Hi everyone.

My friend and I had an abandoned game idea about a war robot suddenly sent on a rescue mission. The gameplay is a top-down shooter with a twist: the robot is always shooting, and pressing a button actually stops the fire. You need to save creatures — but you can’t stop shooting.

We want to bring this idea back to life for a game jam! We're a team of a programmer and a game designer. Anyone interested in joining? We’d love to team up with a composer / sound designer and 2D artist to work on this game. 

Leave a comment here or use my discord arti_popov.

Nice game, but there's an interestig bug. You can press the same card twice and get a match.

The game is very fun, though quite hard for my taste. 

Thank you very much :)

It's a good game, a lot of content for the jam submission.
I like the mechanics of entering the objecs and how you use it.
I encounter several places, where I feel stucked and doesn't know what to do. 

The design is simple and it works. Your character is literally calming the storm using the blowing (!?)
Very good. 

Though I should mention that cooldown of the ability is harsh. I would make it shorter or add some sound / visual indication when you blow for too long.

The music track is super good. Glass canon ability is fun! 
It would be nice if the game has more unique upgrades rather than a simple stats increase.
Good job!

The music track is super good. Glass canon ability is fun! 
It would be nice if the game has more unique upgrades rather than a simple stats increase.
Good job!

Don't rush to start. Spend time to think about the theme, about what you are able to finish.

Hi,

I’m Arti, a game designer and developer (https://arti-dev.itch.io/). I’ve already teamed up with a great composer and sound designer, Pete (https://soundcloud.com/peterhawkey/sets/example-tracks).

We’re missing a 2D artist to complete the perfect team. Our time zone is GMT+1, feel free to reach out.

I don’t limit myself to specific genres or mechanics. I try to find the one which is suitable for the theme. And so far, I’ve always finished my jam games.

Hi,

Have you already found a team? You can DM me, my discord is arti_popov. 

I am a Unity Developer and I'm a part of a team which is looking for the artist.

Hi!

I'm Arti, a game developer and designer. I used to participate in game jams solo, but now I want to make a game with a small team.

I'm specifically looking for a 2D artist and a sound designer/composer. If you have other skills, feel free to reach out to me. I'm also open for joining a small team.

My time zone is GMT +1, my discord is arti_popov. I speak English and Russian. 

Feel free to ask any questions :)

Thank you for such positive feedback :)

I see potential for expansion into a larger game – adding more tower and unit types, incorporating a simple storyline, and perhaps introducing a sandbox mode.

Currently, my focus is on a different game prototype, trying to keep my attention undivided by other game ideas (it's so damn hard).

Thank you!

But, after I spent some time trying to use blurred sprites, I understood that It wasn't a good idea. For example, It created a problem with colliders. So, I decided to draw simple mock substitute images from the scratch for all paid content (including your assets). 

The only thing from your work that is left in the build is the names of the files. I would like to keep them, as it will be easy for people to replace mock assets with the real ones. 

Hi.

I have created a game using some of your assets. Your assets are fantastic, they really worth their price!

The thing is that I want to release my game as open-source. Due to the terms, I can't use your assets in the repository. I would like to ask if it would be okay if I use blurred and obfuscated versions of them?

I attached an example of how it would look.

Great idea :D was to scary for me to finish

Hi!

I have used your asset in my game: https://arti-dev.itch.io/space-madness

Thank you for your work. This was very helpful! It is the best sci-fi tile asset that I found.

You woke up alone in a medical bay of the cosmic station. The station is breaking up and you have to leave it before it’s too late. Unravel the mysteries surrounding the station, solve intricate puzzles and ultimately escape from it!

Space Madness is a short top-down adventure with puzzle elements.

The game is free and available at https://arti-dev.itch.io/space-madness.

Hi! This is my first game, which I made during the Devtober 2022 game jam:

https://arti-dev.itch.io/circle-of-harmony

I wanted to make something simple and came up with that idea. It is a puzzle game with light strategy elements. Your goal is to achieve a higher score. To do that, you need to choose positions for your animals based on their food preferences. 

You can play in the browser or download the build for Windows.

Hi! I have used your assets for my game. Very cool pack. Thank you very much.

I have added you to the game credits :) 

https://arti-dev.itch.io/circle-of-harmony

Hi :) I have used your asset for my game. Thank you for your work.

https://arti-dev.itch.io/circle-of-harmony

17: Final

Finally :) I have finished the game and written a post mortem.

You can find links here:

• https://arti-dev.itch.io/circle-of-harmony
• https://arti-dev.itch.io/circle-of-harmony/devlog/445983/post-mortem

I also want to publish code to the open-source repository. It needs some additional work as some of my assets can't be published due to license terms.

16: Tutorial & Hints

I've spent the last few days fixing bugs. I have fixed at least four major UI bugs. I have also finished the itch.io template for the game page.  As I don’t like working during weekends, I'm going to put all my strength to finish the project and write post mortem today.

16: Tutorial & Hints

I have added a short tutorial to my game. If you choose “Tutorial ON” you will see four tutorial windows with basic information about the game. Also, I have added popup hints showing the information about the species. 

I am at the final stage now. I have sent my build to some friends for testing. I want to work on an itch page now and prepare my code for an open-source release.

15: 7x7 field and initialization

After spending a lot of time playing my game, I have understood that a game session with the 6x6 field was too short. An average player couldn't even see all the animals in action. It felt too crowded and compact. I have decided to increase the field size from 6x6 to 7x7.

I spent some time working on the initialization of the game field. My initialization was completely random, and sometimes it led to a situation when a player couldn't beat the score regardless of their tactics. I have chosen another approach. The field initialised randomly based on a set of prepared initialization fields.

Also, I have tested the WebGL build for the itch.io page. It turned out much easier than I thought it might be.

14: New UI & undo button

I have completely revised my UI elements for the displayed damage. I have created a simple blinking heart animation for the moment when some specimen attacks another one.

I also have introduced an undo button. After that, the player can undo all the moves he made after the last building option refill. This makes the game much more interesting as you don't need to plan everything very far ahead. You can always go back if something doesn't go as expected.

13: Music, sound & game design

I have added several features.

1) I have been looking for music since the beginning of the jam. I have finally found the theme that I like (https://vtakinovmusic.com/product/this-is-africa/).

2) I have started to add sound effects to the game. 

I also worked on simplification of the game process.

• I have decided to set all damage from all animals equal to one.
• I made the maximum amount of hit points equal to three for all animals.

12: Main menu

I have been working on a menu. I added the main menu (some buttons still don't have full functionality) and the exit button for the game scene. I also have worked a lot on a game process. My idea that damage to the animal is equal to the given score points doesn't make the game simpler. I am still thinking about a solution.

11: Major graphical changes

I haven't been posting anything for three days, that's why this update is quite huge.

1. I have added a background to the game screen. I have used assets from <wtf>https://simon-develop.itch.io/game-background-savannah</wtf>
2. I have changed fonts.  
3. I have added button images for the building buttons. Thanks for free assets, https://pauboeg.itch.io/ui-starter-pack  
4. I have implemented a ScoreBoard animation. Circular ScoreBoard fills up slowly when a player achieves the current aim value. Also, when you are in the middle of choosing a position for a new animal, your possible impact to the score is shown on the ScoreBoard.

10: New style

Finally, I have changed the graphic design of the animals. I have bought pictures of the animals on Shutterstock, as I hadn't found any fitting the casual style in free access. I have recolored them and changed some details to make the art more distinguishable. The result you can see in the attached picture.

9: Balance again

After I finished the development of the iterative game progression options, I started to work on a balance again. I designed all building options, which are opened to the player step-by-step. I configured how many entities are available for the player to build on each step. I also added random generation of the next building option. This feature will be used if the player overcomes all set challenges.

I also added random initialization of the map. Now, the map is randomly filled with grass at the start of the game.

8: Progress Design

I don’t have much to share today as I have spent time refactoring code and designing the progress system :)

I have added counters to the building buttons, which show how many entities the player can build. When the player achieves the predefined score, the counters increase and a new requirement for the score value is set.

7: Balance

I started to work on game balance. My goal is to make each of the species valuable. In the early stages of the development, I noticed that a player could ignore bugs and rats and invest only in antelopes, hyenas, and lions.

I have counted the number of points earned by the player for each type of animal. Based on this information, I have changed several things.

• I have increased the number of points earned by rats and hyenas. A rat can earn 2 points for eating a single bug and a hyena can earn 3 points for eating a rat. This makes rats the most useful animal in terms of scoring points. 
• To balance rats, I have also increased the influence area for the hyena and the lion. I have used the chess concept. The area of the lion is similar to the area of the rook, and the hyena's area is similar to the bishop's.

You can see the average points for each animal type after the rebalancing in the attached picture.

6: Button Panel Design

I have tried several designs for the button panel. My favourite one is a button panel which is enframed by a circle. The circle position shows the number of score points that the player has already got. I also have replaced the text on buttons with animal icons. I haven’t implemented scoreboard animation yet and will do it a little later. 

5: Full pack of funny animals

I finally was able to play my game. I configured a whole pack of animals. Now I have grass, a bug, an African rat, an Antelope, a hyena, and a lion. I drew temporary sprites for all animals, as I wanted to have an approximate view of the final game. 

I also played with the size of the game field. The 10x10 size is too spacious and makes the game session duration too long. I choose a 6x6 size and it feels like just the right vibe.

4: First specimens & Score

I have implemented the food chain functionality and the score system. Each animal has a list of feeding options defined by three parameters:

• type of a target specimen, which this option affects
• damage to the target specimen
• amount of score points, which the player will get after this option is activated

I have created two types of specimens to test the new systems. I am not sure if this graphic style is final as it doesn't align with the vibe I want from this game.

3: Food chains

I took time off coding and thought about food chains. I want my game to be simple, that's why the total number of different species should be around 5-7. After some thinking, I drew this chain in the picture below. Arrow from one specimen to another represents the possible food source. If specimens aren’t connected, they will not affect each other directly.

The main question is how the predators can disappear as no one eats them. I did research and found out that hyenas and lions could kill each other in a fight. So, my solution is that predators affect each other. Also, this decision specialized my animal setting to savannah animals.

Hi! It seem that the acces to the board is restricted. Is it on purpose? :)

Thank you :)

2: Influence areas

Each animal in my game should have an area of influence. When a player places an animal on the game field, it consumes all available food sources in its influence area.  

I like to have flexibility in all systems which I develop and that’s why I wanted to be able to change the influence area right in the Unity inspector. To implement it, I use a plugin from GitHub, which allows editing 2D arrays in the inspector.

Then I added visualization. During that, I resolved a lot of bugs. For example, the influence area shouldn't cross the boundaries of the game field, which was the case before the refactoring.