Since I got some great feedbacks on The Quite Annoying League (Thank you!) I thought some might be interested in a time-lapse and post-mortem. So here they are :

Time Lapse  (integration doesn’t seem to work, click the link) :

(some little part are missing, that’s because I used to stop the recording everytime I went out for a cigarettes, and sometimes I forgot to relaunch it when I came back)

The Quite Annoying League Time Lapse par Oujevipo

(more…)

I’ve never been that lazy to rate LD entries. On previous LDs I always rated more than 200 games, but strangely, this rating fever has cooled down, and now, I prefer to spend more time on each game and try to give more constructive feedbacks. Maybe it’s for the best.

Anyway, here are my favorites so far, the ones I already reviewed in french on my blog http://oujevipo.fr. This list doesn’t include all of my favorites, some of them (especially Jam entries) being too obvisouly great for needing a little push up. (Sorry for my bad english by the way, I’m not even sure “push up” DOES mean something).

This list doesn’t really care if the game is compo or jam, neither if it fits well the theme but I added this :

: Excellent use of the theme

: Good use of the theme

: bad/no use of the theme

(click the pictures to play/rate)

#1 Cure 48

#2 Tale of Scale

#3 Monologuer

(more…)

Eventually, I got an idea and am working on something.

This going to be dumb. Really dumb. The dumbest game I ever made.

BEWARE!

A game made of stop-motion animations ? That was a “risky” bet!

So…there are only 5 days left to rate the game, maybe it’s time for us to write a small post-mortem [EDIT: not that small eventually] in order to explain how we made the BIGGEST GAME in Ludum Dare history! 1,14GigaBytes! Shi*! That’s more than Minecraft!

Size does matter

By the way, you can play and rate the game here!

Post-mortem below! (because it’s big too)

(more…)

This is it, I rated 100 entries.

Before going on, here’s a list of my 10 favorite (Compo+Jam)

1 – Ages of Irving
http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-24/?action=preview&uid=11045

2 – Deep See Fish Loves You
http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-24/?action=preview&uid=4958

3 – Beetlefields : The Forecast
http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-24/?action=preview&uid=2952

4 – Neural Nodes
http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-24/?action=preview&uid=15598

5 – Revolution
http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-24/?action=preview&uid=12722

6 – Meow for Mutation
http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-24/?action=preview&uid=5431

7 – Lucas’s Quest Backwards
http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-24/?action=preview&uid=11243

8 – Crab
http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-24/?action=preview&uid=16516

9 – Plan M
http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-24/?action=preview&uid=7835

10 – 2-deoxyborose
http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-24/?action=preview&uid=3222

Ours isn’t in the top 10
But you can try it anyway
http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-24/?action=preview&uid=1874

 
Also, most of these games were reviewed in french on http://oujevipo.fr

Hi!

We’re Team 111 and as we said before we wanted to make a stop-motion game and…we’re making it!

Here’s Felix working hard

It’s a game about games…a meta-game! Almost everything will be stop-motion animations. It won’t be very “gamish” but we hope it will still be fun to play/watch. As usual in my (Pierrec) games, there will be a lot of dialogs and ramifications…but no pixel ^^

Problem is…The game is goind to be heavy. The picture we use are only 640×400 but there will be like THOUSANDS of them.

So expect a 150, 200MB file…Would you be patient enough to download it ? Do you have a favorite file transfer service ? Would it help with a torrent file ? Any suggestions are welcome.

I tried to make some gifs to show you the animations, but failed. So here are some screenshots :

Where is the “Evolution” Theme ?

Well, this game is about the evolution of a game, of a game night, and will probably use some evolutive musics (Like with the gool old iMuse)

Well…I have to go back to work. See ya!

Hi there!

Well…how to put this in words…We’re in!
We’re a team of three french blokes who have once lived together but never worked together. And now, we’re going to make a game for LD #24!

I, Pierrec, am a video game guy (still afraid to write “game developer” ). I’ve made some games for previous LDs like I am Ourobouros (LD21), Never Alone Hotline (LD22) or Ok, Now this is Awkward (LD23), and some other ones for other competitions (Find them HERE)  I also got a blog in which I review some cool experimental/innovative games. Since now, I always worked alone, but I’m willing to try something else, so I grabbed some friends for this Ludum Dare.

Remember this one ? Seems like a billions years ago!

Félix is a librarian. He likes video games but doesn’t play them much cause he’s a Linux user (hin hin hin). He never worked on a video game but he makes cool stop-motions with kids in his library. Here’s one of them :

Où sont passées mes lunettes ? from Médiathèque de Rognac on Vimeo.

You also can watch more of them here. We talked about making a stop-motion game, and got really excited about it. So…whatever the theme is gonne be, that’s what we’re going to make! Of course, Félix will be in charge of the animation.

Jay is an english teacher, but he’s also a graphic designer, a musician, a gif animator, and many other stuff. Everything but game maker…yet!

See this awesome graphic skill ? Well, we won’t use it, because we’re making a stop-motion game! Instead, we hope to use his music skill

(seems like music and video integration doesn’t work here, so, here’s a link
http://soundcloud.com/jay-farkasember/sallys-song-danny-elfman-cover

and maybe his english skill to proof-read our game (because there will probably be lots of dialogs…I love dialogs). Jay *might* won’t help us on this jam because he’ll be busy this week end. If so…we’ll be Team 11 instead, and that’s a lousy name, so I hope he’s gonna find some time!

See his Tumblr, his Soundcloud and his Flickr

To summarize :

Ideas : Pierrec, Félix, Jay
Coding : Pierrec
Graphics : The real world
Animation : Félix
Music : Jay
Dialogs : Pierrec, Félix ?
Proof-read : Jay ?

We’re gonna use Adventure Game Studio to make this game, and probably a lot of other softwares (don’t know which yet)

I hope we’ll manage to make this game, I hope it will be good, but even if it’s not, I’m sure we’ll have some fun!

Let’s jam!

I was so excited to see my LD results that I decided to make a chart!

Here it is :

On this chart, you can see the results of my 3 Ludum Dare entries. Left columns are the position, middle columns are the rates and left columns are (position/number of entries) x 100, something like the position the game would have if there were only 100 entries. A good way to see if you improved yourself or not, despite the increasing number of entries.

I think this chart is quite interesting and I suggest you to do the same. Here, I can see I improved A LOT between my first and second LD Game (first and second games ever) bu that my third LD entry wasn’t as good as the previous one. I already knew that but some details are very encouraging.

1 : I significantly improved my graphics, and I’m very proud of that

2 : Even if I lost some ranks in Mood and Humor, this chart shows that I’m still as good at it. By the way, it’s quite surprising that I got on LD23 a better rating and a worse ranking in Humor. Were the LD23 games funnier than LD22 games ?

3 : Innovation is interesting too! I lost A LOT of ranks in Innovation, even if my LD22 and LD23 entries have similar gameplays. But after all, it’s very logic. Never Alone Hotline was quite innovative, Ok, now this is akward wasn’t, because I already made Never Alone Hotline before.

In the end, I’m very happy with this results. It’s more or less what I was expecting with some good surprises (I expected much worse in Fun and graphics)  and a single bad surprise (only 127th in Theme ? Originality doesn’t pay much)

From now, I’m gonna work hard to improve myself for the next LD in august! Can’t wait!

Ok…so I’ve rated 133 games so far, and I reviewed a dozen of them on my blog. Time for a break.

I’m very grateful to all the people who recommended some games on the Ludum Dare frontpage and allowed me to discover some jewels, so I’m gonna do the same.

Of course, a lot of my favourites already got 100+ ratings and it would be stupid to recommend them one more time, so I’ve decided to present 15 games with less than 50 ratings and which deserve to be played. (The order is not important)

Dr. Biology’s Educational Game

Because biology is fun !

Five by Five

A very clever puzzle game

These are your friends

I fell in love with an island !

Minilization

A very deep civilization simulation

Evolve

A grow-like with awesome graphics

Tiny Toy

The weirder it is, the more I like it !

There is a picture

An suprisingly awesome adventure made on RPGMaker

Dwindling Worlds

My brain and my eyes still hurt…

Real War

Not for kids !

Circus Flea

This one made me ROFL

Tiny World Cardgame

A well balanced card game…moreover : it’s cute

Tinyville confidential

What would happen if Facebook games were actually good.

Rambros

Looks like a video game version of The Expendables

It’s a tab

A 16×16 pixels game…playable in a favicon.

Beefwar

Meat+Panzers = Fun (too bad I can’t see any link with the theme)

On a previous post, Madball explained how he rated the games, and that was very interesting, especially because I myself rated games quite differently. So maybe some people will be interested by my own rating grid :

Here are the categories, by order of importance according to me :

Innovation
1 : This game is a total ripoff, I blame you for that (never used)

2 : This game is nothing more than a platformer/shooter ^^

3 : Ok…you got some good ideas.
4 : That is clever !

5 : MIND BLOWN ! (when I give 5 in innovation, I automatically give 5 overall)

Theme

1:No link with the theme
2: Easy use of the theme (only introduced in a single sentence, or in the title for exemple)

3: Fits the theme, but meh…not very cleverly

4: A rather original approach of the theme

5:A unique approach of the theme

Mood

1 : /

2 : I see what you’ve tried to do, but you obviously failed

3 : Meh.

4 : You made me smile/cry/rage…etc

5 : I was so in your game that I forgot I was playing a game

Fun

1 : /

2 : That was soooo boring

3 : I don’t regret the few minutes I spent on this game

4 : I enjoyed playing this game

5 : I’m still playing this game.

Humor

1 : /

2 : /

3 : Ok, you got me, I smiled

4 : My eyes laughed

5 : My body laughed

Graphics

1 : /

2 : Graphics annoyed me

3 : I didn’t notice the graphics, that means they’re good enough.

4 : You put a lot of efforts into your graphics

5 : Graphics fits perfectly with the game, even if it’s only three pixels on a screen

Audio

1 : / (no audio, I don’t rate)

2 : There is some audio, but honestly, it would be better without it

3 : There is audio, and it is not annoying.

4 : Great audio or/and great music

5 : Audio is part of the gameplay

Overall

Most of the time, Overall is the better value between Innovation and Theme, but is could be lowered if something really suck. I would never give 5 overall to someone with 1 or 2 in Theme or Innovation. On the opposite, if you’re a cool guy, overall could be raised by 1, that’s not voluntary, but I know it counts.

Well that’s all folks.

By the way, Have you played my game-with-an-accidental-spelling-mistake-in-the-title ?

Ok….so I’ve made a game called “Ok! Now This is Akward.”

“Akward: The incorrect spelling of the word awkward. Used by morons and/pr K-5th grade.”

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=akward

THANKS!

I uploaded the timelapse ( Part1, Part2) for my game OK…Now this is akward, and I thought it was time to make a public post-mortem.

This is how I’ve made a game I’m not very happy with :

What went right/What helped

Ritual Hot Chocolate

This was my third Ludum Dare, and as usual, just after I discoverd the theme, I went to my favorite café and ordered a hot chocolate. That’s how I got my ideas on LD21 and LD22, and that how I got it on LD23. Honestly, there is nothing better than drinking a hot chocolate under the sun in the morning, far away from your computer, with a sheet of paper and a pen, to find the inspiration.

Warming up

Three weeks before the Ludum Dare, I decided to warm up and to start working on a new game. My objective was to finish it before the LD, and I failed, but I don’t care because I’ve tried my tools, discoverd new way to code, improved my drawing, did some researches for audio tool…to put it in a nutshell : I was ready !

Various inspiration sources

It’s pretty impossible to create something totally new. I know that. So I always look for things that I like to be inspired by. This time, the game was inspired by a Garfunkel and Oates’ song, I Don’t Know Who You Are, in which a girl is embarassed because she doesn’t know who is the guy speaking to her, and a scene from Human Traffic  in which two characters meet in the bar, have nothing to say to each other, and imagine what this scene would be if they were both honest to each other.
The girl who doesn’t recognize a guy + the bar + the difference between thoughts and acts + the akwardness…I got my game !

Watching/listening these inspiration from time to time during the making of the game was helpful to remind me what I was trying to do.

IRC french chanel

We were around 20 french jamers on a irc chanel during the whole LD, and it was great to share our ideas, our problems, our prototypes. I didn’t ask for much help (except trivial details like : which color should I choose for her shoes?) but it is always great to feel you’re not alone.

Tools

I’m starting to be very familiar with Adventure Game Studio and GraphicsGale. I exactly know what I can and what I can’t do. Useful knowledge of course because then, it was easy to know what game could be made.

Partying

On saturday night, I was invited to a party and was planing to decline to work on my game. But then I thought : Fuck it ! It’s saturday night ! I think I had the best meal of the whole Ludum Dare ( bruschettas, five cheeses tortelini, salmon spaghettis and tiramisu, with some pastis and wine of course…Thanks Jehanne) and I got the occasion to tell some non-gamers people what I was doing this week end. « -Wow ! Is it possible to make a game in 48h ? » « -Fuck yeah it’s possible ! And I’m gonna prove it ! ». I found A LOT of motivation there.

Live beta-testing

I got lucky because sunday, a friend came by to my appartement (to give me a crappy Cathleen Montana DVD…do you remember Cathleen Montana ? That show was awesome ^^!). So I asked her to beta test what I have made so far, and of course, it’s very helpful to actually SEE someone playing your game. You can see the smiles, the laughters, the boring moments…JUST GREAT ! (Thank you Gwen)

WHOA ! So many things went right ! How could it be I don’t like my game then ?! Let’s see…

(more…)

Ludum Dare Games are tiny and done under constraints.
And you know what else is tiny and done under constraints ? Haikus!

So I started to write haïkus about some games I played and I’m decided to write many more!

Unfortunately, the haikus are in french, because I am french. But if you don’t understand them, you still can click the links and play these awesome games :

Minilization

http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-23/?action=preview&uid=1163

Civilization

Étudié au microscope

Que d’agitation.

Gravity

http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-23/?action=preview&uid=11804

Le doux carillon

Est l’annonce d’une averse

Averse de cadavres.

Memento XII

http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-23/?action=preview&uid=2982

Les années perdues

Dans cette froide cellule

T’en souviendras-tu ?

(there’s more )

(more…)

I finally found my title! \o/

And obviously, I finally made a title screen!

Yay!

Hi everybody!

I’m giving myself a little break to show what I am working on :

As you can see, there is no tiny world, tiny planets, huge insects…I don’t like to use themes litterally ^^

In France, when you’re surprised to meet someone somewhere you didn’t expect it, it’s common to say something like “le monde est petit!” (“world is tiny!”). I don’t know if this idiom is used in english, but I really hope so, because if it isn’t, my game has nothing else to do with the theme.

So, in this game, you’re Amy, sitting at the bar, and a guy recognize you and start to chat with you. Problem is : You don’t recognize him at all! What an akward situation!

There’s more of course, but I don’t want to spoil everything.

I still have A LOT dialogs to write A LOT animations to design, background to improve and I need to add some sounds…I hope I will finish in time!
The game is inspired by :

-The Garfunkel and Oates’ song : I Don’t Know Who You Are

- The Human Traffic’s bar scene

cheers

It’s beautiful outside, and I’m gonna spend my whole week end in front of my computer…Rhaaa I hate you Ludum Dare!

Well, I’m entering for the thid time and I’ve never been that anxious. I did very well last time, and I’m afraid I’m not gonna be as good this time, but whatever, I’ll make a game, I swear! Probably another one with a lot of dialogs, not much gameplay and crappy graphics…That’s all that I can do.

Whatever the theme will be, I’ll try to insert the “birthday” theme, because it’s Ludum Dare 10th birthday and well…because one theme is not enough.

I’ll use Adventure Game Studio as usual, with GraphicsGale for the graphics (now I know how to use layers, Wooo! \o/). Don’t know yet for the sound.

Also, I’m french, and I’ll be on irc wia bunch of other french Ludum darers
#ludumdare on irc.philpep.org. Join us!

We got a website too!

Finally, I’ll review Ludum Dare games as usual on my blog : oujevipo.fr

( Go Artificial Life!)

Well, it’s time for me to write my own post-mortem about Never Alone Hotline in order to have more ratings share my experience.

You can also watch the boring timelapse :

Oujevipo#videoId=xn37yp

Oujevipo#videoId=xn381p

What went right/What helped

Hot Chocolate.

On Ludum Dare 21, I found my game idea drinking a hot chocolate outside in the heat of summer. On Ludum Dare 22, I sat in front of my computer for hours without any idea coming, so I decided to have a hot chocolate outside in the cold of winter, juste like last time, and it worked ! As soon as I sat at the café, the whole game idea came immedialty to me, in one second, I knew exactly what I wanted to do. So I recommend hot chocolate, and I’ll order one for every other Ludum Dare.

Breaking up.

Me and my girlfriend broke up a week before the Ludum Dare…and I think it was quite useful (what a jerk!). I felt very sad this whole week (I still do, but that’s not relievant) and I suppose it helped me to come up with this idea of hotline for lonely people and to create this quite depressing atmosphere. Every clouds got a silver lining.

Adventure Game Studio.

AGS is the only software I know for making games, and god, I love it ! Even if it is normally a point & click software, you can use it to make plenty of stuff if you know it well, even puzzles or RPGs. I think it is a great software for beginners : easy to use, and very rich.

Knowing this software helped me to work quicly ans the Never Alone Hotline code is my less messy code ever !

Irc french chanel.

It was great to have people to talk with during this week end. I could complain to them I would never finish my game in time and finally be the first one to finish ^^. It’s a good thing to actually « feel » the community. So thanks to Bender, Meedoc, Gib, Alchymi, 01010101 and the other ones !

Pulsate.

I wanted to use Andre Michelle’s Pulsate even before knowing the theme. So I was quite happy the theme to be alone because this tool makes very lonely tunes. I think it adds a lot to Never Alone Hotline athmosphere ans I’m very happy with it.

Same old graphics.

I suck at graphics. So I used the same old character style I used in my previous game : Big pixels, not much exprissivity, flashing colors…The graphics were done in an hour or two so it allowed me to focus on the narration and coding.

What went wrong/What did not help

Audacity

I spent way too much time trying to record the Pulsate Sound from my own computer with a double-jack. Not only I didn’t know how to use Audacity, but I wasn’t also able to hear what I was recording (because of the double-jack). That was awful, I gave up thrice, then tryed again later. Finally, I managed to do it, but it would have been more clever to learn how to do it BEFORE.

The game title

I don’t like my game’s title. It is the first I came up with and then I did not change, but I think I should had. I don’t like when the Ludum Dare theme is in the title, it’s a serious lack of originality. But even now, I didn’t find any better title so…

Writing in english

I’m not a english native speaker : writing the dialogs in english was a pain in the ass. I wanted to tell much more, but couldn’t because I wasn’t fluent enough. Fortunately, Wordreference helped me, A LOT, and I think it saved the game.

In the end, a lot of things went right and very few went wrong. The game is exactly what I wanted it to be at the first place (drinking my hot chocolate) and I’m very happy with it. I consider it is my best game of all time (ok…I made three…), and I’m glad people seem to like it.

Thanks Ludum Dare !

I you haven’t played Forever Alone Hotline yet : It’s here !

Hi! And Merry Whatever!

In August we were plenty to cover the LD21 on L’Oujevipo. This time, I’ll try to do it alone.
It means I’ll post a new LD22 review everyday during the rating period (and maybe after). I don’t try to review the best games, but the most interesting to me (i.e the ones which deserve 5 stars in Innovation ^^). So if you want to read about games you missed or maybe about your game, why don’t you take a look ?
So far, I already reviewed Al-one, Craequ, I used to speak to the wall, Älone and Comfort Zone (This game is the GREATEST! You should totally play it!). Many more are to come.

Only problem…The reviews are in french…So maybe you should try Google Translate.

-French reviews

-Poorly translated reviews. (Sorry)

Eventually, feel free to rate and give feedback on my own game : Never Alone Hotline .

Just like the last time, I finished my game 6 hours before the deadline.

Finding the idea took me around 3 hours, the graphics 2-3 hours, same thing for the sounds effects, the rest was for coding and writing dialogs (especially writing the dialogs).

I would like to do a What went wrong, what went right thing, but according to me, everything went right. The game is what I wanted it to be, it’s my second one, and I’m pretty proud of myself.

Don’t know if the game is fun, funny or moody still, but it’s mine, and I love it.

Thank Ludum Dare for making this happen. I would have never thought I could actually make games.

(The game is here : http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-22/?action=preview&uid=1874)