Here is my submission for the 2019 Fat Fortnight Game Jam, Desk Dash!
I decided to run with the obvious “workplace” theme of an office with a friend’s character. I’ve recently started working long hours myself, so I thought I would like to make a game about keeping the staff happy in some way. So the reasoning is easy that a happy worker is a heavy worker, and vice versa? I dunno. It feels right.
There is definitely some problems with the concept, but I think with some tuning it could become something special. As it stands, it’s… just a proof of concept. No endings or saving of any kind, and barely any art assets. Programming took up a lot of the time - I really wanted to make it available in browser, so I coded it in Javascript from basically nothing but a basal engine. So, I am sorry there isn’t more art. I at least learned a lot about working with Javascript and the overall development cycle.
In any case, I hope this is at least somewhat interesting. Thank you for playing, if you did.
First time posting. The game is fun, but there’s a big game breaking bug that happens when you’re going too fast. It’s possible to clip through walls due to your speed. When I tried going to get some food items, I ended up clipping through the wall and the timer stopped. I could not get back in and I was unable to finish playing the current month on two playthroughs.
Frankly, this is very impressive for hobbyist JavaScript. The game’s fun enough. It’s simple, but functional. I’ve dabbled in JavaScript, and am still nowhere near able to comprehend how “Hello World!” becomes moving sprites and game logic.
I’m very sorry about the clipping issues - I honestly cannot replicate it so I don’t know what’s going on there. I will look into it more if I go forward with developing this further.
I think if I were to finish this game in the future, I would definitely:
Reduce choices of flavors and disable “mixing” at first
Give some reaction time to the cravings so there is actually time to prepare
Find some way to make playing on mobile better - the dpad is okay, but I wanted to do a touch-based movement set where she would run to where you tapped at first and I couldn’t figure out path-finding in time
Everything else is a matter of making story/art/sound content, and I think currently the game suffers because of it lol
“One hot mint sandwich comin through!!!” I was worried upon reading tthe instructions that I wouldn’t understand the game. I am pleased to report I picked it up as soon as the first request came in! It is GREAT, the names of the food are hillarious and I LOVE mixing just to see what whacky thing I end up with! You have really made something cute and frantic! I am super impressed! Good luck in the competition!!!
Edit: I have one little thing to add, would be nice at the end of each day all the office girls would line up to show you how well you have done (And so I can ogle their plumpness :3)
Edit 2: Sadly I did also encounter the gamebreaking bug… I think it may be caused by running parralell to the wall then hitting the kitchen door, then trying to go down into the door means you can bypass the wall colliders thus making you go into the wall, this then leads to the game thinking you are in the kitchen so the timer stops leading to the game breaking… I don’t quite know if this is the true cause but i hope it helps you squish this elusive bug
Desk Dash is a fun little time dash game where you have to do your best to satisfy the needs of the workers around the office. The game starts out small with a well-paced build up that becomes more and more hectic as you play. The sprites in this game are quite good with very cute sprites that reach quite nice sizes as you help keep the fueled so they can do their job. The UX is also not half bad with a lot of info displayed through icons and colors making it relatively easy to get right into. There are some problems as well though. The largest one, in my view, was how close the camera was to the player. While it is not bad for the first couple of levels, it quickly begins to feel cramped as the office expands. It would have been nice if the camera zoomed out every few levels so players could get an idea of what was needed around the office more easily instead of having to run patrol patterns all over the office. A lesser issue is it would have been nice if the drinks and sandwich where color coated to match their flavor since there was already a distinct icon for hot, cold, and sandwich. Over all a really nice game the reminds me of some of the best flash games I used to play as a kid.
Kilif Score
Category
Total
Basics:
20000
Art:
225
Writing:
170
Concept/Design
1365
Msc:
150
Total:
21910
Comments:
Hah, this game lured me in, got me thinking “Oh wow this is pretty easy,” and then I get to the third level and was an absolute mess trying to get all of the orders right. I think this hits all of the good points of the kind of Diner Dash-type games, such that there’s no down time and you’re constantly trying to improve your throughput while trying to remember all of the minutia of each order. Keeping up with the person’s tastes, if they want a sandwich vs drink, hot vs cold, it was very good. Also, the names for each combo were great. The only thing that felt a little underdeveloped were the actual art assets, but the rest of the game more than made up for it. Great work!
Juxtaterrestrial Score
Category
Total
Basics:
20000
Art:
317
Writing:
137
Concept/Design
1412
Msc:
150
Total:
22016
Comments:
This was a wonderful little project! the idea of being a little office runner is an easy concept to run with for the jam; you made it work so well. The mechanics are great. You have to plan your runs strategically to make sure you’re pleasing everyone and preventing office sadness. You can’t just do one thing, you actually have to change up your routine every level. The requirement to choose ingredients and temperatures makes it a fun juggling act. Some of the unusual combinations of food made me laugh too. The only real suggestions I have for the projects going forward is just to keep polishing stuff! The core gameplay is damn solid! Keep up the good work
