LudumData

TUGBOAT by lucentbeam

[raw]
made by lucentbeam for LD32 (JAM)
Life used to be simple for a tugboat captain. Pick up a
garbage barge, haul it to the sun, get paid. These days,
all that work goes to the moon catapults and there's not
enough junk left to make an honest living. And on top of
that, now aliens are invading! Well, what was that saying
about the lemons and the lemonade?

## Controls

### XBox 360 Controller (recommended)

* Move: Left stick
* Aim: Right stick
* Tractor Beam: Right trigger
* Pause: Start
* Toggle Music: Back
* Toggle SFX: X

### Mouse & Keyboard

* Move: WASD/Arrows
* Aim: Mouse
* Tractor Beam: Left click
* Pause: SPACE
* Toggle Music: TAB
* Toggle SFX: L_SHIFT

## Credits

### Programming & Music: Benjamin Hanken

### Concept & Art: [Pete Soloway](www.petesoloway.com)

**Tools:**

* Font: ['AddLGBitmap09' by Atsushi Aoki](http://www.dafont.com/addlgbitmap09.font)
* Color Palette: ['(◕ ” ◕)' by sugar!](http://www.colourlovers.com/palette/848743)
* Python 2.7 using pygame
* Adobe Illustrator
* Adobe Photoshop
* GIMP
* Linux Multi Media Studio
* sfxr
* iConvertIcons
Windows https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/7949526/Tugboat_Win.zip
OS X https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/7949526/Tugboat_OSX.zip
Original URL https://ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-32/?action=preview&uid=25522

Ratings

Coolness 74% 3
Overall(Jam) 3.56 239
Audio(Jam) 3.58 156
Fun(Jam) 3.59 171
Graphics(Jam) 3.73 295
Humor(Jam) 2.73 574
Innovation(Jam) 3.48 266
Mood(Jam) 3.30 354
Theme(Jam) 3.80 198

Feedback

Dining Philosopher
21. Apr 2015 · 05:28 UTC
Nice game! It is fun to throw the spaceships around!

Just a pity that the ships also seem to crash themselves if you just wait long enough...

I like the colors :)
wg_phancock
21. Apr 2015 · 06:44 UTC
I had an ton of fun swinging the bad guys around once I figured out how to control things! A little tutorial level with a stationary target or something at the start would probably help figure things out at the beginning.

Gets pretty tough when there's a bunch of enemies, that's for sure. The music enhances the frantic-ness when there's a lot of stuff flying around.
ohsqueezy
21. Apr 2015 · 20:34 UTC
What a fun and innovative physics game!
roving-stone
22. Apr 2015 · 06:02 UTC
I enjoyed the game mechanic. There is something satisfying about flinging the ships in to each other. Really like the colours you chose as well! The music was a little repetitive, but you can't do everything in such a short time... Great job!
Benjamin
22. Apr 2015 · 06:12 UTC
fun and innovative gameplay. The swing mechanic remind me the old game Rodland somehow. I lost my 2 first tries trying to swing monsters with my ship moves insteas of using mouse, but after I got it, the game was feeling pretty good. You also have a very nice title screen !
terpin
22. Apr 2015 · 16:24 UTC
I second the earlier comment about having some tutorial levels to help players figure out what they're doing. Fantastic graphics and premise, the music's pretty good too!
DarkwindMedia
22. Apr 2015 · 16:58 UTC
Really enjoyed the slingshot concept and mechanic! I think a little larger battlefield and the ability to grab from slightly further away could have helped, but great job overall.
Mental Atrophy
23. Apr 2015 · 00:09 UTC
Hello fellow Portlander and Pygamer. Fun game. The farthest I could get was stage 9--after that there are just too many things for me to dodge. Swinging enemies around and throwing them into each other felt great, with some nice and crunchy sound effects to accompany it. Nice work, and an especially good title screen.
Tanser
23. Apr 2015 · 16:21 UTC
Very nice game. I have already seen this idea a few times but so far this is the best execution of it.
kabutakogames
24. Apr 2015 · 03:09 UTC
I love this! Sweet little game - though I initially read the name as Tubgoat and I can't say I'm not a little disappointed that it isn't that
jackrugile
24. Apr 2015 · 07:22 UTC
Getting something that says "main Error" when I go to open the OS X version.
MikkelLevisen
24. Apr 2015 · 18:26 UTC
The artistic style in this game is simply awesome. Coolest title screen I have seen so far in this jam.
Game mechanic and execution is brilliant. Solid game!
Hyoga-3D
24. Apr 2015 · 20:03 UTC
Nice job, had some fun with this, art is simple but effective and the gmaeplay is very nice.
calavera
25. Apr 2015 · 03:18 UTC
Fantastic! wouldnt change a thing!
ciaodavinci
25. Apr 2015 · 03:28 UTC
Nice retro colours, cool art and catchy music. Very enjoyable to fling spaceships all over the screen. Could not establish what determines the Fling Bonus at the end of the round. Also, just to let you know that the OS X version worked fine for me.
uvwar
25. Apr 2015 · 04:55 UTC
Fun! I thought the walls were a little distracting at first, but then I guess you needed something for ships to crash into. Maybe just get rid of the walls and add a ton more ships? If you sit still the ships tend to blow themselves up due to the walls I think. Overall really nice colors sound etc!
mildmojo
25. Apr 2015 · 06:48 UTC
Well, the game looks nice, but I couldn't figure out how to engage the tractor beam with a PS4 controller. So all my scores were zeroes. =) A little bit of instruction or demonstration in the game would help.

The art is nice and colorful. The music gets repetitive, so I turned it off. Good variety of sprites for enemies.
Ryusui
25. Apr 2015 · 06:53 UTC
This is not the first game I've played this LD to use the premise of "grab enemies and fling them into each other" but it's by leaps and bounds the better one. Polished, very professional looking, AND gamepad support! My only - ONLY - issue is that bullets become hard to spot when there's enough debris on the field, but that's only a minor gripe.
🎤 lucentbeam
25. Apr 2015 · 12:09 UTC
Hey everyone, thanks for the kind comments! We're glad people are enjoying it - we had a blast making it! We're actually working on a post-jam version with some cleanups and other features we wanted to put in, including improved music :)

@mildmojo : I'm sorry to hear about the PS4 controller... We didn't have one to test, and I wouldn't be surprised if the key bindings are all completely different.
diiq
25. Apr 2015 · 20:13 UTC
Very cool!

As others noted, ships seem to crash themselves if you stay out of the way.

It reminded me a little of another entry: http://ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-32/?action=preview&uid=25578 -- totally different thematic approaches to a similar mechanic.

Looks good, sounds good, fun to play. I'd love it if you got bonus points for salvaging space-junk.

(I will note in passing that the OSX version wouldn't quit -- quitting just restarted the menu!)

Great work!
Tselmek
27. Apr 2015 · 18:56 UTC
Lovely graphics and sweet sounds and music. The spaceship is really hard to control and everything bounces around so fast that I sometimes lose sight of my ship. Nice game nonetheless!
Andrew Quartermain
27. Apr 2015 · 20:44 UTC
Nice original mechanic and pretty colours. It's pretty fun to throw the ships around. I couldn't work out how you win when there's only one left though.
Chris M
28. Apr 2015 · 09:19 UTC
Nice idea! Didn't realise at first how the game was played (I think the UI is a little misleading) but had fun when it clicked. Loved the colourful graphics but the with all the debris flying around it was hard to distinguish between the fast moving objects. I also wonder whether the control scheme could be simplified- it did feel very satisfying to plant a ship into a wall, or bowl one into the others.
tripleVisionGames
05. May 2015 · 16:35 UTC
Beautiful! Hurt my eyes in a good way