I'm going to go out on a limb and suggest that the cooling solution for these servers is not sufficient.
Also, I'm glad to see another Mini Micro submission!
I love the concept of holding out against the waves of enemies. Unfortunately, I played this on a laptop with a trackpad, so the controls were a bit awkward, but I could see what you were going for. I'm sure it plays well with an actual mouse, since I was still able to beat the first wave. Very nice entry.
Hi thanks for the comment. Adding to what you already noted, I had many other ideas that I had to scrap due to time constraints. I had wanted to include buildings in the city. There would be were missions to fly to different parts of the city. You could bring a group of scientists to the volcano to study it, thereby increasing your time available. Perhaps there would be a hospital that you could land on top of and drop off wounded people for medical care. I also had the idea that the lava balls could cause fires in the city that you'd have to put out with water. By the submission time, I was just happy I had something to submit. lol
I found my laptop's trackpad was not quite up to the task of aiming and clicking, but I could complete a number of levels just the same. I think I would have preferred a keyboard button to break the rock if I have to be close enough to trigger it anyway.
Nevertheless, this was a brilliant concept. I like it a lot. Great entry.
I managed to get one level going where I jump over a barrier and then jump into a camp fire to light it, but that seems to be all I could do as the level seems to reset endlessly. I see some of what you were planning to do, and that you had trouble getting a web version to run properly. Your experience with a second game should be much better.
Hi. Thanks for the comment. I had tried to increase the difficulty near the end of development, but that introduced a game-breaking bug that I couldn't solve in time. I had to revert it, and make the difficulty scaling simpler. I think the game could probably benefit from an increase both in difficulty and strategy.
Hi. Thanks for the comment. I had envisioned adding buildings with helipads on the roof. I also had the idea of having the player put out fires, and do other missions. The game morphed into something more arcadish, chaotic, and wild. When I had tried to adjust the difficulty near the end of development, I ended up introducing a major game-breaking bug, so sadly I just reverted it and tried to keep it simple.
Hi. Thanks for trying the game and leaving a comment. Others have noticed the lack of shields. I think I might add some shields or armor after the game jam is over to avoid the one-hit kill.
Note: Dodging is easiest in form 1, harder in form 2, and hardest in form 3. Currently, the easiest way to play the game is to use all of the defensive capabilities with the TACTICAL (form 1) transformation early on. After whittling down the enemy missile launchers with this technique, you can swap to other forms to use your weapons as well.
Thank you for the comment. Excellent points raised. Here are some things that might make the gameplay easier:
I agree that death occurs too easily, so I would probably want to give your ship some armor in the future. Perhaps the different forms would have different armor levels.
Thank you for the comment.
I'm very glad that the tutorial was helpful. I had spent quite a bit of time on that, as it was very important to me that players not feel lost.
I tend to agree that death happens too quickly. Originally I had planned for the ship to take damage when hit, but I ended up simplifying things greatly since the initial design phase. Nearer to the end of development I was contemplating giving the ship some armor so it could take some hits as you suggested. Perhaps this feature deserves a revisit, along with some balancing.
I agree with the other comments that becoming the ship that shot you is cool and that the game needs more built on top of this idea. Some polish in other areas would also help go a long way. I think you have a solid premise to build upon.
Personally, I would have liked using the keyboard for the shooting as well since my laptop's trackpad buttons are a bit awkward to use for rapid fire.