Best game I played so far - don't know why nobody else noticed it upto now :question:
The mood is awesome, it's mostly because of the background "music" - err, sound. The game mechanics work well, and the puzzles are challenging. I think this has a lot of potential, when you add more elements and especially levels.

Great job!!!

@mshopf
Thanks!!!

It was supposed to be music, but ended up, more or less, as ambient noise. If it works I'll take it!
No plans for further development just yet. Will test this on the tablet and think of those additional elements first. Finding the time would also help!

Very nice, almost meditative (in the beginning) experience

Wow, at a certain point things get really complicated. Nice game!

This is the best game I've played made by you for Ludum Dare, it was so much fun trying to figure out the logic and also having the required dexterity to be able to control the transistors and storage.

Very unique interpretation of the theme which works very well with the game mechanics.

I love games which are easy to understand and you get the hang of it quickly and uses simple controls. The only complaint I have is that there is no "prepare time" given to analyze the level before the data starts flowing. Maybe there could be a delay so you are able to observe and work out the level.

Great job :smiley:

@linus
Thanks :smile:

The plan from the beginning was to have pausing at will, then decided against it, put the slo-mo in as a cheat anyways, and completely forgot all about the very short start delay by the end of the jam... It's on the list now.

Meanwhile, the restart hotkey can be abused to gain similar results.

Well that escalated quickly. I looove this type of game so I am a bit biased. Obviously graphics could have been a bit better, but whose couldn't. The ambient music was great and somehow made things way more tense then they should have been. I know that there is a 'cheat' slow down process but you could make this very complicated and just incorporate a straight up pause feature and it would still be really hard depending on the level design. You could also take this in a completely different direction and add programming when the different things switch at certain times to make an entirely different style of puzzle game. Overall this was fantastic and I see a lot of paths this could take if you decided to keep working on it.

Have fun out there!

Quite entertaining, managing different data types and planning ahead for maximum efficiency turned out to be pretty fun. Levels are well designed and provide just enough challenge. I like the whole inside computer aesthetics and music also sets a nice tone for the game. The only thing I could suggest is to make level 'faster' it takes a lot of time to charge battery and complete the level, good thing that you added option to skip levels. In general it's a really fun, short game.

This game gave me serious Mini Metro vibes, luckily I loved the style of that game and I love the style of this one! The mechanics here are extremely well thought out, RAM, CPU, Transistors (I think) all created a really challenging game. The music, while uninspiring was at least calming my brain which at that point was in overdrive. I would have liked the ability to choose how fast a level goes (since in some parts the game goes too slowly), trow some polish on top and you have a really fun brain killer game.

Great entry ! I am really fond of the way each mechanic is introduced, and while the complexity of the tracks escalates quicky, the difficulty curve remains manageable, thanks to the fact that data entering the wrong spots is not too punishing. Controlling everything with the mouse is a joy, and make for a very intuitive and relaxing control scheme.

Regarding the visuals, they are minimal, sure, but there is plenty of visual and audio feedback to provide information, and minimalism makes the whole thing much more readable, which is fully needed, seeing the intricacies of the levels. The background music also make for a slightly sinister, but brainy mood.

As for the game design itself, there is not much to complain about. Each level feels carefully crafted, and while they might seem really undecipherable at first, they soon appear to be manageable, and satisfyingly so. My only gripe would be that, when your action plan is set, it is impossible to accelerate the whole thing. A way to solve that would be to add some fast-forward mode, or to punish more missed data while rewarding successful data more generously, thus speeding the level while adding tension. I also stumbled on levels that ended at 90%, allowing me to go to the next levels without any punishement. Was this initially intended ? Is the additional time spent due the fact that I did not reach the 100% my "punishement" ?

In the end, I had a lot of fun, and this was certainly one of my favorite puzzlers entries this LD, and one of my favorite takes on the theme.

By the way, I came here after seeing your in-depth review of Sthog, and loved your honest and uncompromising take on the game. Would you mind having a look at mine, with the same tone ? (Not necessarily in the same *expansive* way though, I do not mind quantity ;) ).

@jlv
Thanks for playing and the words!

100% is the highest performance score per level (all data sorted successfully, no mistakes). A level can be completed with any score and afterwards you can go to the next one or retry for a higher score. This is by design.

I initially intended to display an average of all the scores after the last level to incentivize replaying from the top, but didn't have time for it. Testing and tweaking the levels took a back seat too. I would have liked to normalize the level durations (e.g, 3 minutes per level) and cut any downtime. A speed-up option might be needed nonetheless.

There isn't supposed to be any punishment of any kind. I'm not into that sort of thing.

Your request has been received, filed; under intense scrutiny and consideration; and is currently pending approval.
*"uncompromising" ... I do like the sound of that!*

Wow, okay, I mistook the 100% rating as an indicator that all the data needed had been retrieved, a little like in those games where the goal is to collect a certain number of items as fast as possible. Your explanation gives yet another taste to the game, and one that I like, reminiscent of a Zachtronics game. In any case, thank you, kind Sir, for your game and for taking my request into consideration :)

Awesome game, really fun to play! Also quite challenging.

Great game! The music is so ominous, really gives an atmosphere. One of the few games that actually feel well designed and thought through. I love how well you made the learning experience, really teaching the player what to do - also a thing that LD games rarely do well. Sometimes it was a bit slow so "press space for 2x speed" would be cool. Really good entry!

Wow, great action-puzzly game! I was actually kinda disappointed when the I completed the final level - I wanted to keep playing. Didn't get 100% on any of the hard levels, but around 90% on all of them! I'm satisfied with that! Great job in the short amount of time.

Graphics could obviously be upgraded, Unity's Particle System is fast/easy and adds a lot of life to the graphical aspects of the game. Solid entry, all things considered!

This is good. I could see this being an iPhone app that I waste hours and hours trying to 100% all the levels. Great work!