Top-down shooter where the stupid and weak aliens get replaced with smarter and more successful aliens as you destroy them.
I've been around for a long time, but I've only had a handful of successful (read: submitted) entries. This one I originally started for the compo, but I ran out of time and didn't want to submit an incomplete game. With the extra 24 hours was able to bring it to a satisfactory state.
The aliens start off in a more or less random state. The successful aliens get their 'DNA' recorded and used for future waves, weeding out the unsuccessful aliens and increasing the difficulty.
Check out my journal for the postmortem.
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bonder28 Aug 2012, 18:56
It's fun! Two nits to pick: It seems sometimes the aliens can hide off-screen (which I guess makes them smart), and when game is over, there's no way to play again.
@QualityAssurance - The idea is that the ones who don't fire at the ship are less likely to end up in the next wave. By the time you get the hang of what to do, "Those Stupid Aliens" will evolve and become not so stupid.
Cool game. Really straight forward, so I'm just going to mention a few things that aren't necessarily good or bad, they just stood out.
* Bullets do not exist outside the screen, but enemies do. * Ship hum effect sounds good, but loops poorly. * Frequently clicking outside of the game. * Gaming the evolution system makes for a dull play experience.
Congrats on finishing! I love the idea of the aliens evolving, very good use of the theme! And our ship's graphic is very cool! Am I guessing correctly that that the aliens' look represents their genes? The connection was difficult to make out. Another tip that would help is to be very clear to the player about what's going on: in the screen between the waves, you could say "aliens evolving..." - I think it would add to the game.
Thought this was pretty fun. I wasn't really aware of the aliens evolving over time though, just seemed like there were more of them as the level increased.
3 lives and then i die? Not very fair considering my ship is the size of the sun yet I can dodge. Still, I can see where its going toward. But yet this was a Jam entry. Doesn't look very hard to code the ship and stuff. But i don't want to start a war so i'm going to say that the AI was hard.
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hamster_mk_46 Sep 2012, 03:28
If I were not explicitly told the aliens evolved, I don't think I could have figured it out from the game play.
Feels very complete and is very playable, but the only way to defend is to shoot the bullets comping from aliens, which is very hard, so deaths feel kinda random and the game can easily become a clickfest. Also, I really wasn't sure if the aliens were really getting better (as they should, since they're evolving), or there were just more of them. The idea itself has a great potential and - be it clickfest or not - I enjoyed the game (lost at waves 14-16 or so). I also liked the audio. Overall, it's a very good entry, and congrats for submitting this! I might also add, I really like your journal, footphotos and the cat. Good job!
Hey pentaphobe and marudziik, what version of Flash are you using? What exactly do you see on the page? I do have a sitelock built into it, so you would have to play it from the website.
I shot bullets out of the sky!!! You panned the sound of the shots!!! Really had a load of fun with this. You've captured the simplicity of a space invaders type game and kept it fresh and fun. Great work!
I like the graphics, especially the scrolling stars.
The game itself is a bit boring, just seems like a clickfest to me. I didn't notice the enemies evolving really. It seems pretty random whether I get hit or not, because I can't really dodge.
@LoneStranger My flash version 11.4 r402 (Firefox). There's just empty space instead of a flash object and I can hear the music. The direct SWF link works, though.
@LoneStranger Okay, no need to worry. Turns out that, at least in my case, the Flashblock plugin in Firefox was at fault here. It's supposed to block flash content, letting the user click on it to open, and usually it works very well (this is actually the first time it's not working properly), but in this case this somehow gets in the way. Adding your site to a white list in the plugin options solved the problem completely.
First game from LD24 that I play that uses this approach on evolution (through AI). Really nice! The evolution is kind of subtle at first, but then I realized that I wasn't being hit for a time and they became smart and beat me easily.
Other than that, a good effort!