The Dark is consuming the stars. Use your wand on stars to provide them extra starlight to vanquish the Dark. Don't let too many stars fall, don't run into buildings, and don't be consumed yourself.
W and S or Up and Down arrows to move. Space or F to use your wand to light stars. R to return to the title screen. Esc to quit.
Tools
* Gamemaker/Gamemaker Language
* Paint.net and GM's sprite editor for art, because I apparently enjoy a bit of suffering
* Bosca Ceoil for music
* BFXR for sounds
Changes made to allow the HTML5 port to run:
* No changes to game logic. One errant semicolon added - not that GML cares.
* Reduced game screen to 1024 x 576 from 1536 x 864
* Reduced font sizes by 33% as a quick fix for above, need to look into UI scaling options going forward.
* Changed all uses of view_wport to view_wport[0] to positively identify the viewport being used.
* Changed all uses of view_hport to view_hport[0] to positively identify the viewport being used.
Frankly I'm surprised the windows version let me get away with that, just naming that array and not specifying the cell. Absolute bonehead move.
* There's a graphical bug which occurs sometimes possibly due to a slight load time on one of the losing conditions which I've never encountered on the Windows version (the background darkening effect drops before transitioning to the game over screen). In the spirit of the Compo I will not be attempting to correct this during the rating event as changes were only to make the port run.
Nice game with minimal mechanic and great fantasy setting!But the hit detection for wand is too harsh for this fast-paced game,and the movement is a little bit slippy. Usually you need to constantly press W and S to fine controll the character and frequently press SPACE or F to hit the star,to be honest this keybinding makes hand tired quickly.
Pretty fun, but I also found it punished my clumsiness a fair bit. Really enjoyed the character design and the mechanic, that loop of lighting acting on the tetris-like enemy darkness is cool and the generated level design works well with that.
Game feels super fluid and responsive and I like to see that! Cute graphics and music. It took me a while to understand that the wand was lighting the stars up, maybe there could have been stronger visual feedback.
@Bad-B4DGuy Thank you! Yeah, I agree with you! I considered making these changes at the last minute (they became *much* more apparent as I filled out the level with buildings) but just didn't get to it before needing to prepare for submission, and ended up having some issues with that process so was glad to have started just a little early on it. But yes, you're quite right about the controls.
@kierogi I feel that on the clumsiness and the loose controls, ha ha. Sorry about that. Thank you!
@Nazorus Ohhh, thank you for mentioning a place where the game's communication could be a bit clearer. That's super valuable feedback.
Great take on the theme. I enjoyed the gameplay a lot. Some feedback: It would be nice to automatically use wand, or allow us to press down space to keep the wands up. Also, a score can also add replayability.
Love the concept and style, specially the pixeled player is super nice! At first I did not understand I should lit up the stars though. Many times it seems to turn to bright, but then I die after a very shortly after....
+ Yes the movement was pretty slippery, sometimes accidentally overshooting into a building, and sometimes taking you too fat to be able to avoid the next building in time. Also there was no reason for not just spamming spacebar all the time. You could alleviate the first problem by making star lighting toggle-able but you move slower, that way you choose between lighting stars and fine control and avoiding buildings. + I liked the darkness effect, although the smoke was confusing. I didn't know if I had to avoid it or not, and I think I died to the darkness several times while touching the cloud. It didn't seem like the darkness touched me when that happened tho.
@Papaya Thank you! Yeah, in the very earliest iterations you lit stars just by flying over them. Then I removed it 'cuz things were so barebones, then once the game got a little busier I didn't put it back to how it was as I guess it still felt to me like it doesn't have much going on. I should have.
@teadrinker Oh, yeah, there's a graphics bug in the web version which can be a little confusing that way. Basically too many stars are converted (so it gets darker) and then that's supposed to trigger the character to stop and fade and switch to one of the game-overs. But on the web version, that specific one sometimes lights things right up to full before moving to the game-over, which really confuses that communication in a game where I chose a visual representation rather than clear scoring. Sorry about that.
@ellaris Yep, you avoid the smoke. And if it gets ahead of you, it blocks off avenues for movement and also kills a lot of extra stars. There are 3 fail conditions, hitting buildings, hitting the smoke, and having the smoke darken too many of the stars without enough smoke being killed by lit stars. That last one isn't nearly as intuitive or well-communicated as I had hoped for - especially with the aforementioned visual bug on the web version. Thanks!
Very interesting take on the theme! I really enjoyed the slippery movement, made it feel more fluid and also kind of provided another challenge to avoiding the buildings (not sure if that was intentional). I agree that lighting up the stars should've been automatic but it was nice nonetheless.
Yeah, I actually liked the slippery movement, but I agree the wand should be automatic, I think. It would also be cool to keep track of a high score (number of stars lit? distance traveled?) so people will want to replay to get a higher score. And so people can compare scores after they play :p
Visuals are really pretty! One thing I might add to the darkness is a clearer indication of when it's about to cause the end of the game. That could be a progress bar of some kind, or it could be stronger / different effects to emphasize when the darkness is about to take over.
This is a great game! The music is great and really adds to the atmosphere of the game. The gameplay is a lot of fun too -- I love the quick rounds that make you want to just keep retrying.
Lovely music, and an interesting take on the theme! You have some really solid ideas here, the only thing I would change is the pacing. I found it quite difficult, since there are multiple ways to fail, and the speed makes it hard to keep track of everything at once. I think it would have been nice to start off slower and have the speed ramp up over time, so it's easier to get the hang of things without having to start over a bunch of times. It might also be nice to space out the threats, for example: it starts off with just avoiding buildings, so you can focus on the stars. Then once you're getting comfortable with that, the smoke starts to creep in.
Awesome entry! It's addicting, love the star mechanic to destroy the clouds but then you get greedy, and ouch that's a building. Nice art as well, wish your web version had full screen so I could get even more into it.
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Good job overall!
@Bad-B4DGuy Thank you! Yeah, I agree with you! I considered making these changes at the last minute (they became *much* more apparent as I filled out the level with buildings) but just didn't get to it before needing to prepare for submission, and ended up having some issues with that process so was glad to have started just a little early on it. But yes, you're quite right about the controls.
@kierogi I feel that on the clumsiness and the loose controls, ha ha. Sorry about that. Thank you!
@Nazorus Ohhh, thank you for mentioning a place where the game's communication could be a bit clearer. That's super valuable feedback.
At first I did not understand I should lit up the stars though.
Many times it seems to turn to bright, but then I die after a very shortly after....
+ I liked the darkness effect, although the smoke was confusing. I didn't know if I had to avoid it or not, and I think I died to the darkness several times while touching the cloud. It didn't seem like the darkness touched me when that happened tho.
@teadrinker Oh, yeah, there's a graphics bug in the web version which can be a little confusing that way. Basically too many stars are converted (so it gets darker) and then that's supposed to trigger the character to stop and fade and switch to one of the game-overs. But on the web version, that specific one sometimes lights things right up to full before moving to the game-over, which really confuses that communication in a game where I chose a visual representation rather than clear scoring. Sorry about that.
@ellaris Yep, you avoid the smoke. And if it gets ahead of you, it blocks off avenues for movement and also kills a lot of extra stars. There are 3 fail conditions, hitting buildings, hitting the smoke, and having the smoke darken too many of the stars without enough smoke being killed by lit stars. That last one isn't nearly as intuitive or well-communicated as I had hoped for - especially with the aforementioned visual bug on the web version. Thanks!