Ludum Dare compo 25: The Plague

Hey all,

I'm participating in the Ludum Dare competition, where you have to create a game, inclusive assets, code, music, everything within 48 hours. The theme is "you are the villain", and sunday night is the deadline. I actually started an hour or 10 ago, wasn't able to begin earlier. I'm using 3D Gamestudio, because Lite-C is a very good language to do quick ('n dirty) prototypes with.

You are a pesky little devil that wants to turn the miserably happy people living in the lands into his undead minions. So far people and you can move around, and the land is procedurally generated.

The source will be released too once the contest is over! More progress will follow in the next hours, after some sleep .

Sunday 4:00 AM:


Sunday 1:00 AM:


Saturday 21:00 PM:

Good luck

Thanks Rackscha!

I've done it, the game is finished. It works on my pc, and I have no idea if it works on anyone else's... but I submitted it . Darn, the code is one big mess. But great fun to do once in a while.

You can download the game here: http://www.joozey.nl/LudumDare/25/ThePlague/The%20Plague.zip
And read some more on my blog: http://joozey.nl/ineedtocode/?action=view&url=the-plague

Picture time!

hey looks cool, but what is the goal of the game?
can i win it?

Just fill the land with plagues and disease (the purple stuff), and create as big an army of minions as you can, that's the goal .

Continued working on the game. I'll release a new version after the contest is over (in 10 days).

I added more mob and minion types: villagers, pest doctors, wolves, minion beasts and skeletons.
The disease wont continue to spread anymore, instead you'll have to construct your own towers to capture the lands by sacrificing minions.
You can order your minion army to guard a certain place or follow you.
Mobs wont die in the spreading disease, but will slow down.
You gain much faster health within diseased lands.
Villagers run away from you.
Pest doctors cure the lands, and are very strong.
Last but not least I zoomed in the view so it is a bit more clear what you're looking at.

Here are some screenshots:

And the contest is over, votes have been cast and the results are published . Sadly, did not make it in any top 50, but it was a good experience nevertheless! I didn't do horrible either, ended up inbetween place 100 and 400 (every rank for separate judged items ended up between #100 and #400) out of 1300 submissions. Not bad at all I think! I'm eager to join the next competition in April .

Also, here is the release of version 0.2! Some updates and additional features, have fun!

Download The Plague v0.2 here

I have downloaded and played your game. It is very nice, very retro and very indie-ish. But after I have collected some soldiers, dogs and other villagers and stuff, my crowd was so big, that noone was able to defeat me. -- I guess that was the end of the game?

Well done, Joozey, though.

Would you like to turn that into a 3d game?

Thanks for testing it out HeelX . Indeed that is quite the end of the game. I thought about a possibility to sacrifice minions in order to construct a tower, so you can flood the entire land. Also the mobs need to be more challenging, perhaps the pest doctors should start curing the lands, and I want one epic bossfight once you conquered enough cities. This final stage is all about balancing the gameplay to make it not too hard in the start, and not too easy in the end (which is now quite the case).

I don't think this game is quite suited to convert to 3d. The way I construct and manage the terrain is a bit of a mess, would require a rewrite. Plus it could impact the pixely retro look, which I want to keep.

Thanks again for the feedback! Much appreciated.

Hm, I was wondering what you were talking about and I found out that I can capture those crystals, too - and there is a purple pest covering the land. But I saw no pest doctors? I think the captured souls are too strong. As long as you have 3-4 entities around they protect you. You can just go into a city - and TADA - its yours.

Your concept fits very well into a game concept of mine for which I never considered to play the bad side. It's of a bit larger scale and in 3D, though.

The pest doctors are the black robed villagers with the white masks that kill you rapidly if you have no minions (reference).

Yes, the crystals are capture-able. Funny, most people that gave me feedback on the Ludum Dare competition found out they could capture, but had no idea how to get minions . I think they were too afraid to die when they attacked enemies and thus never killed one. Another thing that needs tweaking at the start.

I'm interested to hear your concept though! I'm also open for a collaboration project, and I still have to fill 11 months this year with a game .