Poppy vs. the Night by SecondDimension

[raw]
made by SecondDimension for LD27 (JAM)
UPDATE: Our game does not seem to work on Safari. We don't know why, it appears Apple hates us. We're sorry.
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Made in 72hrs by a Team of 3, Adam D, Adam S and James C.
All Gameplay, Art, Sound & Music made by us during the Ludum Dare weekend

THE SHORT VERSION:

Hello! This is our LD27 Jam Entry, "Poppy vs. the Night".
We toyed with the idea of calling it 'Snooze', but I guess we were a bit worried that sounded boring. Anyway the game is playable in a browser, click the link to give it a try, all instructions should be displayed in game. Thanks for giving it a go!

*****

THE LONG VERSION
Hello Again! This is our LD27 Jam Entry, "Poppy vs. the Night".
Adam D: Programming, Design, Art Support
Adam S: Music, Sound, Writing, Programming Support
James C: Lead Artist, Design

Our game is a fairly traditional top-down shooter, with a few building elements and stages limited to 10 seconds (for reasons that will become apparent during the amazing written story). It's based around a kid, Poppy, and her dreams. You basically fight a nightmare creature from a poster on her bedroom wall, plus a load of random stuff. There is also some mini tower defence in there too. Below are some hints & tips on how to play the game.

EVEN LONGER VERSIONS
Friends, Romans, Countrymen, Game-Jammers. Here is a mostly complete instruction manual:
~Controls: Basically WASD to move, Mouse to aim and Left Mouse button to fire
~Basics: Shoot the enemies, avoid getting hit by the enemies
~Overall Goal: You will Keep Encountering a Boss. Shoot him and wear down his health. His health is consistent through out each playthrough so you have to kill him bit-by-bit.
Pickups: There are some balloons with weapon pickups on. Get them, as they are pretty cool and will help you destroy stuff. Most weapons just fire like you'd expect, except the rockets, which home in on the mouse cursor.
~Building: There will be a regular build phase; this is laughably simple, and involves you being able to place either a barrier with left mouse, or a turret with right mouse. These will help you defend against the enemies in the next stage. Towards the end of the build phase, you can stand on a tiny powerup, you will collect it when the next attack phase starts.
~More Building: The small shadow creatures will destroy your barriers and turrets. There is nothing you can do about this, bad luck.
~Boss: Just keep shooting this guy, and avoid his bullets.
~Winning: When you kill the boss, you get a load of points. There is a high score table, so basically just try to get on it.
~Bugs: If you find any, please ignore them. They are a feature. Thanks.

Ratings

Coolness 100% 1
Overall(Jam) 3.80 45
Audio(Jam) 3.69 50
Fun(Jam) 3.64 42
Graphics(Jam) 4.00 100
Humor(Jam) 2.76 210
Innovation(Jam) 3.30 152
Mood(Jam) 3.53 88
Theme(Jam) 3.62 75

Feedback

dungeonsoffear
26. Aug 2013 · 23:31 UTC
Excellent game, good work.
immanuela
27. Aug 2013 · 00:24 UTC
Great game! Good graphics and the sets of rounds make you want to keep playing. Good work!
blopit
27. Aug 2013 · 00:29 UTC
Very nice!
Raiyumi
27. Aug 2013 · 00:29 UTC
Really good game , I did not expect to see a boss and building mechanics.
mtrc
27. Aug 2013 · 00:32 UTC
Stellar audio and art work. Really loved the setting and the idea of cycling stages. 10 seconds made it hard to gauge hat was going on, but that's not your fault! Loved it.
ChrisGaudino
27. Aug 2013 · 00:33 UTC
Really enjoyed this. The menu screen looked great as well.
theholychicken
27. Aug 2013 · 00:38 UTC
It's great fun! nice job!
🎤 SecondDimension
27. Aug 2013 · 00:49 UTC
Thanks everyone, I'm glad you liked the audio as I'm pretty proud of it (did that all from scratch over this weekend)
Thanks for mentioning the menu screen too, I know someone on our team who will be very happy to read that!
psychomonster
27. Aug 2013 · 00:53 UTC
Only one word: THISGAMEISTOTALLYAWESOME!
Fervir
27. Aug 2013 · 00:53 UTC
This game is really cool.
I really like aesthetic that you have going on
zatyka
27. Aug 2013 · 00:56 UTC
Wow. That was pretty intense. It took me a couple rounds to really figure out what I was doing, but once I got the hang of it, it was quite fun. Like others, I thought the music really stood out. Nicely done.
KunoNoOni
27. Aug 2013 · 00:59 UTC
Jaw dropping amazing! 5 stars all the way!
jay griffin
27. Aug 2013 · 01:27 UTC
This is fantastic, the constant switching between gameplay styles livens things up no end. Not to mention that it looks and sounds amazing. A great entry.
Jayjay
27. Aug 2013 · 02:57 UTC
Awesome mix of modes =D
Wertle
27. Aug 2013 · 04:56 UTC
Super hard core theme interpretation. It was hard but I liked the art. It would probably help if the transitions between phases were sliiiightly longer to allow for mental shift between the modes. Good job.
matthias_zarzecki
27. Aug 2013 · 08:16 UTC
Nice one!

Love the character-deign. OF COURSE she has her own death-robot :)
Starspell
27. Aug 2013 · 13:15 UTC
Unfortunately the game lagged on my computer very badly so it was pretty unplayable. What I did manage to see was pretty interesting though.
rxi
27. Aug 2013 · 20:08 UTC
I loved the contrast between the intro and the rest of the game. How we jump from "Hey.. you're... dreaming.." to a strobe light of action.

Nice one.
killmonday
27. Aug 2013 · 20:28 UTC
Fantastic story to the gameplay, awesome top notch with the sounds and mechanics! Teddyy!
Cryunreal
27. Aug 2013 · 20:28 UTC
sorry for that short)
CosmicAdventureSquad
27. Aug 2013 · 20:30 UTC
Neat game. The art is really well done. It felt really frantic to me, but I think that was the point. I had a bug where my character just keept moving downward no matter what direction I pressed.

- Strega

(this is a team account)
JLeybovich
27. Aug 2013 · 20:31 UTC
Awesome job guys :D
flod
27. Aug 2013 · 20:32 UTC
Nice game - liked the theme usage
robb
27. Aug 2013 · 20:34 UTC
Who would've thought that Michelangelo would get April...
PaperBlurt
27. Aug 2013 · 20:37 UTC
Fun idea, great pixels and nice details such as the pointer etc.
GFM
27. Aug 2013 · 20:48 UTC
I felt the game is lacking feedback when you hit things/are hit. Particle, a louder sfx or flickering would have helped... Also, the hitbox was too big (or the lack of response made me mistake it).

Great idea and theme interpretation, though! :D
🎤 SecondDimension
27. Aug 2013 · 22:30 UTC
Thanks for the kind words everyone

@GFM - I agree about the feedback, I made sure there were particles and a sound effect, but with everything else happening it's hard to notice. It's one thing that I wish we'd had time to do, we kept trying screen shake but it wasn't really working.

@Wertle - Yes I think that's fair about the transitions, I think it's just that when you play your own game so much over a weekend then you know what to expect

@Starspell - Really sorry about the lag, think it is probably a combination of the looped collision checking and the many particle effectss. Low powered or older processors may have a bit of trouble I guess.

@CosmicAdventureSquad - That is weird browser bug that happens if you click outside of the window whilst moving. It usually corrects itself within a few seconds. Still, sorry!

@robb - All the text says is that Michelangelo obtained that high score in April. I'll let you make of that what you will...
🎤 SecondDimension
27. Aug 2013 · 22:37 UTC
... Also my best score is 7080
savethejets1
28. Aug 2013 · 01:09 UTC
Fun stuff, I dig the music. Props for having a high score table!
KevinZuhn
28. Aug 2013 · 02:09 UTC
I love the art and the frenetic pacing. The ending made me laugh!
I didn't realize the first time that my health carried between rounds, and I got careless! I'm glad that this game has a persistent goal, it gave me a greater reason to play the rounds well and keep pushing forward.
Colapsydo
28. Aug 2013 · 08:07 UTC
I like how every elements of the game are objects from Poppy's room.
You made a real complete game, with different weapons and different game modes.
Music are really nice, the one form the menu reminds me of Sebastien Shuller.
wine
28. Aug 2013 · 17:30 UTC
Epic! Great work )
GagaPete
28. Aug 2013 · 17:54 UTC
Very well done game. I love this tower defense stage, even if I have no clue what the turrents to. I like the mechanics and the graphics are awesome. Why is there no fullscreen option? :)
Catmoo
28. Aug 2013 · 22:55 UTC
Was really fun to play and great that you incorporated three different game segments into one, also it was nice with the little tower defence gameplay to be among the other two as it gave you a little bit of a breather.

Also gotta love those turtles!
Christina Antoinette Neofotistou
29. Aug 2013 · 00:22 UTC
Awesome audio, you are right to be proud!
Nick Weihs
29. Aug 2013 · 10:01 UTC
I liked it the multiple powerups and the shifting of modes kept it fast paced and fresh. Felt like a total boss firing missles and shotgunning at the same time haha. Nice work.
gre
29. Aug 2013 · 20:43 UTC
A very good game. Maybe one of the best game I've seen so far in term of graphics IMO.
I really like the mix between a Tower Defense and a Shoot them up in the "they are coming" phase,
I found the 10 seconds transition a bit rough, you are in plain action and everything suddenly stops. I have no idea how you could have improved that but it needs some sort of nice transition in term of gameplay.
EdoMiyamoto
29. Aug 2013 · 21:14 UTC
Yeaaaah 5430 I almost die near the end ! Very good entry, it's fast and we shoot things and there's music and all !
Angrycrow
30. Aug 2013 · 02:58 UTC
Excellent game! Love the mode changes.
ratalaika
01. Sep 2013 · 11:08 UTC
good job
mrspeaker
01. Sep 2013 · 13:34 UTC
Woah, I have to admit I have NO idea what was going on there - "ohh, shooting things! No wait, building something? No wait.. boss fight! Um... wut!" (Perhaps this was just trying to jam the "10 seconds" thing in there?) but damn, it was certainly a rollercoaster ride... Fantastic game design - excellent sounds and consistent aesthetic.
domrein
01. Sep 2013 · 21:04 UTC
This game is insanity. I actually like a lot of what's going on here, but the 10 second switches are really jarring.
foumart
03. Sep 2013 · 09:08 UTC
So beautiful! Thank you for that experience :)
sP0CkEr2
04. Sep 2013 · 02:22 UTC
good use of the theme and great idea with the different stages -- i loved it
blackotus
04. Sep 2013 · 17:06 UTC
I like the gameplay variety and the different kinds of weapons you can get.

I really like the boss design :)

The tower defense segment felt a little out of place in my opinion.

Great game!
Blooperly
05. Sep 2013 · 03:17 UTC
Super great! Very polished, though a little too hectic for my taste. But I guess that is what you have to do with 10 seconds :P
Linus Lindberg
05. Sep 2013 · 15:36 UTC
Lovely graphics! :)
Martin_Monosys
05. Sep 2013 · 15:36 UTC
Very polished game, everything about it looks professional. Good job!
Lokarunith
05. Sep 2013 · 20:06 UTC
Very cool entry! I like everything that is dream reltated and this game is no exception.
Almax27
07. Sep 2013 · 14:31 UTC
Ooo, cool frontend!

Really nice game, I didn't feel rushed or get confused with controls, the layout give you time, and explain it really well. The art and music is cute and suits the game well.

Really good job! :)
zanval
07. Sep 2013 · 20:40 UTC
Wow! love the art, the gameplay, the three playing modes, the music, the sound effects, just everything. This game is hard! Really enjoyed it!
panurge
08. Sep 2013 · 12:54 UTC
Excellent. The story-telling was concise but evocative, the visuals and sound matched the mood perfectly and the gameplay was varied and fun. Very enjoyable!
meszka
10. Sep 2013 · 19:17 UTC
Nice art style and mood. Interesting gameplay ideas. Not sure if the 10s phases work all that well with this game, sometimes it felt like the time was up just when I started doing something cool.
motty
11. Sep 2013 · 02:08 UTC
A solid, quality effort.
lordjosephdeburg
14. Sep 2013 · 23:04 UTC
the dream beast.. great play on concept nice work guys!
Urfoex
15. Sep 2013 · 11:41 UTC
Good game.
But it should be a bit slower.
GeorgeBroussard
16. Sep 2013 · 22:47 UTC
I really liked this! Was fun to switch between the game modes and have the meta goal of beating the boss. Well done game.