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A Pyre Horizon's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Theme | #39 | 4.250 | 4.250 |
| Fun | #48 | 3.969 | 3.969 |
| Presentation | #81 | 4.281 | 4.281 |
| Originality | #105 | 4.000 | 4.000 |
Ranked from 34 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
How does your game represent "Power"?
This game spotlights burning fuel as a resource to power a city and defend against an overwhelming wildfire that threatens to burn down the whole world.
There is a thematic spin on power, as the player needs to use non-renewable energy sources. The sun has been stolen away, blocked by the monsters that keep the skies dark, ensuring our need for fire.
If you can't reach the end, no worries! But I hope you check out the ending as I explain it in this video:
https://www.twitch.tv/videos/2372466238
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Comments
I finally came around to play this and I had a great time :) This kinda feels really polished!
ty :3 maybe playground politics protag could convince the world to combat the extinction event
What an excellent atmosphere and theme, I loved the mechanic of expanding the area of influence with the lights, expanding into the dark scary unkown! Normally I'm not an RTS gamer, but this game actually hooked me since I just love concepts surrounding human extinction or big cosmic horrors. The ending was awesome, especially loved the modeling done for this. Amazing entry!
thanks so much!!!!! yeah i had no idea i'd be this deep in the blender mines. we weren't exactly going for looking like you're in a cavern, but i think i'm kinda down for the look, bc we associate living in caves with a primitive time in human history, so the juxtaposition of having an advanced city built inside of a cave sort of contributes to the theming that our use of non-renewable "fire" is primitive and keeps us from advancing, a sign of barbarism. it was my first time making hair and applying shaders the way i did to the model. like for instance, at the end with the burning hole, that burning parts had many different particles layered on of course, but the texture had a mesh displacement shader that caused the burning parts to look like they were undulating with heat distortion. i wasn't confident in my ability to make something humanoid, but it really came together, especially with the particles.
and the cosmic horror thing, yea! like a lot of that stuff involves unearthing some dark terror from an ancient civilization or something. especially with lovecraft-inspired work. but the funny thing is that fossils are often underground, but so are fossil fuels. the pieces all mesh really cohesively together. humanity unearthed something of unimaginable power, but may soon be destroyed by it. fossil fuels are kind of cosmic horror in that regard. it'd be fine if they didn't cause ecological collapse and climate catastrophe, but we unfortunately unearthed extinction from the earth. been really feeling it on the themes, which the RTS gameplay expresses really well.
Very very nice gameplay, coming from StarCraft2 i felt home, trading workers for military felt really awesome (and horrifying) and the game made me focus when i realized power requires constant fire supply. Arts are incredible, ending is cinema. Would love to see a post-jam version with keybind shortcuts and speed settings (like in sc2). Also procedural map generation was always so incredible to me, crazy you made it work so well in 10 days!
Thanks for the comment :D
There is actually no procedural generation. That's one of the features we didn't manage to fit in.
But I will probably do the key shortcuts if I have the time.
we discussed having noisemaps generate the map, but we didn't get around to it in time ๐ฉ yea we were talking about making the resource burn feel really urgent. having to peel workers off the mining rigs for combat units is pretty grim yeah lmao. i can't speak much to the gameplay side of things, but i did want to dress up the main gameplay to be really stressful. like bordering on unbearably stressful. >:3c
Alright team, I know that the screenshots show a city with 1700 people, and that our city has 12. Yes, I know only 6 of you still have mining jobs after our heavy military recruitment drive. But I believe it is precisely this tightknit bond that will allow us to stop the horrific entity approaching from the horizon.
[๐๐ฑ๐ถ๐๐ผ๐ฟ'๐ ๐ป๐ผ๐๐ฒ: ๐ง๐ต๐ฒ๐ ๐ฑ๐ถ๐ฑ ๐ป๐ผ๐ ๐๐๐ผ๐ฝ ๐๐ต๐ฒ ๐ต๐ผ๐ฟ๐ฟ๐ถ๐ณ๐ถ๐ฐ ๐ฒ๐ป๐๐ถ๐๐ ๐ฎ๐ฝ๐ฝ๐ฟ๐ผ๐ฎ๐ฐ๐ต๐ถ๐ป๐ด ๐ณ๐ฟ๐ผ๐บ ๐๐ต๐ฒ ๐ต๐ผ๐ฟ๐ถ๐๐ผ๐ป]
Very fun game.
damb, the attaboy timeline doomed asf :'3 why weren't u producing a city with a population of 1700 in the year 20XX? too busy being a CHILD?
In the year 20XX I was too busy playing Teleco, like the rest of the world
yako_oho
I was excited to sit down and play this one from the second I even saw it pop up in the list of submissions. Well made RTS are my jam, and this one's focus on expansion and protecting as opposed to just eradicating and storming opponent bases hits just right. I wish there were better ways to keep track of your citizens and their whereabouts, especially as your city becomes a sprawling nightmare to manage. The usage of units for combat didn't fully click either until I had been playing for a minute.
Wasn't able to sit through a long enough game just yet to see the ending, but hopefully I'll have a second before the end of the jam to bust through it and witness it in all its glory.
Great atmosphere, good game play, good difficulty scaling for each mode of play, and perfect resource management.
that's really cool to hear ๐ญ i did not have much confidence in our jam page for the first few days lmao, so i'm glad it caught your eye. glad you like the atmosphere and difficulty! mike worked real hard to tune the numbers on resource management so i'm sure he's stoked to hear it.
Impressively fleshed out mechanics given the timeframe we had! I sunk countless hours of my childhood into the Command & Conquer games of the 2000's, and this brought me right back. The music, atmosphere, and resource mechanics were exactly what I want from an RTS. I loved how the power plant periodically consumed fire rather than constantly eating it up, that adds another layer of strategy to the mix.
Great job! :)
ya thx! if u check the boneyard server, our thread on it was full of comments like "omg you know we only have 10 days right" and yea we were run ragged lmao.
Pretty solid little game! I'm incredibly bad at RTS, so I struggled for sure. Ended up losing, even on Easy which speaks volumes of my abilities. I kept recruiting more people and I wouldn't have any to work with, not sure where they went... They probably went somewhere, but I just didn't see where?
I feel like I'd have a much better go a second time around with a firmer grasp on how it worked; Even starting with the tutorial, I felt rather lost but again I think that's more on my complete lack of any experience in this genre of game.
The music was nice, the setting has potential to look really cool, for me it was very dark (again a skill issue. :P), and even kept me interested and kept my attention in a type of game I typically avoid at all costs. Nice work!
nice, very cool. i hope u finish it eventually ๐ฉi grinded the last day of the jam to put a nice cutscene in. but it's not my wheelhouse either so i understand ur pain. hot tip: always keep citizens recruiting, and build into iron early. >:3 it is a shame how little u can see the details on the assets but c'est la vie. if we were gonna do a postjam patch i think i'd try and make it so u can zoom in way further and perhaps light the small assets better.
I'll probably give it another try on the weekend, I definitely don't want your last day of work to go to waste! I definitely tried to keep up with recruiting, but again in the late game I feel like I recruited 4 or 5 people and they just vanished. Do they automatically go somewhere if they're needed, like can the soldiers running defense die and need to be replaced?
the combat units have a replenishing tickbox that's automatically checked :3 ty though! tell me what u think when u get around to it
Very atmospheric city builder! The gamemechanics are quite easy to understand and the resource management didn't get overwhelming. I really liked the atmosphere and the music, but I had to turn off my desklamp to see the game properly. The ending was also a noce addition to the game. By the way, what caliber is that bullet in the cannon? Awesome job on the game!
yo ozmaister! it's been awhile!! i'm glad you enjoyed the game, idk what caliber it is, i just searched up "sniper bullet" and made the first thing i saw haha. but the gun itself is a bastard combination of a lot of things, particularly an archaic turret rifle.
yo! I just found it funny that the cannon uses a normal looking gunpowder propelled bullet that is the size of four houses. Seems a bit overkill. Truly a bastard cannon. Nice to see you could join the jam this year.
mike also thought it was weird and wanted it to be just a rounded slug or smth, but i was like nah, i like the blend of contradictory elements. besides, a railgun will shoot whatever metal you put into it. :p
I really like the resource management component also that the tutorial is very clear and I was not confused after it. the gameplay loop was a lot of fun. great job!
thank u! hope u got to see the ending >:3 tried to wrap it up in a neat little package
that was super fun! really nice gameplay loop and really well balanced resource prioritization. I love that the exponential growth of the city ends with the climax of the narrative too! really really great job!
thanks bagel >:3 yeah i wanted the city to expand even more, but apparently balancing that in was difficult. it is though, as they say, ~ludonarrative~ and i really enjoy that. now that i'm thinking about it though i should've had the enemies that come in at least be on fire or something. not that you could really see it that well to begin with.
Wow, I'm honestly blown away. The gameplay loop is solid, similar to single player Age of Empires II in a lot of ways. And the ending was epic! Reminded me of the moon coming down in Majora's Mask, muy epico
yea! imminent apocalypse scenarios are very cool, i also recently watched the evangelion rebuilds and shin godzilla so it was on my mind. Mike, my jam partner, recently got into age of empires so you hit it right on the head. idr if you were there, but check out my explanation of the ending and themes from the twitch link in the description!
Man, this is a good game! Really enjoying the City Builders in this jam. The vibes, worldbuilding are great, and that ending!!!
ty travis!!!! yeah it's funny that there's more than one but ig with the power theming it's more likely than "mode" lmao
I didn't get too far but I enjoyed making the city larger fun game!
aw dang, u gotta reach the end of it, easy mode only lasts 1000 seconds!
alright you caught me, I'm actually just not a fan of these types of games... but just for you I'll give it another go and reply to this comment when I do it
โค๏ธโค๏ธ
build into iron early and make sure to keep recruiting!
Alright just beat easy mode, I did die once because I misunderstood that placing a barrack does not necessarily mean it will be populated lol. Got it second try and hot damn that ending was fire. Reminds me of the prerendered stuff in FFVII, like if Midgar had a huge gun that killed a giant Sephiroth. Very cool and fun once I figured it out
nice nice!! yea awesome, thank you so much for playing! mike (twanglingblimp) has played a lot of age of empires, so he did all the heavy lifting in design and programming, i haven't played pretty must any RTS games either but once you get the hang of it it's pretty cool! twanglingblimp actually wanted it to have a sort of PS1 style to it, and likewise was very down for the FMV style of the cutscene. glad you enjoyed the ending scene too, we both grinded as much as possible to get the game finished so the assets and direction likewise took a lot out of me haha.
if ur interested i like to do interviews with other jam devs to play their games and ask about their process, i'd love to have you on too sometime this week!
That would be awesome! I put a lot of work into my game too and I'd love to talk about it
add me on discord! @bonejackal
No shame in it.
I was fully prepared for most people not to be into the genre. It is rather niche after all. I only got into some RTS games last year.
But I think it's awesome you are giving it another try. Bonejackal worked really hard on the ending and I think it's absolutely worth seeing.
fun rts citybuilding, PEAK ending! i love the writing/worldbuiding style in this genre of media.
shoutouts bonejackal for hosting dev interviews, made me appreciate this one even more!
we are (not) cooked
thank u so much!!!!! yeah i really wanted to do justice to the concept! i forgot to even mention that the enemies have fossil theming not only because they're allegorical for fossil fuels, but that the fossils that comprise them are extinct. like by relying on fossil fuels they'll drag us back into the ocean after extincting us too. it's kind of like divine justice or something. spent a long time thinking about it. :'3 sure hope we're not cooked IRL
Tysm,
I agree that the theming and concept of our game really made it all come together. Congrats on getting to the end.
This was a real banger, my favorite so far. I stupidly went straight to hard mode and got sent back to the tutorial in defeat, but after I actually knew what I was doing this was super engaging. I love RTS games and this is a really cool interpretation of it. Its so moody and atmospheric and that ending hits HARD lol. Great work!
aw tysm dude ๐ญyea mike knows what he's doing. don't worry though, i couldn't beat hard first try either. i'm glad u liked it, and yeah i was grinding the wheels hard for the ending, it's basically all i did the last day. T w T
Respect for going for hard mode from the get go.
I'm also glad that so far I have heard a lot of positive opinions from people who actually play RTS. I'm pretty new to the genre and this was my first shot at designing one myself, so I'm pumped to hear that you liked the interpretation of the genre.
Tysm for playing :D
nice submission again this year, this is pretty fun but I do like me an RTS, I like the theming and feel of it, I think this is the best example of power in an electricity sense I've seen, since you made good use of the light/darkness of the world. I didn't beat it yet on normal (a couple attempts after tutorial), but I have the feeling of wanting to try again soon, but I gotta rate others rn lol
ayo kobemano >:3 we are jam colleagues yet again
i put my whole themeussy into this one as much as i could. my jam partner mike did all the coding side of things while i did direction and assets real hard. i wanna see how u feel about the ending!!
Oh yes, bonejack really cooked with the theming while I was pulling my hair out trying to figure out the game design lol.
Thanks for playing :D
I'm now of the opinion that every RTS needs a part where you shoot god with a big gun.
u would be correct :3
Oh absolutely !
as an RTS noob, i enjoyed playing on easy difficulty. i got the hang of things after messing myself up in the first minute twice lol. but the third attempt, i went all the way and beat it. i love the gloomy athmosphere, the mechanics are well thought out. managing a city that runs on non-renewable power and defending against attacks is very stressful... who knew?
o ya, i wanted it to be even more stressful, but it's the nature of the shorter deadline ๐ฉ๐ฉ i wanted a lot more stuff to catch fire and for there to be notifications from systems HQ or smth that would have dialogue for when things are getting fucked up, but poor miichael and i were already worked to the brink . glad u enjoyed it and managed to beat it. :]
Congrats on finishing it >:D
imagine living next to a big gun
i don't gotta imagine :3
wouldn't that be crazy o-O
THE RED SEA PARTS
i will bury u deeper than the sundown
lemme bring a shovel
We cannot wait any longer !