Downsizer by RyanWoods
Improved Version on ITCH.IO!!! WASD Pan, and some extra flavor. Also better feeling interactions!
In Downsizer, your only goal is to eliminate as many Corporate Peekmehn as possible. You do this by hacking objects in the environment in order to influence Peekmehn movement and get them caught in your traps. You can click and drag across the screen to move your camera around the screen.
There are four nodes you can hack. To hack, hold the mouse over a hackable object and hold F until the bar fills up and releases.
Door Node: Close a door for ten seconds to change Peekmehn’s path.
Overload Node: Hack a generator to destroy a room and everything in it. Be careful! If any Peekmehn are inside the alert radius they will hear the explosion and try to raise the alarm.
Vent Node: Hack a vent node to slowly siphon air from the room, once it completes, it will kill all Peekmehn inside and lock the room permanently. Peekmehn who enter the room while it is siphoning will try to raise an alarm – so try and box them in before activating!
Attraction Node: Hack a piece of enticing media and enthrall any Peekmehn towards it for the duration of the hack.
Each node costs a different amount of Bandwidth to hack, so carefully selecting your opportunities is key! If a Peekmehn makes it to an alarm the whole space station will abandon ship, with each Peekmehn making their way to the closest escape pod.
Paying attention to Peekmehn behaviors, and the tools in your environment are key if you want to try and eliminate all 12 blights on the company!!
| Itch | https://strfried.itch.io/downsizer |
| Original URL | https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/54/downsizer |
Ratings
| Overall | 768th | 3.366⭐ | 58🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 854th | 3.055⭐ | 57🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 315th | 3.66⭐ | 55🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 952th | 3⭐ | 57🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 50th | 4.527⭐ | 58🧑⚖️ |
| Audio | 89th | 4.057⭐ | 55🧑⚖️ |
| Humor | 490th | 3.052⭐ | 50🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 521th | 3.585⭐ | 55🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 61🗳️ | 98🗨️ |
In terms of gameplay it honestly took me a really long time to understand what I was supposed to be doing and how to move. I wish there was more of a tutorial or at least control descriptions on screen. I know there are some instruction prompts on screen, but the font color chosen make its really difficult to read, unfortunately. I also wasn't a huge fan of the way that the panning worked, it was quite slow and difficult to control. Otherwise, I think the premise and mechanics are very unique and unexpected. It makes me want to play more to really get it down. Awesome submission!
Jolly good & solid work overall!
Putting time into making sure the controls feel good and if the game allows it, simple. I tend to struggle we this because I probably tend to have a preference.
I think any in-built initial hint or tutorial goes a long way for me personally, but even with my own games time restricts me.
the story concept was funny, the art was nice to look at, very good game :)
I am a bit surprised that so many people reheat fish in their offices in the far future. That's a very bleak outlook for humanity. Great game though.
I did find the control scheme a bit annoying, frankly. Leftclick-and-drag to scroll and F to interact? Ouch. (Especially with how much scrolling you have to do on a map this size...) That's rather unconventional, and it took a lot of getting used to.
And I find it hard to do a good job, because the ten seconds for locking doors are too short for crowd control, and activating fans or generators is too slow (and makes targets flee).
Otherwise, it's a beautiful game!
Besides that I love your work. Awesome! :smiley:
The version on itch has improved navigation controls. Thanks for trying the game!
As for controls and what to do you have to downsize all the workers using traps. Theres vents that vent the air, generators that explode and make noise as well as tvs that attract workers.
The art style is incredible, but the key interactables like televisions and vents get lost in the mix. Making these a bit higher in the visual hierarchy would really help the initial play experience.
Lots of potential here, I'll likely revisit the post-jam version soon, looking forward to seeing this developed.
The area is so large that I didn't really feel the "limited space" :wink: The game is more challenging than it seems, so many executives, so little time. But it's fun to try to hunt them down!
I noticed some issues. Sometimes, the things you interacted with could not be interacted with again. Which, of course, made sense when it came to the overload node, but made no sense with the doors or tvs. So, I assume it's a bug. Also, some of the poor executive guys tended to just get stuck in the corner.
Still, I had fun playing. Great jam job!
While the controls could benefit from a bit of "less is more", the visuals and audio is great and the overall polish is amazing. Good job!