This game made me laugh a lot. My best (or worst) run had me end with -400.... very fun though. I thought the art looked great and the background music and voice over was on point. Good work.
Interesting game. I think it's a fun play but found the controls a little frustrating at time. I got caught on a few walls and struggled to figure out what was going on for a few mins. Good effort though.
Ah okay, good point. The countdowns/damage for the systems do not start until the opening scene finishes but I didn't take into account the speed at which people might read it and how much time they may lose. I think that was likely because I wrote it myself and when playing I was just skipping through (oops).
There were a lot of bits I had to cut from the game due to time. My plan for the text had originally been for the timer to stop, the player to be able to control the speed, and for there to be visual queues for the player to progress to the next conversation piece. In the end I just ran out of time and connected what I could.
The conversation with Meredith controls all progression in the game - so communicating with her and choosing the right times to communicate with her (when you have raised your shields, repaired the engine to a high level, repaired the life support systems and eaten food). When you do that then any of the disaster events that occur (I think there are 4 in the game) which knock a lot of damage off all the systems can be easily managed.
Overall, the game can be completed by covering a minimum distance and completing all the conversations with Meredith. It's possible to complete the game in a distance of ~ 973 (units? who knows.... I forgot to specify)... but it can take much much more than that depending on how careful the player is being.
Thanks for the feedback and for playing the game. Really appreciate it.
Nice game. I struggled a little with player controls at times but I was using a laptop so that probably explains it. Visually it was quite good, all fit together well and looked nice.
Thank you. It's always nice to hear someone say nice things about the pixel art (I've always struggled with it). Glad you enjoyed it and thank you again for playing.
Thank you. You're right about the asteroid storm and other effects. I wanted to implement a storm around the ship and a visual representation of the shield but it was a little too much for me.
Great effort, really enjoyed playing this game. I think it could be amazing as a twin stick controls with a controller. I definitely enjoyed a few runs.
Game is very aesthetically appealing. It's a very chill game and I played a few rounds of it while enjoying myself. Took be a little while to get it but I can see it as a game I'll play again.
It might be worth giving the characters a little extra boost on the jump. I've played with the controller and I can see what you mean that it helps. Still a little bit of a struggle but I probably just need to git gud!
Let me know when you've updated and I'll give it another play.
I really liked the look of the game, the simple blocks and bright colours were really appealing.
I struggled a bit with some of the controls. When the game started I jumped and missed the hole.... then ended up needing to kill the game because it just continued to fall forever.
Once I got into the game I struggled a little with the controls, moving the watermelon slice was difficult and some of the jumping seemed a bit glitchy (I got caught on walls a few times).
That being said, I really liked the idea. I can see how it hit the theme and it's definitely a puzzle game I could see being fun. I'll try it again to see if I can get past by few issues but very good idea and could easily see something very good being built on this.
Looking at it now I think I probably needed to be clearer and give better feedback in game on how to interact with the different items.
Eating - Interact by starting to eat, then you have to wait until eating is complete for it to take effect. Shield - Interact and the value increases as you continually repair by not leaving the repair point. Life Support - Interact when damaged, repair will take a set amount of time and when repaired it is fully repaired. Engine - Interact and the value increases as you continually repair by not leaving the repair point.
I'm still playing through the game but I think the mechanics are mostly good. It took a little while to get the hang of it and it seemed hard to judge the damage I could expect to do but I think that's maybe something I'll reconsider when I play again.
Some of the colours of the buttons were a bit hard to see, like when I was in a menu to attack or choose an item I didn't notice the return button sometimes which is maybe something to consider.
The overall battle system was good in my opinion. Well done.
A lot of what you said marries with my own thoughts on the game. Having no sound bugged us and is definitely something we want to focus on for the next game. The bug with the menu I knew about, I just couldn't figure out how to fix it.
I really appreciate the feedback. If we build on it we will definitely take it into account.
Pitch/Information: Zombies have scared your cows; they have broken the padlock on the barn and ran out into the pastures. Armed with a revolver and hopefully a can do attitude you have to venture out into the fields to try herd the cattle back to the barn and lock them up.
I'd like feedback on:
Everything really, the art, gameplay and idea are all new with the exception of some UI icons. Is the game fun? Did you enjoy it? What frustrated you? What did you particularly like?
This was a first for me, I have never taken part in a game jam before so I was very excited to get involved. When I first read the theme I made the rookie mistake of not reading the next line and thought that the theme was locked until you registered for the jam. What followed was about 15 minutes of confusion. I eventually caught on.
Locked instantly gave us a few interesting ideas. We originally looked set on going with the idea of being "locked" in a bar when every one else had gone home. I still think this is a good idea for a puzzle game and we may revisit it in the future. I'm not sure where the idea came from but the idea of a herd of cattle being loose on a farm and needing to lock them back up was suggested by one of us. It was already Wednesday at this stage so we decided to go with it. So the idea was set, herding cattle.... but there's zombies! Why? I don't think I should have to answer that questions by saying anything other than, it's zombies!
We tried to set the scope small and stick to what we knew. All my experience in game development comes in the Unity game engine so I think that pushed us down that road as it would have been a much bigger undertaking by me to pick up Unreal in a short time. We divided up the work and thankfully Paddy was happy to work on most of the art for the game.
The idea is simple; your cows have escaped the barn because the zombies have spooked them. You have to find them in the fields before the zombies do and herd them back to the barn.
There are a few things you have to compete with while trying to herd the cattle
Zombies will try and eat you too
The zombies currently locked up in the barn will try and escape again
If you get your gun out then the cattle will be spooked and run away
We tried to keep the scope small and set ourselves the goals of producing all the art, graphics and code required for the game. We had a lot of ideas that we dropped quickly because we didn't want to have the scope so big we couldn't complete.
Grenades
Zombie variants
Procedural map generation
Multiple gun variants
Zombie cattle
An original soundtrack
I think if we continue to develop this game then these ideas would be incorporated into any future design. We have already talked about taking the current idea and expanding on it in such a way that it would fit in the rogue like genre.
With that said we worked hard over the two weeks and I am exceedingly happy with the result. We were able to stick to the timeframe and deliver a game that we find fun (if difficult at times).
The objective of playing the game is to save all 10 cattle before the zombies eat them. My best is 7 saved and 3 eaten. If you can beat this then let me know, it would be great to know someone has.
Also, any feedback and thoughts are appreciated.
I hope everyone who took part also enjoyed the game jam. It was my first but it certainly won't be my last.
I couldn't really get very far in the game. It looks nice but I kept getting stuck moving forward. It was like I was hitting invisible colliders. Sometimes I could make it through them but others I would just end up stuck.
Really nice game. I enjoyed it and it looks a really polished jam game. Haven't beaten it yet.
Sometimes I found it a little difficult to be sure what I would be able to do with players but I think that is something that I'd get used to the more I played.
