BUS DRIVER by Rombus

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

ss1.png

ss2.png

highScore.png This is my actual highest score! (44 passengers). If you can beat me please tweet a screenshot :D It'll be fun

https://youtu.be/LupeX1TydOc


You are the only bus driver in this tiny world, so work you have plenty.

Pickup all the passengers before they get bored and cease to exist while avoiding buildings at all costs!!

Each level brings a speed boost to the mix.

How many passengers can you pick up?!?!?!

* On the main menu press any key to start *


Tools

Engine: My fork of Flixel-GDX https://github.com/Rombusevil/flixel-gdx
Sprites: All sprites where hand drawn on paper, then digitalized, resized and colored in Gimp.
Music & SFX: Music was done in Korg M01D and SFX on Korg DSN-12 both on a Nintendo 2DS.

Links

TWITTER: https://twitter.com/rmbsevl
SOURCE CODE: https://github.com/Rombusevil/LudumDare38
GAME MUSIC: https://soundcloud.com/rombusevilbones/bikedayinthe80s
DOWNLOAD GAME: https://rombus.itch.io/bus-driver

Personal

This is my first LDJAM and maybe I went a little too simple on it.
I had trouble figuring out a game given the theme, and this game was the second idea that came to me.
I'm a software developer and musician, but I suck at doing graphics, so that's why I decided to draw everything on paper, as it's the most friendly medium I have to make graphics.
Doing art was the thing that took me most of the time (and the art sucks! :P)

Also, I made a game "post-jam" like a post mortem tradition but by making a better game, in which I gather all the feedback everyone gave me, and all the inspiration from fellow jamers to make the game I whish I had done first. If you feel like trying it out here's the link: https://rombus.itch.io/7th-day :D

Ratings

Overall 365th 3.103⭐ 31🧑‍⚖️
Fun 279th 3.138⭐ 31🧑‍⚖️
Innovation 447th 2.571⭐ 30🧑‍⚖️
Theme 368th 3.107⭐ 30🧑‍⚖️
Graphics 273th 3.25⭐ 30🧑‍⚖️
Audio 245th 2.964⭐ 30🧑‍⚖️
Humor 95th 3.346⭐ 28🧑‍⚖️
Given 18🗳️ 43🗨️

Feedback

binaryferret
25. Apr 2017 · 22:01 UTC
I really solid little game. Clear win/loose conditions. I really liked the in-game art. It'd be interesting to see more of that art style. Maybe on the main screen with the mans face tell the user to push any key to continue. I was waiting for a minute because I thought it was loading (In case you wanted feedback on things like that).

Good job! :D
🎤 Rombus
25. Apr 2017 · 23:49 UTC
Thanks a lot @binaryferret!

You're right, the play button is a little buggy I'll have to fix that (I mean come on, stupid framework should make a button that's clickable :P)

The main menu screen did came out more blank that it should be, but I just run out of energy :P I like the idea of the making "Johnny Cocaine" tell you to press any key xD

Thanks for playing :D
Drury
26. Apr 2017 · 08:53 UTC
![busdriver.png](///raw/73e/z/2802.png)

Being a quantum bus driver is hard work
🎤 Rombus
26. Apr 2017 · 21:53 UTC
WOW @drury! I don't know how you did that xD I'm guessing you found out that running into the world borders stops your bus, so you can breathe a little :P

Thanks a lot for playing and beating my high score!!
Frodewin
27. Apr 2017 · 23:35 UTC
I love this game! The graphics are very cute and the music is fitting. It is kind of a snake game, but the new theme is very refreshing!
Matoux42
28. Apr 2017 · 09:52 UTC
Good Game !
It is simple but graphics are cool.
The only problem is collisions, because of perspective. I don't find them very intuitive.
🎤 Rombus
29. Apr 2017 · 16:33 UTC
Thanks for playing @frodewin!

@matoux42 I hear you, I wanted to make the buildings collidable only on the base, and make the top of the buildings transluscent somehow, but couldn't made it due to a mixture of time constraint and not knowing exactly how to do it :P
AnayK
29. Apr 2017 · 17:22 UTC
Good game, nice graphics! It gets too hard after 40 though, 41 is all I could reach :P. Collisions are a bit counter-intuitive, as @matoux42 pointed out, but overall great work. Keep it up!
TechnoNugget
30. Apr 2017 · 01:11 UTC
Cute little game and a lot more fun than I was expecting. I found it to be just hilarious I don't know why. Maybe the fact that I just was murdering a bunch of kids the whole time haha

Art was great I loved the colored pencil graphics, although the pixel font didn't really go too well with it
Driving felt tight and easy, I basically just held down the boost the whole time though
the houses seemed like their collision boxes were a bit too big
you also could have benefited from some particles or some sort of effect when the you picked up the kids

I didn't get past ~~level 9~~ level 5, geez don't know why I wrote level 9

All in all I would definitely consider it a successful gamejam game. Good job!
🎤 Rombus
30. Apr 2017 · 23:48 UTC
@anayk thanks for playing man!

@technonugget thanks for playing! I agree with the font used doesn't fit the overall art style. The reason I went with that is simply becouse it's the deafult font on flixelgdx :P I have to learn how to create a bitmapfont out of images, but It would have made the overall feel a lot better.
BTW: Reaching level 5 is impressive!
slimabob
01. May 2017 · 04:00 UTC
Ahaha nice. Fun take on the 'snake' style of game, and the art style was very charming!

There were a few collision issues where I *know* I didn't run into that building (just scraped by it :p).

Either way, you made an enjoyable game- very good for a first submission. Congrats! :)
jushiip
01. May 2017 · 05:20 UTC
Haha, cute little game. Becomes very difficult as the speed increases. I like the hand drawn sprites! :D

Maybe the collider of the bus could be slightly smaller?
nilead
01. May 2017 · 14:49 UTC
Ha, It's like snake, but whit a bus driver. Neat
Scrumplesplunge
01. May 2017 · 15:22 UTC
I really like how this game looks, the graphics look great :) The explosion of bones made me chuckle.
BearishMushroom
01. May 2017 · 15:32 UTC
What a fun little game!

I didn't quite expect the bus to control the way it did, so it took me a few seconds to figure out exactly what I was doing. After that, though, the controls feel good and are responsive, there's just that initial bump.

The art and sound works really well for the game, even though the font sticks out a little. The overall experience feels cohesive.

There's a very sharp difficulty spike at 30 and 40 passangers, which was quite jarring for me the first time.
Faithcaio
01. May 2017 · 15:40 UTC
Good first game. Interesting art style.
obvious-san
01. May 2017 · 15:45 UTC
Sweet :D I totally dig the art style, it feels super oldschoolish/90s-like. The gameplay is well done :) Good job man!!
nidup
01. May 2017 · 15:55 UTC
Good first game submission! I really like the graphics :)
Nnnnneeeedddd
01. May 2017 · 16:14 UTC
Hey, I didn't beat your score, I only got to 40.
Really neat game though, I really like the hand drawn art style, that's something you rarely see.

The music was cool, it was high tempo, and fit well with the fast (hectic) gameplay.

The collisions felt a bit odd, because i think people generally expect more 'give' behind the houses, because they are drawn as though they are upright, so people expect to be able to go 'behind' them, although you quickly get the hang of it ;).

Overall really nice game.

Ned
Rahtainka
01. May 2017 · 18:10 UTC
Realy good first game and entry!
superpokeunicorn
01. May 2017 · 19:43 UTC
This game is pretty cool. I'm a sucker for games with time limits that force me to make risk versus reward decisions. You could have just made the bus go fast all of the time, but having the boost bound to a button press forces me to make a choice: do I want to risk crashing in order to get to a passenger before they disappear, or do I play it safe at the cost of missing a passenger? That being said, there really isn't any penalty for playing it safe and never boosting. Sure, one passenger might disappear, but the number of passengers that will spawn is seemingly infinite. Boosting is then really only a matter speeding things up as opposed to something I need to do. This game would benefit greatly from having a penalty for missing a passenger or having a limited number of passengers. That way, there would be more pressure for me to play it risky and boost. That being said, this game is really fun. The audio is good and the visuals are charming. Good job!
superpokeunicorn
01. May 2017 · 19:49 UTC
As a side note, if you ever wanted to expand this game, it might be a cool idea to add in bus stops to drop these people off at. You pick people up, but they just sorta stay in the bus forever. Maybe you would only have a certain amount of room in your bus, so you have to unload every once in a while. This would add a lot to the time pressure of the game. Just a stray thought I had.
Samusoidal
01. May 2017 · 22:51 UTC
Cool game! Music was fun, gameplay was fun, and the graphics fit the style of the game. The font didn't, but that's just me.
As a side note, it should be 'You Crashed The Bus :D'
SvartTand
02. May 2017 · 12:04 UTC
Nice game but it was a bit too similar to snake. The music was nice and the graphic style fit well with the game. No bugs either (that i could find). It would have been nice if the map would have changed somehow, maybe different levels or something. But otherwise pretty good.
5Mixer
04. May 2017 · 10:35 UTC
haha this is pretty cool. the graphics really stood out, it's a unique style, I might have to remember it for future ludum dares ;P. Best score I could get was around 30, it gets crazy. I also noticed (I think? it was very subtle) that you speed up the bus noises/sound effects when you press space, which was an awesome touch and similar to the audio mixing I did on my entry. Our entries actualy have a few similarities, they're both somewhat like snake. Good entry overall! :D
walnoot
05. May 2017 · 15:32 UTC
I like the snake-like controls, although they were a bit clunky. Also, since there is no penalty to using the boost I just pressed it all the time in the beginning (until I got bored of driving into buildings). Still congrats on making a fun and polished game!
Bunnery
09. May 2017 · 10:00 UTC
Haha! That was a lot of fun. Love what happens when you crash! I don't know how @drury got 62! :-) Nice Work!
kfischer-okarin
09. May 2017 · 13:08 UTC
That was simple and fun....
The title picture gives the game a lot of additional flair in my opinion :)
Using the turbo all the time should maybe be somehow limited and as a next step mayb different kind of stages or new obstacles :)
Jupiter_Hadley
18. May 2017 · 21:47 UTC
Cute graphics! 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=xnxqXCwu79k
🎤 Rombus
20. May 2017 · 13:39 UTC
Hey @superpokeunicorn thanks a lot for the feedback, you're trhowing very cool ideas there.
I really like about droping the passengers elsewhere.

thanks everyone for playing and comenting!