Headspace by Jaydek

made by Jaydek for LD 42 (JAM)

Just a little tri, tryin' to get by. But stress is hard. Don't forget to take a deep breath and find a little headspace.

Headspace is the product of three broken, over-ambitious prototypes in the first 36 hours, and a complete restart. It's also my first Ludum Dare! Postmortem can be found: here.

CONTROLS - Use the up and down arrows to avoid stress and collect a little calm.

KNOWN BUGS - Sometimes the clouds miss colliding with the player and the lose condition can never be met - FIXED... I think! - The cloud doesn't retreat after collecting 10 blue items - FIXED* - Game menu has issues at 960x540 resolution

*Sadly, I can't actually add in the original design for this mechanic, which was to have the player be able to spend some of their score to force the clouds to retreat... but that goes beyond bug fixing. Feels a little unbalanced, and the random gen needs some work, but rules are rules. I'll be adding some improvements into a post-jam build soon!

Thanks to everyone who has left feedback!

Windows	https://drive.google.com/open?id=14jLYGwnZymKPfBuJ5pjWcWerX0w43xFN
Windows	https://drive.google.com/open?id=1CDAuAaJX7F8j2AIwp4mcIvn7L2_ODylX
macOS	https://drive.google.com/open?id=1Y37QSAYXjZ9VYLPbIEdqhhyCh0XsOCwB
Linux	https://drive.google.com/open?id=1M8tBD3SfHGJY12bAjp-eabcYTGoNGe5j
Original URL	https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/42/headspace

Ratings

Overall	1099^th	2.859⭐	34🧑‍⚖️
Fun	1115^th	2.625⭐	34🧑‍⚖️
Innovation	1223^th	2.281⭐	34🧑‍⚖️
Theme	996^th	2.922⭐	34🧑‍⚖️
Graphics	852^th	3.031⭐	34🧑‍⚖️
Mood	619^th	3.094⭐	34🧑‍⚖️
Given		30🗳️	27🗨️

Feedback

AdroitConceptions

13. Aug 2018 · 18:28 UTC

Game menu has issues at 960x540 - probably need to look at scaling your canvas to make sure your layout works correctly.
there is frequently points were you can't not hit an object (looks like some type of random generation) - it would be good to do some sort of pathing testing.
instead of having the shadows that chase you just toggle in, consider some sort of lerp or over time change to make them smoothly come in instead of just jumping in.

CraigDuth

14. Aug 2018 · 00:22 UTC

This is reallll similar to Blackthornprod's endless runner tutorials

Niarkou

14. Aug 2018 · 00:31 UTC

Beautiful game! I personally found it frustrating that the blue tokens does not give you any advantage over the sandstorm. Also it is impossible sometimes to find a path without hitting a red token.

drnoir

14. Aug 2018 · 05:44 UTC

Hello interesting game which follows the theme well, I liked the music and the overall presentation, live streamed playing on twitch will send later

Zicboy

14. Aug 2018 · 05:49 UTC

Great game!

beanslasher

14. Aug 2018 · 07:10 UTC

The music was bomb! Haha, I liked the concept of the game, not too original but I like the spin on the game! I think you did a great job! I really hope you continue after the game jam and run with it :) Pun intended!!!

Dom Harris

14. Aug 2018 · 11:45 UTC

I really liked the use of the theme, but otherwise it was a little boring :sweat_smile: the art was nice, I especially loved the clouds. Someone else mentioned the similarity to a certain tutorial, but the use of the theme was good and it set a nice mood. Good job :slight_smile:

🎤 Jaydek

14. Aug 2018 · 21:33 UTC

Thanks everyone! I'm not really a coder and I didn't have a team, so I was definitely using and trying to expand on a few youtube tutorials. Blackhthornprod was definitely the main source to get some mechanics working before the deadline. I'm glad the visuals/audio/theme came together for a good mood, because that was my main aim going into :)

🎤 Jaydek

15. Aug 2018 · 02:45 UTC

@adroitconceptions -- thanks for picking up on the menu issue. I will try to get a fix up in the post-jam build!

PowerAuer

15. Aug 2018 · 03:49 UTC

heya! I enjoyed the game but it did sort of got buggy after I had got too much stress and then it just kept going with no consequences. I like the concept, but it can be pushed even more. Good job guys!

🎤 Jaydek

15. Aug 2018 · 04:04 UTC

@powerauer thanks for catching that. I was able to replicate the bug after several playthroughs, I'll try to get a fix up for it!

Nam Nguyen

15. Aug 2018 · 04:15 UTC

Pretty polished game with the programmer art, particle effects and sound effects. I like the simple game play although it gets repetitive at one point. I found a bug though, which eventually lets me never die :smile:

![5b73a81c2cc14262246521.gif](///raw/31a/91/z/19a60.gif)

You can also make the cloud behind you slowly going away if you dont make mistake too, then error would be more forgivable. Overall I enjoyed the game a lot, great job!

🎤 Jaydek

15. Aug 2018 · 04:19 UTC

@nam-nguyen -- thanks for the feedback! I did originally have the cloud retreat after time, but that seemed to bug out a lot and I haven't found a fix yet.

I'm planning to further push the concept and continue fixing up any bugs post-jam!

Sigmath Bits

15. Aug 2018 · 09:39 UTC

I really like the mood you were aiming for here. I'd suggest it'd help the feel a lot more if the "calm breath" was more of a dynamic breathing mechanic of some kind. Like progressively gentle and more relaxing breathing as you get longer streaks of calm circles, that suddenly becomes erratic when you hit a stress spike. But I understand the limited time.

Also if the circle were spinning slowly, I almost feel like they'd feel calmer. I reckon a smoother animation on the approaching black cloud would probably add wonders to the feel as well.
I love the collection particle effects, though. They're real nice and pretty to look at.

🎤 Jaydek

15. Aug 2018 · 10:00 UTC

Thanks @sigmath-bits, all great feedback! I'll take that into account for my post-jam rebuild. Hoping to add a lot of the stuff I didn't have time for.

Mmmuscus

15. Aug 2018 · 14:16 UTC

Wow! I read your post mortem and it was great! I had a similar experience of running out of time to finish my game so I know the feel (I missed the Compo deadline). What you pulled off despite that is great! I love the mood and all the little sound effects. The art is really solid (maybe the player charracter could have been a more complex shape like the rest but thats all). The theme was in my opinion was a bit under utilised, while the clouds do kill you if they catch up it is just basically a reskinned health bar. But don't be discouraged, keep up the great work (and awesome sound design)!

🎤 Jaydek

15. Aug 2018 · 21:34 UTC

Thanks for the feedback and taking the time to read my post-mortem @mmmuscus !

I'll definitely keep working at it :)

Frozen Stick

18. Aug 2018 · 08:27 UTC

The atmosphere is nice,The effects are pretty but sometimes you can't dodge the spikes.Also I believe with a good music the experience would be far better.But limited time limited resources!Nice job.

josehzz

19. Aug 2018 · 02:13 UTC

Nice game, I would love to see it with a better art and a better progression, like with power ups and random events. Don't get discoraged if people recognize where you got the inspiration for it, most gamers don't make games, let alone make a game in 3 days :)

DutssZ

19. Aug 2018 · 22:22 UTC

I got 121 in my first try and had to "kill myself" for acttually losing. I think the game is way to easy, maybe if the cloud raises over time, or if you let a blue item behind the cloud aproaches, because if you get how to avoid the stress there's nothing left for you to die. Besides difficulty the game is pretty good!

gil4

31. Aug 2018 · 12:34 UTC

I enjoyed it. :3 While being pretty simple it felt pleasant to play, with responsive controls, particles on collisions, audio etc. If I were to suggest anything it'd be editing tri's collision box (felt a bit bigger than it should've been, or maybe it's the stress' boxes, can't be sure) and updating score on collecting stress, not when you pick up some calm to update the score with both changes at once. But those are just minor things that aren't getting in the way of enjoyment at all, just didn't want my feedback to be completely useless. :P Well done!

CliffracerX

01. Sep 2018 · 00:21 UTC

Made it to a high score of 52 (?) before eventually just opting to let the game end. Simplistic, but mildly polished, and definitely pretty good for a game made in 12 (?) hours!

My most major complaint is the hitboxes feel a bit...floaty, maybe? It was really easy to take a hit while clearly just grazing the Stress at worst. It made maneuvering more stressful (no pun intended) than it should've been, which I think detracted from the experience a bit.

I also concur with the general complaints about difficulty - it is a bit easy, outside of wonkiness with the hitboxes. It doesn't seem to get any harder as the game goes on, either, meaning it just gets kinda boring after a while.