My entry for LD29 is called Giant Pumpkin. While thinking of the theme, I was watering my plants, figuring beneath the “surface” could imply soil. Roots get really chaotic. Meanwhile I remembered a trip I took to the York, Pennsylvania fair, featuring enormous pumpkins. You get the idea, I latched onto the design idea and proceeded from there.

The Good:
Using Flash, I got a lot of bang for the buck using Tween objects for small animations. For example, the plus symbols on roots and stems grow spontaneously in a fraction of a second. That bit of polish does make a difference as it makes the game feel more interactive. The sound effects came together well using a cheap microphone that came with Rock Band.
The little popup that comes up when the cursor hovers over something became really useful. I hope it helps to explain features to the player.
The Bad:
Balancing basically six resource types in a game is very difficult! I would have liked it to be more educational, but overall is so far from being biologically accurate.
The Ugly:
Implementing the preloader in the final hour broke a lot of features. The bug was a simple oversight, but the adrenaline kicks in as the clock ticks down the final minutes.




