That's a sweet idea. I also like the presentation (although the difficulty ramps up very quickly)

:-)

Cool concept! The only thing I didn't like I was the lack of difficulty. Maybe Prof. Von Doom could shoot things to prevent the mouse from escaping, as you progress?

Also after a while it seems to be playing the same map level over again, in which case I gave up. It could be a bug, but it could also be showing how the mouse's escape attempt is futile :p

Nice work!

I mean no disrespect...

BUT THIS GAME IS WINNING ITSELF WITHOU ME PARTICIPATING
(not counting clicking the "play game" button).

You've either taken casual gaming to next level or something went terribly wrong. Also, from lvl 4 or 5, there's one level in a loop, at least up to level 13 or so.

My laptop screen isn't big enough to play this in its default resolution, but I found that I was able to zoom out and make it playable. :)

I like the artwork and sound effects, but have to echo the other comments about it being a bit too easy. Enemies or some other way to lose (like spikes on the walls) would be a nice touch.

I wish i could give you a community +6 rating mate :-)

About the game: Good concept, you only need to polish the art assets, and maybe get some level designers to help you (it's somewhat bizarre that Mathias thinks it's too hard, and others think that it's too easy, myself being on the second camp)

Love the idea, but it was kind of boring. Would also be easier if the bouncing didn't have so much delay sometimes...

Nice concept.
I almost couldn't play for not having enough vertical height in my monitor, but the chrome fullscreen saved the day.
Have I told you I want more levels?

Levels were pretty easy, but the idea is oddly compelling. I played until the one level started looping. It took me several levels for me to realize I was playing the same one over and over again. lol!

The weirdest pinball game I think I have ever seen. For that you should be very proud!

Haha, bring me back memories of when I played Sonic Spinball on Genesis! Lovely game, albeit rather easy for my tastes. Well done!

Loved the art work, just wish the swf wasn't so tall! =[

Great concept and interesting level design.

Great concept, good fun. Could use some extra hazards or multiple keycards to add variety later on. Nice job!

Thanks for all the kind words, people! There is a new post-compo version with over 25 levels, along with far better level design including: SPIKES! LAVA! LASERS!

The game is actually an Android app and runs really smoothly on my HTC Desire Z (and this is why it is so big: the resolution of my phone is 480x800). I'm planning tomake a smaller version for people without HD monitors. I'll be posting version 1.1 by the end of the week - finally it will be a more fully fleshed out game as this compo editing is admittedly rather sparse with only 5 levels.

Not much depth here - was fun up to I think level 5, beyond which all levels are the same. Is missing something, probably a failure condition.

Nice job! I actually like the bite-sized levels, and I could definitely see people playing a couple at a time on their phone as they're waiting in line, on the bus, etc. As people have said, it would be even better if it had enemies/traps/danger to avoid or destroy, but you probably already knew that!

And this is just me thinking out loud, but how hard would it be to create a level editor to allow players to trade levels?

Great game! It was fun to figure out how to control the mouse, and to get bounced around like crazy. I agree that some kind of timer or hazards could make it more difficult. That said, it might get too hard since it's difficult to predict/control which direction the bumpers will shoot you (at least, I find it to be so compared to something like Peggle). Great sounds, fun idea, good job!

It isn't that bad, but there's no difficulty at all. Maybe this could be fixed by a simple solution, like adding a timer for every level? Other than that, it has some potential.

To be honest, I didn't like your game... I don't exactly know why, but some things come to my mind: the same level can either be too easy or too hard, just because I have the chance to aim correctly without the physics preventing me to do what I want or because the mouse bounces off everything at a high speed; what's more, the number of level is not enough (well, it could have been if there had been something that really changed between them, I don't know...) and the last level looping forever is no fun. Moreover, the game can actually play and win by itself, mainly because the is no way to lose (it seems you changed that on your post-compo version, which I believe is a good thing) ! I don't find the game in its LD48 state very innovative as it's just some variation of pinball with a reduced set of possible interactions, and the theme Escape just seems not to be there because there's no way you could fail to escape as said above... The graphics give me a mixed feeling as they are both colorful and grey, which kind of means both happy and sad to me: the sad grey part is just too serious compared to the cat/mouse story which made me smile. The sound is quite good, a background music would maybe have helped to keep my attention on the game though (a dynamic music would have encouraged me to keep playing and not let the mouse do its thing alone, which also comes from the little control you have on the game).

I give you a four start community rating mainly because of your huge implication in the whole Ludum Dare event, but not five because you didn't really post much related to your game during the compo: an "engine done" and a "game finished" message are not sufficient in my opinion. You could have made bigger progress reports with development screenshots (you only posted one) and maybe a timelapse.

Nevertheless, you made a playable game and that's already something which deserves respect !

If I missed something which seems important to you and may affect the way I rated your game, do not hesitate to tell me as I don't like giving LD games a bad score, in particular when they don't deserve it. If you found my message rude, that wasn't my goal as I hate nothing more than comments which don't help to make things better.

PS: I think that the post-compo version with spikes, lava and stuff like that must be much better than this but sadly for you that's not what we have to rate here...

At one point the same level was generated four times in a row for me. You do get super bonus happy points for making a pinball styled game.

Also agree that the game does kind of play itself out. I mean the mouse bounces off the walls and will hit the key and exit eventually on its own.

difficulty curve is pretty spastic, especially given how little is there.

Also, for future reference, 800 pixels of height is more than most *present* laptops have. This thing came with a 2 gig vid card and the screen still only goes up to 768, and that res seems pretty normal regardless of screensize lately, for reasons I don't fully understand since my last lappy had "screw HD and make it cry in the corner" for a screen res. : | So I couldn't see the bottom of this~ but still figured it out pretty quick. .-.

Very nice take on pinball and original theme interpretation. Easy but addictive. Sounds get old quick though. I think it may have needed more features or at least levels. Should have had an ending (and closure) than same level loop.

Great idea for a game. I enjoyed it. I could imagine this being really fun if it had a few more levels.
Quick note, a restart button would help a lot. I got stuck on one of the levels and it took me ages to get back to the top.

Excellent game and nice covering for the fact you ran out of levels. :D

Reverse pinball, now I've seen everything :) Too bad there are just few levels, definitely good idea for a game.

I'm a little bit confused atm. I played this game shortly after the compo and it was a different experience (easy, few levels, as the first few commenters mentioned). Is this a different post-compo version?
Will hold my rating until a clarification.

Apparently this is the post compo version (judging by your journal), would like to see the compo version