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GravityGameJam Falling Rocks's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Enjoyment - How much you enjoyed playing this game. | #5 | 3.250 | 3.250 |
| Overall | #6 | 2.917 | 2.917 |
| Presentation - How well executed this game is. | #7 | 2.750 | 2.750 |
| Concept - How interesting or unique this game is. | #7 | 2.750 | 2.750 |
Ranked from 4 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
What assets did you use in this project?
skyboxes, rocks, gun decorations, 3D text, audio, AI-generated achievement images; see credits page in app
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Comments
Hi, Astronaut here working his way towards Commander. I didn't know I had a deep seeded hatred towards rocks but it will be a cold day in hell if my 10 ton hand laser and I even let one gosh dang rock hit this planet. Complete game changed was when I went and laid down on my couch instead of playing it standing. Simple and fun concept. I can definitely see myself relaxing on the couch shooting up some more rocks.
Glad you like it! It will be fun getting the other achievements too.
That was fun - I enjoyed it! Simple concept and well executed... it's really playable!
It does feel like you could expand on this quite a lot, but it's great as a starting concept and shows just how playable a more enhanced version would be.
Here's a few things that spring to mind that can be improved on:
- Have the bullets slower so it's more like you have to predict where the asteroid is going rather than a straight on direct hit
- Have asteroids split (like @ToreadorGames suggested). I mean, you could probably get away with just spawning two smaller asteroids half the size without accurately splitting the mesh.
- I didn't really feel much of a threat when playing the game, so adding some other objects at ground level might help to give extra threat in the game.
- I think this game would reach awesome status if you had two massive guns, one in each hand... imagine that, two massive cannons and you can double up the intensity of the asteroids & other threats!
Plus a few minor things. I feel you need to increase your shadow resolution in the quality settings, it's very low resolution and noticeable (don't worry, the quest hardware can take it!). The muzzle flash is quite distracting and it feel like it needs reducing. Also when pressing the settings & achievements menu buttons, they appeared behind me - I didn't see them at first.
Overall, a really fun and enjoyable game - a simple, clean idea done really well. Great job!
I tried a bunch of different quality settings to try to get a better looking shadow for the gun, and to get shadows to appear sooner under the rocks, with no luck, so if you've got some recommendations... Part of the reason for the lack of rock shadows is that I have a directional light pointing upwards, as well as one above; otherwise the whole area gets pretty dark.
You'd get a little more feeling of threat with the donut hole and donut settings at minimum size. The rocks would be more likely to drop directly overhead. :-) And you'd get a slight touch of the "need for prediction" effect if you set the gravity strength to maximum.
I couldn't duplicate the problem with the menu screen locations. The menu screens are child objects of the camera offset, so they should appear in the direction you're facing. Was it just the settings and achievements screens that appeared behind you, or the back and credits screens as well? Does the achievements screen appear in the right place when it displays at the end of each level? What happens if you hit the recenter button?
The shadows can be improved in the Project Settings->Quality section. Set the Shadow Resolution to 'Very High' and reduce the shadow distance to whatever looks best for the game (smaller the distance, the more detailed the shadows will be). Set 'No cascades' too... Hopefully that'll make the shadows look better in the game. Also, on the shadow casting light itself, just reduce the strength a bit so they aren't as dark.
Alternatively, considering you're on a flat plane and the asteroids are mostly spherical, you could just cheat and render blob shadows for things, which will be a lot cheaper and also kind of look nicer in the end...
As for the screens, yeah, it was all of them - they always appeared behind me, not sure why? I tried resetting the view, but still had the same outcome. It kind of looks like it's displaying the menu in the opposite direction to what I'm facing for some reason...
I did some more experimenting on the shadows. I upped the Resolution to Very High, and that improved the shadow of the gun. Shadow Cascades was already turned off. The strength of the upward-facing directional light didn't seem to make a difference in shadow quality. I found the Shadow Distance to be a tradeoff between gun shadow quality and where/when rock shadows appear. The distance to the edge of the platform is 400, and I had the shadow distance set to 20. So only rocks that fall directly overhead cast a shadow, and the shadow doesn't appear until just before impact. But higher values result in a bad-looking gun shadow. A value of 10 causes the rock shadows to barely appear at all. I like the idea of seeing the shadow before the impact, so 15 to 20 seems about right. I didn't look into blob shadows yet. Thanks for the help on what to tweak.
When I realized we were gonna do some Missile Command action, I had hoped for some cell fracture/Asteroids kinda fun, but accept that we all have to start somewhere. Here's a link to a free Unity asset that will take your falling rocks up a notch or two, and then check out 'Cell Fracture' in Blender to be able to make your own!
https://assetstore.unity.com/packages/3d/props/breakable-asteroids-167825
If you wanted to expand on this concept further, I'd suggest perhaps having a multiple grab setup for a large cannon like you have (to reduce the wiggle of this 'heavy weapon') and/or options of one big gun vs. two smaller guns (one for each hand?) Maybe the rocks that hit the ground spawn enemies that charge you at ground level, to vary the angle of what you're shooting at? Nice one!
My original idea for the gun was some kind of swivel, but I was having trouble implementing it, and then I realized trying to aim it properly while playing would likely be too slow.
I gave the game a try. It was fun, other than having to crane my neck to look up at times. Played through level 3.
Glad you gave it a good try. Batman485 posted he was having fun playing lying down.
Here's my me-GPT review: Strap in and get ready to blast off in this stellar VR shoot-'em-up! In a desolate landscape, you're armed with a laser cannon so powerful it could make a Death Star blush. With each wave of asteroids, the difficulty skyrockets, but fear not – your laser-fueled fury will pulverize those space rocks into cosmic crumbs. Surrounded by breathtaking spacescapes, you'll feel like the ultimate guardian of the galaxy, defending your land-sphere of a planet one zap at a time. It's a meteoric rise to heroism. Prepare for an out-of-this-world adventure that’s truly a blast!
Love this!
looks very cool!
Thank you, that's great to hear.