SUPER SHIFTER by Ellian

[raw]
made by Ellian for LD35 (JAM)
-- Current version: 1.1 --
changelog

1.1: Bug fixing
- Fixed latency issue in browser version
- Fixed boss behavior
- Fixed other minor bugs
- Added mouse controls (left clic fires, right clic enter Shift Mode)
- Added boss music
- Added tutorial music
- Misc text changes

1.0: Jam version
- Expect weird bugs half-way through


--SUPER SHIFTER--

SUPER SHIFTER is a vertical 2D shoot'em up.

Through the power of SHIFT MODE, you can dynamically rebuild your entire spacecraft mid flight!

Move around with WASD/arrows, shoot with Space.
Enter SHIFT MODE by holding shift, grab enemy's parts with your mouse, and expand your own ship!

-----------------

Made in 72 hours by Ellian
Sounds and music by Charlie Decadt

Ratings

Coolness 85% 2
Overall(Jam) 4.00 44
Audio(Jam) 4.09 32
Fun(Jam) 4.00 32
Graphics(Jam) 4.11 140
Innovation(Jam) 4.04 45
Theme(Jam) 4.22 37

Feedback

SeaDads
19. Apr 2016 · 13:09 UTC
Dude, this is sweet! Feels so awesome when you have a huge line of guns :D Amazing art and audio as usual!
tanis
19. Apr 2016 · 18:30 UTC
I like the gameplay, but there are a few problems IMHO.

Controls are way too hard when you have to use two hands on the keyboard and one on the mouse.. as long as I don't grow a third hand I feel bad :D

Every now and then the web version of the game slows down to almost a crawl. I haven't tried the Windows version though.

I'd probably change the fire and shift buttons to be the left and right mouse buttons to make it easier to control.
silkworm_sweatshop
20. Apr 2016 · 00:50 UTC
I'm usually not a huge fan of space shooter entries but the concept for this one is really cool and fits the theme well. Too bad it's a bit buggy but hopefully you'll keep working on it because there is definitely something there.
🎤 Ellian
20. Apr 2016 · 01:46 UTC
Thanks for your feedbacks!
Versions 1.1 is here, fixing the most important bugs of the original release.
Even managed to throw in two musics I didn't have enough time to add! Hope you like it. :)

Concerns about controls have been heard, too, and mouse control have also been added.
Eshford
20. Apr 2016 · 02:47 UTC
Amazing sound design!
image/31
20. Apr 2016 · 10:25 UTC
This game is very good. Music creates the right setting. I conquered, really cool happened!
markusfisch
20. Apr 2016 · 20:00 UTC
Awesome game! Outstanding music and sound! Totally my kind of game! Thanks for making this! Had a blast playing it.
sftrabbit
20. Apr 2016 · 23:16 UTC
Nice mechanic that fits the theme well, although I didn't really figure out an arrangement that would be good except for just making a horizontal line of guns. Would be interesting to have different parts of the ship work together in some way. Also, I wasn't sure how the triangle pieces were supposed to be used. Still, graphics and audio were nicely polished. Nice one.
🎤 Ellian
20. Apr 2016 · 23:38 UTC
Triangular pieces are just there for decoration ahah.
I totally agree on the arrangement thing, this could (should?) be expanded further to have some sort of actual interesting gameplay. Right now a line of guns is indeed the right way to go. :(
Weeping Rupee
20. Apr 2016 · 23:41 UTC
Very interesting idea. Needs some more variety but great entry
schizoid2k
20. Apr 2016 · 23:56 UTC
Awesome! Nice graphics, nice parallax scrolling. Lots of fun to play.
mike.cullingham
21. Apr 2016 · 00:58 UTC
Very cool game. On theme, great crisp graphics, nice music, and the ship shifting controls just worked. Would be interesting to try portrait rather than landscape layout to get more lead time on enemies a la 1942. I'm going to get carpal tunnel if I keep playing it from hammering spacebar (Gamepad would be great), but might return to this one later. Very nice job.
andyman404
21. Apr 2016 · 04:28 UTC
Great game! This was one of my favorite games that I've played so far (50+) in the jam. I love the creating and shifting of the ship during the slow motion mode. The music is excellent. I hope you continue this game after the jam. I'd definitely buy a future version of this game on Steam.
ChuiGum
21. Apr 2016 · 04:52 UTC
Loved the visuals and cool game! Great take on theme, and cool audio. Well done! :)
APantaloni
21. Apr 2016 · 08:08 UTC
Really cool idea and fun tu play, congrats! The music is very good too :)
derr
21. Apr 2016 · 09:53 UTC
That game is super sweet, you are on to something here. :) I get a real Xenon Vibe from this thanks to the great graphics and audio.
NightShadow0
21. Apr 2016 · 12:59 UTC
This is a brilliant concept, though i had some issues with it. Equipping guns on the second and further rows didn't seem to have any effect, so i just kept expanding sideways; the kickback on the shots felt a bit too intense, started to get annoying; i destroyed the boss's weapons pretty quickly, so then i had to just stand there shooting at the core for a while. I really like the idea though, it has a lot of potential. Nice work!
Freank
21. Apr 2016 · 16:44 UTC
Hi, nice game ! We're realizing a video with several games of the Ludum Dare #35.
Can you add your game on indiexpo.net ? (it's free)
So we can include also your game in the video ;)
p.s. write #LDJAM in the game's description
NvrSkipGameDay
21. Apr 2016 · 17:07 UTC
This was super fun, and very clever. I could see putting some time into this just to experiment with all the crazy ship configurations you can come up with. A great game, well done.
pixelpotions
21. Apr 2016 · 18:05 UTC
Love the graphics and the arcade like feel of the game! The music was well made and fit the game perfectly. I would really like to be able to vertically stack guns to make them stronger and maybe you could change the colors of the parts on the boss to distinguish it from normal enemies. It didn't strike me as a boss at first until I noticed the movement it made. Nonetheless this game is well made and awesome! It has slowdowns on Firefox but Chrome runs it perfectly.
🎤 Ellian
21. Apr 2016 · 22:21 UTC
Oh man, stacking similar guns to make them more powerful... now this is a great idea. I wish I had time to expand this ahah
adcrusher
21. Apr 2016 · 23:48 UTC
Holy crap that was awesome!The kick back from the bullets made the ship feel super powerful, nice touch! Amazing music too, everything felt so well put together. Maybe I wasn't playing quite right, but I felt like The triangle pieces didn't do much except make my ship bigger so it could get hit more easily. Was there something that they did that I didn't pick up on? Either way, awesome entry, easily my favorite so far!
samlo
23. Apr 2016 · 12:45 UTC
Wow neat game. Really awesome seeing the captain forever mechanic in a shmup! Would like to see you keep working on it! New engines would be awesome, or maybe a horizontal flying version where stuff can come at you from different sides...

Great job!
Franklin's Ghost
23. Apr 2016 · 13:42 UTC
Such a clever take on the theme and the space shooter genre. Liked the feeling of attaching more guns to my ship and the impact of shooting enemies. Nicely polished entry with great style. Just needs a bit more variety with guns combining together to make a more powerful version but definitely understandable with the little amount of time you had to make this.
oxysoft
23. Apr 2016 · 17:40 UTC
Solid entry but unless I missed something, it seems like all you could do is just build stuff in a row to the left or right which is kind of boring, you should remedy to that if you ever work on this again! Sometime I couldn't pick pieces for some reasons also
Solifuge
24. Apr 2016 · 23:09 UTC
Solid art and sound design! Very impressed by the rocking level tunes, and the solid firing sounds.

The Captain Forever style ship building mechanic was a lot of fun. Slowing down time but not pausing the game entirely was a really good choice; the bullets kept flying, and created a great sense of tension when trying to build yourself up in the heat of battle!

Due to the design, the only real way to play was to stack guns horizontally, and didn't change that ducking and weaving was the only way to defeat enemies and not lose your weapons; some more meaningful strategy or choices would have benefited the game greatly. I'd love for an ability to shoot past my own modules (maybe special modules, or the fins, or just all your own modules) as a way to make a sleeker ship with more focused guns, or of armoring up the front of your ship. Perhaps penetrating or beam-type enemy shots could have made that strategy dangerous (many good guns in a row could mean you lose everything). More weapon behavior variety would have helped get around that as well; mouse-aimed turrets, angled spread guns, modules designed for ramming, and whatever else.

Thanks for putting this together; I had fun playing it!
DeltaF1
28. Apr 2016 · 23:48 UTC
Sooo fun to play! The mechanic is simple, but it can lead to so many complex structures and fun ship builds. This game exemplifies why I love games like Starmade and Space Engineers. Well done, 5 stars :)
LevieDAudio
01. May 2016 · 10:20 UTC
Woooow! Such a fun game, with a great game mechanic! I feel like replaying this just to try out other ship combinations and find new techniques!

For critique, I feel like the game was a bit too easy for my tastes, and the art was a little too bland (grey everywhere), although I only noticed this in retrospect!

But yeah: Great art, great audio, and great presentation overall! Rating this highly! ❤
shapemorph
01. May 2016 · 22:26 UTC
awesome game!!! very fun!!
EvanEGibbs
05. May 2016 · 08:14 UTC
What an incredibly clever idea! I love the concept of stealing pieces from other ships and you executed on the idea perfectly! The art and sound are also really nice. Sweet job! :D
Uson Chen
08. May 2016 · 10:30 UTC
Very fun!
Great and innovated idea!
I wonder if better to easily attach the free component with move beside instead of "shift+mouse control".
By the way, the audio is awesome !
Jaenis
08. May 2016 · 13:52 UTC
Great idea! And execution! Fun game.
It would be nice if you could rotate the dropped parts for 45 degree (especially when mounting weapon to/under wing) to be able to shoot diagonally.
Loved how different guns had their own feeling, kickback or such!
geekdrums
08. May 2016 · 14:01 UTC
The best so far. Really fun to customize my ship. Even if I missed some of my parts, I can get it again with my effort! Great job, 5 stars.
Brickkid512
08. May 2016 · 14:01 UTC
I liked how you implemented the rebuilding idea. It just makes these types of games way more strategic.
LeReveur
08. May 2016 · 15:53 UTC
Simple, seen before, but still fun and effective - a bit too short, an endless mode would have add some fun. :D
ButtonMasherBros
08. May 2016 · 18:50 UTC
You were featured in Ludum Dare to Believe! Check it out - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-orIwB_E_qw
Yword
09. May 2016 · 14:50 UTC
I just finished it! It is really fun and the idea is very cool too!