Restless Place post jam thoughts

This is just a short write up of my thoughts on the game after the jam

The Idea

When I saw the theme I immediately thought of a tiny room to platform around and defend. I worked on some of the graphics and during that thought it would be cool to be able to hit a ball into enemies as well. This eventually led to me making it so enemies could only be hit by the ball which is where the game is now. On the second day of working on it I decided to add the upgrade system which was inspired from playing different rogue-lites.

Challenges Faced

I think the hardest part was balancing the game. This is still an issue now with a few people mentioning they can’t get past the first few round but it’s not impossible at least. The main thing was increasing the rate at which enemies spawn but to do it slowly enough that it doesn’t become overwhelming in the small space. This led to me limiting the number of enemies on screen to only 4 which can be tough in itself. As well as this, for the game to spawn enemies, it must build up points which can be spent on enemies with tougher enemies costing more. This means you get more time to clear the room before they spawn.

The other side of balancing was tweaking the upgrades. It was tough getting to a point where you didn’t become too powerful really quickly. I think this led to the character being a bit under-powered at first so there’s still more to do there.

What I would have done differently

I think the only thing I would do differently is to get some music done a bit earlier. Would have added a lot to it but it was better not to rush it in in the end.

How the game turned out

I’m happy with how it all turned out in the end anyway. It feels like a complete game experience which can be hard in a jam in my opinion. It needs a few tweaks after and I want to add some form of boss fight as well so I’m excited to see where the game goes in the future.

Thanks for reading! If there’s anything specific about how the mechanics were implemented then feel free to message me on twitter(@samlowercase) or discord(43sam#2783)