Journey To The Center Of The World

by paulhocker

Overall★★★★★★★★★★3.28

Fun★★★★★★★★★★3.40

Innovation★★★★★★★★★★2.50

Theme★★★★★★★★★★4.14

Graphics★★★★★★★★★★3.28

Audio★★★★★★★★★★3.01

Humor★★★★★★★★★★2.33

Mood★★★★★★★★★★2.96

Are you ready for you Journey to the other side of the World?

Guide your high tech drilling machine through the Earth's core and beyond to the other side of the World. The drill is equipped with a high power mineral inverter that can turn minerals you find along the way into temperature and hull protection. Find pockets of oil to give your Drill a little added boost, but lookout for lava fields and large boulders that will stop you in your tracks.

Build up your Hull and keep you Temperature low as you make your way to the center of the Earth where things really start to get hot.

If you are skilled enough to make it all the way to the other side of the world, you can put you name on the hall of fame wall.

There are more instructions in the game by pressing the Help button when you start it.

Controls are simple, use the left or right arrow key on your keyboard.

Can't finish, don't worry, we have not finished it either, but we know someone will do it.

Version History

v0.0.3
- made hit boxes slightly bigger for minerals and smaller for obstacles
- fixed some of the text in the help screen

v.0.0.2
- added ui text to show hull and temp guages
- keep ui visible when game is over
- high score entry fixed (in case someone makes it)

v0.0.1
- first release

Genres: action

Comments38

Andrew Hoyer27 Apr 2021, 03:49

Saw your share, thought I'd come by and check out your game. One thing I'd like to see is the difficulty level ramp up a lot more quickly. Give the player a chance to get used to the game, then start hitting them with some real challenges. Especially in a jam setting where people are spending at most a couple of minutes per game.

squirmonkey27 Apr 2021, 04:17

Simple, but effective!

I liked the art for the crystals. And I appreciate your dedication to the theme in letting us go all the way through the planet. I made it just past the center of the planet, which I consider a win.

Nice work!

ColeSlaughter27 Apr 2021, 04:23

Very cool! A great example of a simple premise turned into a great game through sheer polish. I love the visual aesthetics here, and I also liked how getting closer to the center of the Earth made your heat gauge more problematic. Very nice attention to detail!

I would have liked it if the gauges would warn me when they're about to deplete though. As it stands right now, I was both surprised and confused when I saw my first game over screen, because I wasn't even aware how close I was to failing.

Other than that though, this is a fun, solid experience. I can see it playing well on phones, too!

jabsatz27 Apr 2021, 21:56

I liked it, it clearly needs a bit more balancing as you said in your itch page, but I know how hard balancing a game in 72 hours is :)
Other than that, I feel the UI could be a bit more clear, It took me a while to understand which powerups were good or bad and what each bar meant

KeyLime27 Apr 2021, 22:00

I liked how the layers changed color as you got deeper and that there was a gauge indicating how much further you had to go

Joris Valette27 Apr 2021, 22:05

Not something I would play for hours, but it was fun trying to get as deep into the core as possible.

I appreciate the effort you put in the art and the progress bar, it was a really nice touch.

paulhockerauthor27 Apr 2021, 22:06

> @coleslaughter @jabsatz thanks for the feedback -- i struggled with the UI, i wanted it to be easy to understand but also not get too much in the way -- did you notice the bonus modifier at the bottom?

jabsatz27 Apr 2021, 22:36

@paulhocker Can't say I did, sorry. I was mostly looking at the three bars on the right side

Nahuelito27 Apr 2021, 22:59

Cool easy to pick up game, really liked the music. The only thing I would change is adding more visual feedback whenever you take damage, besides that it's simple and fun

remram4427 Apr 2021, 23:41

Fun game! The music is short but works. I played multiple rounds but never could get to the bottom (high score also stayed at 0).

The oil is a little confusing at first, I wasn't sure if I wanted that much speed (but probably you need it for a chance to get to the bottom). The dials could use some kind of icon to indicate their purpose (e.g. temperature).

Oil also tends to be hidden behind other things, and gets picked up involuntarily.

LandoSystems28 Apr 2021, 23:28

Great work! The main menu music set a good hype level to start things off with. Thought it could have been a good track for the main gameplay music too, but that music got the job done even though it was pretty short.

Didn't really understand what the different pickups were doing for me, but it was very clear what should be picked up versus what should be avoided. Definitely caught on to the progress meter for depth, but not really the other two progress bars. Maybe a small icon over each one could have helped clear it up?

All things considered it's a fun game that's well implemented and could be the base for a simple mobile game if you wanted to expand on it. Made it just past the halfway mark on my first playthrough. Really nice job! :D

MegaShark29 Apr 2021, 18:19

Great game! Simple but effective! Very enjoyable experience and I love how you can just get so fast!

Madbarron29 Apr 2021, 18:20

Fun little game! There is a bug where your speed (from hitting the holes) doesn't reset when you restart the level. I would also recommend making the heat and hull levels easier to see. Nice jam entry!

frompdx29 Apr 2021, 18:23

Really fun and enjoyable. It's a simple game but everything feels very well polished and the controls are very satisfying. Nice work!

dob29 Apr 2021, 18:29

Fun game - reminds me of RoadRace that I played back on the Commodore PET in my elementary school. The graphics were very crisp and interesting. I had a little trouble seeing any impact from my powerups on the gauges, although I am sure that was happening. It might be nicer to have more obvious feedback there. It was fun accelerating until I got to a crazy fast descent.

tengusheath29 Apr 2021, 18:30

Fun game. Only things I would suggest is to increase the hitbox size on the powerups, a lot of the time I thought I was close enough to grab them but didn't. I also had powerup spawn on top of obstacles and I would hit they obstacle because I couldn't see it.

Maybeagoose29 Apr 2021, 18:31

Nice game on this game jam

DotSquare29 Apr 2021, 19:01

pretty cool game, especially the polish (little screenshake is neat)
maybe the game take too much time to become hard? for a couple of minutes I thought it was not possible to loose.
congrats for your entry!

filgru29 Apr 2021, 21:56

Hi! I had a lot of fun playing this game. I tried to get to the core so badly but I didn't make it :) Maybe it would be cool to make this game little bit more harder when you reach deeper levels. Good job!

retrome30 Apr 2021, 15:42

Simple and fun! Pleasant collisions. Nice sound effects and music.

Some remarks:
1. Boost is pretty sharp. Expectation: speed increases smoothly after boost.
2. Drilling machine slightly differs in style. Expectation: thicker lines used in the drilling machine sprite.

Good job!

Maytch30 Apr 2021, 22:14

I made it to the centre! That's deep enough right?

paulhockerauthor30 Apr 2021, 22:28

@maytch well you made it half way -- journey to the other side of the world :)

CandleLight2 May 2021, 14:13

This game is fun to play. I made it a bit over half way on my first try and I'm going to try a few times more, cause I only went to the HELP menu after playing and realized it is super useful, now I get what to prioritize at what stage. It is quite well designed and thought out game.

The other outstanding point for this game is definitely that the theme is absolutely nailed in my opinion. :)

2 minor things that cause difficulty are:
- Rocks are actually small enough to be completely obscured by a bonus icon, ran into a rock that was hidden that way at least once. Ideally rocks and bonuses shouldn't be able to spawn on top of each other.
- Lava barriers are difficult to see when you reach red-background center part of the World.

This is a well put together game, engaging gameplay, great idea and design, simple but nice sounds and visuals, all that while fitting nicely into the theme of the Game Jam.

Thank you for sharing your game! :)

Jonrei2 May 2021, 19:12

It was a fun little game with very nice music. I enjoyed this a lot :D

My only problem with it is that it took me a while before i understood what kept killing me. I thought the boulders were things i needed to pick up xD

ThatmanRobin2 May 2021, 19:14

It was pretty fun, easy to get the hang of. Similar to some other submissions but that's what we get with the theme. As for theme is was spot on! I definitely didn't make it, 200 miles at least though. Enjoyed it, though I didn't realize what were pickups and what weren't at first. Sounds were good, graphics were good. Overall good submission.

darthone3 May 2021, 06:15

This game was super fun and quick to pick up! One minor complaint is sometimes a resource would spawn over a rock, thus unknowingly ending my streak

Dest_693 May 2021, 07:23

11k score, i like this music, haha, the game is really addictive.

minibobbo4 May 2021, 04:10

Overall a fun experience. I liked the music and the funky loop during play. The loop is extremely short, but it didn't get repetitive or annoying, so well done!

There were a couple things that I think could improve the experience:

- Make sure that you don't spawn obstacles inside of powerups. More than once I hit a rock or a lava field that was mostly obscured behind an icon.
- It was mean to have the center of the earth the same color as the lava. Maybe that was a design choice to make it so hard to see, but I was a little frustrated by it.
- I don't think there were enough tungsten. I died from heat with completely full hull.
- Maybe don't tie the speed to the oil and just speed up over time so it gets harder? Hitting a rock or lava was extremely punishing because you lose all your speed and have to build it back up again. Playing at the very low speed wasn't nearly as interesting as playing at high speeds.

paulhockerauthor4 May 2021, 04:47

@minibobbo thanks for playing and leaving the feedback -- very good points indeed.

LDJam user 2365454 May 2021, 15:29

I made it slightly past the halfway point:

The game was pretty good overall. I didn't realize the oil spills were a speed boost until several minutes in. It looked like a hole in the ground, so I was trying to avoid it. A bit more visual clarity on that would have been nice.

Good work!

LRVStudios4 May 2021, 17:49

It's a great game! There are only two things that I think could be improved:

- The punishment for hitting a stone is too great! I don't know if it's just me, but this abrupt change in speed makes me a little dizzy. Perhaps if the penalty were 30% of the actual speed could solve this problem.

- Eventually, I hit a stone that was covered by a power-up, and it's a little frustrating - you think you are rocking, but then ... it's rock. haha.

Despite these two things, I really enjoyed this game - the art is great, excellent musical choice and could have a big 'replay factor' for me, if you deal with this speed penalty. Great work!

Shin0nome6 May 2021, 07:48

Fun game ! It work really well and the game feel is cool. I think you could move the HUD, I would have prefer to have it on the top side of the screen, that way I think the player can focus on the game easier. But the game was a lot of fun, I had a great time ! Good job !

msipp276 May 2021, 16:54

you should really prevent powerups from spawning on top of obstacles so they are always collectable.

Sanemsky7 May 2021, 11:10

Good game! I got a bit confusing about which object effects which and couldn't get used to the speed at first, felt a bit too fast. But never the less it was well executed game. Good job!

khaotom7 May 2021, 21:22

Nice fun simple game. One thing I wasn't sue at first which things were good to run into and which were not, but not a big deal. Learn pretty fast.

astronautmikedexter9 May 2021, 10:00

I think the music was not really congruent with the game and looped way too much and the SFX were a bit too loud in comparison.

Cute graphics and nice smooth powerups. I wasn't clear which objects did what and maybe a nice upgrade mechanic could have been good to add but over all good job!

dhavavamba12 May 2021, 17:25

Nice but good but I would have preferred to use WASD

LDJam user 23480718 May 2021, 18:09

What an enjoyable game! Just wanted to continue playing. It was very fun to play. I loved the black holes that boosted your speed more and more. I wasn't very good with grabbing all the right rocks, so I died a few times, but with every reboot I got better. I like that you don't die when you hit lava spots or those pesky grey rocks! The sound is awesome and the music is soft enough not to be disturbing. There is a slight lag/shudder when the ship is going down at normal speed, but once it speeds up the lag disappears. Will like to play this again in future. Well done. Game is well polished! And I like the menu as well.

Other games by @paulhocker

Escape From GR0K Tower

★3.27

★3.52