Island in the Sky
A downloadable game for Windows
What I've got so far for GBJam #5. My first jam and also first attempt at actually finishing a game! So far it's been tutorials and "Can I do this? Yes, now trash it." I'm pushing against my nature to get this done on time! Can I do it? You'll just have to tune in to find out...
I'd love to hear back from anyone with advice or comments! Even if it's just "Lame, another Breakout clone..."!
Controls:
Spacebar - start ball moving at beginning of level and after respawn
Left and Right - move paddle
R - restart game after losing all lives (working on automating this...)
Minimum viable product (complete)
+Ball that bounces off walls, bricks, and paddle, and is destroyed when it leaves the room
+Paddle that moves left and right, stopping at walls
+Bricks that break after 3 hits
Stage 1 features (in process)
+Ball changes angle when hit by different parts of paddle (works! -But sometimes shoots ball downward when hit on side...)
+Speed of ball increases over time
+Number of lives that decreases when ball leaves the room
+Restart level when lives decreases to 0
Stage 2 features (If I have time!)
+Multiple levels, change to next level when all blocks destroyed (only two right now, just to test going from room to room)
+Sound
+Block that creates an extra ball when destroyed
-Music
-Title Screen
-???
-Profit!
-Never bounce the ball down from the paddle (Must squash bug! Later!)
Download
Comments
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Heh, well, you got the pong sounds down pretty well. The music, well, felt a bit like pirate ship music to me? :P I just feel like a pong game such as this needs more happy, fun music. But maybe that's just me.
For a pong game, I mean, it's pretty much standard. I do find it odd that when the ball hits the paddle while moving, it can send the ball into an almost perfect horizontal line, rebounding between the two walls. It takes a long time not because the ball is bouncing around other blocks, but sometimes just because of this very gradual upwards movement that can take quite a while before it actually reaches the blocks!
The graphics feel very retro, which is neat. I like how the island is the paddle. But what does that make the ball, then? And why would the ball constantly hit the island? :P
Good observation on the theme! I actually started this just to make Breakout, but I decided to create art halfway through and it eventually morphed into the final version. I wish I'd have come up with the theme in the first place, I could've tried to have it make sense.
The bouncing horizontally is annoying. But what is worse is the bug it replaced. If you hit far enough to the side, the ball's direction would go down instead, straight through the paddle and into the void! I should have tightened the angle possibilities to prevent the super-boring wall-to-wall bounce problem, but I ran out of energy. My wife hates when it does that too, that should have clued me in earlier.
As for the music, I grabbed a track off a random midi generator last minute and it sounded nice enough. I wish I'd got some happy bouncing music, or at least something a little more uplifting. I do love pirates, though - maybe it's just unconscious bias...
Anyway, thanks for playing and leaving such detailed feedback! I had a lot of fun making this, and I'm proud now to tell people "I made a game!" I just don't elaborate on how original or well-designed it is :)