Hero's Quest by GFM

made by GFM for LD33 (COMPO)

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About
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As the Hero of a village, you must follow the orders when you are told that
there are menacing creatures on the forest...

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Compiling
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Refer to the README.md found on the repository.

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Dependencies (linux)
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Note: The Windows build has all the necessary libraries.

This game depends on SDL2 and GFraMe.

You can get SDL2 from the its site (https://www.libsdl.org/) or from your
distro's package manager (well, on linux). On Ubuntu, run:

$ sudo apt-get install libsdl2-dev

Note that to run the game you should simply install the runtime libs;

$ sudo apt-get install libsdl2-2.0.0

GFraMe can only be obtained from its repository
(https://github.com/SirGFM/GFraMe). Clone/Download it and run

$ sudo make install

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Installation
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No extra steps are needed. Just be sure that the 'assets' directory on the same
one where the application is.

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Instructions
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movement - WASD / arrow keys
attack - space bar / 'X'
quit - esc

Double tap in a direction to run

To start in fullscreen mode, start the game through the command line with the
option -f.
If the audio is lagging, run with the option -m to disable it.

Note: There are scripts for running with those options, on Windows.

Windows	https://github.com/SirGFM/ld33/releases/download/v1.0.0/HerosQuest_win.zip
Linux	https://github.com/SirGFM/ld33/releases/download/v1.0.0/HerosQuest_linux.tar.gz
Source	https://github.com/SirGFM/ld33/tree/v1.0.0
Post Mortem	http://ludumdare.com/compo/2015/08/25/heros-quest-post-mortem/
Original URL	https://ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-33/?action=preview&uid=7375

Ratings

Coolness	75%	2
Overall	2.97	607

Audio	3.31	201
Fun	2.47	811
Graphics	3.87	139
Humor	2.34	623
Innovation	2.15	865
Mood	2.77	602
Theme	2.97	705

Feedback

JoeProgram

24. Aug 2015 · 03:56 UTC

Nice entry! I wasn't able to make it to the end - the dagger is small enough that I was only making it to about the 5th aggressive slime before succumbing.

Gravity Games

24. Aug 2015 · 19:44 UTC

The graphics and audio were really nice, but overall, the game was pretty bad IMO. It was very much just a chore to play. The dagger was much, MUCH too short to reliably attack enemies, so any progress felt like it was made by pure dumb luck. There was also absolutely no indication of the player's health at all, so there's no way of even knowing how much longer you're going to last. Heck, because of this I thought the player was invincible at first.

SilentNight

24. Aug 2015 · 22:15 UTC

The graphics and music were nice but I agree that the dagger was way too short with the long animation to actually avoid dying. I didn't make it to the end but it looked and sounded good.

DifferentName

24. Aug 2015 · 22:25 UTC

What about the theme? You play as the hero, not the monster. Maybe he's supposed to be a metaphorical monster, but I can't tell, which isn't good. Maybe it's answered more later on, but I kept dying.

Also, I feel like the weapon should go farther forward in the attack.

bclikesyou

24. Aug 2015 · 23:35 UTC

The graphics and sound quickly drew me in. The controls work well enough too. However the attack just feels like a toss up when you're dealing with an enemy that approaches you. I was never sure if I was going to get a hit in or not.

I played it a couple of times and would've liked to skip the beginning story as well.

There's definitely something there! Just need to make it a bit more forgivable.

🎤 GFM

25. Aug 2015 · 00:56 UTC

Thanks for all the comments!

I admit that the game lacked any actual playtest, so it's to be expected that it isn't quite playable to anyone but the developer... XD

I'll soon write a post-mortem in which I intent to address the reason behind most of those issues. But it was pretty much lack of time and direction (I went through most of the jam thinking about doing a game but ending doing something pretty different...).

On a side note, use the scripts to skip the intro or run in full screen! Next time, I'll parse the options from a file... that should be clearer for the user...

mklee

25. Aug 2015 · 03:19 UTC

Very nice! The graphics are very nice and polished and I like the slight twist with "good" end. It's a little hard with the knife's reach being so short, wished it was just a tad longer! Great job still!

Kakureta

25. Aug 2015 · 18:02 UTC

The game was difficult but I enjoyed it nonetheless. I liked the graphics and music too. Although I understand the connection between the theme and the game, I still don't think it fits well.

TimWright

26. Aug 2015 · 00:43 UTC

Good job. I really liked the music. I got stuck trying to get passed a dead monster once.

Solchain

26. Aug 2015 · 00:47 UTC

Kind of a chore to play through. No indication of health and the player's weapon is not reliable to attack with. The theme doesn't seem to be present at all unless the player is a monster for killing these creatures but half of them were quite aggressive. It would have made sense to make all of the creatures passive to give the player a sense that they are the monster. However, I enjoyed the graphics and audio.

Jupiter_Hadley

26. Aug 2015 · 12:25 UTC

I found the attacks to be a bit odd, but I like the little slime-esque creatures. I included it in part 6 of my Ludum Dare 33 Compilation video series, if you would like to take a look :) https://youtu.be/keaznjOtLXA

GBGames

26. Aug 2015 · 13:48 UTC

Oh, my heart broke when I heard the squeek and saw the tearful faces of the blue slimes!

I liked how you introduced each of the different slimes in their own area before combining them. It wasn't clear that they got stronger, and so I died when I didn't expect the red slime to survive the attack.

The controls were a bit clunky in that attacking never felt right, but otherwise it was smooth.

The theme was a bit on the nose, although from many other comments, apparently it is still too hard to tell that there's a question of who the real monster is even though it is telegraphed from the intro and the "good ending?" screen, and it definitely shows in the "bad ending?" screen.

Good work!

rudra

26. Aug 2015 · 14:51 UTC

Really liked the graphics and the audio, nice work !

MechanicMoon

27. Aug 2015 · 11:31 UTC

The game is fun at first but later it is very repetitive. The graphics are good, but the music is boring. I like the gameplay, but the game needs some polishing and extra skills to be more dynamic. Good try and keep making games!

Quetzakol

27. Aug 2015 · 11:36 UTC

I liked the graphics and the music ! However the game is difficult since you have no indication of your health and I didn't really find a way to avoid the attacks of the red creatures. Nice job !

dhargan

28. Aug 2015 · 21:07 UTC

Good entry! However it is the opposite of the theme :(

kaitokidi

28. Aug 2015 · 21:07 UTC

Omg so good gg!

dhargan

28. Aug 2015 · 21:09 UTC

Good entry! However it is the opposite of the theme :(

adsilcott

28. Aug 2015 · 21:14 UTC

Fun and simple game. Music was great.

29. Aug 2015 · 07:03 UTC

I really enjoy both your game, engine and post.

BTW, since your engine is based on SDL2, maybe you can give Emscripten a try. This could compile your code to javascript and let people paly it on browsers. I use it for this LD and the performance is acceptable.

mar3k

29. Aug 2015 · 10:35 UTC

Interesting little game witch nice graphics (I really like those colors). But the thing I don't really like is the range on the weapon and in that case almost no chance to not get hit by enemies while hitting them and also not being able to see the HP of player.

🎤 GFM

29. Aug 2015 · 13:08 UTC

Thanks, again, for all the comments!

I've made a post to try to explain the theme, for those who did quite get it. http://ludumdare.com/compo/2015/08/29/explaining-the-theme/

@KK

I had given up on doing web games after I moved from AS3 to C. I tried Chrome's NaCl but it didn't work and I didn't want spend a lot of time trying to get it to work... But you have given me back some hope about being able to do it.

As soon as I boot into Linux (erm, OK... Ubuntu... XD), I'll try that! =D

Thanks for the tip!!

Literal Games

29. Aug 2015 · 17:10 UTC

Cool, really tricky though. Like the graphic style a lot!

bodsey

01. Sep 2015 · 16:08 UTC

I'm not sure either how this is related to the theme, at first I thought were nice but after I got attacked so I didn't understand. I didn't finish the game. I also second the fact that the game misses an health bar. But apart from that I think it's a nice entry, it's quite good-looking.

RockhopperGames

06. Sep 2015 · 13:19 UTC

I eventually got round to playing this one, and first off all, lovely graphics and music. The falling leaves in the background are a particularly nice touch.

I do have to agree with the others about the difficulty of fighting with the dagger, though. One improvement would be to widen the input window for follow up attacks (or store inputs for them), so players trying to combo slimes don't have to time their attack so carefully or be left standing. Widening the doubletap window for dashing could be nice too, or just implementing a dash button.

I did play it all the way through, though the number of times the slimes killed me before I reached the end made me feel like they would indeed present a threat to the village! I tried for a pacifist run and couldn't get that, but I managed to get through the game only killing slimes that attacked, and was a little dissapointed to find the ending was still the same. Still, good work with the time you had!

kakarotsan

13. Sep 2015 · 08:33 UTC

Good install instructions. Everything ran very nicely on Linux. Nice mood.

The gameplay was not very interesting due to the shortness of the dagger. It could have been a lot better with a longer range, a faster attack, or a variety of slashes.

Nice attempt!