Alien Lobotomy by SoupWithBits

[raw]
made by SoupWithBits for LD29 (JAM)
Your mission is to dominate the earth!
To do this you need to lobotomize 4 of the earth's 6 major leaders.
You have the power to re-wire the neural pathways within an earthlings brain, use it to make them vegetables!

To lobotomize a leader, you must connect the neurons in such a way that the total is within the numbers displayed either side of the score.
A neuron's value is added to the score for every neural pathway to and from that neuron.

Art + Programming : Cukia Kimani & Kevin Marais
Sound : Tim Harbour

Ratings

Coolness 100% 1
Overall(Jam) 3.25 348
Audio(Jam) 3.01 392
Fun(Jam) 2.93 414
Graphics(Jam) 3.08 484
Humor(Jam) 2.16 531
Innovation(Jam) 3.77 71
Mood(Jam) 3.17 313
Theme(Jam) 2.49 649

Feedback

soulrot
28. Apr 2014 路 22:46 UTC
Rather confusing at first, but as soon as you get the hang of it, it is an interesting game. I seemed unable to solve a puzzle because it required a value over 50 while the only two positive values on the screen where 6 and 8.
TowelKing
28. Apr 2014 路 22:55 UTC
nice puzzle game, a bit more tutorial would have helped, but interesting once you get the hang of it.
馃帳 SoupWithBits
29. Apr 2014 路 06:54 UTC
@soulrot i am 100% sure that every puzzle generated is solvable. Not saying there aren't more difficult ones ;) thanks for the play!
GertJohnny
29. Apr 2014 路 08:41 UTC
Pretty interesting, took a while to figure out but it was worthwhile.
udvaritibor
29. Apr 2014 路 10:13 UTC
I love it really original I think. Sounds are cool as well.
Simon@LD
29. Apr 2014 路 10:18 UTC
Nice graphics and sound design. I had some troubles finding out how it worked though. A better tutorial would help i think. Original interpretation of the theme!
matheod
29. Apr 2014 路 10:27 UTC
Really nice puzzle idea. Never seen it before. The game is really hard at the start but really easy when you understand how all the things work. I think this could be a really good game with more mechanics ^^
I don't know why the game end when there still be some contry to invide.
matheod
29. Apr 2014 路 10:27 UTC
Edit : I just read "To do this you need to lobotomize 4 of the earth's 6 major leaders." :)

Strange choice :p
BarkingCat
29. Apr 2014 路 10:27 UTC
now this is a puzzle game I'd spend hours with, especially on phone. I like how the leaders' brain are full of negative numbers. heheh.
teambrookvale
29. Apr 2014 路 10:38 UTC
A little explanation would be nice but the concept is neat. Mood and graphics are cool!
Diptoman
29. Apr 2014 路 10:52 UTC
That was a really interesting puzzle mechanic. Enjoyed it. Though I couldn't make sure how many nodes could be connected to one node. Sometimes it was 2, sometimes 3. The use of the theme seemed a bit loose.
Norse Games
29. Apr 2014 路 11:44 UTC
I really liked the original idea for this one, but its a stretch to see this fit the theme. I enjoyed this game a lot, and I'll look out for more stuff by you in the future. Congratulations on surviving the dare! Just a note, If there was an iPhone version of this game I might be inclined to buy it. *wink, wink*
codevinsky
29. Apr 2014 路 14:06 UTC
I tried playing this and I just really don't get it. Could you expand the instructions and rules a bit?
Andrew Adams
29. Apr 2014 路 14:09 UTC
I now dominate the earth. Awesome.
r0x0r
29. Apr 2014 路 14:10 UTC
any chance of a linux build?
Maschinen-Mensch
29. Apr 2014 路 14:11 UTC
Didn't understand the instructions but after one or two minutes of randomly connecting nodes it clicked for me and I beat the game. I found the time limit to be a bit annoying. Would be a cool to be able to just sit and enjoy. Not sure if is complex enough for that though. Its a bit of a stretch for theme. I liked the setting, but it wasn't really explored. Overall I liked it. Nice to see a puzzle game on here with a mechanic that I haven't seen before.
Thorig
29. Apr 2014 路 15:00 UTC
Now I know how to play and it is a fun game. It the turn was longer, maybe my son could use it to pratice some math calculations.
somethingsimilar
29. Apr 2014 路 16:51 UTC
Really nice puzzle concept, as soon as I worked it out! The thing that made it click for me is that each neuron can have multiple neurons connecting into it. Once that clicked, it was much easier to understand.

I had a lot of fun - could have done with being longer! :)
BoTreats
29. Apr 2014 路 17:11 UTC
I like the puzzle mechanic a lot, and there is a lot of mood here. Cool game!
GuyUnger
29. Apr 2014 路 17:40 UTC
Really cool stuff man!
It took me some time to understand, but when i finally got it, i felt very smart! haha. It's a cool system.
The game has a very spacy and grim atmosphere, nice work on that :)
The world map and little text's give it that little bit of fiction that it needs.
keep it up!
tomvert
29. Apr 2014 路 18:21 UTC
I'm sorry I must be too dumb, but I couldn't understand your game at all :(
_adamturnbull
29. Apr 2014 路 19:04 UTC
I'm probably just too simple minded but I found it quite hard to understand what was going on. Its a nice looking game though! Good job :)
flavio
29. Apr 2014 路 19:15 UTC
Waow, I was lost, it took me a while to get it.. not easy one
Nice puzzles once you get it !
Tuism
29. Apr 2014 路 21:10 UTC
Wow! This is amazing! I saw it as it grew to this point, and I NEVER thought it would have been so different from what I saw while it was being built! The theme added was pretty damn classy! Well polished, great sounds, nice stuff guys!

NOT easy at all. I almost failed maths so... Not one for me to master :P
NicoM
30. Apr 2014 路 02:09 UTC
Interesting puzzle mechanic, very difficult... also great audio, very moody:)
Lyje
30. Apr 2014 路 12:00 UTC
I am not good with numbers or numerical based games so I found this pretty challenging - but I do like the graphics and effects for this!
Vytheros
30. Apr 2014 路 15:48 UTC
Good game, but was ridiculously impossible. I couldn't get any of the level done. If I had more time, maybe a minute or so, I would've gotten it but due to the limited time I had I just could not do it.
metkis
30. Apr 2014 路 20:28 UTC
Pretty challenging, but I enjoyed the premise and like the look of it!
XenosNS
01. May 2014 路 00:13 UTC
Was difficult to understand the mechanic at first but once you do it's very clever. Enjoyed it.
Balloonsfor600
01. May 2014 路 01:46 UTC
I guess I couldn't understand all the rules of the game. I played for a while, but couldn't seem to get anywhere.
Jupiter_Hadley
01. May 2014 路 03:00 UTC
Simple but interesting game, I like it. I included it in part 5 of my Ludum Dare compilation video series, if you'd like to check it out :) youtu.be/HquvNllyc50
Jupiter_Hadley
01. May 2014 路 03:04 UTC
It seems that your game didnt make it into that video, my mistake, it will be in part 6 :)
JavadocMD
01. May 2014 路 07:33 UTC
Brilliant concept and well executed. Once the blackout phase starts, it's not very long before there's nothing you can do. It would feel a little less fatal if it creeped in more slowly, but that could just be personal preference.
馃帳 SoupWithBits
01. May 2014 路 10:57 UTC
Thanks Guys! We appreciate the feedback. We'll be looking at making the tutorial better in future.
Ragzouken
01. May 2014 路 12:30 UTC
couldn't really work out what decided how many connections a neuron could have, and it took me a while to understand the scoring - but i won!
Jupiter_Hadley
01. May 2014 路 18:18 UTC
Here it is! http://youtu.be/K5ATRciKj24
alvarop
01. May 2014 路 18:29 UTC
As you could see, it took me a while to understand the mechanic. I think the tutorial should be a little bit more clear. When I "got it" I started having fun with it... but I was unsure the whole time if I actually was doing the right thing or not.
TobiasW
01. May 2014 路 18:33 UTC
It took me a few seconds to figure the game out, but after that, it was rather easy. (I don't think it should let you continue until you beat the tutorial though - and more feedback there what you are doing wrong!)

While I think the gameplay idea is really innovative, it was far too easy for me: I just connected everything to the highest/lowest number until I was in the right area, and then balanced. I'm not sure how you could fix that though.

The abstract graphics work well, and the sound effects and the ambience are great.

All in all, pretty cool entry! Good job!
kikaz
01. May 2014 路 21:54 UTC
Nice puzzle game with nice visual effects, very smart mechanism but difficult to handle. Good job !
petey123567
02. May 2014 路 06:41 UTC
Took a while to grok - maybe some feedback animations that visualizes how the value is computed?
2HitAdam
02. May 2014 路 21:20 UTC
Cool once I got the hang of it. I also like that this game could be about just about anything, but you went for lobotomising leaders haha. Nice work.
baykush_figtree
03. May 2014 路 00:53 UTC
I love puzzle games and this is the best one i've seen around here. Good.Job.
BasselGaming
04. May 2014 路 06:30 UTC
Really cool game! great art and mechanics
Oddly Shaped Pixels
04. May 2014 路 11:33 UTC
Nice ambiance and aesthetics but I can't see how it relates to the theme and it definitely needs some tutorial or better explanations.
joe40001
04. May 2014 路 15:45 UTC
I really liked this game, I was bummed though that it stopped me at like 4-5 out of the 7 continents. Fun game, the title screen made it look like it'd be a lower end game but everything else about it was super polished and nice. You should port this to tablet devices.
pinkmonkeyhead
04. May 2014 路 19:10 UTC
The idea is so good!! it just needs more polish
Calvin Pacheco
05. May 2014 路 00:10 UTC
Awesome puzzle. I love this type of challenge
Wertle
05. May 2014 路 02:32 UTC
Complex math under time pressure isn't particularly fun. My strategy ended up being randomly connecting things and hoping the number would get to where I needed it. The idea is interesting but it just needs playtesting and iteration on explaining what exactly the player should be doing. Lots of playtesting with new players.
soy_yuma
05. May 2014 路 16:52 UTC
Took me a while to understand. The idea is really original, I've never seen anything like this! It's simple and fun. Congrats!
Rick Hoppmann
06. May 2014 路 09:14 UTC
I didn't quite get it.
The font is rather hard to read. The soft glow and floating of the neurons looks good, as well as the transmission animation.

All in all this may be a great game, but I don't quite get it.
terraco
06. May 2014 路 10:38 UTC
Very interesting concept!
javifugitivo
06. May 2014 路 11:02 UTC
Very original game of puzzles, maybe you can improve it with some backgrounds and more effects, and a better tutorial, of course. Nice job!
mechabit
06. May 2014 路 13:13 UTC
interesting puzzle game
Atridas
07. May 2014 路 15:38 UTC
Interesting game, interesting mechanics.
One thing I may have found is: It was very hard to solve the puzzles at the begining, but as soon as I discovered a "method", the became really easy ;-)
rojo
07. May 2014 路 18:31 UTC
Interesting idea, but not very well explained. Multiple times I had everything connected with something else and the number within the range, but I still failed. Aside from that the graphics looked pretty good, and the ambient audio was a good fit.
sP0CkEr2
09. May 2014 路 02:25 UTC
interesting puzzle game - nice job
gre
13. May 2014 路 12:58 UTC
Very interesting game mecanism.
Funny world map domination.
Original take on the theme if I understand it correctly.
MidCry
13. May 2014 路 14:17 UTC
Innovative but kind of hard to catch mechanics ... with nice and smooth aesthetics it's worth playing ...
Zerkruemler
13. May 2014 路 18:17 UTC
Interesting idea well designed and implemented. Also good sound effects for a puzzle game.
conormn
15. May 2014 路 04:33 UTC
I'm super bad at math, but really got into this. Thanks for making!
LarryChupacabra
19. May 2014 路 23:18 UTC
Like some other folks were saying maybe adding in the tutorial how the cells multiply/divide when connected would be great. Otherwise it was simple and straight forward once you got going. Was pretty fun working within the polarity range.

As a side note. Despite the lateness of the video. Alien Lobotomy was featured in LD 29 showcase vol 4. http://youtu.be/aFa_iU1gvTg