A game about asteroids, goat plagues and love. First time I did LD all by myself, since Anneroos is in Istanbul for a course. I did not have time to make any music, but I'm happy I finished.
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SUMMARY OF THE MECHANICS Use the arrow keys. More controls are unlocked as the game progresses. You have to protect your asteroid against incoming meteors.
Roots spread through your asteroid from the heartroot, which provides them with food. Roots cannot grow near eachother. Roots grow only once, but you can reseed them if they have enough food (press 'F').
When a root reaches the border of the asteroid, a starflower grows on it. Starflowers generate sundancers that bring food to the heartroot.
Goats eat sunflowers and turn them into asteroid (the goats have severe constipation). This helps you grow your asteroid against the rain of meteors. You can buy a goat with 'D'.
There are limits to the reach of heartroot nourishing; you can take food from a heartroot with 'A' and use it to create a new heartroot on a normal root somewhere else with 'S'.
A cute, enjoyable game. Remeniscent of The Little Prince, which was nice. I liked the idea of turning an asteroid into a self-sustaining garden or ecosystem; asteroid grows flowers, flowers provide energy, energy makes goats, goats eat flowers and build up more asteroid, etc.
The asteroids always come too fast and heavily for me, and I wish I had more direct control over protecting my asteroid... perhaps the ability to move it out of the way, or rotate it to make sure they impact away from my flowers. I feel terrible when my goats get blown up! It might also be nice to have more time to grow your home and flowers (and time to get used to the controls) before the asteroids come. Actually, I think the game would really benefit from a slower pace in general. Gardening is a slow, thoughtful exercise, so it would fit the feel well.
Haha thanks for the comment VictoryGarden! You're right, it does resemble the little prince somewhat :-)
I ran out of time before I could implement placing turrets, or balance the game... The pace is indeed more of a debugging pace. I'll see if I can put up a post-compo.
Yeah, the mechanics were kind of overwhelming to start of with. But I recommend for people to stick with it. The story is cute and the premise of building a sustainable garden on an asteroid is really good. Though I too agree with VictoryGarden that if it were a slower, more sedate game the gameplay would probably be noticeably better and more suitable. Nevertheless, it's still a good entry as it stands and worth people's time.
Asteroids with names? Goats? Sunflowers? I like that! While the gameplay was confusing (walls of text don't help much) I understood enough of what's going on to win, so I suppose it's alright. Graphic style works well, and effects+voice acting are excellent. Music could do wonders in this entry! For your next game, keep the wackiness but try to convey the gameplay better! Maybe by showing and not by telling.
Wow great concept, but the controls... :-/ I wish I could only press space and select from a secret-of-mana-ish menu if I want to greate frog / grab food or anything else. Just arrow Key + action key could really help.
Comments17
The asteroids always come too fast and heavily for me, and I wish I had more direct control over protecting my asteroid... perhaps the ability to move it out of the way, or rotate it to make sure they impact away from my flowers. I feel terrible when my goats get blown up! It might also be nice to have more time to grow your home and flowers (and time to get used to the controls) before the asteroids come. Actually, I think the game would really benefit from a slower pace in general. Gardening is a slow, thoughtful exercise, so it would fit the feel well.
Thanks for putting this together, and sharing it!
Good job.
I ran out of time before I could implement placing turrets, or balance the game... The pace is indeed more of a debugging pace. I'll see if I can put up a post-compo.
the root thing is hard to understand first.
While the gameplay was confusing (walls of text don't help much) I understood enough of what's going on to win, so I suppose it's alright.
Graphic style works well, and effects+voice acting are excellent. Music could do wonders in this entry!
For your next game, keep the wackiness but try to convey the gameplay better! Maybe by showing and not by telling.
Good job!