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A jam submission

Martians in Manhattan! (GMTKJam)View game page

Dash and punch around to defend Manhattan from Martian invaders and rack up combos.
Submitted by Jackson Allen — 22 hours, 46 minutes before the deadline
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Martians in Manhattan! (GMTKJam)'s itch.io page

Results

CriteriaRankScore*Raw Score
Overall#2153.3333.333
Theme#2223.3333.333
Feel#2972.6672.667
Innovation#3462.6672.667
Aesthetics#3622.6672.667

Ranked from 3 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.

How does your submission match the theme?
Although the game perhaps sticks a bit too close to the Downwell design ideals, both dashing and punching have dual purpose design that bounces off of each other.

Since jumping is impossible and standard movement is sluggish and only useful for small adjustments, dashing is used for primary mobility. It's also necessary for getting close to enemies due to the range of punches.

When in range, punching not only starts combos to increase score, it also recharges the dash, which encourages you to dash next to another enemy and continue the combo.

Also, dashing will often overshoot an intended final position, so punching can be used to stop the dash and slow your descent.

The multiple purposes of dashing and punching work together to create an optimal playstyle for player enjoyment, where they dash from Martian to Martian in a combo frenzy, dashing, letting out a flurry of punching, and dashing away.

Third-party resources
Game engine: Gamemaker Studio 1.4 https://www.yoyogames.com/gamemaker
Image editing: Paint.net www.getpaint.net
Sound effects: Bfxr www.bfxr.net
Music: Gameboy Ghastliness by Airborne Alchemist, used with artist's permission.
Font: Coder's Crux by NALGames http://www.dafont.com/coders-crux.font

Contributors
Programming, design, art, and sound by Jackson Allen (Me)
Music by Airborne Alchemist
Testing by NathanOfTheShire, BoxheadPixelart, OnomatoWomba, and more in the discord.

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Comments

Submitted

Feels like its easier to not dash and just hold still. I like the back and forth use of dash and punch on the mouse. Hope you keep working on this one

Developer

Thanks for playing!  Yeah, I noticed that when testing, I just had no good idea for how to make that a less viable option or further incentivize dash playing, which I think is far more fun.  I'd like to work on the mechanic further, but I'm not sure how to take it, so I think I'll take a break and work on other projects first.