Age of Utan by Yetikatt
Heres our entry for the Ludum Dare 38 Jam!
https://yetikatt.itch.io/age-of-utan

Create a small world at the perfect temperature to sustain life - the Utan! Adding volcanoes, mountains and water tiles will increase temperature, earth and ice tiles will cool the world. Grab your tiles by holding the left mouse button on them. Watch out though! Meteors will also stream past and destroy your tiles upsetting the balance of your atmosphere and destroying your Utan. Holding right mouse will shoot them. Try to create and keep your Utan alive for the longest age possible. Good luck!
Controls
Left Mouse Button: Use tractor beam
Right Mouse Button: Fire Lazer beam
[ ] brackets OR "Q" and "E": Rotate camera angle
Left Mouse Button (In block placement mode): Place block.
| Original URL | https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/38/age-of-utan-1 |
Ratings
| Overall | 52th | 4.043⭐ | 25🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 102th | 3.783⭐ | 25🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 46th | 3.957⭐ | 25🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 5th | 4.522⭐ | 25🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 185th | 4.043⭐ | 25🧑⚖️ |
| Audio | 66th | 3.952⭐ | 23🧑⚖️ |
| Humor | 219th | 3.105⭐ | 21🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 128th | 3.783⭐ | 25🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 31🗳️ | 28🗨️ |
One thing that was off though was the pace, it is a game that makes you retry a couple of times and experiment, when you die it takes a long time to reach the same state that you failed in last time - making you not want to try again after a while.
All in all, I had fun with it.
With more additions, like small ecosystems when you mix tiles in a specific way and things like that, the game can grow a lot and be very very fun.
Good work!
The only thing that I didn't like was that camera had 4 fixed angles instead of full 360 rotation.
Congrats!
Very nice mood, music, and concept, which totally fits with the theme !
I really enjoyed it, and the only thing that could have enhanced it, would have some additionnal features.
In this limitation of time it is such a neat game you have, so again : great work !
I feel like the camera rotates at a slightly funny point? I can't quite put my finger on my problem with it, but it didn't feel as quick and helpful as I'd have liked (sorry that's probably not terribly helpful!).
The meteors didn't feel like much of a threat either. I prefer them being there than not but perhaps different speeds or types would make them a bit more of a challenge.
The mood is nice and chill. Felt nice drifting through space expanding my bit of land, got quite attached to the little dudes before I boiled them alive. Whoops.
I had a lot of fun with this game, great job. :D
The gameplay feels nice, simple and polished, which goes well with the visuals and the music to create a relaxed, enjoyable mood. As @daisy remarked, the way the camera snaps when you rotate it can feel a bit weird, but I did not feel like rotating the camera was instrumental to the experience, as I managed to do a few playthroughs without ever using the feature.
All in all a solid game: solid gameplay, solid mood, good to just kick back and relax and yet with some depth (finding out through attempts how the various blocks and their numbers altered the balance of heat and cold was a funny little challenge), ultimately very fun to play.
Good job,I hope to see more games from you in the future.
The game itself felt quite relaxing, asteroids rarely posed a threat. However, there were times when blocks would just pass over (I didn't really need them at that time) and the pace would slow down a bit while waiting for new ones to become visible or even for an asteroid to shoot at.
Great job!
Chill pace, smooth music and a neat little *plane*t simulation. I build a utopia for the rascally imps; they frolicked peacefully and everything was bliss... Until I got bored that is. An ice age took care of them there creatures.
The problem: lack of challenge. Sure shooting down asteroids becomes slightly more difficult as the size of your plane grows, but that is too little too late. *Moar asteroids! MOAR!*
*Ahem*, Fine work on the presentation front. Couldn't find any bugs either.