LudumData

Squirrel swirl by rucksack

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

screenshot.png

Gameplay

Welcome to our IDLE / Tower Defense Game: Squirrel swirl

Explore the depht of the forest to gather ressources and defend yourself against the evil ducklings.

This game is set up in three phases:

  1. Noon phase: Build your path into the woods to collect different ressources. But be mindfull, as the amount of resources increases step by step.

    • Acorn: Used to build new roads

    • Meat: increases the productivity of your horde

    • Crystal: used to upgrade your tower

  2. Dusk phase: Short phase to prepare yourself for the upcoming wave.

    • Frost tower: decreases the speed of the enemies
    • Damage tower: increases damgage output
    • Speed tower: increases the tower attack speed

  3. Night phase: Fight against a wave of enemies (unskippable)

    • amount of enemies increases every night

Controls

Interact: left mouse button

move camera: WASD or put your mouse to the edge of the screen skip to next phase: SPACE

Focus camera on the base: Q

Focus camera on the road: E

Pause: ESC

Note

You can either play the browser version or as a download. If you have performance issues we recommend playing the download version.

Known Bugs

​In the browser version, keyboard input may not work occasionally. Use the downloadable version instead.

Music

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jsLUdXwNxug

Thank you for playing :v:

Link https://rucksack.itch.io/squirrel-swirl
Link https://rucksack.itch.io/squirrel-swirl
Original URL https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/57/squirrel-swirl

Ratings

Overall 318th 3.7⭐ 47🧑‍⚖️
Fun 287th 3.6⭐ 47🧑‍⚖️
Innovation 485th 3.167⭐ 47🧑‍⚖️
Theme 781th 2.767⭐ 47🧑‍⚖️
Graphics 542th 3.433⭐ 47🧑‍⚖️
Audio 252th 3.622⭐ 47🧑‍⚖️
Humor 261th 3.274⭐ 44🧑‍⚖️
Mood 468th 3.522⭐ 47🧑‍⚖️
Given 75🗳️ 92🗨️

Feedback

threegoldeneggs
08. Apr 2025 · 02:34 UTC
Very cute, thanks for sharing! It was satisfying to carve a path through the forest, and I loved the evil ducklings.
LDJam user 399564
08. Apr 2025 · 15:44 UTC
wow I like the graphic and audio, nice game!
mineiwik
08. Apr 2025 · 15:52 UTC
Great combination of tower defence and idle game - love it!
nojoule
08. Apr 2025 · 16:00 UTC
Made it to 178 squirrels! I was confused by the tower upgrades. I could not figure out what they do except the slowing one. For the squirrel road i was wondering if the path length to a building matters. The scaling of the cost without adding anything new felt boring quite fast, but due to time constraints i understand. Good job though, i dig all the small squirrels moving around!
Senkoso
08. Apr 2025 · 16:07 UTC
I really like these games, I sat at it for 30 minutes until I lost. You guys are great, it's cool!!! 💗
xorfe
08. Apr 2025 · 22:10 UTC
The graphics are nice. At one point during gameplay, we can only wait for resources, which affects the flow. The music and SFX could have been supported by other effects (like shake, punch, etc.). Overall, it's good.
Hurp
08. Apr 2025 · 22:23 UTC
Loved this game, satisfying audio and gameplay! Would play again :D
sirblazealot
08. Apr 2025 · 22:24 UTC
This game was really fun and I played for quite a while. I really liked the art and building a path to gather resources is a pretty unique idea!
Lisek Gagatek
08. Apr 2025 · 22:46 UTC
Very solid game. I think I went super far into the run with almost reaching 4096 squirrels upgrade. It was a little confusing at first, I think it would be way better if you greyed out upgrades when the player doesn't have enoguh resource for purchase, instead of just hiding the buttons. Also, it was really hard to judge whether it was better to build a new tower or upgrade the existing one. Some info on tower damage, slow%, attack speed would really help (does upgrading slowing towers incsrease damage, or just slow% ?). Once it clicked, it was a very pleasent game. Congrats!
Broco
09. Apr 2025 · 00:31 UTC
Nice game! I really like the "exploring the forest experience" by building the path. Not sure if the squirrels running around do anything at all, but it feels great watching them grow in numbers.
Also the music fits nicely to the game's aesthetic. Maybe some little squirrel noises every now and then would have been great!

I really liked it! Played it for a while, until I lost. I think it's endless, right?
Good job!
LLlarsO
09. Apr 2025 · 10:04 UTC
@lisek-gagatek Thanks for the good ideas. I keep forgetting to upgrade the squirrel amount, so it would help a lot, if it would flash for a short time. To grey out upgrades or the roads is indeed helpful.

The balance between new towers and upgrading towers is not finished. It was just too late for us to balance it correctly, cause I think now it's is better to buy the "cheap" new towers first.

@broco Some squirrel noises is a neat suggestion! Yes you are right, the game is endless. Our "highscore" is the 4096 upgrade like @lisek-gagatek.
aviolin
09. Apr 2025 · 17:10 UTC
i liked the music and how it was a game that could go on forever if you wanted to. pretty relaxing in that sense!
LittleGamer
09. Apr 2025 · 17:49 UTC
Quite a complete game, the musics are very nice and the graphics funny. It's a bit slow to my taste but it's a nice game.
LDJam user 179298
09. Apr 2025 · 18:25 UTC
Cute squirrels fighting evil ducks what more do you need. I really enjoyed playing the game, the towers attacking was pretty satisfying, I wish I could speed up time tho.
woona
10. Apr 2025 · 06:07 UTC
It took me some time to figure out the rules, but overall it's an enjoyable game. The idea to make a single path is interesting but it could lead to a situation when the player soft-locks themselves if there is no way to grow the path.

Great job with drawing the forest, it looks cool!
Toupaks
10. Apr 2025 · 11:38 UTC
Feels like a good ol war3 Tower Defense, nice ! With there was a way to modify the road after you started understanding what you should do but I guess that's part of the game to make a single path. Looks really cool with the army of squirrel slaves ! gg
Arluci
10. Apr 2025 · 17:52 UTC
Very addicting, love it!!
LDJam user 395340
10. Apr 2025 · 19:47 UTC
Pretty adictive. Seeing the squirrel horde growing and running around was so satisfying. This has so far been the game I've played the longest!

I did find myself getting annoyed that I couldn't branch the path. It adds a puzzle element, which had it's own kind of enjoyment, and it forced me to go deeper (appropriate for the theme). I understand the choice. I do wonder if there's a way to mitigate the annoyance, while still maintaining that puzzling/go deeper element. Maybe add an option for branching paths, but they're more expensive? Or they are an upgrade the player works towards (which would make the branches feel super satisfying)? Just spitballing, only you know what the game should look, feel, and play like ;)

It'd also be cool if there was some sign on the ducks to show the effects of the towers. Now, I upgraded the towers haphazardly because I couldn't gauge what they were doing. It would be fun to see the effect of each tower and it could help players understand what their towers are doing (and what effect they maybe are missing).
Empyreans
14. Apr 2025 · 16:29 UTC
https://youtu.be/ZHOZCjZbziA

Had fun on stream with this one :) Still can't get over sleek squirrel animations.

Give me more Cyber Critter spin-offs!

~Xp
sangheli
14. Apr 2025 · 21:22 UTC
Fantastic game!
I love exploring games about squirrels and nuts,
and this one even mixes idle, minesweeper, and tower defense mechanics.
It’s really satisfying to chill and play.
The only thing—I didn’t quite get the ‘depths’ theme.
oxnh
14. Apr 2025 · 22:49 UTC
Your game is really fun and the music fits well, but I don't feel like it's core mechanics are explained very well. I'm confused if sprawling the path out is a good strategy, because wouldn't it be better just to have a short path to all the core resources so the squirrels can run back and fourth faster? Or do the resources become more valuable further out? Also it was hard to understand what the tower upgrades did just from their icon. Still, I enjoyed the time I spent playing.
LLlarsO
15. Apr 2025 · 00:29 UTC
@mikemikemakes: Thanks for the good ideas. The branching paths system could be a nice addition, but because of the theme we used the single path, so the player is forced to get deeper as you said. Anyway thanks for the good input and it's cool, that you played it so long. :)

@sangheli: Thanks for the kind words. "Depths" is represented by the fact, that you are going in the depths of the forest. You have a fog of war, so you don't know what will expect you there. That's why we only have a long street, so you get deep into the forest.

@oxnh: The distance is not relevant. The squirrels are just a visual indicator, that the ressource is being used. I tried to make it clear by the symbols, what the towers are doing, but I guess it's too small to recognise. Thanks for the feedback.
oliver_day
15. Apr 2025 · 11:19 UTC
I really liked the polish of this entry (little things like how 1 pig shows up when there is a set or different animations when the squirrels start mining). The strategy was interesting to i had to try a few times before i survived 5 waves.
atsh
15. Apr 2025 · 15:26 UTC
The animation of the gem mine was very cute, the music was fantastic, and I really liked the forest was endless

I'm less into idle games, but didn't found much at fault with this game - I guess more animation and variety wouldn't hurt, but the content for 3 days is very good
slay a stone
15. Apr 2025 · 17:53 UTC
Cute game! It felt nice to built a small economy. UI could have been a bit better (like telling ingame what towers do, and showing upgrading/building possibilities when you lack the requirements)
Alexis Brochec
15. Apr 2025 · 20:43 UTC
really cool entry, the game was laggy in html5 for me.
Really cute, maybe add a tutorial.
I_POTS
16. Apr 2025 · 11:15 UTC
Cute game! I like this tower defense gameplay!
jk5000
16. Apr 2025 · 11:26 UTC
A sweet and very well made little game. Well done.
Ashe Liu
17. Apr 2025 · 22:35 UTC
Great game! I keep playing it so I can explore the world. But the game pace seems a bit slow, it will be better if there is a speed function.
Tunasandwich
18. Apr 2025 · 20:14 UTC
That was satisfying ! I liked the sound mood and to see my little squirrels running around. I had trouble understanding the differences in the type of towers and also I am not sure of the impact of upgrading them from one number to another. I would say also that I spent a lot of time waiting for the ressources to be gathered, but still I played quite some time so I was hooked nonetheless apparently :)
Shasaur
22. Apr 2025 · 20:45 UTC
Very very fun gameplay loop. Took some time to understand how to play, but then played for a long time :) Squirrels were very cute!
JAMESDEV
23. Apr 2025 · 06:20 UTC
Very addicting little tower defense! Got up to 261ish squirrels. Good work!
Color and Form
23. Apr 2025 · 10:45 UTC
nice game!
RubixNoob13
24. Apr 2025 · 10:56 UTC
I absolutely loved the art style and music in this game. And I love Tower Defense games, so it was a lot of fun!

I just want to know why are those ducks so mad, though? :laughing:

Great job!