The Race Against Death by Salmonmeagar
EPILEPSY WARNING: THIS GAME HAS MILD FLASHES!

The key to staying alive is to stay ahead of Death. After all, once Death catches up to you, you die. So that's the name of the game. Outrace him for as long as you can, but beware - Death catches up to everybody.
The game consists of a simple track you navigate in a loop, your score is your "age", or laps. At the beginning you'll get a head start against Death, but your lead will inevitably shrink, as Death's AI is simply to repeat your best lap over and over, akin to an unfair Mario Kart ghost. You can get better laps to get farther ahead of Death, but every improvement only makes your lead more difficult to maintain.
The scenery will change as you "age" - Will you live a long, fulfilled life, or will Death catch up to you early?
Control information available on-site
PRO TIP: If you wait a long time before finishing your first lap, Death will be forced to wait that extra time after he spawns, and you can use it to gain a huge lead. I recommend you do this if you'd like to see all 5 tile sets, reached by age 64, however it can make the game somewhat dull.
Tools used: Notepad++, Freesound.org, Audacity, Aseprite
| Youtube | http://simb0rg.com/games/keepitalive/keepitalive.html |
| Original URL | https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/46/the-race-against-death |
Ratings
| Overall | 416th | 3.855⭐ | 33🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 529th | 3.677⭐ | 33🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 709th | 3.548⭐ | 33🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 452th | 4.032⭐ | 33🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 984th | 3.79⭐ | 33🧑⚖️ |
| Humor | 599th | 3.407⭐ | 29🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 822th | 3.611⭐ | 29🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 14🗳️ | 19🗨️ |
I feel the controls were very tight and it was the right level of challenge where I could usually turn fast laps but had to be cautious not to get complacent. Does the course get more difficult as life goes on? I think that could be an interesting mixup.
I like how you also caught the strategy of sandbagging the first lap to gain a lead - I did the same thing.
One GUI improvement I'd like is a more persistent lap time counter - I saw the +/- frames to best lap flash every lap but I had trouble reading it in time while staying focused.
Great work!
I actually really like that you used a stearing-type control for this. Seems strange but it still worked out.
I loved the aging character and changing scenery, too.
I lived a good life
