The Long Journey Home

camdog · Post by **camdog** » Tue Mar 10, 2009 10:07 pm

(Crossposted on Castle Paradox)

Presenting: My first entry in the gameathon!

It's a nontraditional rpg/strategy hybrid about space exploration that's designed to be both highly replayable and completable in about 10 minutes. Just note when you try it that you probably won't win your first time through, and there will almost certainly be a lot of stuff you don't see on your first go.

I know tiebreakers points aren't cumulative for the contest, but I thought it'd be fun to try to implement as many of moogle's rules as possible for each entry, so these are the ones this game tries to implement:

1. Featuring as an important character any three of the following: a pirate, a ninja, a robot, a zombie, a vampire, or a cowboy. (Although it's arguable how important any of these characters are.)

2. Including an original composition as one of the game's songs. (Two new songs!)

3. Creating a game without any traditional fantasy elements. (Pure space opera!)

4. Replacing experience and levels with a different method of stat growth. (I suppose this is arguable too, as I didn't write anything to replace the default method, but it's impossible to level in this game; you must get stronger through items you find. And this is a core game mechanic)

Get it now!

http://www.slimesalad.com/forum/viewgame.php?t=1010

Post by **Mogri** » Tue Mar 10, 2009 11:14 pm

This sounds excellent.

Spoonweaver · Post by **Spoonweaver** » Wed Mar 11, 2009 12:12 am

That's a pretty fun game. Took a while to figure out what i was suppose to be doing.
But after winning some fights and recruiting some pirates I stumbled upon home and noticed that I didn't have to do any of the things I did in order to beat the game. So, great game, but disappointing ending.

Final score: 554

Fenrir-Lunaris · Post by **Fenrir-Lunaris** » Wed Mar 11, 2009 1:36 am

A wonderful fun game. My final score ended up being around 108 or so, which led me to believe that your initial position is SOMEWHAT arbitrary? Favorite enemies are those borg cubes that go down in one or two hits with those Vacuum Energy weapons.

camdog · Post by **camdog** » Wed Mar 11, 2009 3:15 am

Glad you guys liked it!

My guess is you haven't gotten the optimum ending, though... (You haven't if the game mentions that your home is destroyed by the cynite (borg cubes) after you get home).

And no, the starting position is not arbitrary; you start at the top left, home is the bottom middle. It's fairly easy to get there quickly, but you won't get the optimum ending.

Post by **Mogri** » Wed Mar 11, 2009 4:48 am

I had to mine hydrogen. For some reason, my character liked it so much that he spent the rest of his days doing it.

I stopped after four game-years. I'm guessing it's not supposed to last nearly so long.

camdog · Post by **camdog** » Wed Mar 11, 2009 5:30 am

Hah! Not generally, unless you're doing some intense role-playing I suppose...

But yeah, perhaps it should be more clear, you can mine for fuel as long as you like, and press spacebar when you're done.

Fenrir-Lunaris · Post by **Fenrir-Lunaris** » Wed Mar 11, 2009 5:44 am

Hey, it took Voyager 7 years to get back to Federation space, "Jim Tiberius" has a LONG way to go to catch up with Captain Janeway! As far as Hydrogen collection goes, just strap some bussard collectors to the forward facing surfaces of your cocrane-class warp pylons and you'll collect fuel AND move at the same time! Or you could just press the space bar whenever you feel the need to stop mining.

I'd always wanted to make a space-opera game kinda like this. I could never figure out how to work the battles, and there would be FAR too much ship customization involved. Screw the ship customization, it'd all be about landing parties and away teams. Punch the robot alien, sleep with the busty green woman, get johnny redshirt vaporized right after introducing him. Good times.

Again, AWESOME game.

Post by **Mogri** » Wed Mar 11, 2009 6:08 am

Ah, good to know.

I agree with Fenrir. I feel like I've only scratched the surface after playing it once (twice if you count my "Tiberius's New Hobby" run), even though I explored most of the planets.

One thing I have to suggest is being able to sell cargo before buying fuel. Otherwise, you're forced to mine. I guess you only have to lose a day this way (now that I know you can abort mining), so it's not a huge deal.

Fenrir, I'd play that game.

camdog · Post by **camdog** » Wed Mar 11, 2009 2:36 pm

Given that the game is randomized each time, is pretty unlikely you've seen everything, or even played a board where everything in game could be done. One of the game design decisions in this game was about how obvious I should make the optional quests/puzzles. Since the main focus of the game was meant to be re playability (hopefully made easy because it's so short), my hope was that players would be continuously discovering new things.

To help figure out the extra things to be done, just make sure to hang out a bars a lot, and read item descriptions whenever you acquire items! (Have you guys been doing that? Is it obvious that it's possible? I mentioned it in the tutorial, but I know it's easy to just skim through a bunch of text boxes. You can read an extended description of any item you pick up by using it in the inventory menu.)

[edit]
And yeah, I would TOTALLY play Fenrir's game too. As I'm sure you've noticed, there's plenty of star trek references in the game.

Post by **Mogri** » Wed Mar 11, 2009 4:29 pm

It's not immediately obvious, no, but it becomes apparent quickly.

It's especially obvious when you need to jettison something and you select the item instead of dragging it to trash, which I think I did twenty times even after I knew what I should do. Argh. I realize you can't change that behavior without changing the interface, but maybe that should be on your to-do list for v2.0.

Great game, by the way, if I haven't said it already.

(edit) To everyone who's played the game, why not take the five seconds it takes to give the game a vote? I'm sure camdog would appreciate it.

Newbie Newtype · Post by **Newbie Newtype** » Wed Mar 11, 2009 7:22 pm

I indeed voted. This is a great game, though not one I would play to get a high score, but rather to do stuff. I really like the simplicity in the design.