LudumData

Farwatch by Liquid

[raw]
made by Liquid for Ludum Dare 59 (COMPO)

:fire: Farwatch

Farwatch is a small RTS prototype where you lead a force beyond the frontier to investigate.

M1a.png

:candle: Gameplay

Guide your units through hostile lands and do not stray from the light.
Farm resources and build an army.

Reclaim abandoned outposts, build up your forces, and hold your ground against what emerges from the dark.

M2a.png

:crossed_swords: Units & Threats

:shield: Swordsmen hold the line
:bowandarrow: Bowmen strike from range
:candle: Light Wardens keeps your army under command
:pick: Workers build and harvest resources

:wolf: Wolves stalk the edges.
:grey_question: Something worse follows the signal.

M3a.png

:control_knobs: Controls

Standard RTS mouse controls with a grid-based hotkey layout:

  • QWER / ASDF Command units, build, or research using a grid system
  • Ctrl + Key Assign units or buildings to control groups
  • Shift + Ctrl + Key Add to existing control groups

:notebook: Notes

The web-based version might be laggy compared to the Windows version.

The biggest things missing right now due to time are music and sound, along with proper pathfinding and a minimap.

:bookmark: Changelog

  • 21.4:
    Fixed several worker resource bugs
    Fixed a few HUD issues
    Realized that the second map in the main menu was not enabled

  • 23.4:
    Fixed more HUD bugs Fixed a bug where multiple buildings were constructed instead of one Fixed a bug where the resource collection cooldown was resetting rapidly

:gear: Tools & Software

:wrench: Engine: Godot
:art: Graphics: Aseprite

Link https://liqqquid.itch.io/farwatch
Link https://liqqquid.itch.io/farwatch
Original URL https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/59/farwatch

Ratings

Overall 81th 3.725⭐ 22🧑‍⚖️
Fun 128th 3.4⭐ 22🧑‍⚖️
Innovation 236th 2.925⭐ 22🧑‍⚖️
Theme 260th 2.675⭐ 22🧑‍⚖️
Graphics 15th 4.325⭐ 22🧑‍⚖️
Humor 148th 2.472⭐ 20🧑‍⚖️
Mood 115th 3.575⭐ 22🧑‍⚖️
Given 27🗳️ 7🗨️

Feedback

IndigoWolf
Apr 20th · 13:33 UTC
This is extremely good for a compo entry, feels very polished, graphics are great and any kind of RTS is ambitious in my view. Really great job. I did find it slow to get getting and had some issues where my workers seemed to stop producing from my farms which kind of soft locked me.
CrociDB
Apr 20th · 15:26 UTC
How do you manage to make something so polished in such a small amount of time? This is really fantastic. I do miss some music and sound effects, but come on, that would've been impossible! Good job!
pres2300
Apr 20th · 20:16 UTC
As others have said, very well done and impressive getting this done for the compo! My few nitpicks are the pathing could use some work (definitely didn't expect perfection in 48 hours) and the workers seem to have issues changing roles. I had a couple switch to harvesting at a farm, and they didn't actually produce anything (even though their animation would suggest they were) until I offloaded whatever resource they had previously first. Otherwise, this was incredibly impressive and very well done. Nice work!
LDJam user 385997
Apr 21st · 16:43 UTC
Thanks for the feedback everyone! I fixed some of the worker resource bugs that you mentioned.
stasm
Apr 21st · 21:15 UTC
Amazing work and a nearly complete RTS game with lots of the genre's staple features: harvesting resources and constructing buildings, queuing production, command hotkeys, scrolling, group selection, control groups, right click to issue the default order.. Visually, the pixel art is readable and very pretty, with a lot of detail on building sprites despite the low resolution. I spent a good amount of time playing this game, and it's so easy to forget it's a Compo game! I don't know how you decided to do an RTS in a weekend, but I'm sure glad you did :)
a333
Apr 22nd · 20:13 UTC
Duude that's crazy work! it's almost fully featured RTS! even the flags to mark building spawn points! I'm in awe!
Just opened Warcraft 2 OST on second tab and it was perfect.

The path finding hack though :))
baknik
Apr 24th · 13:53 UTC
Same amazement at how much you were able to get done as everyone else. Make a full RTS!
tedrey
Apr 24th · 15:14 UTC
so cool, crazy how u managed to created all this for only 3 days
kanity
Apr 24th · 15:50 UTC
I love the little pixel graphics, they are so tiny and pretty! Everything looks just so so good and cozy. I am not really into RTS but you explained the controls well, I think. It was only a bit confusing when I tried moving down that the screen didn't scroll until my units were already behind the gray UI bar. I think it would be lovely if it started scrolling a bit earlier.

Upon reaching the workers, I started making my village immediately:

![village.jpg](///raw/c93/65/z/72957.jpg)

It looks so cute! I was hoping my soldiers could come in and rest and heal but they didn't care :')

Then the night fell, I couldn't see anything for a while, and in morning I was back at the very starting spot again but with way less forces ^^' Then very soon as I found an already established village and clicked on a tower with fire in it (forgot to screenshot ><) the night suddenly fell again, and it felt like it would never end :')

During that I figured out I can scroll the screen by moving my mouse down without clicking anything :o

The day came again and I thought I wonder what those villages are even for? So I left that village also and kept going, somehow only 2 soldiers left, towards somewhere. I went further south and met a dead end.

I am sorry, I think it's just not my genre... I am still feeling confused xD

But it looks like you've done a lot in 2 days, and the graphics are really pretty!!
fnelix
Apr 26th · 12:56 UTC
Very cool, you managed to put a lot of things into this mini RTS game. Very impressive for a compo entry! I was a tiny bit confused how things worked once you get to the village, farming, what goal to build towards, meaning of the signal/light/dark stuff. Nice graphics, and again, very impressive!
LDJam user 385997
Apr 28th · 08:39 UTC
@kanity Thanks for playing! Yes, every good RTS should have clear tutorials for new players. I was crunching to get all the core mechanics in, so that part is unfortunately missing right now. The buildings are meant for gathering resources with workers and then producing more units.

Thanks everyone for playing and for the feedback!
deformhead
Apr 29th · 07:25 UTC
Great! You've done so much art and UI features, impressive!
Did you have a template project in advance to help you build this game?

I do miss sounds but it's really hard to do all the gameplay, art and sound design in this short amount of time, and since you polished the rest, it's more than OK!

Good job!
Zirrrus
Apr 29th · 12:47 UTC
Wow! Really impressive, how polished and fully featured this game is for the time you had to build it. The pixel graphics are great too!
LDJam user 385997
Apr 30th · 07:41 UTC
Thanks for playing, really glad you liked it!

@deformhead I had a small LD template set up, but nothing with actual gameplay. I went in with the idea of using tiny sprites to save time (especially animations took only minutes), spent a few hours on art, then focused the rest of the weekend on mechanics. I'd built similar systems before (unit movement, fog of war), so that helped speed things up a lot.

And yeah, audio had to take the hit this time. I ended up putting in 34+ hours, so next jam I'll aim for something a bit smaller (and healthier).
Richard Baltrusch
May 02nd · 10:08 UTC
Incredibly impressive work for a compo game! How do you get this much work done solo over a weekend? Is it all hand-coded or using a generous helping of AI?

The graphics are very very cosy - so much so that even with a lack of sound and music the game feels really good to play. There are some pathfinding and resource hogging / vil bumping issues, but nothing a seasoned age of empires player would be unfamiliar with - and it increases the skill ceiling too :)

Got surprised that the buildings even had gather points implemented (though they didn't seem to start resource gathering for villagers right away).

Really well done!
K4su
May 03rd · 12:37 UTC
This is really impressive for such a short gamejam! Thank you, I have really enjoyed the game. I haven't read much of the description prior to playing the game and I was getting more and more surprised of how feature-rich your game turned out to be! Thank you!
LDJam user 385997
May 04th · 14:38 UTC
Thanks for the feedback! @richard-baltrusch It is hand-coded. When I couldn't find answers in the Godot documentation, especially about GDScript or how resource intensive certain things are in Godot, I asked an AI. I was hoping to make it lightweight enough to run in the browser without too much stuttering.
fabonacci
May 06th · 11:10 UTC
really nice game foundation. it's missing stake or mission. I created my town, it was cool but didn't know why i was doing it. sprites are really nice !