Most Ancient of Technologies - Catapult by joe40001

[raw]
made by joe40001 for LD36 (JAM)
Prepare to experience the most ancient of technologies as you play the game Catapult!
What mysterious ancient technology awaits you? You must play to find out!

Left/Right - Move
Spacebar - Action

(I opted to not post a screenshot of the actual gameplay so as to not ruin the surprise of the amazing ancient technology)


----------Rights Stuff----------
Sounds generated in sfxr
Music from Opsound.org [Public Domain]
Icons made by:
HeavenlyDog, Lorc, and Skoll [Creative Commons 3.0 BY (http://game-icons.net)]
Additional Art Assets:
Ancient greek text - Ioannis Kontomitros [Creative Commons Attribution 2.0]
Illustration from "Bilderbuch f眉r Kinder" [Public Domain (Old)]
Tour De Marbault clipart [Public Domain (OpenClipart.org)]

Feedback

PainGames
18. Sep 2016 路 04:35 UTC
Nice game, xD.
Nice retro style.
Score: (because I like scores)
Overall 4/5
Innovation 4/5
Fun 4/5
Theme 4.5/5
Graphics 3/5
Audio 3/5
Humor 4/5
Mood 4/5
amras0000
18. Sep 2016 路 12:49 UTC
That got quite a giggle out of me when the game started past the intro screen. Wasn't expecting what I saw. I couldn't figure out how to defeat the knights for love nor money though. I know my catapult turned into a swordsman if I got to the furthest square, but slashing didn't seem to have any effect no matter how much I mashed the spacebar, whether the knight was right next to me or in the castle.
Aside from that slight issue the game's fairly self-explanatory, so good job there. The format you've chosen is notoriously hard to communicate anything in.

Graphics-wise the colors you've chosen don't really fit together too well. You've got a mostly blue theme with the background, the buttons, and the name, but then a very brown/reddish overlay and bright red button names. I can't actually read what the red letters are saying on that background and that whole region of the screen clashes horribly with the rest of the colors. Generally try to stick to colors closer together on the color wheel; when you do have to use reds in a blue scene make sure to make them desaturated.

Had some fun with this one though, nice work.
馃帳 joe40001
18. Sep 2016 路 19:05 UTC
@amras0000 Thanks for the feedback. You just have to slash the guy a few times and he dies (the game makes a noise as you hit him). Each level he takes more slashes but level one should be 5 slashes or less. You are right about the red letters, unfortunately because of the background there no colors really worked that well at that spot, but since those buttons don't really matter I didn't spend too much time on it.

Also @PainGames, thanks for the feedback!
csanyk
18. Sep 2016 路 23:47 UTC
Wow, this is great... at being a simulation of a terrible Tiger LCD game. It's actually very good. I'm impressed at the authenticity!
Lon
19. Sep 2016 路 06:26 UTC
Hah! Nice play with the theme! I recall playing a game on a similar handheld when I was young boy.

Well done. Took but a death or two to learn the timing of the arrows coming down, just like learning timing for the games on similar handhelds. Nice job adding in additional challenges (like the knight crossing the bridge) as the player progresses. Also true to form increasing speed. Sound effects are appropriate too.

Nice work! I had fun!
MrMordem
19. Sep 2016 路 10:03 UTC
Good recreation of the old "pocket" LCD games of back then, so nice take on the theme, for something using mostly assets made with public domain stuff it looks decent, and it plays well (considering it has the same gameplay as these type of consoles)

Overall well done, with the titlescreen i really didn't expect that kind of a game the surprise was fun. :)
puppetmaster
19. Sep 2016 路 21:03 UTC
This LD has so many Catapult games but yours is f* amazing :)
I need to stop voting because your game is the best so far.
xesenix
19. Sep 2016 路 22:46 UTC
Hahaha that was completely ancient technology both in implementation and topic :D 10/10 for being on theme.

That was fun i liked that i could shot preemptive shots before archers even show just bombard the shit out of that castle. I only didn't know what to do wit that knight guy it seams like he was invulnerable.
馃帳 joe40001
20. Sep 2016 路 02:07 UTC
@csanyk Thanks very much

@Lon That's great to hear. I was trying to recreate not just the feel of the old games but also the difficulty and somewhat ambiguous rules of them too.

@MrMordem Thanks, yeah I added the title screen just to really hammer home the joke, it seems to have worked which is good. :)

@puppetmaster That's awesome to hear. I don't know that I'm the best so far but I'll take the compliment. Thanks!

@xesenix Great, I'm glad the theme worked on 2 levels, that was the design. The knight takes a few hits (should be less than 5 in level 1) he can't hurt you unless you take too long hitting him.

Wow after all this positive feedback I'm thinking of doing a quick port and putting this on Android. I don't know how replayable these kinds of games are but if there is interest I could even make a few of these as little android games. Who knows? Anyway thanks so much for the positive feedback, everybody!