NOTE: This is the competition version of the game. If you just stumbled upon this, you’ll most probably want to be playing the greatly expanded post-competition version.
I’m done. And tired. (The game’s title is quite ironic when applied to the compo, huh…)
Please read the readme if you have troubles, I don’t know how obvious the gameplay is. Also, fullscreen can be disabled in the config.ini file. So far, I only have a Windows build.
I could only play it once. When I tried starting my second game I just got a frozen game screen. This happened even if I restarted the application. I didn't manage to figure out how the barriers worked. I placed a good number of pylons but only at the very end did I manage to get any swirling particles, which I suppose I should have had from the start. The barriers seemed rather useless without them. Anyway, I can't seem to play anymore, so nyah!
(soundtrack made me want to play Metroid Fusion... overall very good polish/presentation)
You win the award for "Only LD14 Game To Make Me Swear At My Screen", as soon as I get off my lazy butt and make it. Also, the only game to never get less than a 4 in any relevant category.
This is really excellent. It's not just about arcade-speed, although that is needed, but there's a certain economy of movement that the game stimulates - it has its own aesthetic of play. I am awed and humbled.
very interesting game! difficult, and engaging in a positive way. genre: abstract realtime strategy puzzle? innovative... high entry level: it's difficult to get into the game on first try, despite the simplicity of the interface. but the rewards are real, once one solved a level, and sort of meaningful! universal patterns? deep gameplay. not shallow easy fun at all. a very impressive achievement for 48h! technically, as well as design wise. the presentation and the background story make sense too. this is great, really. hmm, but first i didn't know what to write... cause i gave up several times, i couldn't get something out beside the nice space grids and music. - it needs really some dedication, like playing chess somehow. or any other good game. that's probably also the main problem. the difficutly curve is steep and starts already quite high. but i got into the last level right before, and it was a good experience... didn't felt like "wasted time", like playing many many other games does. (hmm, i accidently pressed esc twice there! ahh!). -- what could help to make playing easier would be maybe a 2-phase gameplay, i thought. taking the realtime aspect out, and construct the fences in save mode, but that wouldn't be as much fun... the last level is quite hard in that respect, the first couple of seconds really decide how it turns out, that's probably the biggest "gamplay bottleneck" i've spotted. but you have to replay the level anyway, so it's not really bad. - i like the idea to search for dynamic patterns, playing has it's own aesthetics, and the insights on structure/strategy can really make playing games a good thing! but it took a while to think like that about the game... what's not a bad sign, though. impressive!, i'll come back to it... will be interesting to see how long it will take till my neurons will break the first grids again :)
I read the readme and I still really don't get what strategy this game is supposed to use. It doesn't provide enough feedback in my opinion for me to determine what strategies are good or bad.
I was able to brute force my way past level 1 but get annihilated on level 2. I then went back and played level 1 a bunch to try and determine how it works but I still can't figure it out.
I would love to read a writeup or watch a youtube video on how this game is supposed to work from someone who is good at it.
Seems like people have really enjoyed it so I want to know what I'm missing.
Music is nice and ambient. The graphics are well polished and fit. The background story adds a sufficient wrapper.
Very neat game. I liked the background music a lot, it was very fitting.
I didn't like the rmb-click-on-tile navigation. I felt like it would have worked a lot better if you could scroll by hovering the mouse cursor at the edges of the screen.
For me, the game itself got very difficult in lvl3, and, as noted by ondrew, the game lost the relaxed puzzle feel that I felt the first levels had.
I would also have liked a visual cue as to whether or not a pylon would be aligned with any other pylons before placing them.
Comments18
I wish I'd looked at the readme and known that I could zoom.
I didn't manage to figure out how the barriers worked. I placed a good number of pylons but only at the very end did I manage to get any swirling particles, which I suppose I should have had from the start. The barriers seemed rather useless without them. Anyway, I can't seem to play anymore, so nyah!
(soundtrack made me want to play Metroid Fusion... overall very good polish/presentation)
Very nice atmosphere.
Way right.
You win the award for "Only LD14 Game To Make Me Swear At My Screen", as soon as I get off my lazy butt and make it. Also, the only game to never get less than a 4 in any relevant category.
This is really excellent. It's not just about arcade-speed, although that is needed, but there's a certain economy of movement that the game stimulates - it has its own aesthetic of play. I am awed and humbled.
hmm, but first i didn't know what to write... cause i gave up several times, i couldn't get something out beside the nice space grids and music. - it needs really some dedication, like playing chess somehow. or any other good game. that's probably also the main problem. the difficutly curve is steep and starts already quite high. but i got into the last level right before, and it was a good experience... didn't felt like "wasted time", like playing many many other games does. (hmm, i accidently pressed esc twice there! ahh!). -- what could help to make playing easier would be maybe a 2-phase gameplay, i thought. taking the realtime aspect out, and construct the fences in save mode, but that wouldn't be as much fun... the last level is quite hard in that respect, the first couple of seconds really decide how it turns out, that's probably the biggest "gamplay bottleneck" i've spotted. but you have to replay the level anyway, so it's not really bad. - i like the idea to search for dynamic patterns, playing has it's own aesthetics, and the insights on structure/strategy can really make playing games a good thing! but it took a while to think like that about the game... what's not a bad sign, though. impressive!, i'll come back to it... will be interesting to see how long it will take till my neurons will break the first grids again :)
I was able to brute force my way past level 1 but get annihilated on level 2. I then went back and played level 1 a bunch to try and determine how it works but I still can't figure it out.
I would love to read a writeup or watch a youtube video on how this game is supposed to work from someone who is good at it.
Seems like people have really enjoyed it so I want to know what I'm missing.
Music is nice and ambient. The graphics are well polished and fit. The background story adds a sufficient wrapper.
I would have liked to see perhaps some kind of indicator to show a weak wall, like pulsing red or something.
Nice game, music added a lot!
I didn't like the rmb-click-on-tile navigation. I felt like it would have worked a lot better if you could scroll by hovering the mouse cursor at the edges of the screen.
For me, the game itself got very difficult in lvl3, and, as noted by ondrew, the game lost the relaxed puzzle feel that I felt the first levels had.
I would also have liked a visual cue as to whether or not a pylon would be aligned with any other pylons before placing them.
The only thing I had trouble with was telling when things were destroyed, It would be nice for there to be some sort visual and aural feedback.