Hello, Alien! by klianc09
'Hello, Alien!' is a puzzle game where you try to restore interplanetary connection by using satellites with laser technology.
--- Story-ish ---
Everything was well in the connected worlds of the aliens, until one day their inter-galaxy-net was disconnected by an asteroid shower. Help them by restoring the connection.
---Controls:---
Rotate/move things with mouse.
Or use Space to activate lasers.
---Credits---
Created by Accidently Awesome Studios
http://accidentlyawesome.wordpress.com/
Post-Mortem
http://accidentlyawesome.wordpress.com/2014/09/05/ludum-dare-30-hello-alien-post-mortem/
--- Story-ish ---
Everything was well in the connected worlds of the aliens, until one day their inter-galaxy-net was disconnected by an asteroid shower. Help them by restoring the connection.
---Controls:---
Rotate/move things with mouse.
Or use Space to activate lasers.
---Credits---
Created by Accidently Awesome Studios
http://accidentlyawesome.wordpress.com/
Post-Mortem
http://accidentlyawesome.wordpress.com/2014/09/05/ludum-dare-30-hello-alien-post-mortem/
Ratings
| Coolness | 100% | 1 |
| Overall(Jam) | 3.94 | 47 |
| Audio(Jam) | 3.55 | 154 |
| Fun(Jam) | 4.02 | 23 |
| Graphics(Jam) | 3.58 | 295 |
| Humor(Jam) | 3.82 | 39 |
| Innovation(Jam) | 3.62 | 106 |
| Mood(Jam) | 3.51 | 175 |
| Theme(Jam) | 3.90 | 57 |
10/10 would not play skyrim ever again :D
on linux
@mess110: Yeah, I forgot to test it on a linux machine during the weekend, but I will try to get it to work as soon as possible.
@Cireon: Yes, this game is suffering from the common got-no-time-to-create-good-puzzles-for-my-LudumDare-Puzzle-Game-itis.
Controls are something I have been struggling with, but I still can't point my finger on what exactly feels wrong.
Well, this time I wanted to make sure, that the player doesn't get stuck at the basics. But of course one shouldn't hold the player's hand too much. But if the aliens talk too slow, you can click on them to advance the text faster, if you are a fast reader, although this will cause dialogues between aliens to get out of sync, something I didn't get to fix yet.
It turns out my game you played, was unwinnable at the state it was in (some last minute edit that didn't test).
I fixed it, tested it, and it's now playable. It now also gives more heplful hints.
Thank you for trying!
+ music
- move placed object
- rotation start point
I also like little touches like frying the aliens.
The thing that I liked less was the mouse control, for me it was too sensitive so I had trouble getting the lasers get the lasers just right. And likt metioned above: the staring point of the rotation.
All in all a good puzzle game.
But the poor guys in the second last level... ;)
BTW, works nice on linux - kudos for using java ;)
Spoilers:
Level 15!? Was that supposed to be solved by reflecting off the back of the mirror?
It shows that I cranked out most of the levels 'literally' in the last minute (hour).
Upside: So many levels :D
Downside: Not so polished levels (as Arakade already pointed out) :(
Also I think I got a method of rotating/moving now, that actually doesn't suck, I will probably publish the first post-compo version in a few days.
@goerp: I'll definitely check out your game again.
@invader: Sorry for making you emotional, I guarentee you all those aliens deserved it (if this makes you feel better).
@Arakade: Because of time constraints I just wasn't able to perfectly test all levels.
By Design: sometimes not all pieces are needed because I wanted to err on the side of 'too easy' instead of 'too hard'
By Accident: Accidently, Level 15 should not be solvable by definition, but a bug in the win-condition logic makes it winnable. As you can see in one of the screenshots, not all satellites are connected (the two on the right side are isolated from the left side) but it still triggers a level complete. For the post-compo version I will fix the win-condition bug and give an additional mirror to that level.
And for the second last level... no alien is supposed to survive. *laughs maniacally*
I made it to level 15, then got stuck, and wasn't really sure what I was doing wrong. Still, for an LD game, there's a lot of levels. And the music is amazing! :D
I do wish I could control the mirrors better. I find rotating them precisely rather frustrating because when I click on them to rotate, they would often rotate a good amount on their own.
Had a blast playing trough it, good job! Don't see any reason to really shut the laser down though, so maybe it should've just been on all the time by default.
Anssi@MooseflyGames
@jprogman: Yes, that's because I don't actually rotate things like one would assume, but rather point them to the mouse.
@MunkeeBacon: It should theoretically work, but without more details it's rather difficult to troubleshoot the problem.
@Anssi@MooseflyGames: Shutting the laser down is helpful if you don't want to kill any aliens... but not really necessarry indeed. But good idea.
@Rehacked: LudumDare really needs a better comment system, so that people don't have to manually tell people when they replied to someone...
I love the floating away detail when an asteroid buster is used on a planet. :D
The mechanics are fun and make for some interesting puzzles, the dialog from the little aliens is great. Wonderful graphics and sound. The music fits the theme really well too.
This looks like it could be a professional game. It's amazing that you put this all together in the LD timeframe.
Keep up the awesome work.
... Ah! "Connected worlds" I just got that. cool interpretation. :)
Got to agree with ya there.. wanted to let you know my game link is back up. :)
and nice work on yours! very cool!
Don't know if you'll see this, as I am just checking some of my favourite entries out for their scores, but here goes!
I actually took it upon myself to blast as many aliens as possibly in each map before completing it. It was sort of like an additional goal. Did "killing" the aliens have an effect on the game?
Anssi@MooseflyGames
@fisholith: Thanks for the kind words. You also got an awesome game.
@spacedoubt: I gotta agree with you agreeing with me. Thank you for reminding me to check out your game.
@Jupiter_Hadley: Yeah, that's the first let's play footage of any game I've made, thanks for checking it out. :D
@Anssi@MooseflyGames: Thanks, for calling this one of your favourite entries! :D
At first I wanted killing aliens to be the lose condition, but I quickly dropped it (for being not fun).
Currently, killing aliens has no effect (besides painful screaming), but that could change in the future. I indeed already considered killing all aliens as an optional goal for the levels.