A shoot-em-up roguelike with a twist - at the start you get to choose how much life to pay for an advantage in the game. Will you pay all your life except 1 for the best bonuses? Or will you refuse to deal with the devil and go in without anything? It’s all up to you in Barter in Blood. Controls: WASD or Arrow Keys to move, Enter or Z to shoot
UPDATE: I made a post ludum dare update to the Barter in Blood game, which you can play at https://snowinn.itch.io/barter-in-blood-v2. The new features added are pressing “Enter” will skip through the intro and the game automatically restarts when you die. These features are solely to help you play the game without going through the intro every time and should not be a factor in the rating of the game. If this is against the rules, I’ll take it down.
I didn't find the intro cutscene particularly interesting... The ghost sprites are cute. However, the game is not very interesting to play and is very repetitive. The music is not pleasant and similarly repetitive.
I dug the intro, it was super metal. Unfortunately, the menu to select the 'powerups' doesn't list the controls, so I died trying to figure out how to shoot my gun. Then I had to wait through the cutscene again :(
The music felt a bit off after the horrifically awesome intro, blaring dethklok or something similar would have fit better. Solid gameplay!
The text speed is a bit slow, but I like the intro / premise. The idea of wagering your life *beforehand*, as opposed to spending it during play, is pretty novel I think.
I enjoyed the intro but found the game itself to be quite repetitive. If you could choose what to pay for more than just the first time it might be a little more engaging. Good job though
The barter system seems like it's just a regular difficulty setting, I didn't get "currency" from it because there was no consistent value to the life. The gameplay itself was too simplistic. Every level being one room with the same exit, ever enemy being a "run at you" AI and no variety (just more of them). Not that an LDjam game needs a lot of levels or enemies, but at least two of either one would have been great.
I did like the ghosts, it seemed like a cute little homage to pac man. I loved the intro, though I really would have liked to be able to skip it as I had to reset the entire game after dying.
If you aren't doing it already, I would suggest putting a ring around the starting position where the enemies can't spawn. If you are already doing this, I would have liked a bigger radius or I'm just too bad :( I would also have liked some more moody music (although it's your choice what you wanted to go for) and some music at the beginning. And it was a bit loud.
The only thing I didn't like is that every time you die, you need to restart and see the whole intro again, and that's kinda annoying, besides that, it was a nice job
Yeah sorry guys for not including a way to restart, I got pushed to the last minute to submit this game and I would’ve included a way if I had a little bit more time. I think that would be against the rules to change it now though.
Hello, I'm sorry I couldn't feature your game on my stream yesterday, but thank you for submitting. I got to play it, and even tho it's simple, I still enjoy a good challenge of seeing just how far I can go (floor 17 without gun :p). I think the music and the intro are cool, so I'm hoping you do more games in the future cus I want to see what else you'll have under your wings. Best of luck!
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The music felt a bit off after the horrifically awesome intro, blaring dethklok or something similar would have fit better. Solid gameplay!
The gameplay itself was too simplistic. Every level being one room with the same exit, ever enemy being a "run at you" AI and no variety (just more of them). Not that an LDjam game needs a lot of levels or enemies, but at least two of either one would have been great.
I did like the ghosts, it seemed like a cute little homage to pac man. I loved the intro, though I really would have liked to be able to skip it as I had to reset the entire game after dying.
The intro was too slow and I was quite annoing to restart every time I died..
I would also have liked some more moody music (although it's your choice what you wanted to go for) and some music at the beginning. And it was a bit loud.
Well done.
Good entry dude !
Nice work, probably next time you can improve the game design a bit by adding more types of enemies or moves :)
I got to play it, and even tho it's simple, I still enjoy a good challenge of seeing just how far I can go (floor 17 without gun :p). I think the music and the intro are cool, so I'm hoping you do more games in the future cus I want to see what else you'll have under your wings.
Best of luck!