Bosskeeper by YellowKamel

You start the game as a main character of any old video game and meet the slime boss - pretty much the first thing you encounter anywhere. But the boss is weak and easily defeated and therefore nobody even took the time to kill it properly. In this moment you decide that your days as a hero are over and that you would love nothing more than to help this boss to stay alive as long as possible.
In this game you have cards to help the angry slime boss to survive. Each time a marvelous hero comes by, you get the chance to place traps, walls, fields of slime and valuable barrels the hero just can't resist to look into. But watch out: if the slime boss dies, you are defeated too.
Have fun playing ~
| Youtube | https://github.com/creyD/ludum_dare_46 |
| Youtube | https://deranonymos.itch.io/bosskeeper |
| Original URL | https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/46/bosskeeper-keep-the-boss-alive |
Ratings
| Overall | 2128th | 3.043⭐ | 25🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 2184th | 2.761⭐ | 25🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 914th | 3.435⭐ | 25🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 555th | 3.978⭐ | 25🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 936th | 3.826⭐ | 25🧑⚖️ |
| Audio | 1419th | 2.717⭐ | 25🧑⚖️ |
| Humor | 1448th | 2.636⭐ | 24🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 2055th | 2.841⭐ | 24🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 5🗳️ | 0🗨️ |
A minor nitpick on the story at the beginning: I was expecting a single tap of space to skip to the end of the current text, instead of directly to the next one (when the current one isn't even shown completely). (On another note: why do I need to progress the story with my keyboard instead of my mouse, when the game itself is played with the mouse?)
Also, I had a problem with the game crashing sometimes when I fail :(
And once I found the hero spawning in the wall, unable to move! Hah, easy win for me.
The design though is quite cool, the concept is interesting, new, and fun! Good job overall, despite the few minor problems very enjoyable :)
Nice Title screen art!
Some improvements I recommand:
- Slow a bit the game.
- Put informations about the boss life's.
- Don't close the game each time you die, it's frustrating.
- If the introduction had already seen, skip it at the game launch (or put a Skip button)
- Make a UI information for the supply mobs you can get in the dungeon. I was like "I had an ally, why is he respawning only after 3 turns ?" :shrug:
- When you display the power-up selection screen, make the game darker, or let them appear in a modal window. That will be more visible and understandable.
However, I found it hard to tell from some of the cards what is it that they place and what effect you can expect from them. Some description when you click on the card (or hover over it) would be nice. Or at least a name to give a player a hint. And even after you place a trap, it is often hard to say what it did, as the screen can get pretty busy and the game itself does not provide much feedback.
The game in itself lacks a bit of mood I think, maybe a music would do the trick.
I think your project could be improved with some bug fixes (it crashes sometimes or run loops on sound) and some more feedback (a life gauge would be perfect, maybe a clearer "damaged" state for the boss).
I love the idea you had to make a quickstyled combat game only through cards and planning instead of mashing leftclick.