[Please read the description to learn how to play:]
Colors are wonderful, especially when they become an unconventional weapon.
The goal of the game is to protect the tower from the boxes.
You draw colors on the board and that costs some coins. Earn coins by destroying the boxes. You can destroy the box by making it stay long enough on the color opposite from its own. For example, blue box will get damaged on the orange tile. However, it will also get damaged on the red, yellow and green, albeit it will be damaged more slowly. Look at the color wheel - the more distant the color (on the wheel), the greater the damage. There's also a catch - white does not do any damage. Work around it!
[Humor was not included due to my lack of it.] [Sound/Music was not included due to lack of time, unfortunatelly.]
CONTROLS: - Rotate camera with WASD and scroll - Click the colors to select them - Click and drag the tools to fine-tune them. - There are 5 tools: Cell, Row, Column, Area, Board
- While in full-screen, you can exit by pressing ALT+F4 or ESC
Try to score as much as you can.
ADDITIONAL INFO:
[1] The fact that the white - the green's opposite on the wheel - does not damage the green box, does not mean that greens are immortal. Boxes ignore only adjacent colors (on the wheel). Everything else will damage the box, and the further the color on the wheel, the greater the damage.
[2] Sometimes the tower will descend too low. That's a known bug, although I'm not sure why it happens. In normal circumstances, it should survive 10 hits, but sometimes it survives longer than that. Strange bug, but nevertheless, eventually it will be destroyed and the game will be over.
[3] I'm aware that the game is very easy - there are several known strategies that will not allow boxes to reach your tower. I simply didn't have enough time to balance these things out. I gave players too much coins. Originally, colors would decay over time, returning to white which would solve these problems, but I simply didn't manage to implement that in time. Thanks for understanding. :)
[4] Linux&Max ports are not well tested. I've exported them, but I don't have a Mac or Linux, so I wasn't able to try.
UPDATE: I have updated the game with a crucial bug fix that was preventing people play. Some players, depending on their resolution and display mode, were not able to select colors. Since this is the main mechanic of the game, I fixed it in a few mins so people can play. I understood such bugs are allowed to be fixed. No gameplay changes were made.
The idea here is pretty unique, I like it. It took me a little while to understand the concept, but in the end, it's a pretty nice little game. Could work as a mobile game too!
@jormungandr: Nice catch. Didn't try that. The original idea was a bit different - each color having different effects, but time did not allow to implement it. I tried to play with how much coins you get for each box, but there was simply not enough time to test for such scenario. Well done, you have broken the game :) Truth is, it really needs more testing and tuning.
Very nice take on the theme, I couldn't change the colors so I had to fill the board with red squares. I totally understood the idea and I really enjoyed it. Goncratulations !
I liked it. Solid mechanics and the game felt polished. The only thing I didn't quite understand was what was supposed to be happening with the tower. It felt like it was just hiding under the game board after taking a few hits. :p
Good game, a bit easy, but very enjoyable, I love the look'n'feel. I didn't understood what is the right strategy against green blocks (the oposite color is white). I had to ctrl-at-del to quite while in fullscreen
@Hectate: Sometimes, the problem occurs because the windows is not in fullscreen, and sometimes it happens in fullscreen. Not sure what is the problem (probably some scaling stuff). You can always try again - sometimes it solves the problem.
@Paulozz: Opposite colors damage the boxes the most, but the further the color, the more damage it does. So, for green - red and purple damage it too.
Cool concept, but I feel that it's one of those cases where the idea is great, but it doesn't quite work in practice. As @jormungandr said it's easy to survive. I'm not sure what you could change to make it more challenging without making it impossible.
The visual is quite nice. Only problem I found is that the color picker didn't work for me while on fullscreen.
Fun mechanic. For your next LD plz have a look at tools like bfxr or labchirp, some sfx would greatly improve your game with just 1-2h of work.
I read your additional infos and here are my ideas for balance :
- keep an ammo counter for each colors ( maxed at 10-12 ) - refill color when a colored monster walk on a white square > this way full colored level will leave player with few ressources > painting at start will be easy, as everything color refill quickly
- make lvl2 monsters delete the color when they leave a square. - make lvl3 2x2 monsters with more hp - make lvl4 2x2 monsters with more hp + delete hability > just add difficulty as time pass by spawning more dangerous ennemies.
@Benjamin: thanks for suggestions. You made me think about expanding on the idea. I didn't mean to do anything more with it but now I'm considering the option.
@robotic-brain: thanks. Since balancing factors are way off and don'thave a maximum bound. So it went awry. :-) it really does need a balance update :-)
You said it yourself, more design, balancing and testing are required. I agree with the assessment.
The main thing you need to implement is outside forces that change the state of the battle field. Enemies and gradual decay have already been suggested, both valid approaches. I'll throw in a few ideas:
-Color spreading. Colors will take over adjacent tiles with a certain probability and delay based on their location on the color wheel. - Color bombs. A bomb appears on the a random tile, which explodes if even a single enemy reaches it, coloring nearby tiles a single color. It'll disappear after a lengthy period. Or an enemy appears with a bomb on top of it which will explode if the enemy isn't dealt with soon enough. -Plain old randomization. Some of the tiles start flashing at times and change color. - Global color effects. All the tiles will invert color for a time and then revert back.
I have no idea how these and other ideas balance out, but I'll leave that to you.
Nice use of colours! The wheel helps finding the right colour to use. I was a bit confused what the different numbers meant though. I read your blog post, and you managed to get a lot done in very little time. Well done!
The game has a really cool concept! Sometimes I when I clicked on boxes to change their color it wouldn't work. Still, the display is nice and neat, and its very innovative! Nice job!
M
Martin Vilcans26 Apr 2015, 21:44
Interesting base for a puzzle game. It would need more work to become really interesting though, and I'm sure you have plenty of ideas for that. Oh, and it looks good!
thoughts: - I really like this approach to the theme :-) - [POSSIBLE SPOILERS] ... on the other hand, it gets really easy once you realize the penalty for 'not the exact opposing color' is really low. For example: one I had the 'cash', I painted most of the area purple with the big brush, then splattered in some yellows with the 1x1. I noticed almost no opponents touched the tower any more. Went for tea: score over a million. Went to the bathroom, didn't see the green tower any more and figured I was close to dying, and within two minutes my top score was reported: over 733-million. (So I assume there is an increasing multiplier if you don't touch anything... my bathroom breaks aren't /that/ long...) This isn't bragging by the way, just try it yourself and you'll see :-) An easy fix would be to tweak the amount of damage (or even 'healing' from a 'close enough' color?). Or else some sort of 'eraser' block, so 'lazy' people like me can't game (hah) the system forever. - Also, a not completely unrelated nitpick... if your score goes quite high then the last digit may start to be displayed on the bottom, depending on the total width of the printed score.
Very interesting mechanic! You already stated the problems (like being too easy), but nonetheless I hope you take the time for a post-compo version with sound effects and balancing. Was fun to play ;D
Nice little game! It's a pitty you hadn't got enough time for music and sounds. The graphics are good and gameplay is fun! I like your game very much! Thank you for this!
Super innovation points, this was really interesting. And it looks like you have learned a lot from the experience which is the best thing that could ever happen. It was a bit hard to understand without reading the info here but the presentation is excellent.
Comments48
I didn't understood what is the right strategy against green blocks (the oposite color is white).
I had to ctrl-at-del to quite while in fullscreen
https://i.imgur.com/TSl9wgf.png
@Paulozz: Opposite colors damage the boxes the most, but the further the color, the more damage it does. So, for green - red and purple damage it too.
The visual is quite nice. Only problem I found is that the color picker didn't work for me while on fullscreen.
Awesome work!
For your next LD plz have a look at tools like bfxr or labchirp, some sfx would greatly improve your game with just 1-2h of work.
I read your additional infos and here are my ideas for balance :
- keep an ammo counter for each colors ( maxed at 10-12 )
- refill color when a colored monster walk on a white square
> this way full colored level will leave player with few ressources
> painting at start will be easy, as everything color refill quickly
- make lvl2 monsters delete the color when they leave a square.
- make lvl3 2x2 monsters with more hp
- make lvl4 2x2 monsters with more hp + delete hability
> just add difficulty as time pass by spawning more dangerous ennemies.
By the way: Linux version works great.
After some balancing this will be great.
(my score actually overflowed with a rainbow board xD)
http://imgur.com/0nScOkR
Nice 3d engine and coherence.
The main thing you need to implement is outside forces that change the state of the battle field. Enemies and gradual decay have already been suggested, both valid approaches. I'll throw in a few ideas:
-Color spreading. Colors will take over adjacent tiles with a certain probability and delay based on their location on the color wheel.
- Color bombs. A bomb appears on the a random tile, which explodes if even a single enemy reaches it, coloring nearby tiles a single color. It'll disappear after a lengthy period. Or an enemy appears with a bomb on top of it which will explode if the enemy isn't dealt with soon enough.
-Plain old randomization. Some of the tiles start flashing at times and change color.
- Global color effects. All the tiles will invert color for a time and then revert back.
I have no idea how these and other ideas balance out, but I'll leave that to you.
Cheers!
Try to beat my high score of -2147356987 haha
- I really like this approach to the theme :-)
- [POSSIBLE SPOILERS]
... on the other hand, it gets really easy once you realize the penalty for 'not the exact opposing color' is really low. For example: one I had the 'cash', I painted most of the area purple with the big brush, then splattered in some yellows with the 1x1. I noticed almost no opponents touched the tower any more. Went for tea: score over a million. Went to the bathroom, didn't see the green tower any more and figured I was close to dying, and within two minutes my top score was reported: over 733-million. (So I assume there is an increasing multiplier if you don't touch anything... my bathroom breaks aren't /that/ long...) This isn't bragging by the way, just try it yourself and you'll see :-)
An easy fix would be to tweak the amount of damage (or even 'healing' from a 'close enough' color?). Or else some sort of 'eraser' block, so 'lazy' people like me can't game (hah) the system forever.
- Also, a not completely unrelated nitpick... if your score goes quite high then the last digit may start to be displayed on the bottom, depending on the total width of the printed score.
I think that you need some feedback to learn the mechanism. It's not that obvious.
Overall, it's awesome.