BeatFace In Space by DrPrettyPatty

[raw]
made by DrPrettyPatty for LD32 (COMPO)
Well this turned out to be stranger than expected... You are a space ball, tasked by a space squid to conquer space! Explore four different planets, using the unconventional power of music and your face to defeat your foes!

:: TIPS ::

* Having trouble finding the beat? Focus on the kick drum! The bassline might be on the off beat, but the kick drum is always on the beat!
* Don't try to directly and perfectly control the character; movement is physics and force based so consider your momentum! Most of your movement should be through the air, so jump first and then move forward! I often find myself gliding across the planet looking for the enemies.
* If learning the controls and matching the beat simultaneously is too hard, turn on easy mode!
* If you don't want to take the time to play all the way through the game (it takes around 10-15 mins), check out the video link to see most of the content. The trailer shows all four planets, and the timelapse has samples from all four music tracks.

:: Gameplay ::

* Try to knock the enemies on each level into the core hole on each planet (it might be easier to click every other beat!)
* Click with the beat to smash with your face and raise your power
* YOUR MOVEMENT SLOWS when your power is low!
* Activate "Easy Mode" from the title screen to disable the power feature (you'll always be at 100% power, and your face smashes won't be limited to the beat). This can be useful to beat the game if you're having a hard time keeping the beat, or if it becomes desynchronized for some reason.
* Orbiting is fun :)

:: Controls ::

W/D -- Accelerate/Decelerate
A/S -- Turn left/right
Space -- Jump
Left Click -- Face Smash and raise power

:: Tools ::

Engine -- Unity 5
3D Modeling -- Blender
Texturing/Sprites -- GiMP
Music/SFX -- FL Studio (mainly used the GMS and Sytrus synth plugins if you're curious)
SFX -- Audacity
Timelapse -- Chronolapse

:: Misc ::

Website: http://zakjr.com
Twitter: @ZakaryReynolds

Sorry there's no webplayer, it looks like butts in this case and causes issues with the timing of the music :/

I tried a bunch of new stuff this time around; I never really took advantage of PhysX, shape key animation, the new Unity 5 shaders, or most of Unity's particle effect/line/trail rendering stuff before, so I explored all of that this time around :D I also learned how to use Quaternions.. they really make things just work better once you figure them out.

** If you're having problems running the game's standalone version on Linux or Mac, try the build at http://zakjr.com/jam/bfis/HTML5/index.html **

** 5/10/15: I'm in the process of changing web hosts; in the mean time all the files can be found at the zakjr.dreamhosters.com domain so I updated links to reflect that **

Ratings

Coolness 62% 3
Overall 3.86 74
Audio 4.52 7
Fun 3.64 152
Graphics 4.18 58
Humor 3.70 113
Innovation 4.03 51
Mood 3.90 43
Theme 3.85 171

Feedback

Jaloko
20. Apr 2015 · 05:32 UTC
Awesome game, I liked everything about it. Especially the audio. The game overall felt very polished nice job!
stoarch
20. Apr 2015 · 12:02 UTC
Greatest game I ever played. Music and beat is fun. Controls is clunky but not matter.
Pietdagamer
20. Apr 2015 · 18:34 UTC
Amazing visuals, music, and mechanics!
Kinzata
20. Apr 2015 · 18:34 UTC
I found it hard to control the character because it would get stuck on elevation changes. Otherwise it's great!
Azurency
20. Apr 2015 · 18:40 UTC
Nice game, i love the audio and the game is fun!
ChrisGaudino
20. Apr 2015 · 18:41 UTC
Great job! Very unique take on a rhythm game, and I loved the visual style as well.
snesgaard
20. Apr 2015 · 18:43 UTC
Must say that your work looks really cool. Unfortunately I'm having some trouble getting it to run on Ubuntu 14.10 64-bit. It crashes immediately after showing the Unity logo with the following console output:

displaymanager : xrandr version warning. 1.4
client has 8 screens
displaymanager screen (0)(eDP1): 1920 x 1080
Using libudev for joystick management


Importing game controller configs
Aborted (core dumped)

Any help would be appreciated, as I would really like to try out your game :)
Yvanor
20. Apr 2015 · 18:43 UTC
I have serious problem with controls (^^'), but the game is polished and this music make it really cool, so good job ! :)
Frozen Fractal
20. Apr 2015 · 18:58 UTC
Well, where to begin... 5/5 almost everywhere, and I don't grant those lightly. It looks fastastic, it has a sense of humour, great attention to detail, the planets morphing into faces is great, and the music...! Are you sure this isn't a Jam game? ;)
🎤 DrPrettyPatty
20. Apr 2015 · 19:10 UTC
Thanks for the nice comments folks!

@snesgaard: Hmm, it works fine on my laptop running 14.10 x64, but I did some research and I guess a few other Unity 5 games like Rust and Cities: Skylines are having the same problem? It seems like using binary graphics drivers instead of OSS drivers might help, or maybe unplugging any joysticks? In any case, I'll upload a web build so you can at least play it a little.
@Frozen Fractal: Haha yeah it's definitely a Compo game, I made everything but Unity's shaders within the 48 hours. I've been working with these tools a lot lately so I was able to be pretty efficient. I'm working on putting together the time lapse as well :)
Nuclear Mosquito
21. Apr 2015 · 19:14 UTC
This game confirms that I have absolutely no rhythm. But it is a beautiful game
snesgaard
21. Apr 2015 · 19:37 UTC
Linux build is working now :)

Astounding visuals and music, really impressive effort considering the short development time. Did find the controls be rather janky and the enemies falling into the holes didn't seem to have much to do with what I was doing at the time :P

The presentation did give me a Bit.Trip Runner vibe, which is a good thing in my book.
madameberry
21. Apr 2015 · 19:43 UTC
I had a lot of trouble moving the character. Also, mashing the mouse button with no regard to the beat worked. Probably shouldn't.
Nice music and graphics though.
Yamzho
22. Apr 2015 · 15:39 UTC
Very cool game ! ;)
UnconventionalFusion
22. Apr 2015 · 15:54 UTC
Hard but fun game. Nice art. Well done!
fleegle2000
22. Apr 2015 · 16:56 UTC
I like the concept, graphics, music, humour. Very nice little game. My only beef was that I found the movement awkward, even in easy mode without having to worry about keeping to a beat. I wish the controls were more precise. Otherwise a solid entry. Great work!
PaperBlurt
25. Apr 2015 · 10:04 UTC
Impressive work.
A very nice game with some thought into it...
x1212
26. Apr 2015 · 17:02 UTC
Great game!
The graphics and the audio work together really nice.
Jupiter_Hadley
29. Apr 2015 · 01:27 UTC
Interesting little beat-based game, with great graphics! I included it in part 7 of my Ludum Dare 32 compilation video series, if you would like to take a look :) https://youtu.be/Cnio28O-EgI
Andy Gainey
30. Apr 2015 · 22:17 UTC
Couldn't figure out how to actually *do* anything intentional. Clicking on the beat seems aggressively strict, and sometimes I was apparently out of sync with the beat without feeling like I was. Though I'm far from an awesome drummer, I do practice a ton, and so I've developed an ear for hearing when my rhythm is off, but in this case, I felt like I was on even when the game didn't think so. I dunno.

But it appears that the game doesn't penalize off-clicks, so I just started spamming the mouse button repeatedly, and that seemed to effectively keep my power bar near max. And then I tried moving around and doing things, but I had no sense of control, could barely aim for the enemies. The sudden shifts in camera position didn't help. I eventually discovered the tire-looking thing, but didn't know how to trigger it; only seemed to occur when I was in the air. Couldn't tell if orbiting served any purpose. Seemed to just keep me away from the enemies that I had to do ?something? to. I eventually eliminated one enemy, though I don't know how. Gave up on the other two because I didn't feel like I was learning anything more about how to play.
Perjoka
05. May 2015 · 11:17 UTC
Great game, well done!
speakupgames
05. May 2015 · 17:09 UTC
This is exactly the game I imagine would come from someone watching the itunes visualizer all day.
Got stuck in orbit, then I was just jammin to the beats. Loved it.
jojocanard
05. May 2015 · 20:39 UTC
I have no idea what I just did, but it was fun
deadbodyoutline
05. May 2015 · 21:58 UTC
Wow, one of the funniest games I've played on this Ludum Dare!
Archonthewizard
07. May 2015 · 15:20 UTC
Cool idea - the audio and visuals were very impressive
OnlySlightly
08. May 2015 · 03:19 UTC
Your game was great! The music was perfect and I loved the upbeat spacey low poly style. It was really easy to get into the groove of the music by forcing me to stay in tune with it. :D