LudumData

Claustroshooter by José Bonilla

[raw]
made by José Bonilla for Ludum Dare 54 (COMPO)

*Play on HTML5 now: https://manta-ray.itch.io/claustroshooter *

itch page Banner.png

https://youtu.be/FqxhS8oWbTU

Survive as long as possible inside a collapsing black hole while waves of aliens attack you. Beat the high score!

Premise

Claustroshooter is an action game made in 48 hours by manta ray for the Ludum Dare 54 game jam, on the "Compo" format (make everything yourself in 48 hours). The theme was "Limited Space".

What's the deal?

You somehow ended up trapped inside a collapsing black hole. Fortunately, you have a weapon which fires space expansion bullets, that can make it a little bigger. Shoot with them at the black hole.

Your weapon also includes regular bullets for attacking aliens, who are not amused you're invading their space, so they are teleporting in waves, to kill you. Shoot aliens with them.

Take into consideration, shooting regular bullets at the black hole will make it collapse faster!

Your goal is to survive as long as possible (and earn points on the way) by not getting crushed by the black hole and by killing aliens.

Scoring

  • Enter your name in Options so your desired player name gets into the leaderboard!
  • The black hole will get smaller and smaller. While the black hole is YELLOW, it gives constant points. The black hole does not give points if it's too big.
  • Kill aliens to get points.

Controls

There is a tutorial which explains the controls in game (note you might have to re-enable it in Options), but here they are as well:

  • Move: WASD or arrow keys Left joystick
  • Dash: Space while moving Left shoulder button while moving
  • Shoot space-expanding bullets: Hold right mouse button Hold left trigger
  • Shoot regular attack bullets: Hold left mouse button Hold right trigger
  • Pause/unpause: ESC Start
  • Interact while in menus: Mouse N/A

Devlog

  • v1.0 - Compo version

Credits

  • Game design: manta ray
  • Coding: manta ray. Using Gamemaker.

Used Jujujadams's Input library, FoxyOfJungle's PPFX post-processing library and my own Gamemaker libraries as well (including my UI library, gooey, which in turn uses Jujuadams's Scribble library for rendering text).

  • Art: manta ray. Using Aseprite.
  • Music: manta ray. Improvised one hour before submission and played/recorded on my Roland GP609 digital piano.
  • Sounds: some recorded by me, others taken from freesounds.org.
  • Fonts: SF Sports Night from dafont.com, and Agency FB included in Windows 11.
Link https://manta-ray.itch.io/claustroshooter
Link https://biyectivo.com/public_html/games/claustroshooter-source-code-without-ppfx-gmlive/Claustroshooter%20Source%20Code%20Without%20PPFX%20and%20GMLive.yyz
Original URL https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/54/claustroshooter

Ratings

Overall 53th 4⭐ 31🧑‍⚖️
Fun 97th 3.793⭐ 31🧑‍⚖️
Innovation 114th 3.672⭐ 31🧑‍⚖️
Theme 34th 4.345⭐ 31🧑‍⚖️
Graphics 125th 3.741⭐ 31🧑‍⚖️
Audio 67th 3.768⭐ 30🧑‍⚖️
Mood 91th 3.679⭐ 30🧑‍⚖️
Given 26🗳️ 32🗨️

Feedback

candlesan
03. Oct 2023 · 02:46 UTC
Cool - I got 11115 points but didnt' add my name to settings until after. Love the glowing look, the visual style is great. The music is fitting too and I can't believe you had time to compose two different music tracks for the game and menus separately!
Ackbad
03. Oct 2023 · 03:57 UTC
Quite fun, everything comes together very well. I do wish there were faster enemies though as I never really felt threatened and the speed upgrades never seemed to do much. I'm also not a huge fan of enemies spawning from the center even if it was well telegraphed.
🎤 José Bonilla
03. Oct 2023 · 05:03 UTC
@candlesan Thank you for your nice comments! I've modified the name in the database, so your correct name now shows up in the leaderboards :) Too bad you are #2 now, someone has already beaten you!
🎤 José Bonilla
03. Oct 2023 · 05:05 UTC
@ackbad thank you for playing and rating it! What was your score? You did not enter a name in the leaderboard. Let me know and I'll update it with your name!

Did you encounter the green enemies? They are substantially faster. I wish I had more time to add more enemies, I wanted to add shooter enemies to make it more bullet hellish at later stages. Maybe a post-compo feature? Regarding enemy spawn I only checked they didn't spawn too close to the player, but perhaps it would have been better to always spawn them at the border of the black hole.
goddzeproject
03. Oct 2023 · 06:04 UTC
At first I thought that this was another VS clone with a limited field. But after I realized that the field is not static, the game was transformed, the gameplay became more dynamic! Also nice visual style! A little lacking in variety of upgrades!
red-stake
03. Oct 2023 · 10:31 UTC
I really liked this!

Loved the central idea of shrinking the circle when you miss a red shot, that adds an extra level of tension. It makes me think if you could do something extra with the green shot? Like if you hit an enemy it strengthens them? That might add some extra chaos.

Other than that, I liked the sfx and music, and the overall level of polish was really neat.

I would totally play more of this - you should expand it out with extra mechanics/enemies and stuff.
🎤 José Bonilla
03. Oct 2023 · 14:58 UTC
@goddzeproject thanks for playing and for your kind comments! I wish I had some more time to add more upgrades and more enemies. To this end I could have taken the Jam route instead of the Compo, but my wife would have probably kicked me out of my home :)
🎤 José Bonilla
03. Oct 2023 · 14:59 UTC
@red-stake thanks a lot! The green bullet strengthening the enemies sounds great! I'll have to try adding it sometime and let you know how it goes
TTKayttis
04. Oct 2023 · 16:45 UTC
Really clean to play. Good use of theme, i felt there could have been more stages of reward for smaller area since it felt little easy for me and i quit because i felt there wast enough challenge after a point. As others have said adding some more upgrades/mechanics it would be really great game.

Also really nice tutorial to teach player.
🎤 José Bonilla
04. Oct 2023 · 16:51 UTC
@ttkayttis thank you for your nice comments! I might have made the expanding bullets and upgrades a bit op. I agree ok the variations. Best
Little Doctor Games
05. Oct 2023 · 23:38 UTC
Very fun game! Movement and shooting was good, and the graphics were nice and glowy, but I did feel as though there could have been a bit more feedback when the player gets hit. The first few times I died was because I didn't even realize that I was being hit in the first place. Also, the hitboxes for both player and enemy seem a bit big. But those are nitpicks! Overall the game was fun and presentation was good. Thanks for bringing it by the stream for me to play!
🎤 José Bonilla
06. Oct 2023 · 04:14 UTC
Thanks @little-doctor-games for playing it, your feedback and showcasing it on your stream!
Profugo Barbatus
08. Oct 2023 · 00:29 UTC
Great use of the theme! The mechanics might be simple, but they interplay really well and the interactions between them are satisfying. Very well done for a Compo entry!
🎤 José Bonilla
08. Oct 2023 · 00:44 UTC
@profugo-barbatus thanks a lot :)
Defrag
08. Oct 2023 · 04:10 UTC
Nice entry. I jumped right in and picked it up quickly. It wasn't until I had quadrupled my weapon shots that I realized the danger in doing so. Spraying bullets meant that I had to spend a lot more time reopening the arena. That adds a really nice, intuitive tension to gameplay.

One quibble - I think that using audio that you didn't create/creatively derive (ie, used from Freesounds) means that you shouldn't be rated in Audio.
Pious
08. Oct 2023 · 07:35 UTC
Pretty awesome entry. Nicely polished. Simple design but has really interesting implication. The upgrading system was very impressive to add into as well as everything else. Good job!
Mastoast
08. Oct 2023 · 08:38 UTC
solid entry, musics and visuals are great. Giving more points to the player when the black hole is not totaly expended is a very smart way to add risk/reward in the game, it's very effective
Agraffs
08. Oct 2023 · 18:18 UTC
The game is fairly fun and the entry solide, it was nice playing the game, better to use a mouse then a track pad that make things a bit harder. Nice game !
Hakro
08. Oct 2023 · 19:03 UTC
Very fun given the very simple concept. I liked the graphics, and the audio. At some point, I had 2 songs overlapping, when I restarted a new run, but it sounded nice and trippy, and it worked well with the game.

Very nice entry overall. GG.
cheesepencil
08. Oct 2023 · 20:56 UTC
6700!! I probably could have gone longer but the "transparency texture ghost" spawned directly on top of me and killed me instantly :cry:
🎤 José Bonilla
09. Oct 2023 · 03:22 UTC
@pious Thank you so much for the praise! I see you've also got the high score!
🎤 José Bonilla
09. Oct 2023 · 03:23 UTC
@mastoast Thanks for playing and rating!
🎤 José Bonilla
09. Oct 2023 · 03:24 UTC
@defrag Thank you for your comments and glad the mechanic worked out well! I agree with you.
🎤 José Bonilla
09. Oct 2023 · 03:25 UTC
@hakro thanks! Not sure what happened with the two songs overlapping. There is a part where I play the electric piano sound with the sustain pedal and it does sound echo-y, but not sure if that's what you heard or there is an actual bug.
🎤 José Bonilla
09. Oct 2023 · 03:25 UTC
@cheesepencil Thanks for playing! Ghosts spawning over you shouldn't happen, I think given that they are wider, the margin I set for preventing monsters spawning over you was not enough.
Pious
09. Oct 2023 · 04:47 UTC
Oh yeah I did, haha thanks for the engaging game haha!
woona
09. Oct 2023 · 05:56 UTC
Great game even though it's not scientifically accurate! I felt that it has enough depth even with such simple mechanics. There are several different enemies and a lot of upgrade choices.

Had a lot of fun playing the game! Great job!
jk5000
09. Oct 2023 · 11:06 UTC
A very well made compo game. Well done.
LDJam user 268934
09. Oct 2023 · 14:00 UTC
This is a solid game with a unique twist, shooting to make it bigger again. I appreciate the use of vibrant and luminous colors in the game design. Overall, a job well done!
🎤 José Bonilla
09. Oct 2023 · 14:16 UTC
@woona thanks for your comments! Obviously not scientifically accurate. Thanks for playing!
🎤 José Bonilla
09. Oct 2023 · 14:16 UTC
@jk5000 Thank you!
🎤 José Bonilla
09. Oct 2023 · 14:16 UTC
@senso Thanks for your kind comments!
BalimaarTheBassFish
11. Oct 2023 · 04:01 UTC
Brilliant work and wonderful concept based on the theme! All round great job, bravo!
🎤 José Bonilla
11. Oct 2023 · 04:42 UTC
Thanks @balimaarthebassfish :)
PSV Games Studio
16. Oct 2023 · 01:03 UTC
Nice game! Very fun and has beautiful graphics! Good job!
EmperorPenguin18
16. Oct 2023 · 03:19 UTC
This is very similar to the idea I was going for! Except yours is really fun!
🎤 José Bonilla
16. Oct 2023 · 04:27 UTC
@psv-games-studio thanks for your kind comments! Glad you liked it :)
🎤 José Bonilla
16. Oct 2023 · 04:29 UTC
@emperorpenguin18 thanks! Good you found it fun :)
quasilyte
19. Oct 2023 · 21:40 UTC
This is a very good game. I like that the area expansion mechanics stays relevant.
I also enjoyed the music and the overall aesthetics.
Sometimes I thought that the collision shapes are a bit too large and unforgiving, but I guess I should have used the dash more. It's just hard to tell whether something will damage you or not.
🎤 José Bonilla
20. Oct 2023 · 13:54 UTC
@quasilyte Thank you very much for playing it, and I agree on the unforgiveness. Also I would say the cooldown on the invincibility after you get hurt is a bit too short. Glad you liked it though!
zimny11
20. Oct 2023 · 21:48 UTC
Nice game! Very well done game. My only feedback would be: the music was a bit too chill for a shooter game, in my opinion. Anyway, good job!
🎤 José Bonilla
21. Oct 2023 · 19:41 UTC
Thanks @zimny11! You are probably right, but I had to improvise on my Roland piano 30 min before the compo deadline and that is what I came up with :)