cyber_serpent by picross
- :star: - :star: - :star: - :star: - :star: -
:stars::milkyway: play in browser!! :milkyway::stars:
!! note !! -> current webgl build is updated with mouse input. for the original cyber_serpent jam experience, please download one of the builds from itch!
slither and shoot, but don't run out of space! can you beat the global top scores?!
controls :video_game:
| action | keyboard | xbox controller | | ----------- | ----------- | ----------- | | move | wasd | left stick | | shoot | mouse, arrows, or ijkl | right stick | | dash | space | right trigger | | pause | p | start | | restart | alt + r | select |
top the high scores :star2:
stay alive as long as you can to get a high score and top the online leaderboard! the longer you are, the higher your score multiplier will be
infinite mode ∞
take on procedurally generated waves of baddies. what is the highest score you can get?
challenge mode :trophy:
play through 30 curated waves to see if you can make it to the end and beat the boss
screenshots :desktop:
enemies :gem:
the serpent only has one weakness: its head. you will die if you run into an enemy, into the wall, or even into your own body! luckily the enemies will also die when they come into contact with either your bullets or your body.
| frog | cheese blast | bouncer |
| ----------- | ----------- | ----------- |
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| follows your head | emits a circular blast of bullets | bounces around the arena, look out! |
| sniper | lazy laser | hide and seeker | null hypothesis |
| ----------- | ----------- | ----------- |
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| shoots toward your head | fires a laser across the entire stage | tries to impale your head while avoiding your body | ?????? |
patch notes
oct 2 2023 - LD submission - submitted game
oct 3 2023 - post-jam emergency bugfixes - added a few frames of lenience to lazy laser and cheese blast attacks - fixed buttons not selecting in menu
oct 5 2023 - post-jam accessibility fix - added mouse controls
oct 9 2023 - post-jam bug fix - fixed bug where pausing rapidly increased score too fast
oct 13 2023 - pre score chasers fixes - added support for more controllers - resized and repositioned player hitbox to be more fair to player - added quick restart button, r/select - made laser hitbox more lenient - changed enemy bullet color to red - slowed down acceleration of hide and seekers - added more obvious dash indication
software used :computer:
- engine: unity
- models/textures: maya, procreate
- music/afx: renoise
team :hamburger:
- jaden goter: lead dev, music, sfx
- jianfeng sun: 3D modelling, animation, vfx
- camden obertop: gameplay programming
- zach randolph: ui and leaderboard programming
Ratings
| Overall | 36th | 4.276⭐ | 60🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 17th | 4.328⭐ | 60🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 263th | 3.737⭐ | 59🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 185th | 4.198⭐ | 60🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 64th | 4.491⭐ | 60🧑⚖️ |
| Audio | 22th | 4.31⭐ | 60🧑⚖️ |
| Humor | 529th | 2.971⭐ | 53🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 186th | 3.991⭐ | 59🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 64🗳️ | 97🗨️ |
The fact that you only have one life makes things very tense all the way through, so there's no real rest break. There's a lot that can kill you in this game and missing one thing sets you all the way back to the start. I lost most of my runs to the Lazy Laser since there's no warning before it shoots. You just have to recognize the enemy by its model and know to stay out of its way. That's really hard to do when you have seven other things to keep track of.
Oh, and forcing me to take my hand off the controller so I can click the submit button after every run was rather annoying.
But overall this was a fun and well-polished game. Great work!
I'm definitely coming back to this later. Good job!
Also most of the time I died to the laser enemy, too hard to react properly. Even a small telegraph before attack (drawing a line where the lazer will shoot) would be super helpful.
Anyways, replayed like 20 times, very addicting!
@zungryware appreciate all the feedback, thanks for always playing our games <3
@logicon211 great to hear!!! let us know if you get a high score on the leaderboard!!
@nozomu57 Great points! Glad you found it fun :D
@vyndilis @kyle-farwell @driagonv @rolferm thank you all for the kind words!
@n-feofentov @thebmxeur totally hear you. we plan on tweaking the difficulty and adding in some more difficulty modes post-jam. Thanks for playing, despite how hard it is!
Graphic direction is amazing <3
And yes agreed, it's a bug we're ironing out!
Yes, yes, yes!
I thought the movement a little wonky at times, having played with the keyboard, the serpent takes a while to change directions, and though it *is* quick, for such a fast paced game, it still feels slow, and I've ran into enemies because of the "steering" delay...
Well done! Take a candy! :candy:
The game is really well polished !
GG ! :)
@gentoogames LOL i love the old mac whisper tts voice, had to use it. thanks for the kind words!
@deadjolly yeah gamepad controls are definitely more appropriate for the game, glad it was easier once you tried that. Thanks for playing!
@catusfelony very fair! Would love to iron out the keyboard controls in a post jam build. Would rec trying with gamepad if you have one! Thanks for playing!
@jamesw appreciate all the compliments! thanks for playing even though its hard :D
@allenski @bobbie @falestress @hagamosvideojuegos thanks so much for playing!!
The only two suggestions that came to mind when playing it were:
- a quicker way to restart an infinite run - you get kicked back to the main menu if you select the play again option
- keyboard controls in the menu, and fixing the focus when hovering with the mouse
But overall, great entry!
- when you put your name into leaderboard it puts me into main menu after 1 sec automatically
- sometimes the horizontal beams kill me even when they have completely disappeared already. looks like their timing is shifted - they dont hurt in the beginning too
- the shots from cheese blasts disappear but still look very similar, sometimes hard to know if they will or will not kill me
- would be nice to have some visual indication of cheese blast enemies shooting cooldown
- after you are dead you still can dash
- need particles on players head when you die i think
good game. @camden-obertop im coming for that 1st place
Wanted to ask for score chasers if you were fine with me playing some gameplay of your game in the background + play the music from your game in the waiting period. (As well as if you were fine if I played your game music while competitors are playing your game if it gets picked as one of the games played in the competition). In the waiting periods its going to play tracks from games one at a time (entire track unless the waiting period ends) and while a track is playing itll cycle through gameplay from a bunch of different games in the background
Furthermore, I'm curious if you've also incorporated dynamic music into the project? The interplay between visuals and sound enhanced the immersive quality of any interactive venture.
I experimented with various control methods, such as using a controller, a mouse, and arrow keys, and I must say, all of them functioned seamlessly and offered a truly exceptional user experience. Your entry is truly impressive and stands out among the competition. This feels like a finished game :)
@senso we're so happy you enjoyed it! There is a touch of dynamic music, good ear! The kick drum track only plays when you're shooting bullets. The bullets have a fixed rate that roughly syncs to the BPM. I also created all the SFX so they're in the same key as my backing track. If they don't have a melodic pitch, I make sure they fit into the soundscape (like the enemy death noise, which is a 909 crash cymbal that fits with my other house drums). The music's segments roughly time with the backgrounds changing. I really wanted to create that authentic early-2000s acid trance/techno vibe!
Glad to hear all the controls worked for you! My favorite way to play is by moving with the left thumbstick on controller, but by aiming with my right hand on the mouse. Best of both worlds! Thanks for all the kind feedback!
Thank you Cyber Serpent, for telling me how much of a good job I am doing.
@fupi omg thank you for the art I love it so much! we definitely went for a simpler idea this jam and it allowed us to polish it up a ton. I promise it was lovingly crafted by humans... or was it ;) thanks for playing :D
btw we are big fans of The Rock that game cracked us up, we streamed it on our dev discord on 2 separate occasions
I'm still in awe of the style, this game has that Polybius-like quality to it where it feels like a forbidden piece of technology engineered to brainwash the masses, in this case with words of affirmation. This is the kind of game I could see a dead-faced teenager play with a neuralink in a post-apocalyptic cyberfuture movie. Simply unreal.
its little hard for me at first ,but I get hang of it quickly XD
@kanity thank you!! i love snake and i love geometry wars and they just seemed to naturally fit together. i'm so happy you liked the audio! i'm still pretty new to audio design and music composition so it means a lot!!