Sacrifish (Local multi-player) by Papaver

[raw]
made by Papaver for LD 43 (JAM)

The black hole at the bottom of the ocean is hungry! And she has very specific wishes too. Bring her the correct types and amounts of sacrificial plankton before your opponent does and before she changes her appetite. Beware of the other fish though; they can (and will!) steal the plankton they like off of you. You can also use their kleptomaniacal tendencies to your advantage whenever you have accidentally collected too much plankton of some kind. Either play for a fixed amount of time or race your opponent to the first to get a certain number of points!

How to play

Player1 uses the WASD/ZQSD keys to move around, while Player2 may use the arrow keys. Collect exactly the combination of plankton that the great almighty black hole requests. You can see what each player collected on the sides.

You can get rid of an excess of plankton of a color by touching the black fish of that color.

To deliver the innocent plankters to the great almighty black hole, simply bump into her. You will then score points and the black hole will request a new meal of plankton. In normal and hard mode, the black hole also has a timer; she changes what she wants if the timer is up. Good luck!


Please, tell us what you think of our little game. We appreciate comments!

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Ratings

Overall 681th 3.237⭐ 21🧑‍⚖️
Fun 661th 3.083⭐ 20🧑‍⚖️
Innovation 293th 3.45⭐ 22🧑‍⚖️
Theme 836th 2.95⭐ 22🧑‍⚖️
Graphics 814th 2.875⭐ 22🧑‍⚖️
Audio 569th 2.789⭐ 21🧑‍⚖️
Humor 801th 2.222⭐ 20🧑‍⚖️
Mood 661th 3.139⭐ 20🧑‍⚖️
Given 22🗳️ 17🗨️

Feedback

chrismcmath
07. Dec 2018 · 15:57 UTC
The ambience is well done, with a nice feeling of scale. Rather than having many drop sounds in the background music however, it might be better to have them as sfx for collecting plankton. That way you can still have that wonderful watery feel, while also providing aural feedback for collection.
Archimagus
09. Dec 2018 · 06:53 UTC
An interesting game. It was really hard to figure out how to score. It had a nice relaxing feel to it though.
aurel
17. Dec 2018 · 20:45 UTC
So I tried to play this a while back last week but I was alone and figured I wouldn't rate it by myself. This time I was able to get someone else to play with me and it was a lot more enjoyable than playing by myself :)

I didn't realize I had to have EXACTLY that number. I then finally understood what the sacrifice fish were for. All in all, it was a fun, relaxing game, and I particularly enjoyed that you guys had different modes Timing vs Points. I definitely enjoyed the screenshake when the two players collided, but sometimes they would go through each other or something like that. Points mode was a lot more fun than timing mode for us, as the timing made it stressful.

Something that would make it better is if there were a way to stop someone else from achieving the win condition - when I notice the other person about to win, there's nothing I can do, they are closer to the target and will get the final thing they need, and I have no choice but to watch them win. This kind of makes it partially a game of luck.
OrionDark7
19. Dec 2018 · 01:39 UTC
It's an interesting concept, though it took me a while to figure out. Gameplay was relatively smooth. Graphics were OK, but nothing too special. Nice job!
HitchH1k3r
22. Dec 2018 · 02:27 UTC
:thumbsup: I liked the difficulty select. It's neat that the target can change, forcing you to make sacrifices. The animations (screen shake, getting and losing plankton) were smooth. This reminded me of a Mario Party minigame.

:point_right: It would have been neat to play against an AI so we didn't have to find a partner in order to play.

:star: Overall great job. Thank you for making this!
nbrengle
23. Dec 2018 · 20:35 UTC
Super cool idea! I'm a little sad that there's a necessary second player. It'd be amazing to have a simple AI to compete against.
Johnsensei
24. Dec 2018 · 15:25 UTC
Great job. I like the classic arcade feel to it. I didn't have a second player so I easily won. A single player mode against an AI opponent would have been nice, but I understand that's difficult to do in the space of a game jam. Keep making games!
Joshuc
26. Dec 2018 · 08:17 UTC
A good game, and I like how it is simple!
Igor KinGamer
26. Dec 2018 · 18:35 UTC
No second player here... But I really liked the idea and mechanics.
The feedback when the black fish steal plankton is on point.
Graphics are simple but worked very well.

Although I had to play alone, I felt it lacked ways to mess with the opponent, like @­aurel said.
pickens-inc
28. Dec 2018 · 15:26 UTC
A really neat little idea there! I actually think it would have looked better with a completely minimalistic aesthetic, than the fish idea, like other number-y games. Really like the concept, though it'd be great to somehow have a way of ruining life for your opponent, as mentioned by others.

The concept was great and super simple, as all good jam games should be. The implementation was really solid. It would have benefitted from some music, I think, but I'm nitpicking.

Well done!