LudumData

It's a Small World by NedMakesGames

[raw]
made by NedMakesGames for LD 38 (COMPO)

It's a Small World! - Play here: Itch.io. WebGL or Windows downloadable exe - Source: GitHub

The game was made for 640x480 resolution! Please play at that if possible. All 4:3 should work OK except for some GUI stretching. Others might have weird behavior! I left all options enabled in case someone's setup required it.

LDJam38 Screen1.png

Controls: - Left and right arrow to move left and right. - C to jump. - X to crouch.

There are also several special jumps to discover: - Jump immediately after landing to jump higher - Run, crouch, then jump to execute a long, low jump - Switch move directions just before landing then jump to transform horizontal movement to jump height - Quickly alternate between left and right directions and then jump to jump extra high - Crouch in the air to quickly land - Crouch in the air and then quickly jump to perform a short mid-air jump - Stop, hold crouch, then jump to perform a backwards jump - Release crouch in the air during a backwards jump, then jump after landing to reverse momentum - You can chain all these jumps together!

The moon has long admired the tenacity of the people of Earth! Collect their love by jumping through the heavens! Become empowered by their dreams to reach your own! But, avoid the trickster asteroids who would like nothing more than to prank you!

LDJam38 Screen2.png

LDJam38 Screen3.png

I made this game while streaming on my Twitch channel! I also have Twitter

Original URL https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/38/its-a-small-world

Ratings

Overall 159th 3.6⭐ 42🧑‍⚖️
Fun 121th 3.6⭐ 42🧑‍⚖️
Innovation 269th 3.15⭐ 42🧑‍⚖️
Theme 82th 3.925⭐ 42🧑‍⚖️
Graphics 225th 3.425⭐ 42🧑‍⚖️
Audio 103th 3.487⭐ 41🧑‍⚖️
Mood 208th 3.27⭐ 39🧑‍⚖️
Given 37🗳️ 28🗨️

Feedback

wh05herlock
02. May 2017 · 12:04 UTC
This is actually quite a fun game. I really like the idea, and how everything orbits around the Earth. One suggestion might be to give the character lives, so you don't immediately die whenever you hit an asteroid. This would make the game a bit more fun, as it would mean you don't have to constantly start from the start all the time. Other than that a really fun, and quite challenging, game.
merrak
03. May 2017 · 03:55 UTC
This was a pretty enjoyable game--nice idea. I liked the idea of hopping around on the stars, but I think there should be some kind of bonus for doing so (maybe more hearts or hearts worth higher points?)
makenai
03. May 2017 · 05:13 UTC
Fun! I like the simple jump mechanic and cute graphics. All the jump combos made me feel almost like I was playing a street fighter game. Good controls!
Kalm004
03. May 2017 · 22:08 UTC
Cool concept. Multiple jump mechanic is really funny.
Well done!
yyam
03. May 2017 · 23:39 UTC
Very polished game! Jumping and collecting things felt really good. I like the different jump mechanics, it's fun to try them all out!
Maldo19
04. May 2017 · 03:14 UTC
This is one of the few games that I don't know what kind of feedback I could give, it is really polished and is fun. What I can say is that the controls felt too "restricted" and I really hated that the "retrys" just reset everything as that has a lot of wait time. I liked how the concecutive jumps made you reach much higher and the feedback Audio/Graphic to get the hearts (and in general) is really good. So great job! I hope this comment is useful.
Kosmo
04. May 2017 · 03:22 UTC
The background music was awesome! Great job on that. The jumping mechanics all worked well -- but I felt like most of them were not necessary (although I will concede that I didn't make it terribly far, like 7 hearts).

I think you could really have something fun here if you made the collectibles require chaining together all of the cool jump mechanics you built in. As it stands I feel like all you really need to do is double-jump. Maybe you could do things like add a bunch of heart fragments in the arc of one of your fancier jumps where you need to get them all to 'level up'. This might promote using, for example, the mid-air jump to get a bunch of horizontal pickups without hitting the groud.
andrewl
04. May 2017 · 20:46 UTC
Great game! It reminded me of a Super Mario mini-game, which is no bad thing! Got a little repetitive after a while, but for 48 hours work it's great!
Willbl3pic
04. May 2017 · 21:01 UTC
I liked this! The sound got a little repetitive, but apart from that I love it!
PietPtr
07. May 2017 · 18:15 UTC
Cute! The sound effects and music fit in well with the graphics and cute gameplay. The controls where awkward IMO, but still fun game. Had me smiling :)
Ajayajayaj
10. May 2017 · 00:51 UTC
Wow really cool. Music and SFX are great and really help the mood. It can get really fun, but sadly a bit repetitive.

Also, I hit one part where there was nothing I could reach, and it can get kinda disorienting too. Other than that, it's nice! Congrats!
mwcz
10. May 2017 · 01:44 UTC
Great music! Very innovative controls with all the combo moves. Overall really liked it!
ColeSlaughter
10. May 2017 · 02:37 UTC
This is a nice little idea. It's simple, but I can tell that you prioritized polish over complexity (a choice I totally agree with).

I do think the game would benefit from having a larger screen. Particularly when you start getting high up, it's hard to keep track of what's what, and more often than not, that would be the reason for my demise.

I also really like what you have goin' on with all of the different jumps that the player is able to perform. However, there doesn't seem to be much use for them outside of novelty. The backwards jumps in particular seemed like an ability that I couldn't seem to use to much advantage. It's cool that these abilities are there, but if you could design the gameplay to encourage players to experiment with them, that'd be perfect! It's honestly really cool how much you were able to accomplish with only 4 buttons. Great work!
maartene
10. May 2017 · 05:47 UTC
What a cute little game! :heart_eyes:

1. I like that I only needed a few buttons to play (easy to pick up);
2. the jumping feels really good. It also feels very expressive due to all the combo's;
3. Which I couldn't memorize, but happened very naturally;
4. Sound/visuals work well for the game, good mood.

Especially the second point is impressive. Many LD have platformer/jump mechanics, but they are only as much fun as their jump mechanic. This one nails that aspect.

The two things that would help improve the game for me would be
1. slower introduction of new features;
2. stages (i.e. target score), to improve the flow of the game.

So to sum up, good entry.
jlet
10. May 2017 · 16:43 UTC
Good job, your game is very fun. Maybe you can improve the camera because sometimes you jump to high for the camera size and you ram a none visible asteroid.
Quetzakol
10. May 2017 · 23:04 UTC
Fun little game ! Interesting work on the controls, not very intuitive at first but really fun to play. Graphics are really cute and the music fits perfectly. Maybe the game lacks a little bit of challenge but overall this is very well done !

Thanks again for playing my game on Twitch !
Thinkofname
11. May 2017 · 10:32 UTC
Neat little game, would have been nice to see things change up a bit more the further you got into the game.
🎤 NedMakesGames
11. May 2017 · 23:41 UTC
Thanks for the comments everyone. I'm glad you enjoyed jumping, I really tried to make that feel very fun. The backflip was supposed to be a very safe jump to help you build up height "charge," but it turned out to not be very needed.

I'm glad you enjoy the sound and art!

If I revisit it, more challenge, levels, mechanics and content in general would definitely be the first thing to add.
DragonZlay
12. May 2017 · 00:40 UTC
I love the music and sound effects. I also love how much inspiration you took from the Mario Series. If you didn't mean to take inspiration from that series, well, that's quite a few coincidences. Some examples are the characters sprite, the backwards crouch jump and the double jump technique. I wish that you could have more than one life though.

Love it!
Smiling Cat Entertainment
12. May 2017 · 03:18 UTC
I had fun with this, though I will admit that I really could only manage to remember 3 of the jump mechanics. Maybe if there was a way to introduce the more advanced ones over time in-game? The graphics were good, and the background music was very catchy. Nice game!
LeviDSmith
12. May 2017 · 04:27 UTC
This game reminded me a lot of Kirby's Adventure. It took me a little while to figure out that I could jump higher by jumping again after landing. Maybe introduce the jump mechanics one at a time and not all at the beginning of the game.
team-disposable
12. May 2017 · 07:01 UTC
This has great physics, and I love the rotating world. It might be an idea to have something more dangerous looking then the stars as things that hurt you, as they look like collectables! I enjoyed playing this, thanks.
RabbitTortoise
12. May 2017 · 13:02 UTC
A very good entry, art and sound were great. At first the jump mechanic felt weird but it got much better when I learned more about it. Maybe you should introduce the mechanics gradually. Otherwise I had fun playing the game.
conrad123
13. May 2017 · 12:41 UTC
Nice job. I love the graphics.
CoderDozer
13. May 2017 · 14:36 UTC
That was pretty cool, I could imagine my self getting disorientated after a while with all the spinning :slight_smile:

Nice game.
masterkrepta
14. May 2017 · 16:08 UTC
I like the simple feel to the game. It's well polished, yet there is still a challenge.
Antti Haavikko
15. May 2017 · 12:37 UTC
Very cool. Really could have benefited from a full screen button, dunno why you decided to remove it from the web version. I'm on OSX so couldn't download and play full screen. The deadly pink asteroids and red hearts start looking quite similar when when the camera zooms out so far that they're only the size of a few pixels.

Nice and responsive controls. Didn't bother reading all the instructions so I missed majority of the different jump mechanics but those weren't really needed anyway. Pretty much the only one of the ones I missed at first I found useful was the quick landing one.

As some people have already mentioned, some kind of life system instead of instant failing would have been nice. Also some kind of multiplier system might be cool to entice more of the floor-is-lava-esque star jumping.
pi_pi3
16. May 2017 · 18:13 UTC
The game had a slight learning curve, but the experience upon mastering jumping was simply put: amazing
Chaseplays
19. May 2017 · 04:26 UTC
****What I Liked:****

* I'm gonna start with the music, which I loved a lot! It was simple, yet didn't get annoying overtime. It added a lot to the game.
* The combinations of controls were really fun to use and added a whole lot to the game. It was fun trying to find working combinations. It was a really fun mechanic!
* I liked the physics of everything. They felt fun to use, and well done.
* The simplicity of the game was largely to its benefit. It didn't get old very fast, and it had a nice system of making you want to do better each time.
* The art was nice and simple. Great job!
* The jumping felt good, and satisfying when you jumped higher and higher.
* The difficulty felt really well done.


****Minor Nitpicks:****

* The web version lagged a lot for me, so originally I was going to talk about unresponsive controls. I'd suggest adding something on this page saying to use the download for most people. It helps the game a lot, but it's not something I'd take away from the score, of course.
* Sometimes it was unclear if there was an end to the game (in fact, I'm not even sure).
* Come on, that player is Kirby. You can't deny that, haha.
* The hearts were a bit misleading. You could have picked out something else besides the standard simple for health.

****Great job and thanks!****
Jupiter_Hadley
30. May 2017 · 19:20 UTC
Cute little game! I included it in my Ludum Dare 38 compilation video series, if you’d like to take a look :)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ekiortcX84M