Welp, after hours of merciless work and trying to juggle school and other things as well, it's finally finished. Kind of. I would never actually release a game in this state, but with a competition of this length, one can't be too picky. So now, here are a couple of screenshots.
And the download link:http://www.mediafire.com/?c209405us5j3r85StoryYou play as Aria (yes, partially inspired by a Minecraft city of the same name), a magician who lives by herself. Insert more cliches here. When it gets noisy one day, she looks outside and sees spirits. Well, spirits don't belong in the human world, so she sets out to exorcise them.On her travels, she finds a rift and enters it, only to end up in the spirit world. She can't leave the spirit world afterward, and must fight her way through.Soon enough, she learns the ability to return to the human world. But something always pulls her back, so she continues on her little way to take care of whatever it is keeping her there.Yeah. Whee.ControlsArrow keys to moveSpacebar to jumpZ key to shootHold Z to charge your shield (after first powerup, quarter magic meter)X to bomb (after second powerup, full magic meter)Hold X to rapidfire (only during flight, cannot use bomb)C to switch between the human and spirit worlds (after third powerup, quarter magic meter, drains magic meter, and when it runs out, you return to the spirit world)MechanicsThe game is basically a platform shooter with only four stages. Very typical. But it's also got those (being me) bullet hell elements to make things just a little less dry.Pickups are good. Blue is magic and red is health. Your magic restores over time, but your health doesn't. So grab these if you see yourself having trouble.Your shield, if you can charge it up in time, lasts for a while and is particularly useful when your magic is low and you can't stay in the human world for long.Your bomb is utterly useless, but is fun to watch.Switching worlds makes you invulnerable to most bullets that were fired in the spirit world, but you may run into those fired in the human world. Also, some enemies phase between the worlds, so you have to phase with them in order to deal any damage. In later levels, they'll appear as a faded red.You have no lives, and I promise you won't get stuck in one place for more than a few minutes unless your platforming skills suck. Enemies are never in the same place after you die, and all that happens is you return to a checkpoint.NOTESWhy is this in caps? Because it's important. I feel like I've been pretty solid with the game, but I got really sloppy when the deadline came up. So here's a list of things to look out for:Pros- Best graphics I've done in such a short time (spent a total of twenty minutes on sprites, not bad for a guy who sucks at pixel art)- Particularly pleased with the boss track- Pleased with the concept, and will probably build on the game following the competition- Did some fun new stuff with world changing- PRETTYCons (a lot)- Level design is very sloppy due to time constraints- Many abilities were left out- Most of the music tracks are actually very dull and one turned out differently outside of FL Studio- Many abilities are useless (shield and bomb, shield is useful on the boss stage)- Pickups disappear on death, including powerups- Game isn't really balanced. Sometimes a bit difficult- Loaded with platform/fantasy/shooter cliches- Didn't get a chance to make GMFMOD really shine. Instead of seamless loops like I usually do, I only shortened the break time. =(- Transitions SUCKSo yeah, give it a go. It'll take between 5 and 15 minutes to beat. There are no lives, the levels are hella short. If you happen to die and your powerup disappears, never fear. They're rather useless until the boss stage, which, due to proactivity, gives you all the powerups. Just, uhh…practice with C a little bit. The boss stage requires that.I'll update this now and then if I think of something else. I'd really love to keep working on this game. It's a nice concept, but I just couldn't do much with it in this time. Oh well, it was fun.But for now, I lost hours of sleep over this, so at least give it a try. >=[
I suggest binding jump to a different button, perhaps you could use the spacebar for the world swapping instead.
Shadow Bitch takes too long to kill and her rapid white bullet pattern is ass
Other than that great workI liked the boss theme.She was originally meant to be longer, too. =D
But yeah, the rapid white pattern is her final, berserking pattern. Think Eternal Meek here.If you can time it well, you're supposed to alternate between your shield and C. Just a tip.I'll download and play tomorrow. I've only got 3 minutes before I get booted off my dad's PC. >:{
yeah you should continue work on this. really nice for 48 hours. the graphics and music was nice. concept was decent too. just needs a bit of work on design and physics really, character is too slow, bullets are too fast. this could be a really fun game though.
I'm going to post a reply to your comments here instead of the judgment blog. I don't want it to sway any opinions or clutter anything.
I purposely took out lives. I hate playing a game and getting stuck in one place, and I meant to design it so you couldn't get stuck. For that reason, enemies stay dead, and minibosses keep the same health.As far as the boss goes, I never put up a healthbar (though I probably should have).And every situation (as far as the boss goes) was escapable. The strategy was being able to use C and the shield wisely. But I suppose the difficulty/learning curve was much too steep. If I decide to keep going on this game, I'd have a lot more leading up to the difficulty of the boss, letting the player have better knowledge of when to use his abilities.That in mind, the game wasn't meant for dodging. More for prevention of bullet collision anyway.But yeah, I just might continue working on it. Most of those problems you mentioned (lack of lives, boss health, enemy respawn) was to allow people to finish a short game. And the bullet speeds were mostly to compensate for that and make it a bit harder anyway.I appreciate the review.