Heck Deck by torcado
Heck Deck is a :comet:Bullet Hell:comet: + :blackjoker:Card Game:blackjoker: with a dash of :smallredtriangle:Super Hot:smallredtriangle:
Play it here!
(or here for HTML5)
Colliding with a card will deal damage to you but also add that card to your hand! Cast that card at any time for a variety of effects. The game's time only progresses as you move, so you can plan your maneuvers and card plays carefully!
Rules and Controls
Mouse for everything
Colliding with a card will always hurt you unless you have a shield active. It will also add that card to your hand
If you collect more than 6 cards the bottom one gets destroyed and hurts you for 1 health.
When you play a card, a cooldown timer activates preventing you from playing another until it ends. Run it out by moving around. different cards have different cooldown lengths
Card Types
Bullet - Shoots a bullet in the direction you are facing. Does one damage
Health - Heals the player for 1
Bomb - Destroys all cards/bullets (including drops) in an area
Shield - Prevents all damage for a short amount of time. Very useful for picking up cards
Strong Bullet - Same as normal bullet, but does 2 health. (the card deals 2 damage to the player when picking it up)
The game ends when you kill Mr. Boss, but you can keep playing if you want!
Change 1.1: added reset button
| Flash (web) | https://torcado.itch.io/heck-deck |
| Flash (web) | http://torcado.com/LD41/ |
| HTML5 (web) | http://torcado.com/LD41/HTML5/ |
| Original URL | https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/41/heck-deck |
Ratings
| Overall | 5th | 4.326⭐ | 25🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 3th | 4.348⭐ | 25🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 1th | 4.609⭐ | 25🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 3th | 4.543⭐ | 25🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 71th | 4.043⭐ | 25🧑⚖️ |
| Audio | 108th | 3.543⭐ | 25🧑⚖️ |
| Humor | 151th | 3.262⭐ | 23🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 28th | 3.932⭐ | 24🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 22🗳️ | 25🗨️ |
The gameplay is quite clever. Doesn't take too long to get the hang of it.
The only issue I had was that I found it difficult to get new cards when low on health. I think the cards that the enemies shoot should be differentiated a bit more, since I might have missed some shield cards because they look so similar to bullet cards. And it gets really hectic trying to find a card you need if there are a lot on the screen.
Thanks everyone for the feedback!
I did find that after a couple tries the core loop got a bit too easy. Because you have so much control over movement with the superhot time mechanic, it's pretty rare that you actually get hit unintentionally. In fact, I often found myself spinning around for ages, waiting for pickups to drop so I could progress. Something that might make it a bit more challenging is making the superhot mechanic less than 100% effective, i.e. make it so that even when you're not doing anything, things still move, just at a really slow pace.
btw, I saw you mention on twitter that this was the first time you tried a hand-drawn art style; you should try it more often, because it turned out really cute!
@Sean S. LeBlanc oooh that's an interesting idea with the slowly progressing time!
And thanks! you're right i should, i really surprised myself with how well it turned out :)
I found the game a little bit confusing at first. I thought I was supposed to pick up the bullets because they were cards. Game was also a little bit difficult. Remember that you have spent a whole weekend practicing, but new players only have ~5 minutes. Maybe decrease the fire rate of the enemies a little. Higher spawn rate of new cards would also be appreciated, as I feel like I wander around a lot because I have no cards left. And also, that bomb thing is really difficult to dodge. Oh, and a health bar on the enemies would be lovely.
Overall, though, really good entry. Good job! :)
I hope you continue with the project.
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/41/witchs-escape