Booking It by Whirlguy


:books: Summary:
The library is collapsing! Use your book smarts to get out of there before you'll get crushed to death!
:video_game: Controls:
- Arrow keys or WASD to move
- 1, 2 and 3 to select summons
- Mouse to spawn or despawn demons
:clapper: Credits:
Everything done from scratch in the span of three days.
- :notes: Music & Sfx (@Whirlguy)
- :desktop: Code & Design (@Whirlguy)
- :paintbrush: Art & Animation (@Whirlguy)
A huge thanks goes out to @Kylazaur for helping out whenever I got stuck with programming and SurrealEmber for creating the "Lost Century" palette on Loscpec!
| Link | https://whirlguy.itch.io/booking-it |
| Original URL | https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/55/booking-it |
Ratings
| Overall | 203th | 3.95⭐ | 22🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 99th | 4.075⭐ | 22🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 312th | 3.675⭐ | 22🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 120th | 4.275⭐ | 22🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 121th | 4.4⭐ | 22🧑⚖️ |
| Audio | 67th | 4.15⭐ | 22🧑⚖️ |
| Humor | 480th | 3.219⭐ | 18🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 217th | 3.975⭐ | 22🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 17🗳️ | 3🗨️ |
Love the art style of pixel style and hand-painted lines!
Really impressive job, especially for a solo in such a short time. You should be super-proud :smile:
Having a level to get used to the controls before starting it off with the time limit really helps making the game feel complete! great work!
Congrats, mate!

A few tips: please please please - add a better capsule next time - the game is better than it ;) (will drive more people in instinctively). And also comment more on other's games - that's the real driver :D
The only technical complaint is that my character got stuck sometimes, but nevertheless, enjoyed the vibe : ))
If you want to improve the platforming feeling look for : coyote time, edge jump deflection, jump input buffering, ledge grabbing, etc. It's all doable in GM and will make a world of difference.
If feel like you could keep adding onto this game, it's a solid base :thumbsup:
@save-sloth-studios if I had more time I would have loved to do a more platforming oriented level and include some enemies before actually moving into full on panic mode haha. Thanks for all the kind words, I'm really glad you enjoyed it!
@persepolis haha thanks so much, I'm glad you dig it!
@dan-allison Such praise, thank you! Yeah the gameplay is a bit short haha. Would have loved to do more expanding if I had more time but I'm really glad you liked the mechanics!
@monroelabs Thanks! Yeah I really wasn't sure if this idea was going to work out at all when I started working on this but I somehow pulled through! :D
@jupiterintardis haha yeah I see what you mean. The platforming could have used more work, it's definitely a bit janky. Getting stuck in the ceiling and all that :eyes:
@tinykidtoo thanks for the kind words! Yeah the increase in difficulty might have been a bit much and I agree it can be tricky sometimes to place demons in tight little corners. Glad to hear your enjoyed the experience :D
@fabula-rasa Aww man, it's really cool to hear you appreciate all these little elements I decided to put in there, thanks for the wonderfull review :D
@nuanda79 haha yeah gamemaker is pretty cool! I'm really happy that you enjoyed playing my game! Having a start and end to a playable game is a good mindset to have, I'll keep that in mind! ;)
However there are some bugs when you jump into demons while they are begin summoned and you can get stuck in walls and die when you otherwise wouldn't have. Or maybe its just a wine issue idk.
@skvader-418 I'm really glad you had fun! <3
@peachtreemcgee How fun of you to perceive the first stage as a sneaky way for me to ease players into learning to play the game through trial and error. That was definitely my intention when I designed that stage :)
@aweskybear thanks for the high praise! I'm not sure what you mean by capsule (do you mean summary or description?) but it sounds super important, so I would really like to improve on it! I can really get on board with those tactical compaints too, it could have used a bit more work haha. I made music for this game in FLStudio using several different VST's (most notably Chipsynth SFC and Quantum 64, which is free) and an interface to record guitar with. It was a bit rushed so I'm not too sure about the mixing but I'm still pretty happy. It got the job done! :)
@colisan that's super great advice! Thanks for the kind words, I'll be sure to look into those things! :D
@orbitaldot That makes a lot of sense, there's definitely some collission bugs in there! I can completely understand if that cutscene gets on your nerves as well haha. Funny that you should bring up the title too. I had no idea what to call it for a while and one of my friends came up with this. I thought it was absolutely perfect!
@goldyxen Oh yeah, definitely don't jump and summon haha! Damn I'm getting called out lmao, it's definitely not a wining issue! There's a bunch of collission flaws here that need to be ironed out but I'm really happy you enjoyed it regardless :)
If you open your own list of games and compare your last capsule to some others, you will see it's kind of poorer quality than some of your previous games. That's a trick professionals use when creating games (e.g. for Steam): very high quality capsule, even paying professionals in that case (just an example how important that is). It has subcontious powers basically. You can read some articles.
Believe me or not, I got 20 ratings very quickly ckly in the first week - I believe due to the capsule (yes, it's absurd).
Thanks for sharing the music tools! Really love the retro vibe of your game (love this kind of music).
GL!