Sick of Summoning

by cheesepencil

Overall★★★★★★★★★★3.13

Fun★★★★★★★★★★3.33

Innovation★★★★★★★★★★2.30

Theme★★★★★★★★★★2.49

Graphics★★★★★★★★★★3.31

Audio★★★★★★★★★★2.97

Humor★★★★★★★★★★2.17

Mood★★★★★★★★★★3.06

Just didn't have time to work on it during the weekend, here's what I could throw together in a couple hours on Monday.

⬅️ to move wizard left

➡️ to move wizard right

❎ (or `x`) to shoot your magic

🅾️ (or `z`) to restart the game at any time

😈 Zap the devils before they get to your level!

🔥 Avoid the fireballs, your magic is powerless against them.

Go for the high score! Game pad friendly! PICO-8 FTW

After you rate the stinky jam version, I encourage you to give the post-jam version a look! It's a bit more polished but the core gameplay is the same: POST-JAM VERSION HERE

Tools: PICO-8

Comments40

James Greenleaf16 Apr 2024, 03:53

Nice little space invaders style game. Pretty good for a single day!

Koolruz16 Apr 2024, 03:55

For a couple hours of work on a Monday, this turned out really well! I love the super chunky lofi artstyle that Pico-8 games lend themselves to, and you've done a really good job keeping everything really readable and appealing! It's not easy when you're working with so few colors and pixels!

coolasjake16 Apr 2024, 04:31

this is so clean, I love it

Ben Albert16 Apr 2024, 13:11

Dope little game! Neat little upside down space invaders. Great job!

LDJam user 016 Apr 2024, 14:18

Hey it's always nice to see a fellow Pico-8 dev! I enjoyed your game, it's very simple but it works, and there's a fun gameplay loop in there that could be expanded upon into something bigger. This is good for having made it in only a few hours, I'd love to see what you can do in Pico-8 when you have more time to work on it.

jbisnee16 Apr 2024, 16:30

neat!

Patrick Pang16 Apr 2024, 17:17

A flipped version of Raiden.

Patrick Pang16 Apr 2024, 17:17

Games on the PICI-8 always have a unique charm. I love this piece!

Storeyware17 Apr 2024, 05:25

hehehe I like the little demons. Nice work.

Bollatix2350017 Apr 2024, 15:59

Great work!

avareii17 Apr 2024, 16:03

Really clean and neat little game :) even understanding how the demons move it takes some serious skill to get a decent score.

prcastro17 Apr 2024, 16:04

Great work! Just needed to tune the hitbox a little better, but its awesome for a couple of hours

Hoshiibullet17 Apr 2024, 16:11

You really nailed the simple aesthetic and the game is fun, well done for a couple of hours. You made me want to simplify the pixel art sprites in our game.

I could think of multiple levels, the last one with the wizard angrily descending to fight in close combat.

To sum up : Less is more, thumbs up

Rendow17 Apr 2024, 16:42

Great execution on a simple game concept! I managed to get 120 points before getting overwhelmed, was pretty fun! The the PICO-8 retro graphics look great and I'm very impressed you did this in just a couple of hours. Well done :D

Chrispy97718 Apr 2024, 03:48

Love the classic feel.

LDJam user 24319318 Apr 2024, 08:58

Somehow it reminds me to Space Invaders with its slow beginning and gradually gets faster and faster.
I discovered a good trick to kill more demons and that allows me to earn 185 score before a demon managed to reach my level.
Anyways, nice simple game.

XanaGear18 Apr 2024, 13:58

Great sprite for the wizard, smooth gameplay, good job.

LDJam user 27362618 Apr 2024, 17:16

The game was super cute, and amazing for only in an hour or two! Well done! Tried to figure out how to get the second player to work and have my partner join me XD

MisterCarson19 Apr 2024, 03:44

For a handful of hours on the last day, this is super fun. It's simple yet satisfying, great work!

delauraen19 Apr 2024, 03:57

cute little game, loved the retro graphics

Jahwffrey19 Apr 2024, 04:02

For being thrown together in a couple errors it's remarkably seamless. Everything worked great and I love little Atari games like this. Straightforward and fun!

Snory19 Apr 2024, 07:16

This would take him whole Ludum Dare so hat down.

It plays on nostalgic note, which is great, because it reminded me that these simple games were all it took to spend whole afternoon after school playing games.

DenisMarasan19 Apr 2024, 07:23

From the gameplay pov this game is helluva masterpiece! Maybe, just maybe, the wiz should be able to shoot down enemy projectoles. Or may be not.
Speaking of controls it's not a good idea to map shooting (x) between restart buttons (z and c). You better block the shoot button for a sec and then let the player press it to restart.

Overall, great job :thumbsup:

cheesepencilauthor19 Apr 2024, 16:27

Yeah haha @denismarasan I didn't want a "restart button" at all... I plan to resolve that in the post jam! Thanks for playing

Adam Gallina19 Apr 2024, 17:21

Really nice game, the sprites and jump animation were both really well done! It would've been nice if there was more indication for enemy health - it looked like the enemies took 2 hits to kill, but it was really hard to keep track of which enemies had been hit. Overall great job, was pretty fun :)

ScrivenerOfLight20 Apr 2024, 05:05

A really fun game. I like the art style, sound effects... and the game is just fun. Good job!

Lamp_p20 Apr 2024, 05:20

Convincing retro arcade game. The graphics along with the sfx are simple but cohesive giving this game a polished look and feel even if you didn't spend a lot of time on it. Given more time I'm sure you would've added more functionality, I would've enjoyed more player actions powerups, alt abilities, guns etc...

also surprisingly good menu for a jam game lol

cheesepencilauthor20 Apr 2024, 05:39

@lamp-p haha I can't take credit for the pause menu - that's built into PICO-8! thank you for the kind words

ThomasZane20 Apr 2024, 10:07

Great little game.
Somehow I really like retro games like this.

alpacalypse20 Apr 2024, 16:40

I will always support PICO-8. This is very crisp for a monday game, my only real complaint is the hitbox for the fireball feels way too large.

LDJam user 37242520 Apr 2024, 18:33

That's pretty impressive for a few hours. Everything that's there works well. The sounds and graphics are cohesive and there's good feedback. A solid little arcade game, great job!

Ned Murry21 Apr 2024, 05:04

This is really cool! I felt like there wasn't much of a difficulty curve with the randomness - my first round I only ever got one or two fireballs on the screen at once, but after that I had up to four I think. I also found out the hitbox behind the player extends far beyond the sprite, so you can be standing your own width away from a fireball and still die. A 3 lives health system might make the game feel more fair. Great job!

JoeShanahan21 Apr 2024, 11:39

This is a neat little arcade game, that feels like it was perfectly scoped for the few hours you had available. You picked the right things to work on so that it could still be a fun experience, while dropping anything like title or game over screens, and I think that paid off!

I do wish the restart button wasn't right next to shoot though, I did hit that by accident once!

JoeShanahan21 Apr 2024, 23:05

I uploaded my play through of this to YouTube, I hope it’s useful to you in some way!

cheesepencilauthor22 Apr 2024, 00:16

@joeshanahan Thanks for playing!

I addressed (some of) your feedback in the post-jame version

leorean22 Apr 2024, 17:05

Another Pico-8 game, nice!! My highscore is 63 so far :) It was a bit hard to "think ahead" when changing directions since the projectiles shoot out of the staff (which makes sense, I guess), but I was focusing on the player. I really like the idea, it's like a reverse space-invaders :space_invader:

cheesepencilauthor22 Apr 2024, 17:23

@leorean Thanks for giving it a try!

mollusk23 Apr 2024, 09:48

Fun game, plays smooth!

Jimbly24 Apr 2024, 23:47

My high score: 92.

Really nice! It's surprisingly challenging despite how simple it seems! I had difficultly trying to balance keeping track of incoming fireballs and also aiming and also running towards the guys almost to the top row =). Simple and elegant, I can't really think of anything to suggest being done differently, maybe just some variety in enemies after a certain point (ones that take multiple hits but move slower, perhaps?).

LDJam user 23863927 Apr 2024, 20:17

Simple and it works. Good stuff! Score: 304