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Cart #floodedcaves-0 | 2022-04-04 | Code ▽ | Embed ▽ | License: CC4-BY-NC-SA
139

it's flood season, dig caves to redirect an inevitable rising water until you can save everyone
Also available on itch.io for binaries https://nusan.itch.io/flooded-caves

This game has been made in 48h for game jam Ludum Dare 50

Your digging power is limited, it recharges over time. At regular interval, you can save someone by sending your rescue team

You can play the game using a keyboard (action is key C ), a gamepad or a mouse

P#109673 2022-04-04 11:40 ( Edited 2022-04-04 11:41)

1

This is really clever how the water physics have balance between predictability and randomness to give the player interesting decisions.

I saved everyone on a really hard level, but it did feel really hard.

It would be a very different game, but would the physics support having some rafts (that float) sitting around the bottom of the map, and the way you save people is to guide a raft to them and then make sure it carries them the rest of the way to the surface as the level fills?

P#109678 2022-04-04 12:26
1

Very nice! I had a lot of fun with this one, and I'll definitely be playing it more. The water physics was a little counterintuitive for me - I kept expecting pressure to force water up from below, but then I started thinking of the water more like sand and that helped a lot. That might be for the best gameplay-wise, though, I think it likely makes for more interesting decision-making. Great game.

P#109686 2022-04-04 16:26

Great game, but the water pyhsics were a little odd. I think @luchakis right and thinking of the water as sand helped to determine where it would go. But this didn't stop the game from being loads of fun.

A very simple and effective game that is well executed.

@NuSan : A suggestion (that you can ignore): In the game it obviously makes sense to get the lower trapped humans first. To add more challenge to the game, you could implement a points system where higher points are given for rescuing humans trapped lower later in the game. The score for rescuing a human is the Y position multiplied against number of humans already rescued.

P#109705 2022-04-04 21:24 ( Edited 2022-04-05 14:40)

It's really fun to just play around with the water physics in this, it's really satisfying just watching how areas fill up and watching the flow. Super impressive work for 48 hours!

P#109956 2022-04-09 12:36

Fun concept (and well done!)

P#109958 2022-04-09 13:24
3

This is a really fun game! Thanks for making it.

I've been playing on the "really hard" difficulty level for a while, and I've found a strategy that works most of the time. When it works, it becomes quite easy to save all 18 people. But every now and then the cave layout doesn't make it possible, and the game gets hectic.


Partway through the game, the incoming water stream doubles in width (1px to 2px), doubling the rate of water coming in. But the stream also acts as a "wall" that prevents horizontal flow. This allows you to fill up the left and right sides of the screen separately.

In the game below, there were fewer people on the left side, so I saved them first. The left side is now entirely flooded, meaning no new water is coming in from the left side of the stream -- i.e., the stream is effectively back to being 1px wide again, even though this screenshot is from the end of the game.

I also carved the rock such that the air bubbles rise diagonally, going up and to the right. This allows me to erase rock on the left side of the screen, yet the air bubbles surface on the right. This is important because it allows me to keep the flooded side completely full, while still draining the water from the remaining 1px-wide stream.

P#113696 2022-06-26 21:47
1

@cmounce haha, impressive technique, I added the second water stream late in dev as a way to balance and make it more tense at the end, and also to counter the FPS slow down
Interestingly I managed to make an optimized version that run full speed but I can't balance it properly to keep the tense and hectic at the end

P#113711 2022-06-27 05:37
2

I'm really enjoying playing this game. The gameplay is well balanced and I find it so satisfying digging through the rock and moving the shape of the water. I keep coming back to it for a quick blast.

One technique to save drowning people is that their "drowning meter" resets when they fall. So if they are submerged you can keep them alive longer by letting them fall a little way then waiting, then repeating the process.

One other "game mode" you can play is: can you drown all the people (on easy level) before you are allowed to rescue the first person?

P#115553 2022-08-10 11:30
1

Gosh, that was well balanced, intense and great fun!

P#116346 2022-08-27 05:46
1

Really great game, very tense, and very impressive it was put together in 48h. Really creative use of the mechanics.

P#116348 2022-08-27 08:39
4

Am I a bad person?

P#116491 2022-08-29 12:43 ( Edited 2022-08-29 12:44)
2

Wow, I just barely managed to get through the easiest level without losing a life. Superb gameplay, interesting mechanics. Addicting overall. Gold star work, @NuSan !

P#116552 2022-08-30 00:26
3

Why was this done by me

P#118661 2022-10-06 12:44
1

@Spuder Can't drown in a cave if there's no cave ;)

There's one pixel left. You know what to do.

P#118667 2022-10-06 14:55
1

I beat all the gamemodes, good game:)

P#120796 2022-11-16 12:54
1

i somehow saved everyone in super hard on my first try, but 2 people (possibly more) did get close to drowning

P#122033 2022-12-08 16:43
1

Music is really awersome, difficulty is well balanced, did on mobile, normal, or eazy, i clicked on eazy idk, bad that it didnt worked normally in p8 player, just didnt showed out cave and only texture of logo in right upper corner :P

P#123876 2023-01-07 10:27
1

i just love the music so much! this is so fun and i just cant stop playing it!

P#125343 2023-02-05 05:12
1

This is more addictive than I would have expected. I've run thru every difficulty level twice.

P#128880 2023-04-22 08:25
2

THIS GAME IS SO FUNNNNNNNN

P#129232 2023-05-01 14:35
1

Really good game!

I'm new to Pico-8 and just started looking around, but this game is the one that I keep coming back.

Awesome music, interesting concept, fun and rewarding gameplay that is super easy to understand / get into. I love the "sandbox" aspect of it as well.

P#139207 2023-12-26 17:39

@donbattery - completely agree. This is one cart I return to again and again and again. Short enough to only take a few minutes and as relaxing or as stressful as I want it to be.

P#139254 2023-12-27 11:54
1

Thanks! It warms my heart that this game is still played today, I'm glad I managed to strike a good balance for the difficulty, and that the game can be both a relaxing puzzle and an hectic battle against the flood

P#139256 2023-12-27 12:26
1

I have probably told you on every channel already, but thx for coming up with this genius game concept! I updated my clone to reflect it's heritage in the game's menu :) Nothing beats your difficulty settings though, they are perfect. Here is my clone:

Cart #cavedivinggonebad-1 | 2024-01-06 | Code ▽ | Embed ▽ | License: CC4-BY-NC-SA
18

P#139701 2024-01-06 12:22 ( Edited 2024-01-06 12:23)
1

Really good fun this. I'm surprised I never noticed it before. Anyway, I made a video here:

https://youtu.be/GHKHr57wx98

I'll be taking a look at the clone above me in another video so look out for that one too. :)

P#139998 2024-01-11 17:47

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