Super fun!

Yes, really enjoyed the game. Am I missing something or was there no health bar? :)

@sirpumpy Thanks for playing. There is no health. The ice will grow when you're hit. You die when you touch the ice.

This turned out to be really fun! The game looks quite good, and it really is a great take on the theme! It feels really well polished and I don't have anything to criticize. Great Work!

Awesome game, got 2nd place on leaderboard. Damn.

This game is fun. I couldn't stop playing, because I wanted to beat the biggest highscore :). I think it would be good to have a health to feel ehrn enemy shoot you (just my opinion). I dont know if it's intational but when you beat your own highscore that is already on the leaderboard then you can have two higscores with your name. Overall it's a pretty good action game. The music fits the art perfectly. I dont know if it's better to pick up the upgrades or if it's worse with them :D. Original idea on the theme. Good job!

Thanks for playing everyone!

@ham-and-swiss Great job! I'm not telling you my secret strategy... yet.

@hizrok: Glad you like it. I think I should have communicated this better: Your character has no health. you only die when you crash into the ice. But when you get hit, the ice blocks grow. Having duplicates in the leaderboards is intentional, although having a lot of different people on the list would probably have been better. I'm going to write a note for the next time.

A really fun game with a cool mechanic that really rewards accuracy. I found myself avoiding pickups as much as possible as most would make my situation worse! The musics fits the game well, the graphics are fantastic. The feeling of escalation was really well done as well.

Ha nice game. finally made it to top 10 (The highscore board is a nice feature) but my eyes really hurt lol...

The control is made very smooth. The game is in fast pace so it's really hard to stop. I can tell the moving pattern of the enemies are well tuned, making the gameplay challenging.

If there's something to improve, I would say it's the graphics. I saw another game where bullets gets bounce at the border, in which it use lighting and particle system to make flying bullets really fascinating. (But probably since you are using game maker that may not be that easy).

FYI: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/40/the-exalted#/comment-102782 . I think the trail renderer, and lighting can make the full screen of bullets look nicer.

Was a lot of fun. Really good music and the pixel art was nice too. I also liked how as you get better weapons it screws you up for space more.

Very addictive, i like how you reward player for 'precise shooting'. Weapon upgrades are actually more dangerous than enemies sometimes which is a nice twist ti typical bullet hell games. I like how enemies try to move in weird patterns so it is harder to shot them. Graphics are pretty nice and i like how in background we can see space that is moving around and not just a static image. Games feel really polished and is really entertaining to play, perfect for Ludum Dare, well done!

Great game... I really liked playing this one! Love the concept, the music and graphics. The power ups are great for killing but bad you you in the long run... interesting idea. Congrats on a great game!

Permanence with damage on the bullets is a brilliant idea, especially for a twin-stick shooter. I especially like the dither patterns used. The aiming felt a little delayed if you move the mouse around while shooting, it won't shoot exactly where you clicked.

Great visuals, and solid mechanics. Love the powerups and fast pacedness. It makes the game really fun!

Solid game! Nice graphics and good soundeffects!

I love that you cannot win, and the graphics are great.

Wow, this is great. Super fun game, nice graphics, original mechanics, challenging but fair, scoreboard. Really good game.

Just got around to playing this tonight. At first I loved the powerup that shot every direction because it seemed to kill everything. Then near the end I trapped myself in a wall of ice and that's when it hit me that random ice shards everywhere probably wasn't the best thing XD I did a bit better the next couple rounds as I tried to aim more efficiently and not stack up the ice on the edges. Overall this game feels like a great arcade game. I can see people trying to beat the high score and brag to their friends. The graphics were great and went with the sound to set that arcade-like mood.

The gameplay was fun and interesting as well. I'm curious how much time you allotted for playtesting because that's something I may have wanted to put more time into for my game. It seems like having a good difficulty ramp is an important part of these never ending games (you don't want the ice to decay so fast that you last forever or alternatively have the ice grow so fast you get soul-crushingly beaten every round). I think you managed to find the perfect spot where you play the round just the right amount of time with the right level of difficulty to make it interesting.

Also big props for having a scoreboard! If/when I do another game I should try my hand at including one.

Edit: Yessss High score! :D

Best use of the theme I've seen. Really pushes the risk-vs-reward of the power-ups angle. Besides that, it's a really well made twin stick shooter. I really like the music, did you compose it yourself? Very aggressive, goes well with the rest of the game.

Wow, this one drew me in and I kept trying until I got on the scoreboard.

I definitely was a little unclear on a few things early - like I thought the green buzzy things were points I was supposed to get, when they were enemies out to get me, and it took me a little bit to understand the relationship between missing shots, ice, and getting hit.

But wow, once I got it I had a lot of fun. It's tough! You have to move around a lot, but not too much, and you have to shoot the enemies, but don't miss! I decided to cheat the system by sitting there without ever shooting once and letting the swarm build up. In my mind there would be fifty enemies filling the screen and only THEN would I shoot. But the game was resilient to this attack: it only spawned a reasonable number, and then when I did fire my first shot I missed and the ice that was created was ENORMOUS because I'd been hit fifty times by then. Awesome!

My strategy going in later was to AVOID PICKUPS. Those things are like death, because they make you fill the screen with ice. You have to be surgical. I stayed near the center, tried to stick and move. Often I would just take the damage from the last few green buzzy flies instead of attacking them.

As my doom approached on this final good run, it got really tense. I was operating in TINY spaces, and starting to rely on a new layer of rules I didn't fully grasp yet, which is when ice gets deleted to turn into powerups or flies. Never totally grasped that, but I was certainly glad for the space opening up!

So more ice, worse, more enemies, worse, and most surprisingly, more of my own bullets, worse.

I also appreciated the nice animations, art, and sound, plus the responsive control scheme (altho maybe just a tiny bit TOO responsive, when I was first learning I crashed right into ice before I learned to stay in the center).

Great realization of the theme in a well-done action game here. Strong entry.

Thanks for all your kind feedback!

@shrekshao The two games use fundamentally different visual styles, but I agree that I could have put a little more time into visual effects. I had plans for doing better enemy animations, but didn't make it on time.

@gamepopper Huh, I never noticed the delay. Maybe because the shot gets fired on the button press but people are used to see an effect for mouse actions on the button release?

@chipmonkey Thanks for the detailed feedback and congratulations on getting first place. I'm super glad you liked the pacing, as this has been a weak point for me in previous LDs. Strangely enough, I didn't plan much time for playtesting and balancing. I was trying to get the core mechanics done on day 1 and do graphics, sound etc on day 2. That way I could find out early what is fun and what isn't and tune the game little by little in between coding sessions. It also gives me the chance to play the game from a fresh perspective after half a day of drawing and making audio. Hint: If you want to add a scoreboard, definitely get familiar with how to do it before attempting it in LD. I've never done this before and it took me 6 hours until I had it running in GameMaker. It was worth it, but next time, I'll be better prepared.

@jjjjason I'm happy that you liked the music, I struggled a lot with what tool to use and still think it's a weaker aspect of the game, so it makes me glad that other people think differently.

@pkenney Thanks for your extensive play report and congratulations on making it to the highscore list. I think you figured out all the nooks and crannies of the game. I'm super happy that you spent so much time with it.

Thanks everyone, this means a lot!

@cerno-b You definitely have a good ear for composition, keep it up!

@jjjjason Thanks, I will. I'm a huge fan of modtracker music, but haven't spent too much effort learning it, so I fall back to Bosca Ceoil which is really easy to use.

A really solid game with a pretty innovative mechanic. The leaderboard was a nice touch. Great work!

great game! nice graphics and sound. congrats!

After seeing you post about it on twitter over the weekend it's really cool to get to play the final product! Having the arena fill in based on how much you shoot is a fantastic innovation and you should be super proud of how it turned out! I can't believe the high scores everyone is much better and me! Congratulations on finishing anthter LD!

Really interesting, I really like the style of 8bit sfx, works pretty well

That is good ! Looks good, has music, the flakes and ice setting is a nice idea.
More variety / bosses in the waves would be good though . I liked the bees !!!!

The mechanic of your shots forming your arena is fantastic, forcing me to think about my shots instead of just holding down the fire button like I normally do in these types of games. The graphics and sounds are also pretty great. Congrats!

love the gameplay, really addictive, but a bit too hard

Lol this game is a thrill ride! At first I was like 'why am I boiler flying in space outside a window' and then after about a minute I just got caught up in the insanity of it all and had a blast. There were a few times I died without realising it was the ice that was killing me, but after a while I got the concept.

Having a leader board was a real nice addition too. Makes you want to keep playing! Even the music became quite enjoyable despite initially seeming a bit too harsh. This is a sold effort, congratulations! Check out ours as well: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/40/$53149
:)

Nice addition to the shooter style! It's really clever to use the fact that players are always shooting, no matter the number of ennemies (be it 0). I didn't read the description first, and then realised my shooting-fury was leading me to the game over, by my own fault.

Really nice thought!

Fun game, best score was only 4620 though, couldn't even make it to the board. The whole thing was nicely done, interesting mechanic, nice graphics and catchy music. I was also a bit confused by not taking damage and was looking around for a health meter for a while wondering if the dials in the background might be it. Gameplay was nicely balanced and the movement of the enemies was weird but actually worked well so you often just miss them in a way which adds to the fun. Having the power ups break off the ice block was also a nice touch.

this was a really fun game - great use of the theme to incorporate the mechanic of the game - well done

It's a fun game and I make want to keep playing "only one more".
I don't know if was my computer's problem but the game suddenly started to go slow.

The itch link of my game is available again, by the way.

This is such a fantastic use of the theme!

I really enjoyed the fluidity of the controls. I'm also really impressed that you managed to get a high score system in place for the jam! Well done!

@nenrei Did you play the web version? I've just seen the game played on Twitch in the web version and the exact same thing happened. Could you do me a favor and try again with the exe if you're on Windows? I would like to know whether the game is poorly optimized in general or it is problem of the web version for some people.

Edit: I tried to upload an improved web version. It still has some slowdown during the smartbomb shot but it should be a bit better. If possible, please consider playing the executable version

Nice entry. I couldn't make it to the board though :(

@pcmxms Glad you liked it.

The board has become pretty elite by now, so it's not that easy to get on it. There are some specific strategies required to break into the current list.

Some hints: Avoid the powerups most of the time. Sometimes the forward spread shot is helpful but know when to use it. The smartbomb is usually not useful at all. The machine gun has no real disadvantages though. If you collect a powerup that you don't want, it may pay off to wait until another one comes around even if you soak up a few bullets on the way. Don't feel obligated to shoot if it makes your life worse.

Then you have to find a balance between getting hit and not missing your targets too much. It's okay to wait a bit until multiple enemies accumulate and then start shooting them. Even if you miss one, you may just hit another one nearby.

The flies bring good points because there are so many. Here the forward spread shot is actually helpful. If a fly hits you, you won't get any points and the ice will grow.

This is a bit of a cheap trick but it's a viable strategy. If only one or two enemies are left in the current wave, you can simply wait and avoid their attacks (especially useful for the flies). That way, extras will spawn which will clear up the playing field. Just be sure you're skillful enough to avoid the attacks or the ice blocks will grow so large that a few missed shots will waste all your effort.

That's all the strategies that I was able to figure out. Let me know whether you discover any more.

I can't believe such a small gameplay twist could change the meta so much. As soon as I had the revelation that I needed to slow down my shots and pick them carefully, I realized I hadn't really seen that in too many games, certainly not for long periods of time. The game mechanics all wove together so well just with the ice wall element. You not only had to shoot carefully, but also shoot in certain directions so you could make sure it was an even playfield.

I think a hilarious consequence was that I knew full well the powerups were bad for me, but I used them all the time cuz it felt to good to shoot. Devious design there and great job all around :)

Super fun game. But sadly i couldnt make into the leader board. BUt i flet the ice grew no matter whether i am hit or not. i could be wrong though.

Awesome! At first I hadn't linked my shoots to the increase of ice on the borders (I'd assumed it was a function of time) and still I was already hooked, that adds a very interesting risk factor, making the player think about if it's worth to shoot or not. My best score so far has been around 5K points.

The music is super catchy, and the graphics serve their purpose perfectly fine.

A great entry overall!

Cool game! I saw that there was a leaderboard full of totally reasonable scores so I played again in order to add myself to it.

I didn't read the description, so the first time that I died I didn't know what had killed me. I experimented in my second run (standing still and getting hit) to figure out that enemy shots make the ice larger and touching ice instantly kills me.

Firing the 360 degree gun seems really bad for the player, and I accidentally picked it up a couple of times. Luckily it goes away if I find an alternative weapon. I liked that the other powerups were helpful but still came at a cost.

I didn't figure out what occasionally thaws the ice, but my guess is that it's either timed or after killing some number of enemies.

I think an interesting variant would be if instead of instantly killing me, the ice was just a solid object that I can collide with (but enemies can still go through it) and I lose if I get squished between two pieces of ice. Basically that would prevent accidental deaths but still kill you once the majority of the screen is ice.

Another thing that felt weird was that when the ice is large enough, a wave of spread shot bullets can freeze on each other as soon as one of them hits a wall. I think that it might be better if shots that are fired at the same time cannot hit each other.

Definitely one of my favorites so far! Simple, known concept, with a nice twist that fits the theme perfectly! I'm normally way overwhelmed with fast paced games like this, but the mood you create in combination with the music is awesome and I loved every second of it! The online leaderboard is amazing! I can't believe you did all this in 48 hours...
Graphics style could be a little more consistent, but that's just nitpicking. I love the overall appearance of the game.

@peachtreeoath Thank you for your kind words. Glad you liked the game.

@wafiqsha That shouldn't be the case, but it's something I wish I had communicated more clearly. Listen closely to a "ping" sound, that's when you are hit and that's when the ice grows.

@almost I realized that the shots can stick together and kill you instantly. I didn't think it would be such a great deal, but I agree that I should have found a better way to do this. Congrats on third place!

@phi Wow, thank you, i'm thrilled that you actually enjoyed the game so much. Graphics are one of my weaker skills, but then again, I rarely practice. Would you mind going into a bit more detail about inconsistent visuals? I'm always eager to learn and concrete examples are a great help. From my point of view, I should have improved shading in some places, especially on the character sprite, the planets and some of the background elements. I shaded the pipes close to the deadline and there just wasn't any time left for more.

I enjoyed playing this! My downfall was not realising that damage taken was changing the size of the ice! It's a cool idea and pretty original in my view. The controls were pretty tight too, and nice art style.

@cerno-b I think the pipes and the "bullets" have a very organic look, while most of the rest mainly consists of flat, solid colors, which then feels a little "artificial" in contrast. Also, in a game where there are lots of different elements, it helps to reduce the palette to a limited number of colors and shades, keeping the elements distinctly different from each other. I'm not very good at graphics either, but that's what I always try to follow. The shadow effect on the pipes looks really cool and makes them pop out nicely!

@honest-dan You played the game on Twitch, right? Thank a lot for taking the time!

@phi Thanks for the detailed input. Indeed, most of the elements are flat because I didn't have time for additional shading. I also meant to add some small backdrop animations like moving dials and such. Color palette is something I'm very inexperienced at, so I usually try to stick to Dawnbringer's 32 palette. I thought about making a game with a very limited palette, like 16 or even 4 colors. The shadow was actually really cheap. I put the pipes on a separate layer, filled them with black and moved it a few pixels to the bottom and to the side. I made a timelapse video if you're interested (see the description above)

Great entry! The main mechanic is a clever use of the theme, and the risk/reward of taking the different shot powerups adds some interesting depth to it.

I think the sprites could have been something that better represented the gameplay (it's a bit weird that a boiler would be shooting ice), but that's a fairly minor criticism. Nice job!

I love the ideas behind this game. I was never so conflicted about picking up drops.
The only thing I was not very fond of were the movement patterns of the enemies, especially the enemy ships, but I guess if they were easier/somewhat more predictable to hit, than it would take forever to build up the ice.

This was super fun to play! I love that the way that the enemies move kind of force you to spam the attack. I kinda felt like the enemies lasers should've hurt the player though...

Smooth gameplay (even the web version), good controls, graphics, music. Overall a complete game, so good work. The theme is perfect, makes a lot of sense here, and is a nice way to slow me just holding the fire down.

Awesome game! One of the best I've played this Jam! Works really well with the theme :smiley:

Funnily enough I had a similar idea at the start with my game but I decided I wanted more freedom of movement and cause more chaos as the game went on instead. Brilliant execution tho! :clap:

Really awesome game I struggled a bit to handle all that blast processing power ;p

I wish I had more time to hone my skills in this game. Audio was great, and the gameplay is dynamic and matched the theme. And online scores are cool. Overall, a very solid entry.

This is fun! Hard to beat the highscores tho :D

I love the hectic nature of the game. It immediately had me panicked, but also hooked for a few more rounds. Unfortunately, I couldn't get past ~4000 points yet...

I like that your bullets clutter up the edges of your screen over time and turn into deadly hazards. :thumbsup:

Super good job!

Come check out my game if you like!
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/40/virus-detected

Great game. This mechanic is awesome. Well done!

Great entry, I really like games that punish mistakes, and I made oh so many mistakes in this game until I worked out a fairly solid strategy to 'win'. Audio is okay, graphics are fun, gameplay is great. *applauds*

Nice work. It's a pretty simple idea but very well executed. Very hectic and fast-paced!

Very innovative game. You should maybe change the colour of the edges so that enemies and ice gets more visible (except if you intended it to be that way).

really smart entry. Well done

Excellent use of the theme; instead of just cramming in more enemies, you have managed to create a mechanic in which the player is responsible for his own actions. Nice!

Very nice game! Ran perfectly on the web version! :)

Well... That is a very well executed shooter, with a great twist ! You have managed to suggest a cool story around it. The background visual is great. The swarm of tiny ennemies make a great event, and the end scene (when you loose) is really cool.

I am impressed. And congratulation.

Great little game. Like how you used the theme and the overall presentation is really good. Good job!

good graphic and gameplay in theme)

Really good entry, it's nice that you took time to add a leader-board, definitely adds to the game.
The different enemy and the boost made it quite enjoyable. I didn't notice that my bullet created ice at first.
Last thing, seems like I encountered a bug where my bullets would transform into ice as soon as I fired despite not touching anything. Anyway really good entry overall!

@tay Thanks for your feedback.

That's less of a bug and more of a game mechanic quirk. The problem is that if the ice blocks grow larger, then when firing a rapid succession of shots, they will be located so close together that they immediately form a chain of ice blocks that kills you instantly. Not sure how I could have prevented that. Maybe by making the ice blocks small on impact but they quickly grow to their final size.

I may try changing that for a post-compo version, but I think the problem may be that the ice on the wall does not accumulate as fast with this method.

Fun little game. Original way to use the theme in your game.

Nice little shooter. The enemies movements seem well done. Sometimes it was hard to tell where I was shooting, so maybe adding a reticle would help. Movement seemed a little loose, but the best strategy seemed to be just staying in the middle of the screen. The only thing that seemed unfair was that when I was hit, the existing ice would grow, but it seems like it would be better if only the size of new missed shots were larger.

Nice graphics, interesting concept! I included it in my Ludum Dare 40 compilation video series, if you’d like to take a look. :) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yBdKV67omDA

Wow, @jupiter-hadley!

Still going even after the Jam finished. I am impressed.
Thanks a lot for taking the time!

super cool love it