The Minimalizer by johnfn

[raw]
made by johnfn for LD26 (COMPO)
phew!

a platformer game that doesn't take itself too seriously. still, it does have combat and upgrades! it also has a few graphical glitches - i hope you can look past them.

and yeah i totally ran out of time to do a better theme connection :(

thank you for playing! i love ludum dare!

Ratings

Coolness 37% 1594
Overall 3.31 406
Audio 3.61 92
Fun 3.21 351
Graphics 3.00 569
Humor 2.74 258
Innovation 2.19 1157
Mood 2.98 486
Theme 2.50 1273

Feedback

Jonapulse
29. Apr 2013 · 06:58 UTC
Fun, epic sound track, delightfully exploitable economy. but it was the story that got me through the game.
AlvaroH
29. Apr 2013 · 17:04 UTC
Great Game!
mrexcessive
29. Apr 2013 · 17:05 UTC
Playing on Chrome it seemed very, very fast and jittery... To the extent that I found it reasonably unplayable... but then I have problems with Call of Duty being over-twitchy... probably my age or lack of vitamin-D or something. Ambitious
yetanother
29. Apr 2013 · 17:06 UTC
I love the music. Fun to play.
infernet89
29. Apr 2013 · 17:06 UTC
Soundtrack was very good, unfortunately controls were quite annoying, but i liked the humour of dialogs!
KilledByAPixel
29. Apr 2013 · 17:07 UTC
Nice game, platforming mechanics were a little difficult to control, I think the player accelerats bit too fast. After getting the gun I eventually got stuck on the same screen as the screenshot here in the area at the bottom of the screen by jumping up from the screen below.
Hertzila
29. Apr 2013 · 17:11 UTC
Very nice, humorous game, even if a bit short and simple. I like the music a lot.
Polar
29. Apr 2013 · 17:13 UTC
Quite good, although I was quite upset when I got to the '4, 8, You Win' bit as a couldn't max out all of the weapons 10 points - it was a *bit* short.
SmilingCat
29. Apr 2013 · 17:18 UTC
Liked the music!
lanz
29. Apr 2013 · 17:18 UTC
Man that's hard and fast! I like it .) Absolutely awesome soundtrack. But turrets sometimes spawn inside walls. And did I say it's hard? .)
Jeremias
29. Apr 2013 · 17:23 UTC
The music is great, where are the sound effects? :D

Your game is simple but fun to play. I didn't encountered any bugs, so you did a very solid entry. The only thing I can complain, is the following:

- Enemies drop coins after killing theme again, so it's possible to farm coins. That makes the collecting coins/upgrading system a bit obsolete.
- Shooting up and down wasn't clear. I got stucked on the screen where you must shoot up to kill the turrets.
- You should add a save area after each screen. Sometimes I died and still pressed the walk button. As a consequence, I immediately walked off the screen into the next screen and died there, so I spawned on the starting point of this location.
🎤 johnfn
29. Apr 2013 · 18:04 UTC
Thanks for the comments guys. I updated it so that you couldn't get stuck in walls. I also slowed it down a little because it sounds like it might run a little faster on other computers? Sorry bout the little bugs here and there, I was probably too ambitious with some things.
Destroyer40k
30. Apr 2013 · 04:07 UTC
It was fun although a bit short. I didn't even get to upgrading the gu- ahem, minimalizer before I got to the end. It's got a nice difficulty level to it and the background music really adds a lot to the experience. Great game :)
Misael.K
30. Apr 2013 · 05:00 UTC
Good music, I imagined you'd do a higher BPM one.
The controls are jumpy, over sensitive I'd say. Level design is ok, nice progression. Graphics are cute, but lacking something (more colors? a more uniform palette? both? more silliness?)
Loved the funny narrations! This was the way you should've taken it, trying to make the "gun, emmm, minimalizer" joke more obvious, make it truly part of the game.
Good job. :)
Arcana
30. Apr 2013 · 15:08 UTC
Hey. I did Ludum Dare... mostly after you told me to "do it anyway". Can't check this out this evening but commenting to return to it later.
davidpeter
30. Apr 2013 · 16:04 UTC
I really like seeing your graphics improve over the LDs. This game was really difficult because it ran so fast on my computer and the bullets follow me. Health hearts was also a bit confusing to me, I didn't really know how to interpret it. I assume the music is great LOLOL. I enjoyed playing it, good work!
rukbotto
01. May 2013 · 01:20 UTC
Awesome! I really enjoyed it! Congratz!
CosmicAdventureSquad
01. May 2013 · 03:28 UTC
I have the same problem where the game is running crazy fast and really difficult. Platforming is twitchy and turrets are shooting a solid wall of bullets that follow me! D: It sounds like you addressed the speed problem so maybe it's just the browser I'm using? :S

Other than that, the music is fun and dialogue is hilarious. I allo like how there is a respawn point at each new screen. Great job for a compo entry.

-Rosypenguin
(this is a team account)
messiano
01. May 2013 · 05:00 UTC
Great game and music, however it runs way too fast. Congratulations on the effort!
Uhfgood
01. May 2013 · 06:27 UTC
I got stuck trying to leave the weapons upgrade screen
Uhfgood
01. May 2013 · 06:43 UTC
Like others, the (one) music track was pretty good. Not really screaming minimalism to me, but fun none-the-less
starpixie
01. May 2013 · 06:52 UTC
Fun game, very fast but it's entertaining. Might be worth noting that ladders seem to make you fly! Really nice soundtrack and cute sense of humour.
KayZ
01. May 2013 · 08:01 UTC
I went the wrong direction the first time and then got stuck in the room with the 2 turrets. Second time I went to get the minimalizer first :).
Ismei
01. May 2013 · 09:54 UTC
This was fun to play. I enjoyed the music and the dialogue was funny.
Tyro
01. May 2013 · 10:37 UTC
The physics were a little off at times, usually when ladders where involved. But that's easy to look past, considering the rest was nicely done. Great graphics and exceptional music seal the deal for me.
kazukishida
01. May 2013 · 10:56 UTC
Oh god that was hard. DX The controls felt too fast/responsive, and man it's just hard. XD

It seems the turrets spawn in random locations? Because hot damn two of them spawned near an exit and it was near damn impossible to get through T_T

(EDIT: it seemed I was going the wrong way the whole time WTF XD)

But the good art, the wonderful music, and the absolutely hilarious dialogue make up for the difficulty. It was short, but sweet. I think I'd play this if you refine it and keep up the gold humor. And the music, keep that up! Add some sfx and you've got it :)

Also, I should mention that when you hold the jump key on a ladder, you become the Spiderman and climb like no one has ever climbed before. But given the humor in the game, I won't be surprised if did that on purpose.
Frosnite
01. May 2013 · 15:43 UTC
Very cool, was fun to play, good job :)
🎤 johnfn
01. May 2013 · 16:18 UTC
Um. Are people thinking it's too hard because you're going RIGHT instead of LEFT at the beginning? That would seriously crack me up. And then make me feel like an idiot for terrible level design. :D
Wiering
01. May 2013 · 18:43 UTC
Nice little game!
theomnis
01. May 2013 · 20:03 UTC
A little hard to control...and I also demand guns at spawn :)
Milktoast
01. May 2013 · 23:39 UTC
Difficult, but fun!
🎤 johnfn
02. May 2013 · 00:09 UTC
@theomnis: hah... hahahahhaha... if/when i expand this, the "no gun" section is getting tripled. :D:D:D
🎤 johnfn
02. May 2013 · 00:15 UTC
Also, for everyone mentioning how holding jump makes you zoom up ladders - those aren't ladders, they're train tracks! and you're a train! ZOOM ZOOM!

alright, that may have been a lie.
Arcana
02. May 2013 · 02:43 UTC
I had a lot of fun playing. For some reason I loved climbing the ladders, since you SHOT up them so quickly. Firing was really fun too because your gun was so fast. It was a reasonably fast-paced game and I wish I had an old SNES controller to play this with! Catchy music too, too bad it didn't loop constantly and did a fadeout instead :(
matthias_zarzecki
02. May 2013 · 18:06 UTC
Lovely jump'n'run! Music is great.

Could use some balancing though. You see the word "gun" very often, yet you can't shoot, despite your enemies being able to. The "obstacle" looks just wide enough to fit thourhg, so turning left is not very apparent. Also jumping is so powerful, you often jump out of the level.

Still, nice work, and it is fun :)
🎤 johnfn
02. May 2013 · 23:48 UTC
@matthias_zarzecki - I guess you didn't play very far? You can shoot eventually... :/

Maybe I should have made that more obvious.
nilstastic
10. May 2013 · 10:51 UTC
Very fun, little har to control but good that you did'nt have to start over every time you died :)
sP0CkEr2
16. May 2013 · 04:17 UTC
nice game but the controls were not too tight --gravity was a little too much -- nice job
DDRKirby(ISQ)
16. May 2013 · 07:01 UTC
Woo, awesome. The room with the two turrets near the end, I totally abused that screen to farm up my weapon...