LudumData

Press Simulator 1964 by 2HitAdam

[raw]
made by 2HitAdam for LD31 (JAM)
Press Simulator 1964, the game that makes you write like a goose.

You play as a journalist trying to get a piece out before a deadline. You'll be prompted on what to write about, then have a limited time to write a story about it. You'll see "the deadline" moving down the screen as you play: if it overtakes the line you're currently working on, you lose! The game goes forever, getting incrementally harder. There are 15 prompts in total.

DISCLAIMER: I know nothing about either journalism OR the 60's. Kind of a weird topic to pick for a game in retrospect...

I was hoping to store these stories in a database and compile them into a newspaper-styled web gallery too, just for fun, but I flat ran out of time. I may tack that functionality on at some point though, it's a shame for these stories just to get lost...

I've opted out of audio judging because it's all free stuff I found on the web and not mine. Correct attribution as per terms of use is displayed on the page.

Known bug: there are encoding errors on most non-alphanumeric keys. I hard-coded common use punctuation and the like, but the rest is bugged to hell.

Let me know what you think! :D
Web http://www.2hitstudio.com/jams/pressSimulator1964/#.VIZXvTGUd8H
Original URL https://ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-31/?action=preview&uid=15390

Ratings

Coolness 41% 1659
Overall(Jam) 3.28 435
Fun(Jam) 3.06 484
Graphics(Jam) 4.06 144
Humor(Jam) 3.52 120
Innovation(Jam) 3.56 212
Mood(Jam) 3.48 208
Theme(Jam) 3.48 572

Feedback

Azlen
09. Dec 2014 · 02:08 UTC
Interesting game, sadly I am not the fastest typist so the deadline always got to me before I could write much. I like the graphics a lot!
dallonf
09. Dec 2014 · 02:37 UTC
Nice! At first I was disappointed that the game didn't actually enforce the fact that you didn't have to write something real - oh geez, I'm typing this review WAY faster than I normally do -, so I just mashed on the keyboard. But then I decided to play along and not cheat, and wow, you've actually got something pretty good here!

It's really a game you play against yourself, not the computer. And it's hilarious the kind of stuff I typed when I didn't have time to think about it. Well done!
Akurn
09. Dec 2014 · 13:46 UTC
Love the aesthetic!
I don't get how it calculates a loss or a win though?
I would love to see what other people wrote :D
Domicuc
09. Dec 2014 · 16:34 UTC
Wel.. weeeeelll.. i wish you 1-100 place cause this game is really interesting :) also check my project if you have some time x)
OctoTeam
09. Dec 2014 · 22:03 UTC
Interesting game, kudos!
ruerob
11. Dec 2014 · 20:18 UTC
Very nice game. I've tried to write in english, what is not my native language and lose all the time... It didn't come to my mind that I could write in german... Very nice looking and fun game!
Victory Garden
13. Dec 2014 · 06:09 UTC
Oh my god, you have to do the "store in a database" thing. There was a while when I was having a wonderful time hammering on the keyboard, saying nothing, and then I discovered that the "return" key actually worked and started doing some pithy one-liners. I wanted to try to do some poetry or haiku or something, just to make it worth it (I remember once when I skipped the prompt and wrote something like:

"What was the prompt?
I missed it.
I think it might have been about ducks.
But I like ducks...
I should write a poem.")

Love the concept, love the game, great mood, great fun. Thank you so much for sharing!
DrHahn
13. Dec 2014 · 08:39 UTC
#giggle
punkto
13. Dec 2014 · 20:55 UTC
Interesting game. It would be great if you include a syntax (something like https://languagetool.org/ )
anokta
13. Dec 2014 · 21:43 UTC
really nice concept! i really wish that there would be an actual win/lose scenario to encourage people writing relevant stuff. would love to see the resulting content in that case! :)
hundredhundred
16. Dec 2014 · 14:29 UTC
interesting concept! nice entry!
johnbrynte
18. Dec 2014 · 22:48 UTC
I think you can do a lot more with this nice concept! For me it was hard to motivate writing anything that made sense, but if there is maybe a rating system for how many times you input some keywords (like "duck") or if you have some really basic grammar check so that you can't write just anything. Maybe combine it with these action type games, because this is a really funny idea!
baseteam
26. Dec 2014 · 18:48 UTC
a bit buggy, but of course good idea and graphics)
Pulsartronic
26. Dec 2014 · 18:53 UTC
The idea is fascinating, but you need to add some helpers that says to you what the fuck are the people writing, because you will receive a "Well done" without counting what you wrote. The music and the graphics are really, really cool, and the idea is fantastic. Just try to solve that issue and you will have a really good casual game ;)
kipelovets
26. Dec 2014 · 18:55 UTC
Great background picture and nice idea. It could be better though if the game restricted you on what you're typing, now random button mashing works — and it's not really like writing an article. You could turn it into some sort of keyboard education program in which you must type in the appearing words or symbols
Fortyseven
28. Dec 2014 · 09:20 UTC
There's a kernel of a GREAT game idea here. Not allowing backspace makes for some hilarious improv. I went through quite a few headlines because of that, alone. If you can tweak the gameplay a bit, this could be amazing. Just need to slow down the deadline a bit (early on, at least) and create an algorithm to score based on what was written. Make it have to be at least a paragraph... not be jibberish... maybe enforce referencing the topic in some way.

I'm tempted to work on a version of this, now. :D Neat idea!
🎤 2HitAdam
28. Dec 2014 · 09:29 UTC
Thanks for playing the game and leaving feedback everyone! A post-jam version is in the works, where articles will be stored in a fake newspaper website, names and headlines are taken, and articles are scored based on relevance to the prompt. The deadline will start a lot slower too (I forget not everyone can type like a programmer haha).

Follow me (@2hitadam) on twitter if you wanna know when the post-jam ver drops :)
pixelspirit
29. Dec 2014 · 15:32 UTC
It is very fun just as a silly thing as it currently stands with not being strict on scoring - you can write any old thing. I followed the prompts. Loosely. I was the most bad-mouthed rambling journalist in the land. I agree the mood is really nice! I'd love to see it spruced up.
NeiloGD
30. Dec 2014 · 00:58 UTC
I think the concept is great, but as with others a little disappointed it doesn't enforce you write something real. Of course, that is a bunch of work, but even some keyword scanning would have been interesting to make sure I wasn't just going "dkfjdlkjglsjgldgkljdfg".

Might be worth revisiting this one and attempting to try some language analysis to whip it up into a more interesting game.
lasagnegames
30. Dec 2014 · 01:43 UTC
It's still much more a concept than a game, but the graphic is lovely, and the idea is worth to be explored. You could make an online judgment system, in which other people has to judge your articles.