New playable version!

I've just uploaded the latest version of the game, the poetically titled v0.1.1!

This contains a whole bunch of changes growing out of the first batch of playtesting.

First off, I've made some changes to the game's physics. I won't bore everyone with the details of this, but essentially your balloon now rises at a continous rate (it's 6 meters per second, which is pretty much what we're hoping for the actual Andover Space Programme launch).

There's also been a major change to scoring. Clouds don't give you a speed burst any more, but they do give you a whopping 100 points every time you pop a cloud. This makes the game more fun, I think, but it also incentivises players to move the balloon around rather than just sitting in the middle of the screen and slowly racking up a high score...

There've been extensive changes to animation and NPC behaviour, basically a whole bunch of minor things that add up to a quite different player experience. Rockets are much bigger, for example, which means they create a whole lot of effects when they enter the game world. Birds and parachutists both now have randomised speed and lift, meaning that they travel across the screen in subtly different ways. The size of bird flocks increases periodically throughout the game. If birds bump into something, they get stunned, which I quite like, it means that they fall slowly down if, for example, they bump into a parachutist. Powerup medals also fall more slowly which makes them more gettable.

The plan for the next version is to work on some more aesthetic things, particularly: 

• introduce sound
• give more feedback at the end of the game, including high score rewards
• explore links to the Andover Space Programme art project so the game doesn't exist solely in isolation.
• improved graphics & background

I'd really love any thoughts players have at this point, while it's still in the testing phase! In particular:

• How's the difficulty level? Is it too hard? Too easy? Too random?
• Is the balloon character fun and engaging?
• Are there enough obstacles? Right now there are four types of obstacles: birds, parachutists, planes and rockets. Does it need more?
• Is the 'infinite runner' mode of play satisfying, or do you feel like you want to be able to 'complete' the game?