This Precious Land by Ishisoft
"Learn the workings of nature, and make us proud of This Precious Land."
This is a sandbox construction game / toy, where the goal is just to make something you feel proud of. It works a bit like Triple Town, with some Settlers influences too. Use a bit of experimentation and trial-and-error to learn how the game's rules work, and then try and make whatever landscape you feel like.
Or, place tiles randomly and see what happens!
I was kinda worried for a while about not having a proper goal in the game, but I quite like how it turned out in the end. It's sort of therapeutic to watch the world come together. Hope you enjoy it!
This is a sandbox construction game / toy, where the goal is just to make something you feel proud of. It works a bit like Triple Town, with some Settlers influences too. Use a bit of experimentation and trial-and-error to learn how the game's rules work, and then try and make whatever landscape you feel like.
Or, place tiles randomly and see what happens!
I was kinda worried for a while about not having a proper goal in the game, but I quite like how it turned out in the end. It's sort of therapeutic to watch the world come together. Hope you enjoy it!
Ratings
| Coolness | 54% | 3 |
| Overall | 4.26 | 6 |
| Audio | 2.78 | 305 |
| Fun | 4.04 | 8 |
| Graphics | 4.51 | 4 |
| Humor | 1.97 | 566 |
| Innovation | 4.08 | 28 |
| Mood | 3.60 | 55 |
| Theme | 4.29 | 12 |
+ nice puzzle idea
+ gets even nicer once you gain access to all block types
- I hate your grid; it should be on the bottom!
@nihilocrat All of the materials are useful!
So the volcano advances things quite a bit.
Great job, you are my fav :)
There is only ONE problem and that is that grid :/
Otherwise really excellent game I expect I'll play more and more.
This is one of the reasons I love LD and gamejams, because sometime really good idea manifests itself.
You know, this almost doesn't need anything else (maybe except that confusing grid and some music) to be declared full game. Some hints for player would be nice, but finding it out by myself was very rewarding.
I suggest you take this idea and put it on ipad/android to get some money rewards for your idea :)
I was surprised how addictive this was! Great graphics and sound as well. I didn't get too far (About 3 mana tree things), but what I played before I gave up I really enjoyed.
At first I was a little disappointed to see it played a lot like triple town. But then when I had no moves left and tried right-clicking the forests, I saw there was more to it, and that the triple-town-esque mechanic was just a base for something bigger.
Couldn't wish for a better polish in a LD game! Shouldn't there be some kind of score though? The experience was fun but kinda pointless if there's no way to evaluate my progress (or is there?)
If anyone posts any tips I'll try again.
As others said, the grid is confusing, maybe have a selection box instead of a rectangle. I only managed once to get a mana tree and worked from there. Sooner or later your grid is full though and you have to restart. I'd love to keep on clicking ;)
The sort of LD game I'd want to make, it captures the joy of discovery/creation while also fitting the theme and having a polished presentation.
Congratulations! CLAP CLAP CLAP CLAP!!!!!
The art is charming but I'm still not sure what all of them represent. The first time I played through, I missed the 'gathering' option and didn't think it was that fun. Perhaps you could add a reminder or a notice the first time a 'gatherable' tile is available?
Overall, amazing job for 48 hours!
@wgemigh Yeah it could have probably done with that; I didn't want to hand-hold the player with game mechanics tutorials, but making double-sure they know how to interact with the game would have been a good idea. As for the undo, it would be nice to have in order to rectify mis-clicks, but on the other hand I quite like for tile placement and experimentation to be permanent.
@Endurion Good idea, a transparent full 3D tile might be clearer than just a rectangle. Also if I made the sides of the tiles fade to a darker colour, and change the height of the tiles so they're clearly not placed on the grid, it would be more obvious how the 3D space works.
@chambers I thought about a scoring system. I found that it was interesting to set my own challenges though, for example making a nice forest (with no dirt or chopped-down trees) using nothing but nature tiles, or making a peaceful non-military village. A scoring system would have basically defined what the perfect landscape should look like, but I think that's a matter of the player's own tastes.
At first it was a toy - as I wondered how it would react to my input, then it was a puzzle to reliably place the tiles in the right order to get things to evolve, and then there was the strategy of sharing a relatively small area between each of the various resources you need, and finally there was the pleasure to be had from designing your small spot of land in an aesthetically pleasing way (mine cradled a river with two castles by the bank on one side, as if they sat on a frontier, overlooking a yet to be tamed wilderness of deep forests and in the distance, a smouldering volcano).
I didn't mind the grid. The only problem I encountered was occasionally getting stuck when learning the game, as it took me a while to work out how to plan the order of placing tiles to get them to evolve fully, and without ending up with lots of wasted space.
It seems like I'm the only one though, and it was very polished for an LD entry. Good job!
Other than that, a real gem!
Congratulations!
I also found the grid to be confusing. But still this game could work well on mobile devices. :)
The should give you a coin every few turns when next to a castle in the same way tress grow next to water!
With music it will be even better :D
However I don't quite understand how does regrowing trees work exactly. When surrounded by water, the stomp regrows once and that's it. Maybe I have to replace the water ...
By the way, your goal succeeded: if you play to the "end" you definitely have a work you're proud of. =) http://dl.dropbox.com/u/52019586/veryPreciousLand.png
I’ve just discoverd your game this evening and I find it amasing ! Can’t stop playing it!
Discorvering myself all the feature was a real pleasure (what will happen, what can i do with wood, will the right click erase every-thing, can I make a combo of 2 Volcano…)! Never give tutoriel or tips, the player must all alone find the solution/possibility!
Thanks a lot for this great moment ! We need games like this!
PS: The grid was ok after few try – no need to improve it
PS1: I’ve found everything during my first “map”, quite proud of me ;)