or “What not to do during a compo” xD

Once again I’ve taken part of the Ludum Dare. Last time I ended up really slacking off… So, this time, I forbade me to do anything not related to making a game =D . Turns out this didn’t worked as planned… But I must say that I really had fun.

Though I made a game about a tiny little creature that eats others tiny things (what, in my opinion, doesn’t really have anything in common with the theme… since it’s missing the “World” =x) this wasn’t my original idea. After seeing the theme, I thought about what to do and came up with two ideas:

• backup idea: a game about a tiny creature that is hungry and keeps eating until it grows so much that it can eat the planet, then it would go to another one; (this is a little diferent from what I ended making)
• main idea: explore a tiny world, interact with it’s tiny inhabitant, then [the player would] play in their tiny reality…

I really don’t know why, but I thought the latter would be better. Even though the idea was interesting, when I completed the “macro world” parts I couldn’t think about anything to do in the tiny world… And what’s worse: the game wasn’t fun at all! >_< (at least, I learned how to implement a “random dungeon generator”… or, how I really did it, “random paths between objects in a random landscape” =D )

So, within 8 hours from the compo end, I had something I wasn’t happy with (by “wasn’t happy” read “couldn’t work anymore @_@”). Then I did what any (in)sane person would do: I scraped that idea and start a new project… Since time wasn’t exactly on my side, I quickly remembered the basic feature: you eat things and grow bigger. I also had a new idea: you can jump on things to shrink them. Since I was using Flixel, i didn’t have to remake the core… but I couldn’t reuse anything usefull from the original idea (well, I copied the “control” class… but since I didn’t allow user modifications to the controls… it was kinda useless… xD).

Then, in a hurry, I began doing everything needed: coded, drew the sprites, coded some more… Had trouble comming up with the song xD. Then, with the base working kinda properly, time to design the stages! I ended up doing only tutorial stages and two that should have enemies… but I ran out of time to implement them. =x

Since I rushed so much, I didn’t realize that I forgot to allow the creature (which had already been named Hummy =3) to grow bigger than the world in order to eat it… Anyway, in the end, I was able to work something out that (even though wasn’t exactly what I had planned) I really liked. =D

Next time I must be sure to think throughly about what I’ll be doing… Though I must say (now, after the compo…) that it was fun… it would be really better if I didn’t repeat this. I regret not doing a better game (especially since I know that, had I choosen this idea from the start, I would be able to do something better). =X

If you haven’t played the game, why not play it now? =D

Thanks for reading. =]

Since yesterday, but due to circumstances (it being late, having class in the morning today, etc) I’m only writing this post now!

Play it here! =D

This game is about a tiny little creature that is hungry, and only one thing will ease his suffering: eating that delicious yummy.
And did I mention that when you eat things… you get bigger? =D

The game ended begin much shorter and incomplete than expected… but I’ll do a post mortem version, which will surely have enemies!
Also, I’m planing to do something like a puzzle (e.g., having the right size to pass through passages)… though I’ll think more about it.

I’ll probably write a post mortem talking about how my LD went… but later! Now I have games to play! =D
(and there are a lot of games this time!!!! =D)