Awesome game! I really like the dialogue

Nice game! Really like the graphics

Really nice game mate, you have done well!

@prv thank you :)

Very cool game! Sometimes enemies shooting out of screen and bullets not flying under water, but this is all. Well done! Boss Z is cool :) Water effect pretty cool.

I don't know how you ended up with such a wonderful idea, but your determination has paid . Good job for achieving this project . The only thing I regret about this game is the easy boss fight, but hey, we can't have everything we want :)

Thanks @Meoanar ! I appreciate the feedback. The real challenge was after you beat the boss doing it again in challenge mode! I'm going to try your game next :)

Love the dialogue! Super funny and a nice idea. For me, with the xbox controller I couldn't shoot (only move). Really impressive amount of content!! It looks great!

@schsam Thanks for the feedback! Pressing X on the controller (blue I think) didn't shoot? Very odd!

@patvanmackelberg Oh nevermind! I restarted my computer and it worked. Very strange.

@schsam no lie, I just played your game for 15 minutes straight ahahah! It is awesome :)

Sweet game! Had a great time playing, killed Z and saved the alphaworld.

This is a really great game! I felt like my player was a bit fragile and sometimes died suddenly thinking I was at full health but I may have just been losing hearts and not realizing it. Those rockets are OP when enemies use them! I also got stuck for a bit on level 3 trying to find the exit and almost gave up and decided the game must only have 3 levels. Also the destructible trees were a nice touch!

@patvanmackelberg Thanks! I've actually opened up your game a couple more times to see if how far I can get!

That is an impressively polished game for 48 hours!

It seems like the difficulty level depends a lot on the camera. If you can't see far because of the camera, then enemies can pop up and get close to you. If you can see enemies far away, then you can snipe them without them even moving.

I'm amazed that you had time to spare to make animated destructible trees.

Holy shit, love the art style. And so much content. Very well polished game for 48 hours! I too always wanted to make a game similar to this. This gave me inspiration, thanks! :smiley:

@Alans-Antics Thank you! I really should have centered that camera, but it definitely works in your favor just as it works against you lol! Thank you for the feedback :)

Are you using Game Maker 2? They dropped support for Windows XP, is it possible for you to create a Linux build so that I can play your game?

@gonutz sorry! I didn't realize it but apparently I can publish to Ubuntu - which I've never done before nor do I have anyway to test it. When I get home I will try to publish it and then you can let me know if it worked!

@gonutz After looking at what I need to do to set up Ubuntu - it looks like way to much of a hassle sorry!

I like almost everything in this game: The art style, the witty dialog, the oldschool sounds.... the only thing i really dislike is that you disengage from dialog with 'esc' (on keyboard). Not even to skip it, but every time there is dialog!

@radow Thanks for the feedback! When I'm working with games I always find dialogue to be a pain my bottom area. I think with a bit more time I could have made it go faster, or press space to skip to the end - I'll remember that for the next time :)

Would have loved to have some more info on what each weapon is/does. Other than that this was actually a really enjoyable experience. :)
But why do we have to press ESC to continue? :D

Wow, this was fantastic. I loved the text aesthetic. The short beep sounds were great. This will probably end up being on my top ten games of LD41.

The game is pretty fun. I can't stop dying against all those letters... can't reach Z. :(

You manged to achieve a lot there. Old school RPG map is what bought me but combat part has impressive amount of complexity due to those simple but diverse factors. And character violence is for real, some of those letters were mean and fearless. Love that juicy sound of projectile connecting. I'd say this should do well in Mood category, I mostly kept playing because ASCII RPG atmosphere felt good.

@microwerx thank you! That means a lot to me, honestly!

@kr4ft3r Thank you! I really tried to pack as much as I could into the game. Working with the letters as characters - not some complex animation of a character - saved me some time in this project. I feel like I used that time to work on some of the finer things :)

AWESOME GAME!!
It looks so retro but it mechanics are so fresh! As a roguelikefan-fan i loooved the ascii graphics. Atari sounds and witty dialogue. I feel its the Atari's "adventure" spiritual successor.
If anything could be enhaced its the non xbox controller input and to make each enemy letter more like the monster it represents.
Coolest game ever!

Well, this is an awesome little game. I'm sure this is the way Miyamoto prototype the Zelda games 😜. Who needs AAA graphics, right?

I manage to beat Z in the first run, wasn't too hard, just 4 or 5 bullets with weapon #4 and done! The Challenge mode is insane, though.

Very well done!

Looks super super nice : D

The mix of ASCII and pixel graphics look really nice. I wasted the cool weapon's ammo at the start because the particles look so cool (specially ``=>``)! I really like how the game feels, I can really see the game getting a little "CRT" post-process effect! Overall a very good RPG experience, but the AI is a bit too predictable (They always walk towards you?). Love the design :)

@tajamsoft Thank you! The CRT would be very cool, and I may just try it when I get some time to myself! I definitely saved some time with the basic AI - you nailed it on the head, they just walk toward you and avoid anything in their way. If I had to change something in the future I would make some try to avoid bullets and others larger and more HP, maybe like special units! Thanks for playing :)

@mrPenguin thank you :)

@acoto87 Thank you! I'm glad someone got to the challenge mode, and weapon 4 is definitely OP bahaha. Thanks for playing!

This is a solid game with a lot of potential. I like that it's not too long, but part of me also wants more. :)

Very enjoyable. Liked the art. WEapon 4 was super fun to use. A text-based rpg indeed!

Did you really have to make penises ^^ ?
I would have prefered perhaps different color for amo and bigger ennemies (well of course maybe you want the game to be hard which is fine)

It's cool that you included gamepad support, even more for people like me without qwerty keyboard !
The controls are good, as is the idea.

Nice game ! Feels more like a top-down shooter with ASCII graphics but that's just a detail :p

Appart from that you really nailed it ! Props to the audio, it's not that common to hear different music throughout the game, even if they were simple, that strongly participated in the general atmosphere.

The only gripe i have with the game is the bullets hitbox, you should have made them little bit bigger than what they really are. Showering the ennemy in bullet and seeing them brush him without connecting is somewhat frustrating ...

Anyways, congratulation on your submission !

@theprint Thank you! I think if I made it a Jam game I could have probably had 10 levels :P

@candlesan I appreciate the feedback! Weapon 4 was fun and at the beginning I had 10 to start - but if you saved up 4 or more you could beat the last boss no problem!

@joqlepecheur If there's an opprotunity to put a penis in a game, I will take it lol! But thank you for the feed back, I never considered a non qwerty keyboard, the controller support was sort of last minute (last 120 minutes really), different colour ammo is a great idea! I'll remember that for the next jam :)

@Olivier-Millochau Thanks for the feedback! I've done music for a few jams with another tool - but this time around I used Beepbox (https://www.beepbox.co/) it was a solid tool for quick little diddys. I even tried to make the cave song feel like a cave ahha. The bullets were very small - I agree. I didn't consider how annoying it really could be but I absolutely see your point. Thanks for playing :)

Great job on the game. It was really fun to play and felt polished. The art style worked very well and the weapons were satisfying to use. Some things that could be improved a bit is slightly faster text and a more obvious level exit since it is a bit hard to tell in the caves where you were supposed to go.

@MiltonNH25 Thank you! I've always been a bit of a text noob - but next time I will make sure it's more user friendly. I really made no attempt to show the exit and it wasn't a thought for me, but now I know!

this was really fun, it was balanced pretty well, and the story was amusing enough. there was a bit of a hitbox/map bug on level two (the hitbox went out lower than the characters at one point, its towards the bottom, shouldn't be too hard to notice). I assume the coins reduce the power of Z because I destroyed them all and Z was kind of a pushover (normal not challenge mode, I pretty much just had to shoot him once with weapon 4). Also when skipping dialogue, hitting escape the first time should display all of the text rather than dismissing it.

I shall call them debras too, and I will only eat pidda.

Pretty solid game! Had a good time exploring the levels and using the different weapons. Z was difficult, but it felt good to win over the big boss.

@C1FR1 Yes that little blip of a wall! I really thought I was going to get away with it too lol. I changed the background image at some point then forgot to change the barrier. Those Coins, the "power nodes" they all reduce his hp by about 25% and the last one brings him to 12.5% of the original hp. The dialogue is a weakness for me, I'll keep that in mind so you don't have to wait it out to see the full message. Thank you for playing it through, enjoy the pidda! :)

@Diego_Escalante thank you for playing it through! I don't have a lot of experience making "bosses" so it was fun to make a simple one :)

I like that the edge of the world is nulls =). Having shift change weapons combined with it catching my shift presses in the background makes it really hard to type this feedback when I can hear my weapon changing in the background...

I had a heart drop from a monster that spawned on top of a wall, so I could not pick it up :(. Or so I thought, maybe it was because my health was full, but it looked wrong so I was confused =). I did run into an invisible wall (lower right of level 2, I think - the wall you need to go around to start going back up extended 2 characters beyond it's visible length). I think I accidentally entered Z's cavern without realizing it, as it didn't look like the rest of the screen transitions, I didn't think I'd be unable to go back :(.

The graphics are just lovely, really enjoyed it. I liked the enemy AI, they often felt quite different from each other, not sure if it was just random or if each letter was different, but it definitely felt good. I just barely managed to defeat Z, that was a great boss fight and difficultly ramp =).

@Jimbly Thanks! I was really hoping no one would find that invisible wall! I edited the background and managed to forget that barrier lol. I never made an obvious "full hearts" measurement but to me it sounds like you had full hearts - 10 if I remember correctly. Next time I'll make that detail a bit more obvious, like empty heart containers when hurt. The AI was fairly basic - run at the player and avoid everything else, so they would try to avoid bullets if encountered while running. They would also go to place last seen if you ran out of their range. I'm not a great ai programmer but it was fun to come up with a way that they could intelligently follow you! Thank you for the feedback :)

This was very fun to play! I love how you mixed text adventure and action RPG, wouldn't have thought of that myself. The controls are very responsive, but maybe the game is a little bit too easy, killed Z with just 2 hits of the 4th weapon :sweat_smile: And the SFX/music were great! Good job!

PS: All hail the Debras.

@patvanmackelberg Heh, if the AI was that simple, then I guess it was perhaps some "emergent behavior" based on their speed and the wild pattern of bullets I was throwing at them, they seemed more complex =).

@AlejandrodeCea Thanks for playing! All those funky towers you blew up made Z that much easier! He's a bit of a challenge without knocking them down though lol. Thanks for the feedback, we'll make you vice president of the Debras :D

Really fun gunplay for a adventure. You did a really good job on the atmosphere and unique use of text. Good story, it feels like it could be the start of a full fledged indie game.

Really fun gunplay for a adventure. You did a really good job on the atmosphere and unique use of text. Good story, it feels like it could be the start of a full fledged indie game.

@bryyrt thank you! I am considering making a couple tweaks and throwing it on steam for 2$ lol. I don't know that I'll make the 100$ back for submitting but it would be a good experience for when I submit a real game :P

This is a pretty great game! I managed to die a lot on level 2, but none of the other levels, and I was rather surprised when it seemed to change layout.

The use of "text-based game" is really clever, and I really like all the "U [did such and such]" puns.

I have to say that the exploding weapon seems a bit overpowered -- killed Z in about 3 hits, but also insta-killed me twice on level 2 when enemies used it at super close range, because I was hit by something like 10 bullets at once. I think a cooldown on damage would mitigate that, or you could just leave it in as something to watch out for.

That was Bliss. Thank you. OH man... THANK YOU.

@TheMonsterFromTheDeep thanks for the feedback! I'm glad you liked it, I took a chance with the whole "text based" thing. I was really hoping it came off well, and not like a work around to the horrible theme lol. That rocket is definitely over powered! I didn't consider a cool down, I did really like that it was a horribly dangerous weapon to get shot by - but it is sort of disheartening to get one shot with the 10+ bullet spatter! Thank you for all the pointers, I will keep it in mind for the next LD :)

@Ratherjolly thanks for playing! I hope you enjoyed it :)

Excellent game! Amading that you finished such an innovative and complete game in only 3 days! You must have had a very pro[duck](https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/41/motherducker)tive three days. This has real potential as an expanded game too.

I think the final boss fight could use some tweaking. I fired all of my =>s at where the shots were coming from and never even saw Z. I did find all of the <0/1>s though, so maybe he would have been more of a challenge had I not hunted those down. If he had more health and escalated as he lost health instead of starting off firing =>s, I think that might make it a more epic fight.

Very cool! Love the text based art and pixel vfx. The sounds fit nicely though bordered on the harsh side at times. Everything felt great to control, and the variations in AI were fun to encounter! Great job!

@ecmjohnson thank you for the feedback! This was actually a compo game! I did use the submission hour though to get rid of a couple bugs I missed while making it. Unfortunately I didn't have my Chronolapse configured on my new pc for a timelapse - but here's my youtube to see some of my older timelapses https://www.youtube.com/user/Pvaatn/videos!

The tower s you destroyed reduce his health by 25% each for the first 3 and then 12.5% for the last one so if you managed to get them all then the boss was very much weakened :P Those rockets are very overpowered!

@irwatts Thank you for playing! For the music I used https://www.beepbox.co/ for the first time, it was a really easy to use tool so I was able to make a song for every screen you would transition to. The sounds were all pretty primitive lol I used https://www.bfxr.net/. I really wasn't picky as long as the sound sort of fit :P

Really, really cool idea. It worked very smoothly and everything seemed to be in place. Shooting was pretty cool too, 'X' kicked my butt hardcore.

Very good game!

Good game man and the art style is also very innovative
.....also do check our game https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/41/boomball

Great! Just voted it! May you try and vote my game? https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/41/rts-shooting

Cute game. I thought the ASCII art graphics were fantastic.

Gameplay was difficult. I think if you made the controls twin-stick, with one for moving, the other for aiming, it would have been more manageable. I just kept running into enemies that I was trying to shoot, and running away from them (and thus not aiming toward them) so I died a lot.

I didn't care for the music. Better music would have kept me playing a bit longer.

@csanyk Thank you for the feedback. My initial controls were twinstick - but my testers just couldn't figure out how to move and shoot (my 5 and 7 year olds lol) so I changed it up so they could figure it out. The music was definitely basic. I used https://www.beepbox.co/ to make all the tunes fairly quickly. I will take these into consideration for next jam :)