Crime in the City by Volute

[raw]
made by Volute for LD25 (COMPO)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tagline
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Be a master of crime and take control of the city !

Crime in the City works like a card game. Build your team of bad guys and send them on raids ! Steal a bus, kidnap the chief of police, etc. and raise the level of crime in the city until you can establish your reign of evil !

But beware, The Dark Cape and the cops will constantly stand in your way and try to catch you !


----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
How to play - Quickly get started on the game !
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

1 - Hire bad guys
2 - Click "raid"
3 - Choose an easy raid
4 - Select people and launch the raid
5 - See if you can cancel the effects of the encounters with your guys. (see below)
6 - If you get to the end of the raid, you win money and crime points. You don't need to remove all the effects of the encounters.
7 - You need 20 crime points to win


----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Who should I hire ? - tips for choosing the BEST bad guys
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

STRENGTH : bad guys with a high strength can neutralize more encounters

SKILLS THAT BOOST STRENGTH : They make a guy more flexible against encounters because you can spend $ if his strength is lower than the encounter's

CANCEL SPELLS : Pay attention to the type. Some Cancel spells only allow you to cancel effects of a specific type of encounters.
There are 4 types of encounters : Heavies, Devices, Structures, Super-hero. You only have super-hero encounters on hard raid.

FIND NEW GUYS : if the guys you can hire are weak, reset the panel !

RAIDS : When you launch a raid, make sure your guys can cancel Heavies, Devices, Structures, and that they're strong enough or can boost their strength.

K.O. : The guys are K.O. after a raid. They need to rest one night before they can fight again.


----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
How the battle system works
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The idea is to remove the effects of the encounters before you face them. The characters can use their "Cancel" spells if they have a strength superior or equal to the strength of the encounter and if they can cancel the right type of encounter.

Select a "Cancel" spell, then click on the button on the left of the effect you want to remove.

If you don't finish a raid, you can consult the encounters you've already seen to adapt your strategy.



----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Don't hesitate to ask if you don't understand something in the game.
Sorry for the very basic graphics, I didn't have time to work on them !
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Ratings

Coolness 91% 2
Overall 3.61 76
Audio 2.96 188
Fun 3.17 206
Graphics 3.57 152
Humor 2.95 228
Innovation 3.37 149
Mood 3.12 196
Theme 4.10 27

Feedback

loren
17. Dec 2012 路 18:26 UTC
Nice art! I like the clean style
LucaPavone
18. Dec 2012 路 00:37 UTC
I like it! Very clean, nice music, took some getting used to the system but once I got the hang of it I was hooked.

My only complaint was that the UI sounds were a bit too clicky, and I disabled them.
Porpentine
18. Dec 2012 路 11:07 UTC
I really like the boardgamey/card gamey aspect of this. I'm unsure how to beat encounters though--even boosting my strength or negating encounters with abilities doesn't seem to work.
馃帳 Volute
18. Dec 2012 路 11:32 UTC
Thanks for the comments :)

@ Porpentine : The idea is to remove the effects of the encounters before you face them. The characters can use their "Cancel" spells if they have a strength superior or equal to the strength of the encounter. Select a "Cancel" spell, then click on the button on the left of the effect you want to remove.
hints
18. Dec 2012 路 16:11 UTC
Quite a bit of fun, I didn't realise at first that I hit to the X to negate abilities. So maybe a bit more direction on your first mission (maybe a tutorial mission would be helpful?)
naxum
18. Dec 2012 路 16:29 UTC
Pretty sweet, this is gorgeous. My main issue was the UI could be confusing at times, especially with negating effects. I would suggest making some of the effects be a random chance or something, because I ended up only beating 1 raid after 30 nights, but I had a crew of 6 guys that could negate everything. :P
Christina Antoinette Neofotistou
19. Dec 2012 路 03:22 UTC
very cool, VERY fun. It can be a gread game
Edocentrique
19. Dec 2012 路 12:32 UTC
Very good, I think this entry can be something even nice !
MaximSchoemaker
19. Dec 2012 路 16:35 UTC
Looks like a very fun game, but sadly it appears your webpage won't load :/ I'll try again later :3
ElScootro
19. Dec 2012 路 17:46 UTC
Love the card battle thing. I had a lot of trouble winning even easy fights, but kept at it until the Investigation level finally got me
Cosmologicon
19. Dec 2012 路 18:46 UTC
Wow, this is so polished, especially those sweet vector graphics! The only thing I would say was missing would be a tutorial, since the mechanics are fairly abstruse. Once I understood them, though, it was pretty fun to strategize!
馃帳 Volute
19. Dec 2012 路 18:59 UTC
@ MaximSchoemaker : Sorry, the web hosting was down earlier :/ The issue seems to be resolved now.

@ Cosmologicon : I agree, a tutorial would be great ! The game is way too complex to be picked up easily without one and I'm very surprised and happy so many people gave the game a chance anyway !

Thanks all for the nice comments :)
Pierrec
19. Dec 2012 路 19:10 UTC
As usual, I had a lot of fun playing your game. This is a very good management game, and at first, I was totally in love with it. I played and I played and then I started to be more critical. The problem is that the game isn't veru well balanced : after 2 or 3 tries I aborted just as soon as I got the mechanics, I played as the Lunatic and the Assassin Tower and won on Day 10. I didn't lose any fight because I used the Lunatic power every time, and I didn't even try medium or hard encounters, only easy. Still, every turn, I had enough money to fire the guys who had already played and hire some more to go on mission.
In the end, it was quite frustrating to win without even trying medium or hard cases.
So, my recommandations would be :
- Lower the power of the lunatic (for exemple : he can see the type of encounter, but not the strenght)
- Don't allow to fire people who have already played this turn
- At a time, don't spawn easy crimes any more, then no more medium crime.


Of course, I know this game was made in 48h, and this is already FREAKING awesome but I really would like to see a bigger version so this is why I give "hard" feedback. This entry is one of my favorite.
illugion
19. Dec 2012 路 22:48 UTC
Hey nice art style and i really like the music and the gameplay, the flow is really good
MaximSchoemaker
20. Dec 2012 路 10:02 UTC
Interesting concept. I found it hard to get a grasp on what would be good tactics. Mainly because encounters and people to hire were random it's hard to find the good guys for the job, so to speak.
I really like the graphical style you went for and the whole game feels very complete presentation wise :3
cwilloughby
21. Dec 2012 路 00:38 UTC
Art is great. Music is good. Kept loosing battles before investigation caught me. Would be great to see a little more direction while in game.
jmaasing
21. Dec 2012 路 00:40 UTC
Had a bit of trouble understanding the mechanics but otherwise really nicely done.
rvmook
21. Dec 2012 路 00:40 UTC
A really complex game for so little time. Never really got the hang of it though. Audio was getting a little annoying after a while (but that's why we have the mute button right?) Maybe I'll try again in a couple of days when I have a little more time. Although the graphics are basic, they work really well and the characters look funny.
blob
21. Dec 2012 路 01:11 UTC
Loved this game! Feels super polished and finished. Its innovative and I loved how each of my hire had a random name, made me feel attached to them like in the old x com. Searching for stronger hireling until you et a cheap 1dollar +2 strength was fun. I made my little team of specialized badies and won the game by taking the local organized crime hard mission. I only regret i never met any super hero !
Very clean and well thought interface and all.
Congratz !
amidos2006
21. Dec 2012 路 09:14 UTC
Nice game :) have a nice style and lots of details :)
Cake&Code
29. Dec 2012 路 10:05 UTC
My god, the amount of menus and buttons and options were overwhelming. A very deep and comprehensive undertaking for the compo, my hat is off to you sir.
Jeremias
29. Dec 2012 路 22:04 UTC
Very addictive game. Seriously: Keep working on it, come with a nice visual style and this game is perfect.
馃帳 Volute
30. Dec 2012 路 19:04 UTC
Wow, lots of nice comments again. Thank you all :)

@ Pierrec : Thanks for pointing out the balancing issues. I knew the game wasn't well balanced, but not in that sense. Losing the game very frequently, I was very far from imagining that it could be too easy !!
Sestren
06. Jan 2013 路 19:15 UTC
Great entry! All around one of the best I've played.
Joseph Miller
06. Jan 2013 路 21:33 UTC
This game has a tremendous amount of polish and the interface is very well done. The gameplay doesn't grab me at all, though. There isn't a great way to tell what kind of obstacles you'll face which makes it feel kind of arbitrary. I wish there was some kind of scouting mechanic. The variety of characters is great though.
leafo
07. Jan 2013 路 06:12 UTC
This is a really well made game. Great job for 48 hours.