[Prototype] Dolphin Bodyguard

Ross

Hey everyone. Here is a little infinite runner/digger game I made last week.

You are a dolphin bodyguard and must protect the dolphin president as he takes a lift to the penguin ambassador. There are bad penguins who want to stop you. Not everyone likes dolphins!

1 keyboard/mouse player and 4 controllers are supported.

Thanks, @TerryPogger for the fancy sawng.

This was an exploration of Unity tilemaps that expanded into something. It's infinite because I didn't want to make an ending, but maybe that works? IDK. I hope its fun :)

Any feedback would be appreciated! I'd like to expand on this concept if it's got any potential.

Itch (Web and windows)


Gameplay video:

watman

1) The browser version is too big for my 1920x1080 screen. (I haven't downloaded the game yet but I assume it will scale properly?)

2) Arrow keys, please. I can't play with WASD. (Shift for jump, I guess.)

3) It's spelt bodyguard (UA).

(Also: why are you posting under the Renderheads itch account rather than your own? Just asking out of curiosity.)

M

shanemarks

@watman, thanks for the feedback. Good point re the alternative controlscheme - should be quick to implement.

Its posted under RenderHeads because we sponsored the prototyping time. The plan is to dedicated a chunk of our time to prototyping things, so with any luck there will be a bunch more games up there soon.

Ross

Thanks, @watman. Yep what Shane said.
1. Yeah AFAIK I need to make a better webgl template if I want it to scale properly when full screen is placed. The windows version scales properly to 1920x1080.
2. Cool, this was something in the back of my mind. Will do.
3. Dolphins have a different (but very similar) language. Ill localize it.

Thanks for the feedback. Dumb little things like these are important.

watman

@shanemarks That's a cool idea. I'll watch the itch page.

Ross

Ok the webGL scaling has been addressed, spelling mistake fixed and additional keys have been mapped.
Z and Ctrl for dig, Shift for jump. For controllers right trigger for dig now works as well as right bumper.

New WebGL and windows builds have been uploaded to itch.

watman

Browser version (still haven't downloaded): Up arrow, Control, and Shift keys aren't working on my computer (standard Windows QWERTY). If you don't make the game full screen you can't read the in-game text. Even full screen it's a little small.

Future feature request: I'd like a volume control. I love the music but it's loud.

Fengol

Please reduce the screen size for the web version

ashashza

Hey, I had a few goes. It's quite charming to play (music adds to that feel a lot), I got to max depth ~280.

Here are some smaller niggles I had:
- Initially I totally thought I was a wizard! (despite the word dolphin appearing multiple times on your post and the itch page)
- I wish I could click to start. I had to lift my hand all the way off the mouse to press enter! :p
- My first few tries, I didn't get chance to absorb all the tutorial text because everything start moving so quickly.
- Sometimes my digger-dolphin doesn't dig where i expect. I'm mostly holding down left-click and the pickaxe is moving but tiles aren't being dug. I feel like this isn't a problem when I'm also holding S to push downwards?
- For healing, my understanding is that it takes 10 stones to touch my avatar or the elevator to regain 1 health heart. But once I start bringing / collecting stones and they get ingested, I can't tell how many are still required to "complete" the heart.

At a higher level... for me to feel compelled to return and play more runs, I'd like to see more tiles / elements to the game. Maybe they exist but I didn't get a chance to see them above depth 280?

I really like that I can use the poor penguin explosions to help me dig deeper faster. I'd love to be able to also use lava to help me dig and/or exterminate penguins!

watman

That's true. I also keep thinking he's a wizard.