Meteor Power by UkuleleFury

🤖 A point-and-click AI platformer: Build solar stations, connect power, avoid meteors!
⚠️ TIPS!
- First, hold A, then click on a different station site to build a solar station.

- Then, hold A, and click on the power-line buttons for your new solar station and the command center.

- Don't build a second bot until you have a couple connected solar stations!

(Sorry I didn't get around to adding better in-game indicators!)
🎮 Controls
- Mouse and keyboard.
- A/S/D/Q/W/E to select a bot.
- Left-click on a platform to move the bot.
- Left-click a station button to do that command.
💿 Software used
- Godot: Game engine.
- Aseprite: Pixel-art image editor.
- Bfxr: Sound effects editor.
- DefleMask: Chiptune music tracker.
- Surfacer: Framework for procedural path-finding across 2D platforms.
- Scaffolder: Framework for general app and UI infrastructure.
- SurfaceTiler: Framework for "next-level" autotiling.
🐞 Post-submission bug fix
- I fixed a critical bug the morning after submitting. The exported game wasn't running at all!
- The bug: I was referencing the type
EditorPluginin one of my global classes, and Godot doesn't include this editor-only type when exporting a game. - The fix: I just removed the type annotation! My logic wasn't actually using the value outside the editor environment anyway.
📺 I livestreamed the development on Twitch!
- https://www.twitch.tv/ukulelefury

| Link | https://github.com/levilindsey/ludum-dare-50 |
| Link | https://levi.dev/ld50 |
| Link | https://levilindsey.itch.io/meteor-power |
| Original URL | https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/50/meteor-power |
Ratings
| Overall | 142th | 3.737⭐ | 40🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 305th | 3.355⭐ | 40🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 70th | 3.934⭐ | 40🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 370th | 3.5⭐ | 40🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 98th | 4.026⭐ | 40🧑⚖️ |
| Audio | 129th | 3.645⭐ | 40🧑⚖️ |
| Humor | 363th | 2.554⭐ | 39🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 282th | 3.292⭐ | 38🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 39🗳️ | 60🗨️ |
Took me three tries to actually figure out how not to run out of energy so fast ;) , but it worked out better then. Is this somewhat good?

Also, i noticed a small graphics glitch when you zoom out very far - maybe you should just limit how far one can zoom out a bit more?

And thanks, I'll fix that zoom-out bug in my next project!
Impressed at how much you were able to get done and how polished the game was. Nice work.
I did find it super difficult to understand what everything was doing but that seems like the spirit of it.
It took me a while to get the controls down, (and I'll echo other sentiments about indicators/UI), but overall it just worked.
Bot movement felt nice and juicy, cables even jiggle; really there's not a whole lot else to complain about.
Nice work!
:) Next time, I promise I'll have better in-game indicators all over the place!
I liked that the gameplay had depth in it, it even took me some time to figure out how to properly play it. It is an actual full-fledged game if you just add some levels, visuals and audio are amazing too!

... I'm not really sure what force of gravity was pulling him down though.
Anywho.
I like this game! It probably wasn't intended, but Meteor Power had what felt like multiple paradigm shifts. First when I realized that I had to be patient, then when I realized I could connect solar panels with multiple wires. I felt smart.
I definitely don't think I ever had a reason to have 6 robots. Having more than 2 just made me spam through the buttons trying to find the one closest to the destination. I don't think it was mentioned anywhere that time slows down when you hold left click, which is a shame since the effect was well-made.
As you said, more indicators would be nice. You might not even realize that meteors are a threat until they bombard you completely. But! I imagine you were busy implementing other things in the game... like jumping robots.
Nice entry! You better make it to Ludum Dare 51. You better!
It's great fun. I had a great time playing it.
The soundtrack and effects are not too-interrupting which is very nice.
At first it was a bit hard getting used to the controls and trying to survive. But after that It's all good.
Suggestion
- Maybe you could allow connecting powerlines between unpowered solar panels?
- Yo should add more indication to controls / threats / how to play in general
- Nothing more. This is really good!
My verdict: If there's an award I could give, this game is one the award-receiving list!
// Also, what is that font you used in the menu ui?
(I know the controls are written in the description, but I usually only read the description if I can't figure them out, while in this case it _seemed_ that I did figure them out, which was kind of infuriating later)
Maybe just selecting a robot by mouse and then clicking where it should go would be much simpler for the player? I ended up keeping A pressed all the time anyway. Given this controls, and the fact that robots have their own pathfinding (which is great, btw!) it's pretty much impossible and useless to have more than one robot at once. There seems to be a glitch when part of the solar stations' network gets disconnected from the main station: some disconnected stations are highlighted as active, so aren't, which was a little distracting. I didn't realize you can zoom in/out at first, and that background is rendered in a bit strange way when you zoom out. Anyways, I managed to build the solar stations and it seems that the only thing left is connecting them over and over again, since they get destroyed by the meteors, which gets repetitive quickly.

I did not believe the robots could make giant jumps until I clicked on a top platform. I like how they manage to path-find, wherever you click. It makes them more alive and more "independant".
Like many other people said, controls could have been simpler. Click on a robot to select it, then click on a destination, or click on two stations to connect them. Click on another robot to change selection. That's all.
The stations seems to be powered off or powered on, but I couldn't determine when. It does not seem to depend on wether it's connected or not.
Nice music and graphics. The background deserved more variations. These two moons infinitely copy-pasted looks quite weird.
Thank you for this cute game.
I read in the comments above, that the meteors speed up over time and make the game more difficult. I already connected all the stations and nothing happened. So I stopped playing too early it seems :(
Good job!
I made the font! You should go check out [fontstruct.com](https://fontstruct.com/), it's really fun/easy/free to use to make a font!
Or here's a link to my simple pixel font: https://github.com/SnoringCatGames/scaffolder/tree/master/assets/fonts/pxlzr
I'll try and make some for my next game (:
Really fun, I liked the feeling of the music and graphics and it really absorbed me. :D
Thank you for sharing your game on my Twitch stream (MsMiaChar). Here's a link to the video (game starts around 02:42:00): https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1446760516
holy cow, this one's going in the bookmarks for me to dissect later! It's got it all: rope physics, rts elements, and 2d platformer pathfinding for goodness' sake! I also had the "bot leaps off to explore the great unknown" in level 2. I don't have any criticisms you haven't already heard. I really like the shine animation on powered solar panels, that's a nice touch! The bot animations help quite a bit to make them feel more alive and active. It's a nice little thing that if you're lucky they can block asteroids with their bodies as they jump around. The feeling of playing this game is nice, it's fun to lean back and watch a bunch of busy bots running around tripping over wires and themselves.

Definitely something to be proud of, especially in a compo setting! Nice work!