DEFEND YOUR SMALLEST OF WORLDS by Ben McEldowney
Here's our entry into Ludum Dare 38.
https://bmceldowney.github.io/ludumdare38/

Your planet is small and it's under assault. Aliens have shown up and are trying to trash your planet, DON'T LET THEM.
Your defenses? An ultra-powerful slingshot that you will use to destroy the alien vessels with the only things that make sense: cows, cars and coal plants.
We made this in Phaser with all original art (except the UI). The software used: - Atom.io - cfxr - GIMP - Phaser - EZGUI - Pyxel Edit - Piskel
Assets: - Buch's awesome Golden UI - DL Sounds Fantasy Game Loop
Ratings
| Overall | 537th | 3.1⭐ | 22🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 364th | 3.2⭐ | 22🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 321th | 3.25⭐ | 22🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 401th | 3.4⭐ | 22🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 559th | 2.947⭐ | 21🧑⚖️ |
| Audio | 390th | 2.833⭐ | 20🧑⚖️ |
| Humor | 219th | 3.105⭐ | 21🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 540th | 2.947⭐ | 21🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 28🗳️ | 23🗨️ |
Neat little game, although I'm not really sure about the logistics of getting a power station into space... The mechanics and the art all worked well together and it was genuinely rather fun, if somewhat unforgiving. I'd probably recommend giving the player more chances to react where the aliens stop to hover before they finally get bored and apply for a visa.
My main issue would probably be with the music. Not to say that it was bad or that there was anything wrong with it in and of itself, but it really didn't feel like it fit with the game very well and sort of threw off the overall mood.
Anyway, good job overall: keep it up!
-Skruffye
But overall you did a good job :thumbsup:
- Struggled a little at first to figure out how to play.
- I liked the friendly fire concept with the gameplay. Early on I shot a car into a space cow and watched it tumble away.
- I could keep playing sort of (in the background) after I killed the earth with my lack of space sling-shot competence.
Overall, good job, this is a fun casual game.
Heh, I haven't seen that many games use slingshots for self defense. It's quite hard, having to aim opposite yourself to hit targets. The game has a humourous concept, and I like how you have the most random items to throw, from a car to a factory? to a cow. I felt like the UFO ships are too small, especially when starting out with such inconsistently sized items. Aiming was quite a pain, especially with the rapid speed the UFOs moved at. I also feel there would have been more of a sense of progression if all the items you threw were more or less the same size to start with, then changing it up gradually as the game goes along. Different sized UFOs too, would have been great. Well, maybe that's something to consider for a post jam.
And, I hate to break it to you, but I don't think an entry can [opt in](https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/rules) for audio if they use a royalty free loop, which appears to be what you've done. Granted, it's a nice sounding loop (very reminiscent of Pebble Dash) but as someone said above, it doesn't really go for the right tone. It is very "nighttime" sounding, but nighttime music does not necessarily fit into the space theme. I think your sound effects were fine, but unfortunately, I don't think rating audio is proper even if you generated your sound effects because you got the music from somewhere else. (You could, however, remove the music entirely, next time in an entry so you can be rated in audio.)
Also I know this sounds weird, but I like your UI. :stuck_out_tongue:
I don't if you're aware of it, but instead of using the weapong like a sling, you could just grab the cow/car/anything you launch until it's just behind the alienship and the game becomes a million times easier !
I liked the concept, and physics is pretty much well executed !
I had the feeling that music didn't feat with the atmosphere though, didn't really feel like alien invasion, but more like "space heaven"
Anyway you did a nice job here !