't move the boxes back to its place but other than that I enjoyed the game, congratulations! ;-)

3ggplant

15. Jan 2023 · 03:51 UTC

Really nice graphics and audio, although it can be hard to know where the boxes are to stop the thieferinos and throwing apples at point-blank range feels really inconsistent at times.

🎤 jaywoody

15. Jan 2023 · 14:31 UTC

@island-jam-2-group-3 Thank you! Thanks for the feedback and playing the game.

@3ggplant Thanks you! Yeah there's room for improvement, for sure!

KeichiTS

16. Jan 2023 · 02:00 UTC

Very impressive for a COMPO entry. The game is very fluid and consistent.

Congrats!

lfreinoso

17. Jan 2023 · 01:20 UTC

Very beautiful game, it took me a while to understand what to do.... I think they steal the boxes very quickly! But it's fun.

Check out my game: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/52/space-harvest

🎤 jaywoody

17. Jan 2023 · 14:49 UTC

@keichits Thank you so much! Thanks for playing!

@lfreinoso Thank you! It is a bit difficult for sure. Thanks for playing!

someone

19. Jan 2023 · 23:28 UTC

The thieferinos were great, and the audio was good. The game was way too hard though.
The mouse sensitivity was way too high and the movement too slow, and could also have done with a reticle.
I found hitting them very difficult with the way the apples arc from the side.
Making jam games too hard is an easy trap to fall into since you have been playing it all weekend so it seems so easy...
I appreciated the hold to pick apples instruction that popped up. I was a bit confused as to how to pick the apples them at first.
I really like the dissolve effect when you manage hit the pesky villains.

🎤 jaywoody

20. Jan 2023 · 05:50 UTC

@someone Thanks for the feedback and playing the game! Yep, there are some rough edges in the game for sure, hopefully you still had a good time testing the game out.

Mephistase

23. Jan 2023 · 18:14 UTC

It is a fun game!

I needed time to adapt to the throwing position which is a little too decentered for me.

In the end, I find the pace of the game a little to slow. Moving around is a little frustating.