Wheat by Tiseno

made by Tiseno for Ludum Dare 52 (JAM)

A game about collecting wheat.

Life is harsh for the common bird, but you have nested right above a ripe patch of wheat! Wheat can be found all over the ground! Collect as much as you can and store it safely in your nest for the coming winter.

And remember: birds only eat while in their nest, so be careful to return to your nest before you expend too much energy and starve to death.

Copy and share your final score in the comments!

(The current world record is ~~5752, set by my friend~~ 9933 by @ratrat44)

Controls

Ground

A/D or H/L- skip left/right

W or K - jump

space - flap wings

Air (while flapping)

W/A/S/D or H/J/K/L - movement

space - hover

General

t - show fps

v - toggle vsync

Love2d/Box2D

At the last minute I realized that the physics behaves different on different computers, most is the same, but some key mechanics are physics based and for some it might unfortunately be impossible/a lot easier. And yes I use frame dependent time for calculations, but I still do not understand what the issue is.

Version 1.1.0

Tweaked version which plays roughly as intended on my windows system, but is a bit easier on my laptop.

Version 1.0.0

Is the first version which works as intended on my Ubuntu laptop but is almost unplayable on my windows machine.

Running the game

Windows

Either download the zip from here or from https://github.com/Tiseno/LD52/releases

Others

You have to install love2d (https://love2d.org/) and download the love file https://github.com/Tiseno/LD52/releases

Then run with love wheat.love

Tips (MINOR SPOILERS)

If you do not need to be economical with your energy, holding down space all the time while flying is easiest.
You spend more energy while carrying a lot.
You spend less ambient energy while in the nest, but that time spent alive does not count in the final score.
When skipping on the ground, tapping space makes you skip/hover fast over the ground.
Max carry was the mechanic changed on the different platforms and was intended to be 62.

Link	https://github.com/Tiseno/LD52
Link	https://github.com/Tiseno/LD52/releases/tag/1.1.0
Link	https://github.com/Tiseno/LD52/releases/download/1.1.0/wheat.love
Original URL	https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/52/wheat

Ratings

Overall	388^th	3.524⭐	23🧑‍⚖️
Fun	323^th	3.5⭐	22🧑‍⚖️
Innovation	401^th	3.3⭐	22🧑‍⚖️
Theme	415^th	3.7⭐	22🧑‍⚖️
Graphics	521^th	3.35⭐	22🧑‍⚖️
Audio	362^th	3.158⭐	21🧑‍⚖️
Humor	374^th	2.95⭐	22🧑‍⚖️
Mood	499^th	3.3⭐	22🧑‍⚖️
Given		22🗳️	31🗨️

Feedback

Ysendrin

10. Jan 2023 · 15:07 UTC

Heyy, I liked it! It gets really hard pretty fast haha!
Loved the graphics, the gameplay is smooth. Some kind of musical ambiance other than the frogs sounds would have been great ^^

Aes1

12. Jan 2023 · 07:39 UTC

I collected 229 wheat, survived for 54 seconds, and then I failed the bird exam, for a total score of 3038!, cool game I really like the movement mechanics, It seemed pretty hard with the frog's reach since they are pretty spread out at the start after the frog hops I could avoid the tongue by going to the end of the map but I think 3000 is my limit, good game!

deimos

12. Jan 2023 · 16:22 UTC

Love the visual effect of the wheat and those little falling seeds. And the clicky sounds when I collect the seeds is really satisfying. You did well with the game juice! And the play cycle is complete and fun! good job man.

Xandruher

12. Jan 2023 · 21:56 UTC

Fun Game, I liked that it was not so easy as usual. :D I especially like your wheat visuals.

pikkufighter

13. Jan 2023 · 07:57 UTC

3102 was my personal best. The frogs really got me. Took me a while to learn that you needed to hold space and a directional key to fly properly. it was fun!

fizzbark

13. Jan 2023 · 08:06 UTC

This is almost a rage game, I found it almost impossible to land back on the nest twice in a row but still had some fun. Of all the farming games in this jam, yours has the best looking wheatfield, very peaceful and satisfying to just watch it sway.

DmitryGalias

13. Jan 2023 · 08:14 UTC

Nice game! It's an interesting idea, but when the frogs show up, it becomes too difficult to collect the weed.It would be great if you could add some hills not only plains. And maybe a few safe places on the ground.
![Screenshot_2.jpg](///raw/833/53/z/56587.jpg)
My record 3130

Renneberg

13. Jan 2023 · 08:27 UTC

Simple but a lot of fun. Really loved the frog animations at the end

Qooorti

13. Jan 2023 · 09:48 UTC

Nice aesthetics. Simple enough. A way to flesh it out would be to add levels

jcg

14. Jan 2023 · 15:54 UTC

There was a lot more detail to this beyond what I assumed just by looking at the cover photo; I really liked the little animations and polish given. The flight had a small learning curve, but was fun! My first play through was beyond optimistic; little bird went straight for collecting 100 wheat and perhaps to nobody's surprise, fat doesn't fly.

I think if you give this a background, with similar attention you gave the wheat swaying and frogs, it'd pull in more views.

Ratrat44

21. Jan 2023 · 05:09 UTC

I DID IT! it took me an hour but I beat your friend!
I like pixely and physicy games, so this one was quite cool to me!
I like how this game looks, it reminds me a lot of Stick Ranger and a bit of Rain World.
My tactics were to eat the seeds in the middle area and when the frogs come out, eat from the piles near the edges.
I'd also do some tiny flaps on the ground that kinda made me slide fast across the ground.
![Untitled.png](///raw/3cd/71/z/56b01.png)

🎤 Tiseno

22. Jan 2023 · 18:23 UTC

Haha damn @ratrat44 that's awesome, glad you enjoyed it!

Amolker

26. Jan 2023 · 19:43 UTC

Love this game very much! Minimalistic sounds and graphics are cute. The controls are nice, but it's too hard to control the bird until you have seeds. Also it gets too hard at high levels so you just have to wait until the frogs jump to the position below your nest. Also, I think it would be nice to give a chance to break free when you are caught on the tongue.

But in general! I played with great pleasure. Great job!