LudumData

The Quota by ArkansasLover

[raw]
made by ArkansasLover for Ludum Dare 57 (JAM)

Access the itch.io page HERE.

ATTENTION DEBTOR #59573

You have been allocated to Zone 24 for kactite extraction. Leave your accommodation pod immediately and make your way to the depot for kit allocation. Attend elevator 87B at 0530 hrs where you will receive further instructions. We at Pizcorp Limited hope you have a productive and uneventful day.

Explore, Outmanoeuvre, Survive, and Fulfil your Quota

Descend into the depths to repay your debt with Pizcorp Limited. Navigate the dark. Avoid and slaughter mad bedlams. Discover and extract precious crystals to meet your daily quota. This is a horror survival game focusing on creating a deep atmosphere and a strong ludonarrative about a worker who is just trying to get by in a dark situation.

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Tips for play

If you are having too much difficulty surviving, try these tips: - Hold left click to prepare your swing before you release for more accurate timing. - Not all delirious miners attack on sight. Each one has a slightly different personality in terms of aggression. Making noise near enemies and spending time near enemies generally builds their frustration so try to keep your distance and stay quiet when around them unless you want a fight. - Always watch where you are going, most delirious miners really don’t like being bumped into. - If enemies are chasing you and you don't want to fight. Keep running away at a good distance, eventually they will calm down. The more you have angered them, the longer this may take.​ - The speaker on the door is loud and will anger nearby enemies. Consider killing nearby enemies individually before you submit a kactite node or prepare to run away for a while once the door buzzes.

Link https://vaughansampson.itch.io/the-quota
Original URL https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/57/the-quota

Ratings

Overall 50th 4.176⭐ 36🧑‍⚖️
Fun 261th 3.632⭐ 36🧑‍⚖️
Innovation 462th 3.206⭐ 36🧑‍⚖️
Theme 85th 4.258⭐ 35🧑‍⚖️
Graphics 86th 4.414⭐ 37🧑‍⚖️
Audio 19th 4.309⭐ 36🧑‍⚖️
Mood 11th 4.515⭐ 35🧑‍⚖️
Given 45🗳️ 53🗨️

Feedback

Joe Rickwood
08. Apr 2025 · 04:59 UTC
Was very smooth to play but felt very difficult, couldn't really protect myself well from the miner guys, however was very on theme and graphics were awesome
hollowheartedcabbage
08. Apr 2025 · 05:12 UTC
love the vibe of this game
TopperVideoGames
08. Apr 2025 · 05:15 UTC
Very well done! The atmosphere is top notch, it was creepy to explore the tunnels even after I completed the game. The long windup really adds to the danger of the combat, as simple as it is. The objective was relatively easy to complete, though I did like the agony of how long it took to mine each deposit.

The lighting system is cool, it made me do circle sweeps in case something was around. I would have liked to see more variety in what could be found in the tunnels, but that is just a limit of the time. I really liked seeing the health would go to normal after resting a bit. It made it viable to clear out enemies as I went along. Great work!
Allie Vera
08. Apr 2025 · 06:15 UTC
Perfectly grim! This reminded me of Darkwood, both in terms of aesthetics and how well you nailed the atmosphere with those subtle details. I only regret playing this late at night a little bit...
AToxigner
08. Apr 2025 · 06:20 UTC
Overall, superb visuals and camera work quickly drew me into a state of flow. However, the combat is somewhat too challenging and might need some balance adjustments. My poor performance prevented me from experiencing further content—after collecting and delivering an ore, I was quickly surrounded by two or even more zombies. Notably, I experienced a game crash during play.
Team 9tailed
08. Apr 2025 · 07:24 UTC
Nailed the creepy atmosphere, the ambient music and the sound effects really hit it home. Always felt the tension when one of the delirious workers was nearby - they were no joke to deal with. The timing of swinging the pickaxe and the strategy of kiting them around made the experience feel dangerous, but beatable. However, there were a few times where I thought I did my due diligence to check my surroundings, but would find myself being ganged up on by two enemies at once, which was pretty much just a death sentence since they will chase you to the ends of the earth.
Art_Alchemist
08. Apr 2025 · 07:43 UTC
It was a bit counterintuitive that a guy with a heavy pickaxe needs at least three hits to kill those who kill you with their bare hands in three or four hits. Overall, the game is interesting. I liked the lighting in the game and the overall atmosphere.
🎤 ArkansasLover
08. Apr 2025 · 09:36 UTC
@team-9tailed Thanks for your feedback. I think any further iterations on the game would need to make running away a lot easier through having a more detailed enemy vision system and an interesting mechanic such as the map's gas leaks distracting and confusing enemies when they run through it.
🎤 ArkansasLover
08. Apr 2025 · 09:39 UTC
@joe-rickwood Thanks for playing! I think a lot of the difficulty simply comes from there not being many ways to interact with enemies. Being able to push them over to slow them down, block attacks or damage them through map features could be very interesting and make the game more fun and creative. The original intention was for player to mostly try to avoid them altogether, but in a tight cave it proved too difficult for players to not avoid fights.
🎤 ArkansasLover
08. Apr 2025 · 09:44 UTC
@toppervideogames Thanks for playing and giving such a detailed response. I'm impressed you found the game relatively easy, most other players found it really difficult. I think its because the game relies too much on combat right now, so if you aren't a player who has a strength in that area then there aren't always viable alternatives. I think a future update would have to allow easier alternatives to combat and maybe a higher variety of enemies which could have different levels of combat challenge.
🎤 ArkansasLover
08. Apr 2025 · 09:59 UTC
@atoxigner Sorry to hear about a crash, was it random or did it happen during a specific interaction?

I think enemies getting annoyed and approaching when you deposit ore and the buzzer sounds is cool, but its probably too hard right now to survive the attack without culling the nearby enemies beforehand. In an update we would need to add more options during combat and more options for escape from enemies to make the game more amenable to a variety of approaches.
xoudz
08. Apr 2025 · 15:41 UTC
vibe very cool
Aveezavr
08. Apr 2025 · 15:54 UTC
As a sound designer, I have to say the audio works really well here — it's great. I really liked the atmosphere and the intro. The visual style is super cool, and the lighting does its job perfectly. At first, I got frustrated with how long the attack takes, but then I changed my strategy and started picking off the workers one by one. I made it to the end. This is a really awesome game, truly.
🎤 ArkansasLover
08. Apr 2025 · 16:49 UTC
@aveezavr Thank you. We are a team of three amateurs and one of us is a full time musician and sound designer. We don't have much experience in game development at large and this is the first time we've done something atmospheric so we are very happy with how well the simple but thoughtful sound and the graphics came together. It makes me think that perhaps we should concentrate on more atmospheric projects in future...
StupidHobbit
08. Apr 2025 · 16:54 UTC
The combat mechanics feel a bit clunky, but I understand this might have been a deliberate design choice. Regardless, the game is fantastic and truly atmospheric. I managed to complete it on my second attempt, so the difficulty level seems perfectly balanced. Overall, an excellent game
Callum Schultz
08. Apr 2025 · 19:09 UTC
The sound design and pixel art is insane, really good job :)
Aashen
08. Apr 2025 · 19:42 UTC
Pretty dark and eerie atmosphere, just the right mood for the Depths theme, great game
Merfarion
09. Apr 2025 · 05:14 UTC
Delightful atmosphere, sound design to the point of goosebumps. On leveldesign a small wish that I would have put a destroyed block with a mineral at the beginning, and it would have been a little more pronounced, for I only after 3 deaths found the clue in the spawn point. But the game is beautiful
Croped
09. Apr 2025 · 12:20 UTC
Very nice execution! Mood, graphics and sound design are on point. I really liked how the scene lit up once you finished the level, great touch! Controls felt a bit clunky but i guess thats the point. Would have loved an indicator for the first ore so you know what your looking for, for some reason i was looking for cacti plants of some sort cause of the naming of the ore xD
LDJam user 337697
09. Apr 2025 · 12:30 UTC
The game is very atmospheric and fits the theme. Good job!
byebye
09. Apr 2025 · 12:36 UTC
I really liked the visuals, great game!
GreenRadiation
09. Apr 2025 · 14:20 UTC
This is such a gorgeous game, very, very similar to Darkwood. Everything is done perfectly: atmosphere, sounds, combat, graphics. This is definitely 5/5, excellent work!
Jacob Kreiner
09. Apr 2025 · 15:46 UTC
Sick entry! The mood is put together perfectly with the spatial audio, music, and lighting! The pick axe seemed a little slow for my liking, but that same slowness also added a bit of strategy and intentionality behind each strike. I wasn't expecting difficulty to be an issue, but it took me 3 restarts to finally beat it. I could totally see myself and some friends playing a game of this style/genre if it was further fleshed out. Well done!
Onhore
10. Apr 2025 · 13:10 UTC
Gorgeous atmosphere—the sound design and pixel art are chef’s kiss. Totally nailed that Darkwood-esque dread! The pickaxe’s slowness grew on me—it made every swing feel weighty and strategic. A tiny hint for the first ore (like a glint?) might spare some early deaths, but the clunky combat oddly adds to the tension. 10/10 would descend into this eerie abyss again. More co-op cave chaos when?
🎤 ArkansasLover
10. Apr 2025 · 14:27 UTC
@onhore Looking into this...
TurKiSsh
10. Apr 2025 · 17:03 UTC
I really liked it, the combat was a little difficult not to get hurt one the chase you, but all the mechanic of digging and leaving the material was great. The graphics and sounds transmit a great atmosphere
LDJam user 179298
10. Apr 2025 · 18:15 UTC
Insane visuals and atmosphere, the controls felt kind of sluggish but other than that it was a great experience.
SiENcE
10. Apr 2025 · 19:26 UTC
Great atmosphere, dark and moody! Everything fits togehter.
Hit3c
11. Apr 2025 · 00:47 UTC
I really liked the vibe of this game. The droning music and sfx were on point. I love the fact that you never know what you're walking into. When they run after you its unnerving because you swing the same speed.
DrSmey
11. Apr 2025 · 18:25 UTC
Very atmospheric and cool style.
Skvader_418
11. Apr 2025 · 20:18 UTC
The atmosphere and graphics were all brilliant. The idea aswell is very good, but it was just too difficult. I couldn't beat it. Your swing speed is just laughable. I know the tip said that I should kill nearby enemies but I could barely kill 1 enemy. Even then, the speaker attracts 2 more and it's just instant game over.
SurWeaver
12. Apr 2025 · 14:16 UTC
Your game is very cool and tough, it's done very cool! Pickaxe hits feel very heavy, slow turns, it has a very good effect on immersion. Not to mention the visuals and sounds :D It's done just great in any case, but it's nice that all the elements of the game complement each other and give a very good combination!

I already told one game that it is top 1, but now for me you both are in first place according to all criteria :D It's done just great, you are all breathtaking!! :D
jacobingalls
15. Apr 2025 · 03:45 UTC
![Screenshot 2025-04-14 204159.png](///raw/da9/b1/z/6c352.png)

That was hard! The sound design was impeccable. Really liked the mood. The diegetic health system was very tense and extremely polished feeling. It made every interaction feel important. Great job!
mars88
22. Apr 2025 · 02:38 UTC
This is amazing.
Paulsams
25. Apr 2025 · 17:10 UTC
It's a very atmospheric game. But at some point, 3 zombies attacked me and squeezed me in a vice, but overall I really liked it.
GreenRadiation
29. Apr 2025 · 18:52 UTC
I'm so glad you got a good result in the end! Great game and well-deserved 11th place in Mood!
🎤 ArkansasLover
01. May 2025 · 13:09 UTC
@greenradiation Thanks for your support! Our team is prototyping a larger game based on this game jam. If you are interested in playing it, consider following the Twitter account in my bio where I'll post updates in the coming months.