Down to Earth by Chum Chum
Made in 48 hours for COMPO

Aliens are coming 'Down to Earth' and attacking your farm! Throw veggies and fruits to defend yourself! You'll have to plant and grow seeds to keep a good supply of crops to use as weapons in this Harvest-themed top-down shooter.
In-game tutorial included.
| Source code | https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1_UyTwHRhNWE727YqlNH2uFMdwqWcjptl?usp=sharing |
| Play at Itch.io | https://chumx2.itch.io/down-to-earth |
| Original URL | https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/52/down-to-earth |
Ratings
| Overall | 154th | 3.5⭐ | 48🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 88th | 3.674⭐ | 48🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 159th | 3.348⭐ | 48🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 84th | 4.022⭐ | 48🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 150th | 3.587⭐ | 48🧑⚖️ |
| Audio | 239th | 2.716⭐ | 46🧑⚖️ |
| Humor | 120th | 3.057⭐ | 46🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 215th | 3.102⭐ | 46🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 39🗳️ | 65🗨️ |
Maybe you could add a new type of enemy with a different movement pattern?
Very nice!
Maybe it's me but I would prefer to use right click to plant & harvest.
Also, I think the enemy movement could be improved, they often end up really packed.
My first play I got 1900 points. My second play I got 6450 points. Using the watermelon to kill a bunch of enemies at once felt super satisfying!
- One thing that I didn't like was that you needed to press "E" to pick up the seeds. I think picking up seeds should be automatic, since you are usually doing it at the same time as you are dodging the enemies.
- On the other hand, I loved that you did not *expire* pick ups, so I could take my time dodging the enemies before going for the seeds. That was really appreciated!
- It is really nice that the enemies slow down when getting close to you. It allows the player to try and "herd" the aliens to make dodging easier and also saving ammo.
- I liked the choice of random ammo... it gives a bit of that "gatcha" feeling of "come on watermelon, come on!"
- In the middle of the second game, I noticed that you could walk under the score card (and the enemies could too). It might have been cool to make the score card move out of the way when you are there (or maybe turn transparent), specially if an enemy leaves a seed pick up there.
- Music please!
But really, I loved this game. Great job!
As a bit of feedback, I really liked playing, but it became a bit repetitive after a while. As others have mentioned, a bit more content (like varying enemies or more plants) would make this game even better. Although that is more for if you want to extend the game. As a compo entry I think you already did a great job with what you have :)
Another thing is that at some point I did not have any plant ammo left, and I was just shooting the monsters with zucchinis. This meant I had to slowly chew through the monsters with very low damage output to get a seed again. This felt a bit frustrating.
That said, I have to say again that I really enjoyed the game and its interesting gameplay! Really great submission and thanks a lot for making it :D
Doing this for a compo is impressive!
* Leaving the mouse to use E to plant or harvest crops is not convenient.
* Pickups seed should be automatic, not pressing E.
* I love the watermelon attack (is this a watermelon? I looks like so). It is quiet efficient. Is it random ? or every 15 shoots or something ?
* All art is perfect, really : colorfull, animation.
* Yeah, aliens do attacks farmers, and farmers do defends themselves with vegetables ! :smiley:
I really loved your game. Congrats on a such a polished job.
I had a very hard time with the controls. But that might just be me. I am used to play with game pad.
Nice animations, nice 8 bit graphics. Sound is very basic.
Doing all of what you did in a compo is fantastic! Congratulations!
But overall great game, good job! :smile:
It would be really cool if you added some interactions between plants and enemies, you could have a plant that acts as a land-mine for instance, or maybe an enemy that digs up your plants if you don't stop it - there's so many cool ways you could build on this post-jam if you want to!