Hi all! I've finally got a working version of my first Playdate game which I've tentatively called Light Year 200X. I've never done anything like game dev before so it's been quite a challenge, and I have no idea how easy, difficult, or fun this will be!
You control a pair of robots on a deep space colony ship tasked with keeping the hibernating cargo alive. At semi-random intervals a pod will require Food, Meds, or Water and, if you don't get it to them in time, they'll die. The menu system is rudimentary and I have future plans for more functionality, but since I've got it working I figured I'd get it out there.
If you have any thoughts or feedback, it'd be appreciated!
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This is pretty cool, your art style looks very nice. I love the death animation haha
Maybe in the empty area have a close up of the pod/character just to fill in the empty space
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I really love this concept and setting for a video game, and it also already looks pretty nice!
Because you ask for feedback, here are some thoughts on what I would add:
- Since the gameplay is time based, I would always show a clock on screen, maybe where every realtime second a minutes passes. This will add some gameplay structure and urgency to the game.
- Maybe show some pod statistics per pod, like age, brain activity/intelligence, health etc.
- Besides managing people, the robot also has to manage itself, like diagnostics and virus checks which also takes time to complete. An internal robot problem could be that controls are reversed for example.
- This also opens up the possibilities of received software updates, that give the robot more features which result in new gameplay mechanics.
- People that have died can be replaced with cloning, but that would have the downside that each clone replacement has lower stats, until cloning is barely possible and often fails.
- I'd would also not make the game too long, but to have multiple different endings based on how much pod people survived and the cumulative stats of the group. Endings like what happens to the colonization or settlement some time after the ship has landed on the other planet. This increases replay-ability.
- You could also decide on a level system; That landing on a planet after some time is the end of the level, and that after colonization is a success the ship gets sent to another planet with new pod people and new problems along the way.
Keep up the good work, and I'm looking forward to see what you'll come up with for your game!
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