MAGICAE CATUS by chaikadev

The game:
You're a magical cat that is tasked to defend the earth against swarms of robots. Defeat as many as you can! Weapons switch automatically every 10 seconds.
Blog:
I wanted to add more weapons and enemies and polish the gameplay but I ran out of time. I will continue to update the game on itch.io, see the link below.!
| itch | https://chaikadev.itch.io/magicae-catus |
| my twitter | https://twitter.com/chaikadev |
| Original URL | https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/51/magicae-catus |
Ratings
| Overall | 729th | 3.368⭐ | 21🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 406th | 3.579⭐ | 21🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 1011th | 2.816⭐ | 21🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 760th | 3.474⭐ | 21🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 560th | 3.658⭐ | 21🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 740th | 3.278⭐ | 20🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 23🗳️ | 25🗨️ |
Since I'm a shmup-fanatic, some general notes that may be worth considering:
- Shmups tend to have snappier movement, to make dodging easier. I found myself drifting into bullets quite a bit, which can be frustrating.
- Most shmups don't have the bullets fly in the direction of movement, but instead straight-up. That makes it easier to position yourself, and also easier to build predictable bullet patterns based on enemy and the player's position.
- Some frames of invulnerability after getting hit might be nice to have for the player. Enemies tend to not have them because it's more satisfying to blast away at them, but getting combo'd yourself feels a bit bad.
I hope these can be of help when it comes to the itch updates. Keep it up!
-Tim
As for the gameplay you can safely stand on either side of the screen and wait for guided missile to pop.
The art style is nice, but a variation of enemies would be nice to see. Snapper and quicker movement of the character would as help. As for weapons, once I realized you can't collide with the enemies I stuck with the sword and waited near the top.
For weapons, I felt like the gun was a bit weak. Maybe that was the point. But maybe some sort of progression as you play (each time you "roll" a weapon, it "levels" up?) would help balance the weapons more.
Instadeath made it tough, which has its appeal. But some HP would've made the game last longer and given me a resource to manage, which I would've also liked.
Also, the game had style :v: well done