Feed the monster gems to keep it alive. Some gems are better than others. Change gems to better gems by placing them in machines. Use gems to create upgrades for the machines.
This is my first Ludum Dare. The game was a 3d game, but I failed at it yesterday evening. So, I changed it to 2d and it looks way better.
*I did turn off the sound for the machines after I published the game since they were a bit annoying.
Love the menu, looks super cute ^^! I couldn't really tell the colors of the gems that well, but I'm sort of colorblind so that wouldn't help :). Maybe add some indicator what machines your current gem can be put into?
@symphonia Yeah. I didn't think about color blind. There was a small green light under the gem, but I didn't have time to fix it. I appreciate your commets.
Artwork is awesome! Animations and sound are on point. The gameplay gets a little stale after a while as it's the same thing over and over but its an interesting concept. I did find the animation to pick up a gem to be bothersome as I couldn't just run over the gem to quickly grab it. It was creative and haven't seen another like it!
The art style and sound is great, the monster and its voice lines are funny and entertaining. The gameplay is fun trying to get the most effecient gems while maintaining the monster hp, it gets quite stressful while waiting for the bigger gems to get made. Really fun game. Well done.
@rirdeg Thanks for the input. Yeah the game gets samey after awhile. With more time I would had difficulties and different set up of the machines. I really couldn't get the animations to work well. Need to learn how to do that better.
Sound effects and music were great! Took a while to get used to the triggers and colliders (the monster doesn't accept gems if you approach him from the side), and I did get blue borders on my screen, but overall it's pretty good. Once you get one of the upgrades you can pretty much keep the monster alive forever. Good job!
Really cool game! The monster is so cute, you really don't want it to be hungry :grin:. One thing that could be improved is some feedback when picking up gems: sometimes I did not notice that I missed a gem.
@derkuchen I had a sound effect for picking up the gem, but it does come out well. 3x on the red gem is the best. I had an idea that the monster would want certain types of gems at random points and what he would want would changed base on how far you got in the game. Didn't have enough time to program it though.
A nice engine builder. And ohhhhh does that engine ever get built. Died the first couple of attempts but by the third one the only way I would have lost is negligence. That x3 gem upgrade is where it's at.
I enjoyed the gem upgrade system, the pickup and walking was a little slow and I eventually got in a situation where too many black gems laid around and I couldn't walk well.
a chart (or sign) would be cool to understand what the monster likes, he seemed not to like something I gave him. also, what do I do with the x3 yellow gas can?
@brandann how much points you get lets you know how much its feed. I chart at the being would have been helpful. Ran out of time though. The black gems to get in the way, but it made it challenging. When I first was working on it in 3d I had made a robot to help you. You would have to create them though using gems. The x3 upgrade is like the x2. Machines will make that many gems. The other upgrades speed up the machine. The longer it takes the machine the more valuable the gem.
@binaryprinciple Thanks a lot. I do want to expand on it. I wanted it to have it where the monster would want certain kinds of gems or combinations of gems. Has the game progresses how much he wanted would change.
This was a really cool little game (very similar to my entry actually) that was really fun for me. I really liked this take on the crafting/resource management style game. As simple as the graphics and sound effects were, I feel like it was perfect for the little story that you told. Overall, nice job!
Great gameplay, I had a lot of fun playing it. The audio is really good too, the effort you placed in it definitely paid off. This has been one of my favorite games so far. Great job!
This was really fun! It did not know at which end of the machine I should put the gems at first, but I found out quickly :D The voice acting is really cool and the game really challenging! Great job!
The monster is really cute! The gameplay is simple, yet still really fun, and I love how you incorporated crafting aspects into the game. The monster's dialogue is also hilarious and adds to the humor. Great job!
I liked this game a lot! In the first play I had no idea how this works, then I figured it out and I created upgrades and so on! Nice job in 48 hours. You should make a different levels with goals, then port to android and iOS. I would actually play this game on the phone :D
Super game. I like the idea and how difficult it actually is to manage it the further down the line you get. The voices you make are really setting the mood and I would have loved to hear the monster complain even more and in all kinds of ways.
Nice, needed a bit to figure out where to place the gems in the machines (first I just dropped them on them and nothing happened) and where to place the gems to feed the monster (if not placed below, the monster will not eat them). Cute art, voices and fitting audio too!
I love the addition of upgrades/powerups to encourage the player to strategize and know when to feed the monster, when to make the machines move faster to get the monster the next gem faster, and when they can take time and produce a bunch of gems at one time. Overall the game feels great and is fun to play.
Very cool game, it's interesting to make all the combination while monster is treating you. Very clever idea. Sometimes the crystals refuse to be taken, you need to move away from them and go back. But overall it's a great game!
Thanks for all the comments and feedback. I really appreciate it! Many of the problems I knew existed, but I didn't have time to fix. But, even with those problems I'm glad people can still play it and enjoy it. I had a lot of ideas for the game, but knew with limited time I needed to focus on one thing to make it playable and fun.
I feel knowing about the issues people talk about! I liked what I got, though, despite the shortcomings. Kind of a clicker-game like thing, but with a crafting element. Doesn't sound great when I put it like that, but I really enjoyed it. Like Factorio except with the complexity dialed back a bunch. I thought the monster was going to eat me at the end, so him just dying was kind of a relief. Felt like I won, in a weird way. Nice work.
I really enjoyed this one. The gem crafting was a neat idea and the monster's commentary while I was running around making gems was hilarious! Since you're aware of the issues I won't mention them again and will end with saying this was a great entry for the compo. Congrats on finishing your first LD!
Was a fun game. really enjoyed the monsters commentary. Turned out to be a lot more challenging then I initially thought it was. The instructions a the beginning were super confusing before you have played the game. but Im sure with more time, a proper tutorial could have been created.
I don't think I would have worked out the gameplay without that tutorial screen, that was a good idea. I found the monster to be a little annoying(thought the voice acting was good) but that might just be me haha. I'd be more inclined to want to keep it alive if it was more endearing Once I worked out the mechanics with the machines, it was really quite fun though, juggling the upgrades and food made for a really strong foundation for a game. Good job!
Grats for your first jam! The game core mechanic is quite cool, but at some point the monster really annoyed me saying he was hungry all the time x) Nice entry though !!
@fatpenguin Thanks for playing. Everything is automatic. Spacebar is only used when you pick up a gem that you didnt want to pick up. I think that was the confusing part in my instructions. So, if you have a gem you have to face the correct direction to put in a machine. You don't have to press space bar to drop the gem in the machine. Same with feeding the monster and placing upgrades. The high score was an after thought. Didn't have time to put other things like levels. I would have had the monster want certain gems at different times. So at first he might only want a black and white gem, but than as you progress he would want red and purple. But, ran out of time. I would also redo the controllers as well. But thanks again for playing.
Hey there, no worries! :) Oh I see.. I think I overlooked that, might have to try again :) yeah I feel ya, that’s why I said „if time allows it“ because I’ve experienced firsthand how gamejams can be tough and don’t leave you with enough time and your game turned out really good for a jam :) Good luck with further development! And hey, if you ever need a break you can check out our game if you want :) Happy developing
The gamelplay is fun and really intuitive
Really great job !