Baserackcanball by HacksawUnit

It is 2009. Deep in the woods, some bored teens play a strange sport... Hit the can with the bat! Or, is it a racket...
Please read the controls and information on the itch.io page!
| Link | https://hacksawunit.itch.io/baserackcanball |
| Original URL | https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/49/baserackcanball |
Ratings
| Overall | 107th | 3.849⭐ | 45🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 91th | 3.814⭐ | 45🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 183th | 3.607⭐ | 44🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 370th | 3.298⭐ | 44🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 24th | 4.31⭐ | 44🧑⚖️ |
| Audio | 52th | 3.902⭐ | 43🧑⚖️ |
| Humor | 129th | 3.25⭐ | 38🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 131th | 3.588⭐ | 42🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 22🗳️ | 25🗨️ |
Knocked it out of the park. Or the court, rather.
Nice game nonetheless, had some fun playing it :D
The 1 player layout is too cramped, though, the hit area could be a bit more generous and the system that prevents the ball keeping vertically sometimes redirects the ball into super hard to catch angles.
The only trouble I had was telling whether the bat or racket was active. But then I noticed that the colors of the circles are different and had a much easier time.
Super good!
I also like the shaking of the screen whenever you hit.
Really nice game!
Some of the people complaining about the controls are apparently trying to use one hand to both move and hit, which is...bizarre. Having grown up playing 2p coop games on a single keyboard, I didn't see any problem with the control scheme at all, though I think the "B / R" letters on the rings were probably kind of confusing.
Having the "F / G" key icons be on the lower left of the screen is probably a bit awkward for some players since it forces you to divert your attention from the ball -- it's not a place that people naturally look? I found it to be just fine, but something you may want to consider.
Other than that, this is strangely fun. Maybe you should explain the rules of the game a bit more, though? Like it's really not obvious what the "crits", "rings", and "runs" are. Perhaps just a short blurb in your game description?
I would echo others' sentiment about placing the F/G buttons somewhere more within line of sight. Otherwise, had a lot of fun playing it!
Even if you put effort to make it clear on the character, it is a bit hard to know what racket you can use though.
Also it is not clear what zones do what.
Nice entry and good job :smile:
If you’d like to rewatch the playthrough, you can find it here:
https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1173646881?t=2h34m56s
Good luck on your ratings, see you next LD! :D
💜 Elysia Griffin AKA Button Feedback Lady
https://www.twitch.tv/elysiagriffin
https://youtu.be/EWJKsLF4MMg?t=9620
I finally had the time to come back and rate everything I played so far!
Here is a link to the vod of the review if you wish to see it again: https://www.youtube.be/watch?v=AiVWayIqffU&t=10748s
This game is really addicting. Everything has just the right amount of visual crunch and juiciness to it. It's easy to get into the rhythm of the game and enter a certain flow where you can keep the can bouncing from wall-to-wall.
At the same time, I was a bit disappointed that it was possible either the bat or racket control can end up being deactivated. While that does bring some much needed change-up for two-player gameplay, on one-player, knowing that the controls may be disabled forced me to pay close attention to the character and the rings around it, vs. the rest of the game. This is a shame, because it looked like upon watching the recording that there's a lot of nuance on how to adjust the angle of the shot, what each ground element does, and whether to use bat or racket based on whether you want to take advantage of the ground elements or not. It would have been nice if the range and toggle of whether the bat or racket is usable or not was streamlined so that I can put my focus elsewhere, such as adjusting the angle and speed of the can.
That said, the polish in this game is quite excellent, and I can see myself playing this over and over to get a better score. Great job.