Bubbles by thaaks

[raw]
made by thaaks for LD32 (COMPO)
What a Halloween party! But what's that? Not your bed, that's for sure!
You wake up in a maze full of monsters and your only weapon is some soap bubbles?!

Charm all the monsters with your beautiful bubbles to open the exit on each level and make it past the final exit to get back to freedom and your king size bed with tons of pillows!

Bubbles is a peaceful low resolution platformer with lots of functionality (Jumpthrough and moving platforms, double jumping, wall jumping, checkpoints, moving monsters, hazards) and currently contains 5 levels to play.

You can play the game in any HTML5 browser. Press F10 to play it full screen! Seems not to work with the LD embedding but on my site (see link below) it does work.

[EDIT]: I fixed the collision and checkpoint stuff in a post compo version which you can play here:

http://www.rightanglegames.com/bubbles-my-post-compo-entry-of-ld-32.html

But for rating please play the original version first - just to be fair!

Ratings

Coolness 62% 3
Overall 3.50 264
Audio 3.06 361
Fun 3.52 214
Graphics 3.42 335
Humor 3.25 287
Innovation 2.76 780
Mood 3.00 484
Theme 3.82 187

Feedback

pvwradtke
20. Apr 2015 · 03:25 UTC
Quite franly, I was surprised to use bubbles to charm enemies. Unconventional to the core :).
MattV
20. Apr 2015 · 05:43 UTC
really liked how when my bubbles 'charmed' the enemies they had cute little floating hearts spinning. very pleasant to play, nice little platformer game
sanojian
20. Apr 2015 · 19:15 UTC
Who doesn't love bubbles? The collision was a little bit unforgiving but a fun game.
madameberry
20. Apr 2015 · 20:14 UTC
I wish the charmed enemies would do something for you, or at the very least turn into platforms and let you stand on them. Cute interpretation of the theme!
shrapx
21. Apr 2015 · 17:38 UTC
cute "ooh" every time you charm an enemy. It was hard how they level reset previous charmed enemy, and it made the save system not helpful. very cute and nice pixel art :3
🎤 thaaks
21. Apr 2015 · 20:32 UTC
@shrapx: you are right - the level reset was a mistake. Player should just have been reset to the last checkpoint with all charmed monsters staying charmed. Will fix that for a post compo version.

@all: Thanks for your reviews ;-)
Tiago Ling Alexandre
22. Apr 2015 · 12:42 UTC
Cool game, the bubble idea is very nice! One thing that could be better is the collision: it is too unforgiving - there was some spikes which i could not pass because the jump would have to be perfect.

Also, i don't know why, but some commands made the browser window (latest Chrome) scroll all the way down removing the game from the screen.
Dining Philosopher
23. Apr 2015 · 12:16 UTC
Cool game!
It took a while to figure out I could double jump.. and the checkpoints seem a bit useless since I need to go back after every death and beat all the enemies before I can continue..

I really like your weapon choice! It is a good weapon in real life too, it melts even your worst enemies :)
Prowler
23. Apr 2015 · 17:52 UTC
This is neat :D. Very unexpected behavior for such a small platformer. I really liked it. And I do live your minimalistic pixel art. Keep it on!
raisedmedia
23. Apr 2015 · 17:55 UTC
Loved the bubble angle. Slightly unforgiving collision, but otherwise well done.
Trasevol_Dog
23. Apr 2015 · 18:31 UTC
This game is fun ! Gotta love the sound effects !
jukben
25. Apr 2015 · 12:50 UTC
Cute! :)
Blobo
25. Apr 2015 · 13:00 UTC
Really nicew game! i loved all the sound effects.
Blobo
25. Apr 2015 · 13:00 UTC
Really nice game! i loved all the sound effects.
Benjamin
25. Apr 2015 · 13:01 UTC
nice feedback on charm action with your little hearts animation. The weapno somtime feels too powerful, mayb some monsters with hp ( whar resist ) would have help to make the game more challenging. I like the blow and pop sfx a lot but I'm not fond of the end level and new level tada!
johnnwfs
25. Apr 2015 · 18:51 UTC
This was a fun concept but I did get very frustrated at all the monsters getting un-charmed if I got hit. Even some sort of charmed cool down would have been helpful to me (just noted the developer comment on that). Ditto the positive comments here.
elpaulo
26. Apr 2015 · 16:11 UTC
Solid platform game. The conditions to finish the level are not very clear, but the feeling is very nice.
mildmojo
26. Apr 2015 · 19:11 UTC
Great non-lethal puzzle platformer. It's a little light on the puzzle part, though. =)

Good variety of platforming elements. The charm with floating hearts is nice; reminds me of stunning Vorticons in Commander Keen. Bubble blowing is cute.

I would've liked to see the bubble floating used as a puzzle element, like needing to float bubbles to locations you can't access or having bubbles directed by wind flow. Still, the game's very complete as-is. Good work!
phi6
27. Apr 2015 · 10:49 UTC
Yep you nailed the platforming physics perfectly. Variable jump height, wall jumping, double jump, even moving platforms. Stellar work! The only thing I'd add is a slightly horizontal jump off the wall rather than straight up, it'll look and feel better I think! Love the graphics also, chunky pixels I'm a big fan of. And that audio. "SAVE"

I also created a platformer/Metroidvania thing with similar jumping mechanics, hope you have time to give mine a try too!

Really enjoyed your entry, top marks!
🎤 thaaks
28. Apr 2015 · 06:32 UTC
Thanks for all your feedback so far! Nice enhancement suggestions some of you named (better wall jumping, bubbles for puzzles for example)! I might continue work on "Bubbles" a bit more and add some new elements and improve the "engine".

Thanks again!
Crefossus
01. May 2015 · 18:56 UTC
Pretty good. I like the character/bubble animation and impact animation. You nailed the theme.

Spike jumps with low roofs are tricky - maybe have a one block solid nearby for practice? Gets tedious if you fail near the end, some checkpoints cause death immediately if you're moving before. Platform movement is weird if you jump from under.
frogcheese
10. May 2015 · 09:37 UTC
I really liked this one! The mechanics are solid and easy to get into, the graphics are clean and fairly polished. I love the sound effects as well. :)

One thing to note though is that the checkpoints don't really matter much since all the enemies get uncharmed when you die. Maybe keep track of the enemies you charmed in the checkpoints, or alternatively make the levels smaller and more compact so that they're not needed to begin with?
resty
11. May 2015 · 13:22 UTC
Like it. Those bubbles are so powerful. A lot of fun.