My first Ludum Dare entry!! Also worked on game solo.
Ludum dare 45 entry by "HiveMinds"
Theme - "Start with nothing"
Title - "SwordMaster"
DISCLAIMERS: Crude language - If it bothers anyone of you guys. Only windows build was tested - Please comment if you seem to be getting problems!
I started out with tackling this theme - just as confused as everybody else. The logical way to approach this theme, was to have an entry where you gradually evolve the capabilities of the player / game the farther you progress.
I saw a unique twist I could take this: You start with nothing. But you don't gain anything at all. The game is designed to let you really play with whatever little you can do and how it affects the environment.
So in the end, you start with nothing but you do gain something - experience, skill, knowledge.
STORY:
"""
Play as a master swordsman, entering finally his 1st real dungeon to smite all who stand before him with his mighty sword!!!
At least I hope he does.
...
Is that his sword here near the couch?
HEY WAIT UP!!!!- Welp he's already locked inside.
.....
Hope it goes well......
"""
Would love feedback (even negative feedback is welcome)!! Hope you enjoy!
Resources (Special thanks to the following for public domain assets): - `.fbx` Assets by Quaternius (http://quaternius.com). - MicroSoft's Cascadia Code font.
A really cool entry! Interesting mechanic, decent music, and quite funny. I did like the Glaive mechanic. Not sure if you could kill the enemies, or maybe I just wasn't patient enough. The obstacles you had to jump over could have been clearer, I didn't realise what they were at first.
It's so cool, I really liked how the theme is used in the game like yeah use your sword, but it does literally nothing hahaha, so it's cool how the puzzles need to be solved using the scenario and the enemies itself. The only thing is, as you said, that the pits are not so clear at all. But nice job anyway!
Fun game and I liked the twist with the weapons. I was a bit confused as to what I had to do in the beggining because the green button wasn't being pressed (I had to run and poke at it at the same time) but other than that its a solid entry. Nice job.
Couldn't figure this one out--pressing "F" didn't appear to do anything, so I didn't know how to fight the first enemy except to run past him, and then I couldn't roll over the barriers to poke the next switch.
Oh, cool! I missed the important first text box on my first play through. This time it all made sense. I got to The End (?) and had fun on the way there!
Dude the game is amazing! It's very compact and I definitely enjoyed every room you put in there! When I first came across the enemy I realized you can poke at him and his weapon will fall. I literally spent a couple of minutes trying to maybe pick up his weapon and kill him but nooope. Definitely a great taste of the theme. Thank you for the game!
@hiveminds from the very start, I would press the movement keys and the player would stutter in the direction i press. Basically it took a while to go from the first room to the next
@mad-brokli The game has scripted 'cutscenes' of sorts. Where a dialogue box appears. You can't move in my game when a cutscene is playing till it ends.
I'll be honest, until I read the comments, I thought the falling pits were long large pots for potted plants for some reason! The models are nice and simple and the controls are nice.
Sound, admittedly, was a lil jarring though. As for the enemies, I mostly just ran past alla em.
Was very glitchy for me overall. I even ended out of bounce once (see screnshot). In the room on the screenshot I tried to roll into the corner to get the enemies into the pit and rolled right through it. The puzzles were short and easy to understand. The graphics were a bit too simplistic for my taste. but you opted out of that anyway. Overall solid game.
Appreciate you leaning into the start and continue with nothing. Improving the player's knowledge and skill instead of their avatar is a wise design choice. I think that makes for a potentially stronger design, which is much harder to build a sense of accomplishement around.
Comments41
You can actually kill enemies, though not with your sword anyhow :/
I was really scratching my head on how to make the falling pits clearer haha.
Hopefully next time I'll think of a nice solution to my next attempt at a falling pit. Maybe a slight fog emission (and an actual clearer pit haha)
I'm glad the theme was clear, I was afraid the cinematic aspect of the game wouldn't be understood too well.
I'll look in to fix weird issues such as green button poking soon,
thanks for pointing this out!
I implore you try again the the roll over the to the switch,
there's more content after that, that I think going through would maybe help you understand the game and why it was made this way a bit better :)
Again, only if you are still interested in the entry, have a great day!
This means a lot to me thank you!
I never thought of the possibility of having a window of time to pick up the enemies weapon when it falls!
If I would have designed it to have a pick up mechanic I would definitely add that :) Really cool idea!!
You can be proud !
I would really appreciate more details on what you encountered.
Was it a specific room? The start of the game?
Persistent stuttering in the game or just at certain moments?
Thanks for playing!
Where a dialogue box appears.
You can't move in my game when a cutscene is playing till it ends.
To see it to the end there's some fun moments in there :)
Would love to hear what you thought if it when you finish!
I wanted to make a control setup screen that would actually effect the in-game button tutorials, just didn't have time sadly haha :v:
Was there anything else you found confusing about the game? I would like to know if you remember anything :)
If you are still interested in the game,
give it another go and see if you still feel about the game the same way.
Thanks for playing :v:
Sound, admittedly, was a lil jarring though. As for the enemies, I mostly just ran past alla em.
Still nice game! And great work making it
I'll definitely be attempting to make some more engaging enemy encounters in future titles.
The puzzles were short and easy to understand. The graphics were a bit too simplistic for my taste. but you opted out of that anyway.
Overall solid game.
I'll definitely look into this bug where you rolled out of a room bounds, thanks for reporting :)
Thanks for playing :)