AfterDark by AClockWorkLemon

made by AClockWorkLemon for LD18 (COMPO)

Hi guys, here is my entry!
My second Ludum Dare ended up with me making this baby.

The theme was 'Enemies as weapons", which i played around with a bit. In this game, the "enemies" are the falling blocks, which kill you if they fall on you, and you use them as a "weapon" to climb higher, and earn more points.
More is explained in the in-game instructions.
I know it's easy to change the highscore, but don't go around bragging if you do.

All in all, i'm /REALLY/ happy with this, considering it's taken about 32h. I've got school in six hours, so i need to get some sleep. I might make a Jam entry with some nice ambient music off the interwebs tommorrow afternoon.

But for now, have fun, enjoy, and GOODNIGHT!

EDIT: I've added a timelapse. Also, about the sourcecode: the game was made in Game Maker 8, and i used some of the pro functions. to open it you'll need GM8, and to build it you'll need GM8Pro, or you will have to change those functions.

I have now added a post-compo version above. Please give it a go :D
New features:
-Music :)
-Replaced arrows with something slightly more obvious
-Some Neat gfx
-short invincibility after respawning
-credits

I haven't included source for the new version because of size, but if you want it give me a shout at info.clockworkgames (at) gmail.com

Windows and Source	http://www.mediafire.com/file/idua2thsn1idlp3/AfterDark%20-%20AClockWorkLemon.zip
Timelapse	http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SIJc9ZO55SM
Post-compo (win)	http://www.mediafire.com/file/d69he2vkqs9gi24/AfterDark%20-%20AClockWorkLemon%20%28PostCompo%29.zip
Original URL	https://ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-18/?action=preview&uid=1844

Ratings

Coolness	8%	82
Overall	3.39	27

Audio	2.13	100
Community	3.83	23
Fun	3.17	48
Graphics	3.33	55
Humor	1.60	131
Innovation	3.83	12
Theme	2.83	121

Feedback

Manuel777

22. Aug 2010 · 21:12 UTC

Its quite fun, i managed to get more than 35 (till i accidentally closed the window). Played it again and figured you can cheed :P (take some blocks and stand on the top of the largest tower, jump and leave thoose bocks below you without being hit, of course)

🎤 AClockWorkLemon

23. Aug 2010 · 00:20 UTC

I realize that, it's the main way of getting up (at least for me), however it means it's harder to dodge falling blocks, and if you die, you have quite a bit of climbing to do.

Sparky

23. Aug 2010 · 02:02 UTC

This is quite polished, I'm impressed. I wish I'd played it on a faster computer :).

timgarbos

23. Aug 2010 · 06:22 UTC

I like it and a played it a couple of times :D, but it very quickly turn into being about 4 - 3 blocks in the middle and taking blocks form the ground and put on top.

It might be fun with some big blocks/towers falling down once in a while to change the terrain completely. Otherwise it's just kind of flat and a big tower in the center.

Also you should consider making the markers for where the new blocks fall a bit more visible. Maybe a beam all the way down?

After a short while I didn't think about the falling blocks as tools, but just obstacles. I always just move blocks from the solid ground to climb on. If the cool down was longer one might have to focus more on the falling blocks. Dunno though.

someone

23. Aug 2010 · 06:49 UTC

Respawned right under a block (and died again)

cymon

23. Aug 2010 · 08:24 UTC

Giving you props if only for not using "enemies as ammo".

snowyowl

23. Aug 2010 · 14:01 UTC

Was it really necessary to set the program priority so high? The game didn't always respond to my inputs because its priority was higher than the keyboard and mouse. Reducing it to normal fixed the problem completely, and it didn't lag either.

🎤 AClockWorkLemon

23. Aug 2010 · 16:01 UTC

snowyowl: my bad, i thought i changed that. i had set it to maximum because my dev platform at the time was... s**t, lets be honest. I will set it to default normal priority for the jam version

tigmarboss:
that, as a matter of fact, is my usual tactic as well. thing is, if you do that, there is less area to maneuver in, plus if you die, there is a chance you will spawn bak at the bottom of the screen. I will consider a fix for the new version

TenjouUtena

23. Aug 2010 · 18:20 UTC

This was OK. It seems like the winning strategy is to try and even out the playing field and avoid getting head-dropped, but the game was too slow to make that any fun, and the tower climbing seemed random since you'd just get head-bricked and die.

SonnyBone

23. Aug 2010 · 19:23 UTC

Nice use of theme, here. It's certainly innovative. It look good, too... which is always a plus.

:D

🎤 AClockWorkLemon

24. Aug 2010 · 00:18 UTC

TenjouUtena:
Generally, the best idea is combination of the two: a tower about 4 bricks wide.

SonnyBone:
Thanks

someone:
I'm implementing a 3-second invincibility after spawning to correct that, as it happened to me quite a lot as well (it'll be in the post-compo edition)

Danik

24. Aug 2010 · 05:34 UTC

Innovative and pretty fun. Was a bit hard to see the falling blocks against the dark background.

alistair aitcheson

24. Aug 2010 · 05:47 UTC

A wonderful concept, definitely one of the most interesting takes on the theme I've seen so far. Simple and efffective. The main problem I had was that it was hard to tell when a block was going to fall near you. The alerts need to be more obvious, maybe with a sound when something's about to fall on you, or a beam of light showing where each block is going to land. The black-on-blue colour scheme looked wonderful, but it made it hard to tell when something was going to fall on you.

That aside, this is a cracking entry! One of the most interesting I've played so far :D

🎤 AClockWorkLemon

24. Aug 2010 · 15:19 UTC

Danik & alistair:
I have implemented a light beakon in the post-compo version :D

stqn

24. Aug 2010 · 17:55 UTC

I like the graphics (except the arrows) but it's too slow to be fun I think (maybe removing the teleport delay would help) and a, d and w is a poor choice of keys on an azerty keymap... It makes the game hard to play.
I played it under wine and there are slowdowns.

stqn

24. Aug 2010 · 17:58 UTC

PS: there is no sound, right?

🎤 AClockWorkLemon

24. Aug 2010 · 18:15 UTC

stqn:
Wine is renowned for screwing up GameMaker, im sorry. The teleport delay is designed to make you need to dodge more falling blocks, etc.

And yes, there is no sound in the compo version

madpew

25. Aug 2010 · 10:24 UTC

Well done, liked the game very much. Sadly there were a few sounds missing for me (block hittig floor,..) but besides to that very well done.

pekuja

28. Aug 2010 · 11:45 UTC

Well, this was pretty neat. I couldn't understand how to use the portals at first. The game started making more sense once I did figure that out (right before I was going to quit, mind you). Could use some music. Also, I imagine the mechanic might get old pretty quick.

stqn

30. Aug 2010 · 05:42 UTC

I've played the game some more and found that it goes much faster (probably twice) once I've climbed a bit and less blocks are visible... Not sure if that's intented or if it's because you expect a fixed amount of time between frames.

stqn

30. Aug 2010 · 05:48 UTC

PS: what I meant is: the faster pace is much better than the slow game I'm experiencing at the start, and if it's not a gameplay decision then maybe an improvement would be to use the elapsed time between two frames to compute movements and/or optimize the game by not redrawing/handling movement of all blocks but only those that are moving. Or maybe Wine and Linux open source ATI drivers just suck, which is another possibility.

🎤 AClockWorkLemon

30. Aug 2010 · 16:31 UTC

madpew:
I purposely kept most sound effects out, as i found them quite repetitive and irritating.

pekuja:
The post-compo version has music

stqn:
No, that is simply caused by the fact the more blocks there are, the slower it is. Pure common lag, unfortunately. If you are on linux, running the game under wine, the lag will be multiplied greatly, as wine is renowned for not being good at game maker

stqn

31. Aug 2010 · 05:10 UTC

I tried the game under Windows and it’s much faster than under Linux, but also gets totally unplayable because of huge input lag. Oh well.