All right, so before we get all critical, I ended up only being able to spend about 12-13 hours on this game this weekend, and frankly I think it's a gamble that didn't work out. This was also my first LD alone, I think I did a much better job as just the programmer on a team last time. It was originally going to have an ending, 3 levels, etc, but for now just think of it as a short arcade game.
That being said...
This is Triangles, a game about... er... triangles. Being minimalist as it is I would prefer not to have to give too many instructions, just know that you need to use the arrow keys to direct your triangle(s).
If you really need instructions, get close to triangles of another color to turn them into your own color, but beware of the big triangles, and don't let yourself get swarmed; they can change you into their color as well!
All programming, art (er, shapes?) and the non-existant sound/music was done by me. Towards the end when I knew I wasn't going to make the 48 hour deadline, I was also helped with ideas and playtesting by a friend of mine who goes by Sqwarecircle.
Game was programmed in Java using the standard Java libraries, in the Eclipse IDE.
The concept is quite cool, it was confusing at first but I read the entry. I think the biggest improvement would be to shift the colours faster so that the gameplay is more dynamic - I found that I could just collect a few triangles and then wait for them. When I wanted to "go out and explore" I ended up being overwhelmed.
I was really hoping for a "I AM POWERFUL!" moment as well, when your swarm got so big that you could just faceroll everything. It was really exciting to watch your swarm grow over time and how you became dissociated from your triangle as the group got larger and larger.
J
Jiggawatt30 Apr 2013, 03:56
Hm. Runs unplayably slow on my computer, though I haven't had problems with other Java entries.
Hah, yeah, if you want power you can go to the last LD game I'd made with some others, though I was originally going to do that here as well before being forced into making it more of a "survive as long as you can" game, there'll probably be a post mortem.
Shift the colors faster, eh... you may have a point there, thanks for the advice. :)
@Jiggawatt Yeah, I've done a few things I shouldn't that's probably making it less efficient than it should be. I'll be fixing that in the post-mortem.
Congratulations on your first solo LD entry. Even if it didn't go quite as expected. I think this can serve as the basis of something rather good. I'd imagine there being some sort of goal object you need to pick up (in a similar way to how reds are picked up), but the player would have to scope out the area and lead reds away from the escape path before making an attempt on the goal object.
I was really hoping for a "I AM POWERFUL!" moment as well, when your swarm got so big that you could just faceroll everything. It was really exciting to watch your swarm grow over time and how you became dissociated from your triangle as the group got larger and larger.