Wildfire: Forest Containment by candlesan
Wildfire: Forest Containment is a game about fighting forest fires.
This game is about using three tools to stop and contain forest fires.
* Tractors - Sacrifice a tree to prevent the spread of fires.
* Helicopters - Drop Water to douse flames
* Airplanes - Drop Fire Repellant to slow down the spread of fire.
:fire: :fire: :fire: Play Now :fire: :fire: :fire:
Theme Interpretation
I chose this interpretation of the theme because: * To fight a forest fire you create a firebreak by uprooting some trees, sacrificing healthy trees to stop the fire. * When fighting a forest fire, sometimes firefighters make the tough decision to let one house burn to save many others * Forest fires, though terrible, are necessary for ensuring healthy future vegetation.
Post-Jam Changes
- Allowed clicking and dragging on minimap to look around
- Added the high score leaderboard as a meta-wrapper.
- Made it more clear when a tree is smoking that you can't uproot it
- Added the option to skip early years when you've proven you can beat it
Tools used:
- Unity
- Photoshop
Other
- Game jam was streamed on twitch.tv.
- You can follow me on twitter @candlesan
- Timelapse of the game jam! https://youtu.be/8gNknlfvbtc
Forest fires in California have destroyed over 130,000 acres of land and claimed the lives of over 40 individuals.
If you enjoyed this game, please consider a donation to http://www.cafirefoundation.org/support-us/
| HTML5 (web) | http://www.wyattcheng.com/games/Wildfire |
| Other (web) | http://www.twitch.tv/candlesan |
| Other (web) | http://twitter.com/candlesan |
| Source code | http://www.wyattcheng.com/games/Wildfire/Spinach-src.zip |
| HTML5 (web) | http://www.wyattcheng.com/games/WildfireOriginal |
| Other (web) | http://www.cafirefoundation.org/support-us/ |
| Other (web) | https://youtu.be/8gNknlfvbtc |
| Original URL | https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/43/wildfire-forest-containment |
Ratings
| Overall | 81th | 3.775⭐ | 22🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 146th | 3.525⭐ | 22🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 48th | 3.8⭐ | 22🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 31th | 4.2⭐ | 22🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 202th | 3.525⭐ | 22🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 235th | 3.15⭐ | 22🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 25🗳️ | 18🗨️ |
Raised a lot of awareness into the theme of the game but also to game Jam community too! it has inspired me to take part in the next LD Jam and look forward to being part of the game jam community.
We all know it's a serious issue but doesn't turn the game edgy. it's tastefully done, and more importantly, fun!
@nottingham Thanks for hanging out in the stream and I'm glad you were able to enjoy the creation of this game. I look forward to playing your next game jam!
Really crazy how two similar ideas were formed under this theme!
Both of your guys' fire fighting games are great <3
The game seems simple at first but there is quite a lot of depth there. It’s an easy to learn and hard to master kind of game, which is a balance that is hard to hit, so awesome job there. The way the tools in the post jam version were introduced makes it even better.
I got a bit frustrated at the start because I really wanted to contain the fire quickly at the most obvious choke points, but the tractor wasn’t fast enough, and the fire spread out of my control. Eventually I made peace with the fact that some sacrifices must be made and started planning ahead more. A really cool “realization of the theme” moment. After a while I also started to get a better idea of how quickly the fire spreads and could better judge the areas that had to be isolated and when to use the right tools. In other words, the learning curve is super nice! There is also a really cool element of risk and reward with judging how close you can make the isolation zones to the fire.
Some suggestions on improvement.
I think it would be helpful to show the tractor on the minimap. Since the tractor targets the closest marked tree to itself, it’d be useful to know where the tractor is when its off screen to get a better idea of when the tree that you mark will be removed.
It would also be nice to be able to “priority mark” a tree to make the tractor target it immediately. Right now, if you notice that there is a tree that needs to be removed quickly that isn’t next to the tractor, you’ll have to unmark all the marked trees closest to the tractor, which is a bit annoying.
Some sound would of course also have been nice.
Overall, it’s a super solid entry and I enjoyed it a ton. I love that you are taking the opportunity to raise awareness for an important cause at the same time. Super awesome!
Adding the tractor on the mini-map is a great idea. I'll add that to my TODO list!
- unable to zoom out at least a bit
- plane and moving map used the same "action" - this was major - I would use different mouse button and/or allow to move map with keys
(once the controls got stuck for a few minutes - not sure how or how I fixed it)
But overall a good job and a good game.
(just noticed I played the post-jam version I guess)
The rough edges are few and far between. It's not terribly clear that you need to click and drag to aim the plane. The tractor is so slow as to be basically useless after the first couple levels. Building fire breaks is an important containment tool so it'd be nice to see that option upgraded in some way on later levels to keep it viable (multiple tractors moving faster, something like that).
And it might be out of scope, but it could be interesting to add another layer on top with managing funding, like use your expensive options (helicopters and planes) less to retain more funds for later levels. Or other municipalities can lend you equipment later if you help them out now. But that's all pie in the sky. What you delivered is already fantastic, and very impressive. Great job!

@naali @commanderstitch Thanks for the kind comments on theme. Going into the final 20 this was one of my least liked themes but as the firefighting theme expanded it became one of my favorites and I'm grateful for having been "forced" to work with it.
@folex70 Thanks! That'd be pretty neat to continue work afterwards and release on Steam.