My Enemy El Cactus

by bluemirror

Overall★★★★★★★★★★3.36

Fun★★★★★★★★★★3.42

Innovation★★★★★★★★★★2.46

Theme★★★★★★★★★★2.84

Graphics★★★★★★★★★★2.78

Audio★★★★★★★★★★3.14

Humor★★★★★★★★★★3.56

Mood★★★★★★★★★★3.21

My Enemy El Cactus

Your fighting "El Cactus" in a 2D top down racing shooter. Who is "El Cactus" ??? He is your worst nightmare, Max. Do you got what it takes to get rid of him?

I highly recommend playing with a controller. A Keyboard is just less precise and therefore the game turns out to be about 10 times harder.

Controls:

W,A,S,D = Movement

Space or 'J' = Shoot

Left Stick = Movement

A Button = Shoot

Credits

Have fun and thank you for playing our game :)

Music and Sound: Christian Lösekamm https://twitter.com/ReleaseComb

Main Menu Sprite: Kekziie

Game Design/Code/Art: Deniz Cakmaz https://twitter.com/indie_maker_bot

If you got any kind of feelings about the game let me know, I highly appreciate (and love) honest criticsm. I mean if you dont tell me why my game sucks, then the next game probably will suck for exactly the same reason. And we dont want that do we?

Comments18

Maloy Quinn24 Apr 2018, 12:13

Nice game, controls are a bit odd in my opinion

malobil24 Apr 2018, 12:15

Funny game but controls make it really hard and frustrating.

Mckruggins24 Apr 2018, 12:18

Well your not wrong about it being really hard with a keyboard, pretty good otherwise tho

Nehvis24 Apr 2018, 12:20

I think your idea was good, but the controls make it nearly unplayable

Yokimbo24 Apr 2018, 12:25

Fun times were had :dog:

DUUUUDE24 Apr 2018, 12:42

Fun game! I don't have any controller on my desk at the moment so I had to play with the keyboard. Boy it was hard! Once you get the hang of it it becomes easier to move but still, the controlls for keyboard are horrible.

The flavour text at the beggining of the game was a neat little touch.

A shame I had no controller to play it properly...

Kepp up the great work!

Kindred25 Apr 2018, 05:41

Really interesting idea with a single boss fight. It was a lot of fun once I figured out the controls and realized I was supposed to be in a car. Something about knowing it was a car made the controls feels o much more reasonable and correct. Awesome game!

aevek25 Apr 2018, 07:36

I think the main reason people are having a hard times with the controls is the main character does not read as the car I think its meant to be controlled as. Its really hard to tell which way is forward, and the driftyness, while awesome for a car, feels really weird for controlling anything other than a car. Once I got used to the idea that this rectangle is a car, it was actually really fun. I'd have liked more telegraphing on the boss for his big attacks (players are blind, deaf, and slow and need 12x more than you think) because I took a lot more damage there by just not noticing his face changing in time to react. Could have been something special given an extra day. No extra days in Ludum Dare.

BlueMirrorauthor25 Apr 2018, 07:46

@aevek I wanted to draw a car :/ But I really suck at drawing and didnt make it in time. The thing I had was ugly, like really ugly, so ugly that I prefered the block. At that time I forgot to show what side is the front sadly :P
like I said on your stream, thanks a lot for all that great feedback!

Goplite25 Apr 2018, 15:21

I like the drifting firing, game was fun overall. For some reason the backstory in conjunction with you being a car cracked me up.

NorthernHawk25 Apr 2018, 17:06

Nice game, it was so fun and challeinging (could't beat the boss) I don't see the mix of genres so well but I enjoyed it so much.
Good job and keep it up!

CG_Fred26 Apr 2018, 20:50

Great and fun game. Well done! I had a bit of problem telling the front from the back on the "car".

MZA27 Apr 2018, 06:43

Game was great fun. You've made a great template to include multiple bosses of cacti. Controller controls were far better than keyboard controls and the UI was clear. The only thing is that, I didn't know that you could get damage at the far end of the screen. Solid entry.

BlueMirrorauthor27 Apr 2018, 08:58

@MZA in the last 30 minutes I realized that I would have to opt out of Graphics, because of 3 things that were not done by me. Ground, flowers and ... stones which indicated the end of the level. So in the last 30 minutes I tried to make em all, and weeeeell I didnt make the stones in time.

Sorry for the confusion. And thank you a lot for you kind words sir :)

Honest Dan27 Apr 2018, 18:17

I found the controls in this made the game very difficult HOWEVER - that is the point of the theme! There were some things you could have done (such as use a sprite for the car to / particles for skidding effect) to help the player understand the movement mechanics of the car on their first attempt. I really liked the boss, he had 3 distinct phases, that were fair. Every death was due to my own inability to control the car! I think with a bit more polish, a game like this could do really well in LD. Good job!

Paula27 Apr 2018, 18:46

I had some issues with the screen bounds, it seems that this bounds are detected like enemies (since i lost health) and collision is disabled so i can go outside the screen. Gob job with the music. I liked the art style so it's a pity that the player icon and shoots didn't have any sprite. I think it has a good design since at the beginnig the game teaches you to shoot some cactus without too much presion (and get used to the controls) and then play against the boss. Overall, I felt it intense and fun (and being angry to myself for being so bad), and I like very much your choice of game generes.

27 Apr 2018, 23:37

Those controls were really hard to get a hang of. While you were mixing two genres, I'm not sure if the the bullet hell was helped by car controls or the driving game was helped by being a bullet hell. Your sketch of the cactus and the setup really entertain me though!

Elfcirynn28 Apr 2018, 19:29

That was tough, but I like that it's tough because it keeps you trying again until you beat it (note: I haven't beaten yet, but I want to!). I liked the simple art and the top down perspective, would have been nice to see some car tires and some indication of front/back. I really enjoyed the drifting!

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