Really liked this movement system, though I think you could simplify the controls by putting everything on the arrow keys (up and down to move orbit, left and right to change speed). I've been trying all the games about orbits and I think this is the most creative I've seen so far. Great job!
Oh, and I think you wrote "UP ARROW" two times in the tutorial by accident
Thank you for trying my game and your word of encouragement!
Yes, I was originally going to stick with that control scheme that you also mentioned. Problem is that using the arrow keys introduces an aspect of confusion into the game regarding ascending and descending in orbit, because the direction between the player and the planets changes constantly. Since, as you orbit, up and down invert in logic but stay the same in the controls, also because my camera has a fixed rotation. Pressing the up arrow to ascend makes sense when you're above the planet, but once you're below it, that same key now visually feels like it should descend instead.
To avoid disorienting players and myself I decided to go with the temporary fix of assigning those actions to Space and Ctrl. They’re neutral in terms of direction and convey the "go up" and "go down" idea better without me needing to add accessibility features such as changing ascend/descend using the angle between the player and the current orbit parent, or using mouse clicks on the planet and outside of the planet to go in the direction that the player wants. I’m still thinking about possible fixes.
I too looked around the jam for this style of orbit gameplay to see if anyone has implemented a better control scheme. One good example I saw (which I also noticed your comment on their jam page) was the game “Nova Looper”, that game automatically descends the player when no input is detected and only ascends the player with the mouse1 button, which easily helps with conveying the ascend/descend idea.
I’d like to hear more of your opinions on the game's design solutions if you have any!
Also thank you for highlighting that typo, I will upload a fix once the jam voting finishes.
