Black Body
A juicy arcade like bullet hell shooter around a black hole inspired by Galaga and Gravity Ace (by John Watson https://jotson.itch.io/gravity) This is my first game ever! This is a current prototype of the game originally made for VimJam 2020. Please leave some constructive feedback.
HIGHLY RECOMMEND THE DOWNLOADED VERSIONS! HTML5 version is super laggy. It is really just meant for people to what the game is like.
Last as long as you can! This game rewards chaining multikills together with a multiplier in the top right corner. Touch the black hole and you die. Collectable Power ups will float towards the black hole from the void, simply fly through them to pick them up. Don't let them touch the black hole!
CREDITS:
In-Game Music: Liquid Metal by Dos-88: https://dos88.itch.io/dos-88-music-library
Title Music : Joel Steudler Free Music Sampler: https://joelsteudler.itch.io/free-music-sampler
All other assets were created by me.
TOOLS USED:
Art: Photoshop CC and Piskel
Music/Sounds: Traction Waveform 11 Free (Highly Recommend)
Godot 3.2.2 game engin
Download
Click download now to get access to the following files:
Development log
- Black Body 1.3.1: Squashing Bugs!Oct 11, 2020
- Black Body 1.3.0: Juice and Polish!Oct 07, 2020
- Black Body 1.2.0 Update!Oct 03, 2020
Comments
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Hi, so despite what I said in the game jam, I don't know if I can fully get used to those controls with that perspective. I still love the idea of the orbit around the black hole and the physics/gravity that goes with it but the fact that I have to think before moving makes my reaction time quite low. And sometimes I just go in the wrong direction and die xD
It might just be me having trouble adapting to that setup. But in case it's not, an idea for making the movement more intuitive would be to keep everything the same but just make the camera rotate with the player. I don't know how well it would work though.
Now, on a more positive note, everything else (the audio, the visual effects and even the menus) is amazing and the shooting and feedback we get from it is really good :)
And I appreciate the addition of the easy mode and the additionnal lives we can get while playing. It makes it much more enjoyable than the game jam version.
Overall I really had fun playing it, the only downside being the difficulty with controls. For what it's worth my highscore is 5335 in easy mode (didn't even dare to try harder modes xD)
thanks for the feedback Seldon!
I like the idea of the blackhole. The gameplay is simple and easy to understand but very confusing at first especially that you can't see incoming enemies.
Very nice use of the sound effects! I like how there is a power up duration meters and beeping sounds that warns you the effect about to go which is a good touch.
My biggest complain is since this game is based on score, there is no increased difficulty the longer you stay alive. It makes the game not as interesting the further you go.
Oh and there's no theme "there and back" feature in the game which is what you need to considered next time you do jams. But there is collectible which is good.
Here's our jam game if you haven't tried already which I think you did https://meltedbrainz.itch.io/the-forgotten-artifact
Hey magsolid!
thanks for playing! Thanks for noticing the powerup sound. At first I just had the power bar at the bottom, but I realized people will probably not notice when it runs out and could get pretty annoyed (especially with the shield).
As for the difficulty curve, the rate at which enemies spawn increases by 0.2 seconds each time a "skeletor" enemy spawns up until a new enemy is being spawned every second. You may have encountered one of the know issues with this prototype where less enemies spawng after each death. (can't fix because of jam).
And I thought I actually hit there and back better than collectables with this game because you're going around and round the black hole! I actually had a lot more planned for the collectables component but didn't get around to it.
awesome! Cool sound! already addicted but and I suck only got 200 ptsðŸ˜ðŸ˜ðŸ˜ðŸ˜ðŸ˜
haha thanks man! it takes a lil getting used to the controls, but you'll get the hang of it!
I've not even started playing and the music is great.
Alright I've played the game for a few minutes and my only complaints are that it's a little bit weird to control and there's no real tutorial.
Yeah I wanted to implement a practice mode where you were invincible but didnt get any score but didnt get around to it. will probably do that after the Jam! Also there is a bug where less enemies spawn after each death so you have to reload the page, but you might be able to use that to get a handle on the controls!
I love the effect of that giant laser beam!! Awesome game, really fun to play and maybe this could be a great idea for mobile (swaping to move and tapping to shoot) 5/5 stars
Thanks a lot man! glad you liked it!
I loved the look and sound. I’m not a huge fan of the orbit. I also felt like the bad guys didn’t come fast enough, as any time I had a powerup it was over before the next fight. I’d kill an enemy, grab the powerup, and then it would be over, then the next enemy would appear.
Hey thanks for playing!
Yeah I wanted to change up how enemies were spawned but ran out of time for the jam. You also might be referencing a bug where less enemies spawn after each playthrough. Just reload the page after each death to fix this, i'll upload a fixed version where this isn't an issue after the jam.
There is some hint of intentionality to this tho, because I want to make you fly around and get enemies to group up so you can chain big multikills together rather than kill them as soon as you see them.
Cool game, vfx are on point! Not a huge fan of the controls though. The circular gravity makes for kinda clunky controls, and I more often than not died from lsing control of my ship rather than from an enemy. Maybe you could tune the controls so that vertical and horizontal axis aren't affected by the rotation of the plane?
Hey jackjong thanks for playing! yeah I tried going with that initially, but it just didn't really feel like you were orbiting something. once you get the hang of these controls I think they're better tho, but it's definitely something that might prevent players from continuing on.
Fun game cool it was made in Godot!
Thanks GDev11! glad you liked it.