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smack paddle: bounce ball's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Fun | #11 | 3.957 | 3.957 |
| Originality | #12 | 4.000 | 4.000 |
| Accessibilty | #22 | 3.130 | 3.130 |
| Overall | #23 | 3.528 | 3.528 |
| Audio | #30 | 3.261 | 3.261 |
| Controls | #37 | 3.261 | 3.261 |
| Graphics | #42 | 3.391 | 3.391 |
| Theme | #42 | 3.696 | 3.696 |
Ranked from 23 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
Godot Version
v4.3.stable.official [77dcf97d8]
Wildcards Used
N/A
Game Description
You got your Breakout in my Vampire Survivors!
How does your game tie into the theme?
The key mechanic of the game is to bounce balls with your paddle and the walls. It's like a physical reflection!
Source(s)
N/A
Discord Username(s)
N/A
Participation Level (GWJ Only)
0
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Comments
I enjoyed my time with this, good job!
My Notes
Not what I was expecting at all! I really like the way that the tank controls "take you out" of the Arkanoid frame right away without feeling exactly like a dozen other Vampire Survivor-likes. Its unfortunate that problems with farming come along with this mashup, but for a jam game I appreciate the leaning in and spending effort on the experience that's there (upgrades, etc).
Interesting mix of Breakout and Vampire Survivors, haha! I like this one. I'll echo what others have said about the XP staying between level changes. I also feel like the tank controls could be changed to something more intuative, like maybe experiment with normal WASD movement then the mouse can rotate the paddle? Not sure, the tank controls still fit pretty well though. Otherwise, had a great time playing this one!
WASD + mouse is a good suggestion, thanks :D
Amazing idea, and a pretty solid execution — outside of some glaring design issues. My main complaint is that clearing stages is at odds with farming exp, which makes for a weird gameplay dynamic. Destroying enemy spawners means I get less exp, so I’m incentivized to farm instead, which isn’t very engaging. Enemies kinda clump up in the middle, unless I deliberately kite them to the edges, but I didn’t find that very interesting to do. Also, I was disappointed when all the exp on the ground (behind the swarm of enemies) disappeared every time I cleared a stage — it’d be much more satisfying if all of it was vacuumed up instead.
Complaints aside, this was really fun, and I played until the frame rate approached zero. Pleasant colors, nice vfx, crunchy sfx, cool upgrades… it’s all great, only held back by the design issues I mentioned. I absolutely love the idea!!
Yep, I'm in agreement with the sentiment here! It was on my todo list to address, in particular adding upsides to eliminating spawners early and clearing levels quickly. Vacuuming up the leftover XP, even at a discounted rate, would be a neat thing to add. Thanks for playing!
Concept is cool, but I think I got a bug, with ball not killing enemies on start of level until I got a bonus (by rushing myself the enemies). Could be interesting to push the concept !
Was this on the second round? The enemies gain health and deal increasing damage every round, so even by round 2, they'll take more than one hit from an un-accelerated ball.
Balls passed multiple times on the enemies without killing them. But I retried it, and this time, 2 or 3 hits and they die. This time, I made a new game, and there was massive lag on level 7, with of course a loooooooot of enemies and 8 or 9 balls I think. But hey, this is a fun game, really !
FYI: I go in the middle of a side, I wait until every line comes to me, I start going down, then I go on the other side with a boost and get all the bonuses, then I start again. Pretty solid strategy :D
Super cool concept - creative take on the survivorslike formula. I found it interesting that increase and decrease paddle size were both upgrades lol. I kind of had the opposite experience of the other posters, where it felt like it was generally difficult to have impact as you're kind of hoping that the ball just gets close to your paddle. I was really into it while playing though - awesome job. Congrats on the submission!
Wow, I really loved this blend of Arkanoid and vampire-survivors-like game! If not for the frame rate issue - I would keep playing for hours :D Although the health becomes a bit of an issues, and maybe some block should restore you some health? Or maybe there were and I just was to busy avoiding enemies to notice :D
Anyway, lots of fun and I can definitely imagine it becoming a unique full-fledged game!
Enjoyed your take on the theme. Enjoyed the color choice a lot. Felt really retro!
I like the concept, though I'd be curious to try a version with the tank controls reversed so that up/down rotates and left/right moves, which I think would make it a bit easier to try to hit the balls while moving. Had a great time as-is though!
Hmmm, interesting suggestion! The controls do seem to be a sticking point for some based on the comments. I'm not sure if I misunderstood your idea but I tried it just now and my brain can't handle it haha. But I guess this is how the current controls feel for others, so I totally get it. I am curious if a gamepad and twin-stick controls would be fun - an experiment for another day/jam :)
One of my favorites so far. Very clever combination of breakout and survivor mechanics. Very cool 😊. Great job.
Also maybe I had very lucky strong builds, or the difficulty is a bit too easy. My strategy was to trap a ball in the horizontal axis near the middle so it bounces from left to right in a hopefully straight line. Then, I kited everything into this deathzone.
Thanks! I was curious to see what kind of tactics people would try out. It does seem optimal to farm XP in the way you describe for as long as possible in each round, so that would need to be addressed.
Really enjoyed this one, the upgrade system was a nice twist on Breakout. The presentation was nice and I didn't get as much slowdown as I expected for a browser game considering all of the entities on screen.
I think the difficulty could've been increased a bit? By the time I got a couple of upgrades on each level most of the blocks were destroye.
Overall though a really nice idea well executed!
Thanks! Yes, the difficulty curve could definitely use refinement. It probably stays easy for too long before tipping over to impossible.
Sadly, I'm very bad at your game, but it was fun playing it! hahahaha Congrats!
Definitely creative and was fun figuring out how the game worked. Not the biggest fan of the tank controls but it’s not really much of a hindrance (and what else could you really do considering it’s Breakout?) Cool stuff
fun and unique take on the theme, everything felt responsive and flowed smoothly; didn't encounter any bugs either. it took me a minute to figure out and get used to the controls but once i did i really enjoyed it, i liked experimenting w different upgrades. great entry!!