The Last Word by adsilcott
The Last Word
by Stellar Door Games
Update: We finally had the time to fix the couple of game-breaking bugs, so the game is now playable on Windows and Mac. We would love to host a WebGL build as well, if we can, but we would love your feedback on the desktop builds in the meantime!
Update 2: Just a small update to fix spelling and a missing background.
The Last Word combines the chill of galactic strategy with the fast-paced thrill of... reading? That's right, we bring you all, at last, the genre mash-up that action gamers have clamored for: the Real-Time Strategy Visual Novel. (Needless to say, we had a lot of fun with the theme this time around.)
You are ~~Imperial Space Marine~~ Human Legion Captain Fureus Maximus, one of the last embattled warriors doomed to lead the resistance of a planet long ago deemed lost. Your enemy: a swarm of aliens that have overrun the planet, destroyed its civilizations, and claimed its once-famous Spaceport as their insectoid hive.
Take on the role of Fureus as he commands his forces across this alien world from his tactical map, summoning and directing units to their alien targets, and -- if the Fates are smiling upon you this day -- to their victory over the alien swarm, destroying their Spaceport hive once and for all!
Controls:
RTS Sections: * Click/Right-Click units to select them * Once a unit is selected: click/right-click the map to send them to that location * Once a unit is selected: click/right-click an Alien target to send your unit to chase/engage that unit * Once a unit is selected: click/right-click the Spaceport to send your unit to assault the Spaceport (Be warned, the entrenched swarms there will fight back!) * Click the unit's frame in the left-hand "Active Units" panel to select that unit * Click "Train" for either type of unit, to begin a timer that will create a new unit at your Citadel. (See their stats in the Unit descriptions.)
But do not let the Aliens linger near your capitol -- the Vis Citadel -- or they will destroy you just as effectively!
*Visual Novel Sections: * * Spacebar: Advance to the next line * Option buttons: Click one of the replies (in blue buttons) to choose a dialogue reply * Spacebar: Return to the Tactical Map at the end of a dialogue section
Parting Thoughts
We had a lot of fun with this theme, and borrowed happily from some of our favorite games and sci-fi/fantasy tropes to bring this to life -- we hope you will find some of the joy we had in designing this world, its monsters, and especially its over-the-top humorless heroes, melodrama, and heavy use of haughty Latin names. (We promise we love the things we parody here, too.)
We will do what we can to get the WebGL working, but in the meantime, we'd love your thoughts from the Win/Mac builds!
Stellar Door Games is:
- Melanie Judd: 2D Artwork
- Greg Lord: Music, Story/Dialogue, Programming
- Adam Silcott: Programming
We love all feedback! Please let us know what you think!
Ratings
| Overall | 151th | 3.929⭐ | 23🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 660th | 3.238⭐ | 23🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 448th | 3.523⭐ | 24🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 305th | 3.932⭐ | 24🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 5th | 4.682⭐ | 24🧑⚖️ |
| Audio | 284th | 3.55⭐ | 22🧑⚖️ |
| Humor | 900th | 2.281⭐ | 18🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 118th | 3.925⭐ | 22🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 22🗳️ | 20🗨️ |
As for gripes, it felt a little confusing where to attack the enemy base since it wasn't marked, so I spent awhile just putting them in the space area until I realized some 'locked on' the base, also it was abit too easy just spamming units.
Anyways, amazing work here! :)
Overall though, great job!
You all did well: great art, great narrative and no major bugs has been spotted (hello to coder ;-) ).
Some critics:
Genre switching breaks the gaming user experience. When I'm playing strategy mode and having tense action in progress, suddenly game triggers switch to narrative mode... When i'm reading narrative and my imagination (with the help of your great artwork) dissolves me in battle scenes of alien invaders fighting space marines on some distant planet, the strategy mode roughly grabs me out of my dreams and throws back to the hell of the battle.
As a suggestion (it might be nice to have a "split screen") with both modes running a the same time. On one side i'm commanding the troops and on the other side i'm receiving "battle reports" with all that visual beauty... or having switching to narrative and back only between battles (i.e. levels)...
One minor bug has been spotted: when you have to many troops built the icons overflow the green bounding box to the left.
Also (while it is strategy) it would be nice to have some limited resources to constrain the player to add challenge and diversity to gameplay (Say random resources spawning on the map to be collected by both sides... you name it.). As of now - time to produce the unit is the only limit in building up players army and it it pretty easy to build up huge army and swipe the aliens if you don't forget to purchase new units as soon as "construction" finishes.
Instead of conclusion:
I had a lot of fun playing your game! Great job!
Gameplay wise, the loop is well rounded, and the rts part is functional. The game is well balanced, although the impossibility to select several units at once sometimes was a little overwhelming. The lack of resources also made the win unavoidable at some point, but that certainly ensures that player can enjoy more of your amazing artwork. Great work !
It'd be great if you could check out our game! https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/41/rattys-stew-an-immersive-cooking-simulation
Would appreciate if you gave mine a go! https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/41/left-for-bait
The music gets repetitive after a couple of minute, however it sets the mood.
The strategy part could be more diverse, with resources has suggested above, or with the possibility to put your unit in defense mode for instance.
There is a lot of potential, you could make a really cool game, if you extended the RTS gameplay. However, being pulled constantly from the RTS part by the visual novel is a bit annoying and probably could have been done in a less intrusive way.
The visual novel part is really good and adds a lot to the immersion but I think it should run more smoothly, not having to press space for every line of text.
Finally there is a bug with funky aspect ratios, the background art keeps switching between stretched and bordered depending on which mode the game is in.
Please, take a look at mine: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/41/confessional
It's always a pleasure to play your games ;-)
Nice job!
Please rate our game : https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/41/hellfest-simulator