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[ThetaGames]

I would like to introduce my newest game,

A Sea of Soil


Basically, you play as a little green worm who moves throughout an image.  Once the image is loaded as a level, different colors represent different things, and certain terrains (like water or lava) are passable only under certain circumstances.  Collect gold, and move through vast (yet minimalistic) tunnels in order to complete the level.  At its heart, this is a simple maze game, but I would like to consider it as something more, simply because of the freeform nature of the level design, and the overall atmosphere that this creates.

In the actual game, you play through twelve randomly-ordered levels, trying to negotiate the labyrinths as quickly as possible.  You can also design and load your own levels (it is as simple as opening Paint and drawing a picture - most image file types are accepted).  There is a storyline, as well as a full description of the game's controls and mechanics, in the opening cutscene.


Screenshots:


A simple level.


Playing the above level (you are the green worm).


Download:

Mirror I (Host-A.net) (1.99 MB zipped)

[agj]

There should be some kind of indication for when one has collected every coin, I believe. Also, I would make it so that the snake has a bit of acceleration, because right now, since it goes to full speed as soon as you press a key, it's really easy to overshoot the coins and items.

Here's a quick test level I made:



I think you should leave more room for playing with the colors a bit. The black needs to be 100% to be a wall, for instance, yet almost any color is considered 'white' right now, I think.

Anyway, I really liked the idea. It's simple yet allows for lots of possibilities. The opening introduction was quite amusing, as well. Good work!

[Loren Schmidt]

I really like the 'use an ordinary picture as a level' idea. It makes designing levels have a directness it usually doesn't. Bob le Moche also did that with his Commonplace Book entry, didn't he? It makes me want to try.



The game itself is appealingly simple and fun. The way the worm controls seemed a bit twitchy to me at first, but eventually I took it for granted and stopped noticing. I'm not sure what I'd recommend- it seems like moving much slower would make the straightaways go too slowly. I don't know, maybe I'd recommend reducing the size of the maps somewhat, and having the worm be a bit slower.

[ThetaGames]

Glad you liked it! 

I think you should leave more room for playing with the colors a bit. The black needs to be 100% to be a wall, for instance, yet almost any color is considered 'white' right now, I think.

I don't know - it seems like it is reading your orange pixels (which seems pretty light) as lava, which is good.  All of those grey pixels (from jpg compression?) are being read as white, which is also what I wanted.

I forget what value I used for saturation that defined the pixel as a color (as opposed to black or white).  Once the pixel is defined as a color, there are no gaps in the spectrum.  As you can see, your shade of orange was defined as red.

Also, I would make it so that the snake has a bit of acceleration, because right now, since it goes to full speed as soon as you press a key, it's really easy to overshoot the coins and items.

Because the snake moves only one pixel at a time, I think the only way to implement this would be to change the room speed while playing, which might lead to inconsistencies with the timer and such.

Sparky, I really like that image.  It goes to show that some artistic things can be done with the level design.  You can even play in one of Piet Mondrian's works (with some manipulation):

You gotta love all that gold at the end.

I don't know, maybe I'd recommend reducing the size of the maps somewhat, and having the worm be a bit slower.

That would also decrease loading times.  The reason for the current map sizes is that I was trying to go for the look of simple, scrawled tunnels through a black void, that one could draw in paint without much zooming.

[agj]

I think you should leave more room for playing with the colors a bit.

I don't know - it seems like it is reading your orange pixels (which seems pretty light) as lava, which is good.  All of those grey pixels (from jpg compression?) are being read as white, which is also what I wanted.

Oh, yeah, but I had to play around a bit with the colors until the game recognized them. And it's a PNG, not a JPG, so everything is intended. I'm glad that you left that possibility space, but I wish it was wider, that's all. :)

[ThetaGames]

The colors have to have pretty high saturation, or they will be recognized as white.

[YagerX]

This game was quite fun but uh after about five minutes i became strangely motion sick...
Oh and I didn't particularly like the fact that all the items were the same shape (square ) and were colour coded...(I'm a bit colour blind, NO not black and white)

[spinachthief]

I found the exit right when I was about to give up on levels 2 and 3.  How about a simple HUD to remind you what suits/keys you've picked up?  Intro was pretty funny.

[ThetaGames]

Oh and I didn't particularly like the fact that all the items were the same shape (square ) and were colour coded...(I'm a bit colour blind, NO not black and white)

I can't really change the shapes; pixels of an image are usually squares.

How about a simple HUD to remind you what suits/keys you've picked up?

I found that difficult to implement in-game, because the view is 32x24 pixels.  However, if you press SPACE, it will pause the game, and tell you all of that information.

Intro was pretty funny.

Thanks.  Did you get the Pink Floyd references (or how about the Death Worm reference)?

[Kneecaps]

I like the game, and I really like the way that levels are made.  However, I think I would like the level-making even more if the user could define their own colors in a separate text/image file that would optionally be loaded.  That could lead to some really visually interesting maps.

[ThetaGames]

I like the game, and I really like the way that levels are made.  However, I think I would like the level-making even more if the user could define their own colors in a separate text/image file that would optionally be loaded.  That could lead to some really visually interesting maps.

Hmmmm, that's a really good idea, maybe I could make an '.ini' file that defines each level element as a specific range of colors , and users could adjust which color ranges would be assigned to each element.  If I have time, I might have to implement that! 

[Fuzz]

Sorry for reviving an old thread, but the link doesn't seem to work, for some reason.

[letsap]

Worked for me.

Just wanna say this game had some kind of Yoshi's Island vibe or something that made me all warm and fuzzy while playing it.

[Fuzz]

Yeah, it worked a couple minutes later.