Play Fortress Swarm
Fortress Swarm: Chain Attacks's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Gameplay/Design | #5 | 4.000 | 4.000 |
| Enjoyment | #6 | 3.933 | 3.933 |
| Originality | #11 | 3.933 | 3.933 |
| Overall | #11 | 3.583 | 3.583 |
| Theme | #33 | 2.467 | 2.467 |
Ranked from 15 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
How does your entry fit the theme?
A bit far-fetched, attacks are "echoing" through the monsters on the battlefield
What would you like feedback on?
First, are rules easy to understand with the single picture-tutorial, and then, how is the overall playability. Is it worth taking further, and in what direction?
What assets did you use (if any)?
All assets were done by myself and some AI
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Comments
This seems like a great idea but to be hoenst, I just don't understand how to play. I'd really like to see an updated version with clearer instructions, good luck
I really like this game, you should publish it one day. The game is not actually hard to understand, it just needs a better tutorial, which I understand is hard to program with only three days. I enjoyed playing it on my phone, games like this fit portable devices very well. Things I would like to see in a new version are:
- the upgrade pop up should be on the right side of the screen so you can see the enemies and take more strategic decisions.
-A more attractive art style.
-Better tutorial.
-I guess, if you wanna make a full release, a story mode, if you come up with something interesting to tell, or a challenge/puzzle mode with limited moves or something like that.
oh, actually, I didnt understand what the piercing thing did.
Thank you! These are some really good points indeed, for when we want the monsters to go back especially for instance, we need to still see the board to decide what to do.. and the tutorial and art style definitely need a complete rework. The piercing allows you to attack a creature while ignoring 1 or more defense (for example, if he has 2 physical def and 2 hp, and you attack with a physical attack with 3 damage, he will have 1hp left, while with 1 point of hysical piercing, he will be dead). But in fact it is only usefull at start, when creature have low HP: If a creature has 3 physical def and 1 hp, and can still kill him with a physical attack with only 1 damage and 1 piercing. However it becomes useless once you have way more damages than the creatures defense..
gotcha, glad I could help :)
Let me start by saying that this entry took me a bit longer to review... because I couldn't stop playing it! :D
It's easily one of the most impressive and better entries of the jam. Everything about it is near perfection! The simple yet complex system implemented here is incredibly fun and challenging, and the upgrading system is a neat addition. The tutorial provided is simple and effective, allowing me to easily grasp the mechanics compared to just guessing and finding out on my own haha. (though I wish it had something to make it easier to learn but that'll be for later)
While I'm not the biggest fan of AI artwork, it works well within the context of this game. Considering the time crunch and the direction you took, it's completely understandable, and overall, the visual experience is quite nice!
If I had to nitpick, I would suggest having the tutorial as an interactive button rather than a splash image. This would allow players to learn faster and refer back to it if needed. Additionally, introducing some extra variety, such as range enemies or new types, could add more diversity to the gameplay. However, these suggestions are minor because, honestly, for a game developed in just three days, this entry is incredibly impressive!
Regarding the theme, I understand what you mean. It's a bit of a stretch from 'echos,' and it doesn't fit the theme too well in my opinion. Nevertheless, this doesn't detract from the fact that it's a great game. It showcases impressive skills and delivers an enjoyable experience.
Overall, despite the minor nitpicks and the theme aspect, I thoroughly enjoyed playing this game. I highly encourage you to continue working on it because there is so much potential here. Best of luck and wishes to you! Great job!"
Thank you so much for your kind review! I really appreciated it! Adding a correct tutorial is definitely something I need to do ASAP for the very first update of the game. But I think instead of an interactive buton, will integrate it directly in the gameplay in the first levels of a puzzle version of the game, progressively, so that should be easier to understand while playing. Yeah, I must say I’m not a big fan of AI art either, as I’m trying to learn to draw and it’s a bit discouraging to see what AI can do while I’m struggling to draw a simple body.. But that felt like a good opportunity to try it for this time especially since I wanted to use sorts of tokens, so any monster head would be fine for that… Again, thanks a lot for your review, that was really nice of you!
Awesome work with the gameplay design: this is one of those game I myself would never be able to make because I lack the skills to think about a small, compact working system like this one. Tutorials were there, feedbacks are basic put present, graphics are essential. Could be a great demo for something more!
Thank you! I’d say all it requires is some practice. Take some basic idea and refine it, twist it to reach something really promising, then all is left is finding some consistent element to show to the player and add some feedback elements to make it alive..
For instance I started this game with an idea of a character isolated in the middle of a grid, and he had to select the right direction (top/left/right/bot) to attack and move, while propagating its attacks to the neighbors of the target. Then I reused some elements from classic rpg (def/magical def, brut attack) to make the choice more complex (going from 4 actions to 12).. I tested a few things (At some point I had also critical damage for instance, but it didn’t work so I removed it.) but It didn’t seem to work like that, because I wanted both the player to be moving in a grid, and also that all direction would be occupied by monster so that the choices of the player really matters, and the strategy allowed him to anticipate something and feel rewarded (it all comes down to how does the player feel rewarded for its efforts).
So I refined the idea and reconsidered the player entirely, as well as the gameplay.
I needed the choices of target, but I didn’t need the character, so I put the grid at the center of the game and I found a new objectives for the monster, destroying a castle. I ended up with this castle and the grid which is pretty much clickable everywhere..
Interesting, just one question out of curiosity: did you prototype all the phases that you described here? Like, did you actually implement the character moving or was it just a document/mental idea/etc?
Only mental idea at start, trying to simulate the gameplay in my head and imagine what the interface of the game would look like, what would be the player actions what would happen on screen, and what were the issues with this idea. But once I had the grid idea, I tested it with a simple prototype with pieces of a board game, which can be really helpful too to help visualize ideas
Extremely engaging, this is easily the game jam entry I've spent the most amount of time on.
After four attempts, my best score was 712,300 at wave 72 :)
Thanks a lot! And that’s clearly a good score already, better than me :D, well done!
Made it to round 40 and this is quite fun. Although I will agree with you that this is quite a stretch on the theme, but its still fun to play
Thank you! really glad you enjoyed!
My highscore is 23.670, fun game, maybe add some skills to choose when to activate, like switching monsters places or adding status effects, also maybe range attack monsters that attack from the back row.
Woah, nice ideas, some range monster would be clearly cool, it would change strategy quite a bit, but that’s clearly a good idea to make the game evolve into something even more interesting. Thanks a lot for the suggestions, I’ll keep them in mind!
Very fun!
I definitely agree with a sentiment I saw glancing at the reviews that the image that explains the game's rules should be available through a button at all times, I just took a screenshot of it and kept it on the other monitor for a bit until I understood how it all worked.
I appreciate the unique take on the "echoes" theme and I think it fits pretty well for that.
Overall creating a game with mechanics this intricate in just 15 hours is very impressive and I could definitely see this becoming a very popular strategy game if you continued development. If you wanted to take this further I feel you should put more focus on the visual and possible story aspects of the game and of course mutate and evolve the gameplay as the player progresses adding new mechanics the further in they go. Overall I do hope you continue development because I'd love to check in on this and see how it progresses!
Thank you! I think I will develop it further, and indeed the art will be a challenge, especially all the backgrounds and the clarity of UI. I might evolve it into a puzzle game too, this way I’ll be able to integrate the tutorial into the gameplay itself, which should definitely be better. Thanks again for the kind review, I appreciate it
This game is awesome! Please make a full fletched game with all the bells and whistles because you are so close! I would gladly take the job of creating all the graphics! ;) Would be perfect on mobile. The only issue I have with the game is that I suck. :P
Wow, thank you so much for the heartwarming review! I’m definitely thinking about going further with this one indeed. It could clearly fit on mobile although it might be a bit small to click on the right buttons, so UI might need some deep rework… And be sure I’ll keep your proposition in mind in the future, I’ll have to try a few things with the gameplay before going bigger.. Thanks again, really
Not easy to understand at first, but dangerously addictive
Thanks a lot! As I said, my developer highscore of 446 000 looks really weak already :D but it’s awesome to see people enjoying the game! I must say I definitely spent about a 3rd of my development time playtesting and getting lost in long runs before I noticed… Definitely felt addictive indeed!
at first hard to understand but after some rounds it is much fun. I really like it! for the future maybe you could add more late game content or more levels in some way. or maybe abilities?
Woah! I was gonna put the “developer highscore” on the itch page, which is 446 000 at wave 64… You totally crushed it, day one :D well done!! I have to go back replaying it now :D Yeah more late game content could be nice, I coded a diagonal propagation for instance, but I had no time left to add it to the upgrades… I’m not sure what you mean by abilities, but I thought about selecting a row/column to clear it for example, but that was too complex to implement (new buttons to add and so on…). And thank you, your remark made me think about other types of levels, and I think puzzles could be interesting, meticulously crafted with a single solution. And it could be used for the tutorial as well.. Thanks again, really glad you enjoyed!
The rules are very hard to understand, i was overwhelmed with too much information in the single picture, i gave up on reading it as soon as i saw it. consider not forcing it on the player and make it a button in the corner so you can toggle it on and off. i dont play many match-games but this felt like a cool spin on the genre.
Thank you for the review! Indeed, it could use a real tutorial for clarity. I put the image on the itch page directly to help, but it could be a button in game as well, thanks for the suggestion. Thank you for testing it!