| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Community choice | #13 | 3.000 | 3.000 |
Ranked from 8 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
Team Name
Damon L. Wakes
Maybe it's because I was playing on a 60hz monitor but the numbers on the dice appeared fuzzy and unclear to me, they kind of hurt my eyes. Other than, it's kind of a frustrating game when you think you're shooting a six and it turns back into a one before destroying that red block you wanted! Some dice also seem to spawn in and then just stay floating in place for me.
Could be interesting with some more development!
That's funny - I ran into the same "fuzziness" problem initially myself, but thought I'd fixed it by making the dice bigger. The first setup I had was about half the size (and also made for too many bricks on screen). Is your monitor 1920x1080? That's what I'm using (albeit at 75Hz).
Dice are supposed to spawn a short distance from the paddle, sit for a second, then launch towards the paddle (giving the player a rare chance to aim a shot with some degree of precision). I suspect the ones that just stay floating may be getting nudged away from the paddle just before launching, meaning that the force towards the paddle simply cancels out whatever force nudged them in the wrong direction - unfortunately dice that start bouncing horizontally can often do that. I think if I were to put this together again I'd probably not use an actual physics engine to handle the collisions, though it did save a ton of time just for the jam.
Thanks! That might help clear things up. Your 4k monitor could be making the dice look fuzzy, but I don't have a higher resolution screen to test the game on myself so that's just a guess. (It certainly sounds like what I experienced at 1080p with dice sprites of a smaller size.) The physics issue almost certainly isn't just at your end: I suspect it's probably a quirk of how the new dice spawn then move. It shouldn't ever happen with the only die on screen, but once there's another one bashing about it's possible for some of the forces to cancel each other out: I've seen it happen on several occasions myself.
An interesting little game, though the dice physics feel a bit odd. I would appreciate either a timer that indicates a countdown to the next die or alternatively the ability to just choose when to fire (maybe on a cooldown).
Yeah, that's fair: if I were to do this again I'd probably opt to write rules for the dice movement rather than count on the physics engine to do all the heavy lifting. I did actually consider having a timer for the next die to appear, but it was complicated by having the delay reset when no dice are on screen. Definitely a good idea, just more than I could fit in during the jam.
Simple, bonkers, chaos! Very fun, and the exploding dice are a great feature to get rid of stragglers. I enjoyed the game and played through all the demo stages. My only notes:
Honestly though these are very trivial notes and if you did nothing to address either of these it'd still be fun!
Ah! I actually shifted the paddle a little higher very late in development. I hadn't tried it on mobile until I uploaded the HTML5 build to itch, and when I did I discovered that having the paddle right at the bottom of the screen meant my finger obscured it while trying to use touch controls. It probably is a little close rather than a little far at this point: in hindsight a check to see if the player is on mobile (and a shift in paddle position if they are) might have offered the best of both worlds.
When it comes to the sideways-shooting dice, I've got no idea what's doing it. If I were to remake this I'd probably specify movement rules rather than simply rely on GDevelop's physics engine for everything, though I am rather fond of the exploding dice myself!
Well implemented! I was on the train and this is exactly the game I want to play. Its relaxing, its pauseable. However I cant feel the odds before reading the description. I played it as usual and I hardly find it heavily depends on the odds of dice.
Other than that this is a good little game. Btw those customized level designs are cute.
Thanks for playing! In hindsight the die vs brick scores ultimately might not work all that differently to other Breakout-style games where bricks have varying hit points (since a 1-in-6 chance to destroy a brick is statistically similar to a 6HP brick). It's also just plain hard to follow exactly what value any given die has at any given time, which might contribute (and sort of makes me wonder if this could have been turn-based...).
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