UPDATE: Windows binary added.

Well I was counting on working down to the last minute, but I have to quit for the day so this is going to be the final version, 5 hours before the deadline. The game is “done” in the sense that you can win and lose, but I wouldn’t really call it complete, there’s a list as long of my arm of things that need to be fixed up and added. All the art is placeholder, which especially hurts. Spent waaaaay too much time on the tech.

So overall, success! I made a game in 48 hours. This was my first LD and I had a blast, I’m definitely doing this again. And I’m definitely going with a simpler game next time. I think Solar Lift has some good ideas, but 48 hours wasn’t near enough time for me to experiment and pull those ideas out into a polished, enjoyable game experience.

The game is written in Gosu with Ruby. Intro is lacking, so here’s instructions: the goal is to rescue stranded people off the plummeting planets before they are consumed by the Advancing Wall of Doom. WSAD moves, left mouse shoots, spacebar fires your super laser blast. Rescuing people charges your laser, bullets are unlimited.

>> OS X Download <<

>> Windows Download <<

Source Code

Well, interesting times. My allergies decided to attack, I lost internet for a good hour, and I even began to contemplate tossing out my whole idea and starting over from scratch. That’s crazy talk though, if I’m going to have any chance at all of finishing a game this weekend I better stick with what I started, even if I’m not super happy with how the gameplay is turning out. Speaking of which, I better get my ass in gear if I’m going to have gameplay wrapped up by tonight so that I can focus on graphics and sound tomorrow…

Also it turns out I’m lucky to even have power, let alone internet. A transformer exploded near here and a good portion of Salt Lake City and eastern Utah is without power right now. Mmmm dried apricots.

Progress! I woke up around 6:30 this morning and squeezed in a couple hours of development before my stomach forced me to seek out food. Warning: placeholder art ahead.

Unfortunately for the player, shooting the advancing wall only makes it grow faster, and there is not as yet any way to beat it back. That’s next. I have no idea if this idea is actually going to work out to be any fun, so I’m focusing on gameplay today and I’ll worry about art tomorrow. Hopefully.

Also, breakfast! Words cannot describe my love for waffles.

OK, advancing wall of doom, didn’t expect that but I’ve got an idea on how I can crack this. But I swore that I wouldn’t start tonight, it’s 10:30 PM here. I’m going to go to bed early, wake up, and get cranking. So all I’ve done is set up a github repo. And uploaded a shell class that just displays a blank window. And some basic update/display logic.

Because that’s not really coding, right?

Right?

Going to bed now… maybe I’ll dream about my idea.

Only 7 more hours until my first compo. My home office is always at the ready:

Though I’ll probably spend a lot of time in coffee shops instead, no way am I sitting in one place for two days straight.

The contest starts at 9PM local time, so I may start doing a bit of work tonight if I feel confident that I can force myself to go to bed at a decent hour.

Everybody vote for layers! I’ve got some good ideas there.

Tools: Macbook, Wacom tablet, Ruby, Gosu, cfxr. Possibly chipmunk for physics but I’d rather avoid it to keep things simple. I’m gonna try and avoid 3d too, or keep it to a minimum.

Lots of coffee and green tea. I’ve stashed up on miso soup, dried fruit, and burrito fixings. I’ll try to avoid hitting the homebrew beer but I make no promises.

This is the first time I’ve ever done a game compo, I’ve been looking forward to it for the last month. My wife has been warned.

I’m planning to use Ruby with the Gosu library, since I’ve been playing around with that a lot lately. I’ve been using Ruby for 7+ years so it’s a natural fit. I’ve been writing a few quick game prototypes to practice, but I’ve been out of the game industry for years so this could be interesting… keeping my fingers crossed.