(Crosspost with: http://rs.gam3dev.com/2011/11/04/october-challenge-aftermath/)

I’ll go ahead and say it out loud in the first place: the october challenge is over, and we failed. I do not know how other people here deal with this kind of thing, but in case it is not obvious, it is hard to say this. I do not mean to be discouraging or pessimistic, but I think admitting our failures and not just dismissing them, no matter how hard it is, is an important first step towards becoming better.

While my hopes were high on having something sellable within a month, I am aware that we are still very immature concerning game making, in almost every aspect. But even in not completing the challenge, we learned something. We tried to make something from scratch, and have at least improved our technical and (on a lesser degree) game designing skills. I hope that next time we can reach play testing, or who knows actually trying to market a game.

Our problem might have been not taking one of our incomplete projects and invest the time in it, it might have been not being able to do the first things first, or even not having a plan at all. And this is where I think we can learn from failure itself. After failing we analyze the past objectively…by thinking what went wrong we can create a path forward, a path of improvement that leads to the future!

So, best of luck to every game designer out there. And congratulations to those that actually cleared the challenge!

And it is time for a post mortem, I have posted it on our blog, please read here:

http://rs.gam3dev.com/2011/09/07/post-mortem-avalanche-2/

The finished game

Well, and the time as come and the game is done. There was a bazilion things more I wanted to add (like always) but I am just glad it has at least some level of completion. Tomorrow I’ll try to find the time for a post-mortem.

Cya next time! Looking forward to play those awesome games!

So, the basic gameplay is almost finished (I will tweak it if I have time). So right now I will focus on finishing the game, which means I will now implement the winning and losing conditions. The game is about escaping an avalanche alive, while riding a cool snowboard, avoiding trees and jumping over rocks. As you can see:

I promise it is more fun to play the game than to look at it . So off to make a menacing avalanche

I just woke up so I am going to post a resume of what this LD has been

So, going with an idea I already had proved to be somewhat of a curse since I could not figure out a good way to make a small game that would be fun. So I changed plans! (A little bit before the compo hit the 24h mark)

Right now I already have a new game, that is starting to show. Right now it looks like this and I am letting you guess what it is.

So, the theme is Escape. I am probably going to use an idea that has been on my mind for some time, and create a context in which it relates to the theme. Although I am still missing some details, I will probably fill those when dealing with the mechanics.

I will probably return to the platformer genre although I hope in a not so classic “style” . This time I also intend to have different levels. For the time being I will start to write the core engine with support for multiple levels and transition between them. Then I will make the mechanics, using placeholder art, and then finally, make all the art I can get away with and add some sound.

Wish you all good luck

Hi all,

It’s been a while and I am looking forward to the next weekend and another awesome LD. This time around me and a friend sent an e-mail to our university mailing list to try and get more people to participate, so we are gathering with them to participate so we can try to help the first timers.

Regarding technologies to use, my default will be flixel, but I would like to give a shot at haxe one of these days, so I may change my mind. I am a little reluctant to learn a framework from scratch during LD. As for sound I will probably use cfxr, and am still wondering what I’ll use for music. Graphics will depend a lot on the theme so I’ll postpone that decision till saturday.

That being said, I’m in! Good luck everyone!

Phew, LD is done! The game misses some features that I initially envisioned, but whatever, it’s done! And I think it went better than last year

The game ended up being a platformer where the player can disable some physical phenomenon. This could well be a base for a more elaborate game!

You can see the submission here and try the game. Any comments, suggestions, critics and insults are welcome

I think above all else, it was fun! I dived a little more into flixel, and once again my mind is blown, it is an excellent library. If you like to make games, you must check it out. The actionscript might seem weird at first, but once you get used to it, it rarely stands in your way .

On the artistic side, I am glad that I could practice a little bit of drawing, even if the end result was far from brilliant , however, I was with higher expectations for the sound. Unfortunately I broke a string on my guitar, so that was a no-no. Oh well, there is always next time!

Good luck to everyone still working! I am looking forward to try some interesting games!

Oh! And see you next time!

(Go try the game )

The theme was announced around 3 AM here, so I thought about it for a while and went to sleep. Guess it is time to start now! Realized now that I forgot to take a picture of my breakfast . Oh well…

I’m going to make some sketches and then write the code with flixel and box2d. The idea will be to build some kind of platformer that allows the player to play with some physics elements

Fine-tuning the strings and plugging the amps! This will be awesome!

This will be my second LD, last time I tried my luck making a game using javascript, but the poor performance and the time I lost were a show stopper. Some time after I tried flixel and it completely blow my mind, so I’ll be using it this time unless I want some kind of 3D, which is unlikely.

So, g’luck everyone, and see you in the compo!

Hi all,

My submission is already up. While I have managed to implement most of the things I wanted, I wish there was time to polish it much further.

This was my first LD and I have learned a great deal. Even more important than that, I have had much fun building this game. I think I should do this more often, even if not in an “official” competition.

Wish you all the very best, and as usual you can check out the game here, and you can check the submission page here .

See you around!

Hello,

I have implemented clouds in the background with parallax scrolling look here!

Here is a screenshot showing how it looks like:

Next up: foreground clouds to hide the crests

Hi all,

The demo can finally be called a game (sort of). You can take on the role of our friendly alien and explore the earth in search for the mighty elemental crests. In this case your task is to gather all of the air crests in the scenario.

Some context: Basically, our alien friend is a scientist with the task of collecting the essence of the four earthly elements in order to study them. Given the constraints of time, I am focusing on one element, and even so, I think I won’t be able to do everything I want.

I finally fixed the worst bugs (I think) on the physics side and built a mid-sized level. I would love to have time to add clouds to hide some of the crests and some adversities (giving the game some very much needed fun), to animate some of the stuff, to add sound and to implement some kind of dynamic background.

Right now, I am going for a sleeping session, much needed after a 22h run (with pauses for meals). I’ll decide my focus after that if I still have the time.

You can have a look at the demo here

While I know it is still lacking a lot, at least I learned stuff

Finally made one of the things I thought of  initially, but doubted I would get to.

Check it out here! (You may have to clear the browser cache for the changes to show)

Yes, cloudy! The map generator is now using a procedural cloud generator over the map shape, and I’m using a photo editor to add the black outline

As I said on a previous post I wil now start working on the level design

In the last hours I have been struggling to implement the map and gameplay system. Turns out it took a lot longer than expected, partly because sprite.js is not as mature/complete as I thought it would be and because of my own lack of practice.

However I think I have done something worth showing/talking. First I did a python script that would parse a txt file and output a PNG containing a wire frame to design the level from. The same text file is used as input by the game to generate the collision platforms. I also needed to implement basic physics, which still have some rough edges but it will have to suffice for now.

The current prototype is accessible through here.

I think I will leave the gameplay engine for now and move on to game rules and visual stuff. What do you think?

Ok, I havent fully decided on the exact objectives, but I settled on a main character. A cuddly alien that lands on an unsuspecting planet…and more I cannot tell yet!

Here is a picture of our lovely friend:

I still haven’t decided if the it will fit with the rest of the game’s look, so it will probably suffer some alterations. What do you think?

Yeah, it is a little late looking at the contest start but it is morning here. So it’s a damn good time! Ideas are starting to appear, I’ll post once I have decided the path to follow.

Here is a photo of my base of operations:

The guy there is bmfs. We gathered to participate in LD#19

Good luck to everyone!

Hi all,

Since this is my first post I will shortly introduce myself. I am a simple portuguese guy fresh out of university (MSc in computer science, University of Coimbra) that loves to read, listen to and play music, and to develop stuff .

This will be my first attempt at participating in Ludum Dare. I have only recently started to develop games, and am doing my best to make it my full-time occupation (indie style). The Ludum Dare will be the perfect opportunity to hone my technical and game design skills, and to receive useful feedback.

As for technologies I am thinking of using sprite.js for the graphics, and cfxr to generate some nice sfx (thank you Ludum Dare posters ). If physics are required I will probably stick with Box2D. If anything else is needed, improvisation will be the way!

As for the art itself, I will try my luck with my wacom or some pixel editor.

I wish the very best luck to all of the participants, and am looking forward to see very nice games being born

See you around!