Beetle Era by icxon

GAMEPLAY:
Customize units, collect sap, build your army, crush the enemy base.
Soldiers won't harvest the sap. Foragers won't do the fight.
There are 3 levels in this entry.
CONTROLS:
- Mouse - draw / erase pheromone path
- Tab - switch factories (if many)
- R - restart
- [ - prev level
- ] - next level
WIKI (optional):
- Soldier: hp: 5, damage: 1, speed: 10
- Forager: same & sap carry volume: 50, sap transfer speed: 10/sec
- [:heart:] Vitality: +10 hp, sap carry volume +50 (each)
- [:cyclone:] Agility: +5 speed (each)
- [:zap:] Power: +1 damage, sap transfer speed +2/sec (each)
TOOLS:
CREDITS:
| Link | https://bitbucket.org/volcanicgiraffe/ld56-icxon |
| Link | https://icxon.itch.io/beetle-era |
| Link | https://icxon.itch.io/beetle-era |
| Original URL | https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/56/beetle-era |
Ratings
| Overall | 102th | 4.075⭐ | 42🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 76th | 4.061⭐ | 43🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 102th | 3.927⭐ | 43🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 33th | 4.402⭐ | 43🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 483th | 3.744⭐ | 43🧑⚖️ |
| Humor | 652th | 2.833⭐ | 38🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 512th | 3.55⭐ | 42🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 32🗳️ | 57🗨️ |
Like someone said, maybe a pause button could be a good addition cuz my brain was burning (wait a have to create units, but with which characteristics haaaaa *panic*)
I guess I should have read the description first, but sometimes it contains spoliers. :)
As @yogurtthehorse mentioned, the pathing system is interesting. It also allows you to skip the pathfinding programming in a creative way. :D
Also, as @kiberptah said, adding "click to continue" to the "Victory" text would make the level transition a bit better. But since I've read as far as "this game has 3 levels" I was expecting more. Also, "press tab if many factories" kinda gives away that you might get to that point, eventually.
At first, I thought different slots affected different body parts, but it seems that it's more about stats. E.g. having more agility leads to more legs, etc.? It's probably a quite creative way of handling it. Although it would make combinations like A-A-P and P-A-A look identical (and maybe they should, as their stats are identical anyway).
A somewhat simple addition that I would have is ranged weapons, even if they're pathetic. Because it would make tanky frontliners more worthwhile, since you can only have 3-4 effective melee attackers anyway (there is usually no space for more). If you could have a composition of 3-4 frontliners with HP+HP+HP, covered by ~4 ranged units and a couple of "pushers" (all into power and maybe 1 agility) to destroy the enemy base fast, it sounds like a more balanced group than 10 average buts (e.g. a bunch of power and health upgrades).
I tried making some agility-heavy combat units to flank the enemy base after their initial attack, but it failed. :D
But either way, it's always nice to see an RTS-like game on a jam.
https://youtu.be/vI-I_CPE4Gs
I'd love to do a RTS some day in a jam, but that's seem so difficult to balance.
I loved the mechanisms you had put in the game, the pheromone to guide your soldiers, the body part selection is very innovative as well.
Not super sure of what agility/power do though. Is one related to movement speed ? Are the ability useful for harvester (like max collectable energy, collect speed, movement speed ?)
I also ended up making an RTS like, though they're still so different. Seems it's hard to balance them within such a short time frame.
this project by Lychee Game Labs (I removed the link to YT because it embedded a huge player right into my comment, but: ...watch?v=adXr4v0rEBo), a similar idea, both implementations are very cool and inspiring!
I'd like to have a quicker way to select attributes. Maybe something like a color selector with a 2d plane + a slider (x for power, y for agility, slider for vitality or something like that) so I can design my army more efficiently!
Overall a great entry with high replay value, I'm going right back to try and beat that double base level

Lost the first time because I only had soldiers and naturally I ran out of sap to get more units. But that was my own fault for not reading before playing haha
Once I knew what to do I cleared all three levels. Feels very polished! And I was very happy to see an RTS here :)
I really like the pheromone system for movement.
It could do with buttons for those extra controls so it can be played entirely with the mouse. Also an auto-queue option would have been useful to save having to keep spamming the add button.

And i totaly dig the "building" - expand on that and give it some nice ui's and you got an amazing game in your hands :o
It remind me of Warcraft III, or Starcraft kind of game (that I love).
WELL DONE.
Nice graphics, OK Sound.
I had a Great time. Good Job.