Escape from the Prison Planet by roving-stone

[raw]
made by roving-stone for LD32 (JAM)
Pilot an alien spaceship in to the heart of the prison planet to rescue your fellow humans, dodge and destroy prison security with your ship's thruster, and ESCAPE!

I didn't get everything that I wanted to in, but I am going to keep working on it. Apologies for the repetitive music and silly sound effects, there was just not enough time! Any feedback is much appreciated. Enjoy.



Edit:
Taking in to account all the feedback to improve future versions. Follow my progress on twitter: @rovingstone. Thanks for playing!



KNOWN ISSUES:
Once you escape the atmosphere gravity is set to zero. When you restart, I forgot to set gravity back to its original value. Piloting the cave in zero-g is really tough. I've fixed this on the web version, but if you are using any of the desktop versions I'd recommend closing and reopening the game after going to space.



Tools used:
Unity 5
Blender
Photoshop
cfxr
Ableton 9

Ratings

Coolness 76% 2
Overall(Jam) 3.33 423
Audio(Jam) 3.41 216
Fun(Jam) 3.15 454
Graphics(Jam) 3.59 361
Humor(Jam) 2.22 820
Innovation(Jam) 3.02 567
Mood(Jam) 3.47 231
Theme(Jam) 2.78 853

Feedback

spreadtheflow
21. Apr 2015 · 03:42 UTC
I find the spaceship really hard to handle, but beyond that I've found your game surprisingly relaxing and I've kept hitting the spacebar, saying "one last try" :-)

The mood is great, the music is just enough, there is a lonely feeling controlling this tiny spaceship.

I liked it and will definitely keep playing it.

Good Job!
Aaranos
21. Apr 2015 · 03:50 UTC
I honestly couldn't find the prison, looped around a bit and probably flew past it a lot haha. Either way it seems solid enough.
seraphki
21. Apr 2015 · 04:52 UTC
I am the worst savior ever.
Game looks nice though =3
TailyILoveYou
21. Apr 2015 · 04:54 UTC
Really nice little game, though it took me a second to find the prison. Maybe putting it to the right of the starting area would make it easier to find, as most gamers think of going right first :P
Nibble Bits Studio
21. Apr 2015 · 05:02 UTC
It's hard to control the ship, and the tele-guided missiles became too difficult to reach the destination.
Frenchie
21. Apr 2015 · 05:03 UTC
This game is beautiful! My favorite part has to be that awesome fire particle effect. Really really nice :)

Feedback: I was unable to beat the game :( I think you need to make the spaceship much easier to control. I would suggest making the turning velocity based rather than acceleration based (i.e. when I press left I rotate left immediately (and vice versa) and when I don't press anything I don't turn). I would also increase the turning speed a little for better control. You should also increase the health of the hull by a lot, and/or make health regenerate. Lastly, if you could add checkpoints that would be great. I got really dispirited when I made it very far and died :(

OH, one last thing :) Change the resolution on the standalone build in project settings -> editor, switch off "use native resolution" and put in the value 9999x9999 instead. Then re-build the web player. It will make it so that when you go full screen (via right-click) it will change the resolution to the native resolution and not just blow up/pixelate the normal small resolution.
🎤 roving-stone
21. Apr 2015 · 05:43 UTC
@Frenchie Thank you! I will definitely try your suggestion out. I was just going for an all physics route and didn't even think of having a constant turn velocity. It's tough to gauge; when you play and develop your own game for nearly 48 hours straight you get pretty good at it :P

And thank you for the resolution tip. Very useful!
DaniDK
21. Apr 2015 · 18:25 UTC
Wow, that was awesome. I felt so relaxed playing this. Awesome job
MaesK
21. Apr 2015 · 18:28 UTC
Great! The ship is hard to handle at the beginning, but with a little time it gets easier, and its movement feels pretty well designed. Really nice music, good work!
DKoding
21. Apr 2015 · 18:28 UTC
First I was like WTF where's the wepaon?
Then I just escaped the atmosphere right away.
But then I got it... the thruster. And rescue prisoners. And the game got a lot more enjoyable. Good one. :-)
Barnabbas
21. Apr 2015 · 18:36 UTC
the spaceship was very hard to handle for me and at the start of the game I was quite confused about where to go to.
But the game looks really nice and it is interesting to use a different kind of control system than most other games.
TheMeorch
22. Apr 2015 · 06:05 UTC
I really enjoyed the atmosphere here. Given that the ship is hard to control and can die quickly from hitting walls, I felt the need to move very slowly, which made it a bit tedious when I died and had to restart. I honestly preferred just easing around the sky and slowly leaving the atmosphere. Sorry, prisoners!
Yaroslav Kravtsov
22. Apr 2015 · 06:42 UTC
Yep, I'm also confused with controls. Or, what is more correct, uncontrol rotating of rocket. Probably there are some inertia. But it very unconvinient to play.
Jv the Wanderer
22. Apr 2015 · 06:55 UTC
The ship was hard to control. It was fusterating to get the ship to stay still.
tripleVisionGames
22. Apr 2015 · 13:25 UTC
The graphics are really simple and nice, really like the look of it. The way the craft controls is, in my opinion, fantastic. It reminds me a little bit of Lander, which is a game I love. Took a while to work out where I was supposed to go though
🎤 roving-stone
22. Apr 2015 · 19:39 UTC
@tripleVisionGames thank you! That is exactly what I was going for :D

Thank you everyone who took the time to play and leave feedback. I'm working on ways to make it more forgiving in future versions. Will definitely increase health and add checkpoints. I'm playing around with alternate control schemes as well.
2Bit
23. Apr 2015 · 01:18 UTC
I really liked the mechanics of the ship even though it was quite hard to handle. The mood was great too.
Lancelot Gao
23. Apr 2015 · 01:37 UTC
Really like the art sytle and particle effects!Good job!
stvr
23. Apr 2015 · 02:52 UTC
A tough-as-nails Solar Jetman? Too tough for me, but really nice!
felipeberquo
23. Apr 2015 · 02:54 UTC
lol i've crashed my spaceship a thousand times before i can make it the first time. It's really hard to handle it. I really liked the art. Nice game!
ZoneOne2
23. Apr 2015 · 23:25 UTC
I think this is my favorite game that I've played so far. It was definitely really challenging, but that was part of what made it so fun.
Justin Mullin
24. Apr 2015 · 01:38 UTC
The particle effects were great, and the lighting was phenomenal. The first time I played I encountered the gravity bug (hadn't read your description close enough). It's still a very difficult game, but much more playable with gravity on. Nice work!
PlasmaErnst
26. Apr 2015 · 22:34 UTC
Oh wow! This was fun to play (but also hard).
The music helped to create a sweet, unearthy atmosphere. Nice!
gelisam
27. Apr 2015 · 13:51 UTC
The music, sound effects and art create the perfect dreamy space mood for this game. Love the particles and lighting effects in the tunnel. Also liked the physics of flying the capsule that has a pulsed engine. Couldn't get past the first turret after a few tries.

(rating and comment by my teammate François Mayrand)
ondrej.paska
27. Apr 2015 · 17:42 UTC
Great fun, little bit frustrating after a while. The hull mechanic is good, let some minor fender-benders slide.
bossmojoman
28. Apr 2015 · 03:15 UTC
Game is Waaay to hard, that being said, I loved it. I never did save anyone though ;)
puckers
28. Apr 2015 · 10:44 UTC
Beautiful. I loved the feeling of exploration even though it was so linear - casting the little fireballs into the void to light your path is really satisfying. Now you just need to add more story hehe many thanks
rishal
28. Apr 2015 · 12:51 UTC
Quite a well polished game. I couldn't find the prison though. A radar might be a nice addition. Well done!
shadow64
04. May 2015 · 07:45 UTC
I liked the music and the atmosphere a lot. As some have mentioned, I think it was a little too difficult to get started. I assume most people wind up going into space on their first run - I only noticed your instructions about the zero-g bug after I closed the game.

I replayed and started heading down into the cave, but I was still just getting blown up. I found the ship pretty hard to navigate even with proper gravity. I feel like I'm missing a lot of cool stuff, but the gameplay I have to pass through to get there is a little too challenging so early on.

It FEELS like I'd love it, if I could progress, but right now I can't. So my biggest suggestion is tighten up the controls and make them a little more reactive for the player.

Still a cool idea and I want to see more of it. Thanks for sharing and congrats on meeting the deadline!