Keep the bee (Jeez) Alive by dhim

[raw]
made by dhim for Ludum Dare 46 (COMPO)

The idea of the game was to keep the bees alive by constructing a shelter with some random blocks. And also protect cactus from the rains so that they would flower... The bee hive is there, the cactus, the rain, the flower, the bees, the moving of the bits and things to build. The score board is there, the music is there, some sounds were there but I think i disabled them by accident... Everything is there but a real game... not much game testing, you can build you dont have to protect the bee hive so much as not destroing it. the cactuses need some water, but not to much. I forgot to do the dry part during the sunny part of the game.

It was fun to do!! Enjoy this thing.

FIXED VERSION : I just removed the shadows as they were not functionnal on webgl... and reuploaded the game on github.

! POST MORTEM VERSION ! https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/46/keep-the-bee-jeez-alive/long-long-long-post-mortem-keep-the-bee-jeez-alive

Ratings

Overall 990th 2.813⭐ 34🧑‍⚖️
Fun 948th 2.656⭐ 34🧑‍⚖️
Innovation 421th 3.422⭐ 34🧑‍⚖️
Theme 615th 3.578⭐ 34🧑‍⚖️
Graphics 373th 3.656⭐ 34🧑‍⚖️
Audio 349th 3.313⭐ 34🧑‍⚖️
Humor 665th 2.429⭐ 30🧑‍⚖️
Mood 508th 3.226⭐ 33🧑‍⚖️
Given 19🗳️ 34🗨️

Feedback

🎤 dhim
20. Apr 2020 · 01:48 UTC
THe lighting is screwed up in the release web version... I'll try to compile a windows local version tomorrow for a better experience
Retti01
20. Apr 2020 · 07:16 UTC
Yeah fix the lighting and the game is amazing.
Ian Kettlewell
20. Apr 2020 · 08:02 UTC
Really liked the glowing effect when picking up objects, and I can see the physics based gameplay of building a fort for the bees being pretty fun. It was tricky to build things because the objects weren't constrained to 2D, but I still found it fun to stack stuff!
TomekS
20. Apr 2020 · 08:03 UTC
there is something in there, definitely adjusting the lighting would be needed, and maybe restricting the physics to 2d (in rigidbody) as you cannot control the depth anyway. Solid effort.
🎤 dhim
20. Apr 2020 · 10:04 UTC
Fixed the lighting by removing shadows completely.
The cursor is fixed on a plane, I was planing (sic) to have that plane distance adjustable... should have kept it 2d, but not sure how the fix would have work to topple object and stuff..
Uppitydonkey57
20. Apr 2020 · 20:42 UTC
Really enjoyed it! my only problems is that I feel like the sound affects could be a bit better and its a bit annoying to have to deal with the Z axis
🎤 dhim
20. Apr 2020 · 20:53 UTC
@uppitydonkey57
Yeah I added the sound in the last 30min in the middle of the night I had to fiddle with bfxr and could not record actual sound... I tried to have some variations, but they are not coherent based on the material of the element... Removed the bee noise at it was horrible. Forgot the rain sound effect, :( it was good..

@uppitydonkey57 , @tomeks @ian-kettlewell
Agree with the 3d/2d... I wanted a 3d game, with the feeling of building an shelter like a kid forts. The pointer is on a plane that I planed to have adjustable on the z axis. I should also probably have made the object collision free with the press of a key.
Maybe I'll come back to the idea in a post mortem version.

thank you all for your comments!
ZerohBeat
20. Apr 2020 · 20:54 UTC
The game has an amazing mood! Its really enjoyable just to pick things up and stack them. By mistake I picked up the bee hive and threw it somewhere (oopps). Really cool idea.
🎤 dhim
20. Apr 2020 · 20:57 UTC
@zerohbeat Jeez! you had to keep the bee alive :)

If you shake it too much, the bees get angry!

thank you for your review
Camilo Quintero
21. Apr 2020 · 02:09 UTC
Nice game! I had a bit of trouble controlling the bricks, specially because of the movement in 3 axes, but it felt really good to move them around! Maybe the sound is a bit distracting and the Ui could improve a little to catch more the eye. Great idea overall! :D
Shigure
21. Apr 2020 · 08:46 UTC
I like the idea of keeping bees alive by building a shelter, but I can't find myself really enjoying the game. The main reason is the fact that it is very unclear what to do. There really isn't a lot to do in the first place, as there isn't a clear objective. I just covered the bee hive and cactus with some bricks and watched my points go up as I dragged some stuff around.

I agree with the other commenters about the third axis. This game would've been better off as a 2D game.
🎤 dhim
21. Apr 2020 · 08:59 UTC
@camilo-quintero
Thank you for your comments, yeah I added the sound too late in the dev process... it didn't felt right without it, should have been lower voule also and localized..
@shigure Thank you for your comments. Yes my game tend to lack this clear goal... You can't really know how much water the cactuses are getting and what will make them flower. The bee should have a light path so that you see them being attracted by the flowers...
Jason Woerner
21. Apr 2020 · 11:48 UTC
The main component I was missing was the ability to shift my objects on the Z axis. I kept trying to stack things that would tip off off each other either forward or backward, and I had very little control over it. Even so, I had fun tinkering around stacking things. The controls were really clean and the graphics and bloom rocked =)
pke1029
21. Apr 2020 · 18:38 UTC
Interesting and original concept, but not sure about the objective. Still, its nice to see experiments with physics engine
🎤 dhim
21. Apr 2020 · 19:52 UTC
@jason-woerner
Thank you for the comment, that bloom was an happy accident that I fell in love with. I think the idea to have the target sphere jump from object to object in highlight mode and stick to some plane in move mode help make the control being nice. I had planned for the target plane to be movable with the scroll of the mouse but I lacked time.
@pke1029
thank you for your comment, my game lack that clear sense of objective, still better than my last attempts though. I should challenge myself to even smaller game but with clear goal. The physics engine was a treat to play with.
Linx
21. Apr 2020 · 22:15 UTC
Interesting game, but I'm sorry to say I didn't understand exactly what to do. I tried building some sort of bridge over the bee hive, but it's not clear. I got 12 points and I don't even know why :sweat_smile: Fun and satisfying physics and grabbing mechanic though!
🎤 dhim
22. Apr 2020 · 06:47 UTC
@linx Yeah! That was the game idea : build a shelter hover the hive and somehow over the cactus to protect them from the weather.
I didn't put enough effort on explaining the goal and having the game reflect that you were doing a good job.
Thank you for your comment
NaBo369
22. Apr 2020 · 15:47 UTC
I love the idea of the game and I of all ludum games I played this one has the best into in my opinion, just a bunch of resourches falling from the sky in perfect piles. A perfect start to a game.
Other then that it was a bit hard to make structures so a way to move things in a certain direction would have helped but considering the time it is already impressive as it is.
Oh! And one detail I loved was that the cactus's actually started to bloom when it started raining
mikouaji
25. Apr 2020 · 11:24 UTC
Cool physics game :D Love the wonky controls in this one, and the option to throw the hive far away when you get mad that your build collapsed for the 5th time :D
Hakro
26. Apr 2020 · 12:11 UTC
The graphics and controls feel really nice. To bad the gameplay is lacking, I think it would have been great.
Nice job on the effort and graphics though.
Bart Wach
26. Apr 2020 · 20:06 UTC
One of my favorite games in the jam. The only problem is the 3d aspect and the fact we don't fully control the depth coordinate and items sometimes stay in the background and sometimes come forward when you pick them.
JamieOK
26. Apr 2020 · 20:25 UTC
Weirdly fun gameplay for it being so random. I like the idea of physically building the shelter. Like other comments said, constraining the parts to 2D, or allowing the player to adjust the depth, maybe with a mouse scroll wheel would improve the building slightly. Other than that, cool concept. Great work!
yy404
09. May 2020 · 13:53 UTC
Amazing artwork! I failed to build things up but it feels comfortable.
🎤 dhim
10. May 2020 · 17:49 UTC
I Made a post mortem version of the Game to anyone interested : https://github.com/dhmmasson/ld46/tree/master/keepTheBeeAlive-PostMortem