How to Play

Cattle Crisis is an arcade shoot 'em up  game (Shmup). Pilot your fighter jet to defeat evil aliens and save our precious cows! Cattle Crisis is a short game and currently features one level.

• Arrow keys - Move the jet
• X or M or V - Shoot
• Z or N or C - Hyper / Bomb
• You can also use a controller

System

As you shoot enemies or collect 🐄, your meter will fill. Once it passes the halfway point, you can activate Hyper Mode by pressing the Hyper button. While in Hyper Mode, the meter gradually depletes. Taking a hit will end Hyper Mode, but you won’t lose a life. Pressing the Hyper button again during Hyper Mode unleashes a devastating bomb, which consumes half of the remaining meter—if any is left.

Scoring

• Shooting enemies at close range increases your score (up to 4×) and causes more 🐄 to drop, allowing you to charge the meter faster.
• While in Hyper Mode, enemies drop ⭐ instead of 🐄, which grant extra points. The value of each ⭐ is shown in the top-right corner during Hyper Mode.
• Each enemy defeated in Hyper Mode increases the ⭐ value.
• Activating a bomb turns all nearby bullets into additional ⭐.

Video Series

Cattle Crisis was created as part of a tutorial series on how to make an Advanced Shmup from scratch. If you also want to make a game like this check out the Lazy Devs Academy YouTube Channel!

Credits

This game was written and designed by Krystian Majewski, an Independent Developer and the host of the Lazy Devs Academy video channel.

The music was composed by Sebastian Haßler, a music composer for film, TV and videogames.

The cover illustration was created by Mag Draws.

This project would have not been possible without the generous donations from my supporters on Ko-fi. Thank you!

Special thanks also to all of the playtesters including: Aktane, Boghog, Indra_S, MasterCoding101, LokiStriker, Barend, TheGacko, SquidLight, Buster Ermy, mg1399, BrainOnOxygen, SkullDragger, Blixten, middleclassjoe, Chaz, otto: A Mush Man and others.

Cattle Crisis was written entirely in Pico-8.