All right. My entry, YAHG, was my 2nd LD entry. Last year, I worked on this, which was also my first game made alone, my first “Jam” game, the first time I made graphic & sound assets for a game… it was a lot !

But anyway, this time, I was up for something a bit different. It was mostly a technical Jam for me, not really a fun one. Let’s get into details !

What happened ?

I had two main objectives in mind for this LD : learning how to use Wwise and code something. 

The Wwise part is obvious : I never used it, only watched some tutorial videos, and I really wanted to learn, as this engine totally blows my mind. Fortunately, an alumnus of my school, Cédric Liaudet, created a Game maker plug-in… which happens to be one of the only ways I know to efficiently create video games.

I could learn how to use something else (like… Unity), but leaning both how to use Wwise AND a new engine in 48h seemed too much of a task for me. Plus, I didn’t take the occasion to code something finished, even with Game maker, for almost one year, and I didn’t want to loose one of the few technical skills I have. So yeah, Game maker studio was a natural choice.

I worked 36h. I actually had some ideas about the concept before the LD, something in the lines of “let’s make a game with creepy robotic narration with very minimal graphics so I can pretend I’m a hipster” (whatever that means). So when I saw the themes, I was like “okey, let it NOT be minimalism, because I would be stuck with my idea”. Well, there was no way around it.

The successes !

* Wwise ! WWISE ! – Well… Yeah. My main goal is a success : I made a decent use of Wwise engine, with some RTPC’s on volume and pitch and a random container. I learned how the whole thing works : post events, soundbanks, all that stuff which were abstractions 4 days ago. As I put everywhere, I owe a lot to Florent Dumas for his help on how the thing works.

Here’s the best part : I heared my very first Wwise-generated sound RIGHT on the CLIMAX of the music of this scene, and my God was it epic. I’ll never forget it.

* I can actually code ! Somehow. – I don’t think there’s anything really complex about the game. Maybe the “line drawing” part was a bit tricky, but that’s it. Nevertheless, I was pleasently surprised that I was able to add more and more fonctionnalities with everything going on smoothly. I’m able to create as many levels as I want with minimum extra coding ! So even if I’m not an ace programmer, I feel like I may be able to use another technology next time.

* It’s sort of finished – It obviously lacks some polish (see : “The failures”) and is quite short, but the game is playable, has a beginning and an end, and I reached my objectives. This feels good. I even had the time to make some tests thanks to some friends of mine, which revealed several big weaknesses, part of which I could adjust (not everything unfortunately).

* Looking at it isn’t unbearable – I’m a terrible artist. My graphical choices are mostly bad ones, it takes me a lot of effort just to draw basic things, even making something sober yet not desperatly ugly is a miracle for me. I don’t say the game is beautiful, but I feel like it’s style doesn’t fuck up the global experience by its ugliness, and that’s a lot to say.

* Some people enjoyed it ! – This is my biggest success. I didn’t expect anyone to say they’d enjoy the experience, mostly because of the failures described afterwards. I don’t know if it’s because I was too much into it to be objective or if I took it too much as a technical exercice…

The failures

* No music – The other points are way, WAY more important, but the absence of music is my biggest disappointment. I’m quite sure it would have brought something, even if it was a simple 30s chiptune loop. But I simply didn’t find any place in my “pipeline” to create it, as I always either found something more important or wasn’t in the right condition. That’s even more ironic for a game using a sound engine !

* Barely understandable voice… and game – Yeah, well. I had several feedbacks of people not understanding either what’s the goal of the game, how the volume system works, or just what the goddamn voice is saying.

I couldn’t do anything for the latter as I only had very basic Text to speech softwares on which I had little control. Plus, the whole technology seems to be not so accurate, which is quite understandable. Having no decent microphone (this is bad), I couldn’t record & modify my own voice, so I had no alternatives but to take 2nd speech center.

The game understanding is much more concerning. I tried to put one extra indication on the title screen, but the voice control system is quite messy and confusing, and many people don’t understand it. I’m not sure what I should have done unfortunately. Any ideas would be appreciated.

* Weak use of my gameplay system – So, here was the idea : you have to use the voice volume to make good use of the voice.

Sometimes it gives advice while it’s too low so you have to up it. Sometimes it’s too high and threatens to kill you, so you have to lower it. In fact, I tried to add an extra “analysis & reflex” challenge component, hindering the player while working on the core gameplay experience (finding the exit), along with the moving spikes.

I really believe it’s a decent idea… Unfortunately weakly used, mostly because of my low level of control on the voice changes (I had to use Game maker timelines : it worked, but it’s quite annoying to do) and my lack of time. So the game may have this boring feeling due to the weak gameplay.

* I wanted to do 10 levels… – [SPOILER ALERT] – 7 is a dumb number. I like round numbers, like, 10. And I had extra ideas for 3 more levels, so I was a bit sad no to have the time to make them. Actually… I sort of “had” the time, as I had 2h remaining before the end when I submitted the game. But I was too afraid to fuck something up, even more with my high level of tiredness, so I didn’t even try.

* Minimalism ? Where ? – Yeah, well, I thought “Minimalism” could be a very weak theme for the LD, basically because I was afraid to see too many “whatever the game is, it has minimalist graphics with geometric forms so it’s OK” entries, even if there is a lot of great things to do, as some games I’ve already played so far showed me.

And guess what ? YAHG is exactly this kind of game. :p

* No HTML5 export !! – Little disappointment here. I have GM:S with HTML5 export so I was excited to be able to export it for web. But Wwise makes this impossible due to the DLLs. So… no HTML5.

Would you have any feedbacks, don’t hesitate to leave me a comment here or on YAHG’s voting page.

Here’s a few popular articles from my blog which may be helpful to GameMaker users:

• Position and Motion basics
• Sine Wave Motion
• GameMaker Tutorial: How to build an Extension 
• Level Up as a GameMaker Developer
• Random Number Generators in Game Design
• Setting goals for your Game Jam

Enjoy!

I’m in.

• GameMaker
• Code I’ve posted at GMLscripts.com
• Photoshop
• Lightwave 3D
• Audacity
• Bfxr
• LMMS? cgMusic? Some kinda tracker? Music ain’t my strong point.

We’ll see if I can maintain my unbroken record of failure. GMC Jam is happening the same weekend which should help.

Hi guys! This will be my first real Ludum Dare, because I couldn’t participate in the previous one.

These are my tools:

Code: Game Maker Studio with the HTML5 module

I’m still polishing my javascript abilities so I’ll use Game Maker to be able to focus a lot more in the design and gameplay of the game

Art: Inkscape or Adobe Illustrator

I’m NOT good with pixel art but I can make some decent simple art with vectors. FAKE it till you make it!

Music: If I have time I’ll make some sounds and music with Reaper, if not, I’ll use some from opengameart.

I love you all!

Hello, Ludumaries!

Those of you who use GameMaker Studio may be interested in a new book that was just published today by Packt Publishing. I provided technical review for the manuscript of HTML5 Game Development with GameMaker, and it will be useful for the beginner and intermediate GameMaker developer.

Much of the book is applicable for general GameMaker development, not specific to the HTML5 build target.  If you pick up a copy, please drop me a note and let me know what you thought.  While I’m not the author, I’m still interested in your feedback.

Hi there, this is my first time doing something like this. I have made many games/ experiments already but never really finished or released anything. I wonder how much I can do in 48 hours.

Anyways, this is what I plan on using

• Enviroment: GameMaker; Although it sucks for large projects, it is great for making something workable in a short time frame.
• Graphcis: Mypaint for backgrounds, Gimp for everything else
• Sound effects: Bfxr; it is simply awesome for creating sound effects
• Music: Public domain music, possibly wolfram tones; I have very little musical talent, so I have to keep it simple here

The weird thing is that I like using GameMaker for quick game making even though I run linux. It runs perfectly in wine though.

By the way, I upvoted Potato. I am very interested to see what kind of things people come up with if that becomes the theme.

I potato does not become the theme (which it probably won’t) I plan on adding a potato easter egg, just ’cause

Starting April 19, the 5th Hack-a-Jam Game Development Competition will begin!

This competition is held every 2-4 months, and this is the approximate 1-year birthday. Because of this, I am offering a prize to the winning entry. This prize is free advertising (one month), on both of my main websites, which have decent traffic.

What is the Hack-a-Jam?

The Hack-a-Jam is a game development event/competition where you must create a game within a set amount of time. The time given in each competition varies, as it could take two days, four days, or even just 30 minutes. Different from other game jam events, the Hack-a-Jam uses a multiple-award system, meaning there is no “Overall Best Game”. This allows for us to give awards to the best games, and not make a decision between two games which are equally amazing. The theme will be a suggestion voted on from the community through many different voting sessions. Another thing you could do to win certain categories is make things such as dev logs, timelapses, etc. You can them post them or links to them in the Posting section of the Forums.

What are some possible winning categories?

Most Psychedelic Visuals
Most Deaf People After Hearing The Game
Most extra items (dev logs, etc.)
Most Rage-free
Most rage-induced
Most Suggestive Content Without Crossing The Line
Shortest Game
Best themed
Most Things On Screen Without Lag or Crash

What are the rules?

Since we are a laid back community, you could probably get away with most of these rules (except major ones, like turning in your entry a whole 24 hours late…). Here are what I would like the community to follow, however:

1. All game content must be created within the set time. Note: You can use other music, placeholder graphics, etc. as long as you are allowed to!
2. Your game is not required to follow the theme, but would greatly improve your chances of winning. Unless almost every other game is not following the theme, it is almost guaranteed that your game won’t win anything.
3. You must work alone, and you must create everything included in the game.
4. All game creation tools are permitted, such as Unity, GameMaker, Photoshop, Flash, Paint, etc.
5. All external game extensions/DLLs are permitted. If you want to make it multiplayer (if you are using GameMaker), go ahead and use 39dll.

You can visit our website at http://www.hack-a-jam.com/. From there, you will want to head over to the Posting section, and sign up for an account (you can use Google, Facebook, etc.). Good luck to everyone!

Starting April 19, the 5th Hack-a-Jam Game Development Competition will begin!

This competition is held every 2-4 months, and this is the approximate 1-year birthday. Because of this, I am offering a prize to the winning entry. This prize is free advertising (one month), on both of my main websites, which have decent traffic.

What is the Hack-a-Jam?

The Hack-a-Jam is a game development event/competition where you must create a game within a set amount of time. The time given in each competition varies, as it could take two days, four days, or even just 30 minutes. Different from other game jam events, the Hack-a-Jam uses a multiple-award system, meaning there is no “Overall Best Game”. This allows for us to give awards to the best games, and not make a decision between two games which are equally amazing. The theme will be a suggestion voted on from the community through many different voting sessions. Another thing you could do to win certain categories is make things such as dev logs, timelapses, etc. You can them post them or links to them in the Posting section of the Forums.

What are some possible winning categories?

Most Psychedelic Visuals
Most Deaf People After Hearing The Game
Most extra items (dev logs, etc.)
Most Rage-free
Most rage-induced
Most Suggestive Content Without Crossing The Line
Shortest Game
Best themed
Most Things On Screen Without Lag or Crash

What are the rules?

Since we are a laid back community, you could probably get away with most of these rules (except major ones, like turning in your entry a whole 24 hours late…). Here are what I would like the community to follow, however:

1. All game content must be created within the set time. Note: You can use other music, placeholder graphics, etc. as long as you are allowed to!
2. Your game is not required to follow the theme, but would greatly improve your chances of winning. Unless almost every other game is not following the theme, it is almost guaranteed that your game won’t win anything.
3. You must work alone, and you must create everything included in the game.
4. All game creation tools are permitted, such as Unity, GameMaker, Photoshop, Flash, Paint, etc.
5. All external game extensions/DLLs are permitted. If you want to make it multiplayer (if you are using GameMaker), go ahead and use 39dll.

You can visit our website at http://www.hack-a-jam.com/. From there, you will want to head over to the Posting section, and sign up for an account (you can use Google, Facebook, etc.). Good luck to everyone!

Starting April 19, the 5th Hack-a-Jam Game Development Competition will begin!

This competition is held every 2-4 months, and this is the approximate 1-year birthday. Because of this, I am offering a prize to the winning entry. This prize is free advertising (one month), on both of my main websites, which have decent traffic.

What is the Hack-a-Jam?

The Hack-a-Jam is a game development event/competition where you must create a game within a set amount of time. The time given in each competition varies, as it could take two days, four days, or even just 30 minutes. Different from other game jam events, the Hack-a-Jam uses a multiple-award system, meaning there is no “Overall Best Game”. This allows for us to give awards to the best games, and not make a decision between two games which are equally amazing. The theme will be a suggestion voted on from the community through many different voting sessions. Another thing you could do to win certain categories is make things such as dev logs, timelapses, etc. You can them post them or links to them in the Posting section of the Forums.

What are some possible winning categories?

Most Psychedelic Visuals
Most Deaf People After Hearing The Game
Most extra items (dev logs, etc.)
Most Rage-free
Most rage-induced
Most Suggestive Content Without Crossing The Line
Shortest Game
Best themed
Most Things On Screen Without Lag or Crash

What are the rules?

Since we are a laid back community, you could probably get away with most of these rules (except major ones, like turning in your entry a whole 24 hours late…). Here are what I would like the community to follow, however:

1. All game content must be created within the set time. Note: You can use other music, placeholder graphics, etc. as long as you are allowed to!
2. Your game is not required to follow the theme, but would greatly improve your chances of winning. Unless almost every other game is not following the theme, it is almost guaranteed that your game won’t win anything.
3. You must work alone, and you must create everything included in the game.
4. All game creation tools are permitted, such as Unity, GameMaker, Photoshop, Flash, Paint, etc.
5. All external game extensions/DLLs are permitted. If you want to make it multiplayer (if you are using GameMaker), go ahead and use 39dll.

You can visit our website at http://www.hack-a-jam.com/. From there, you will want to head over to the Posting section, and sign up for an account (you can use Google, Facebook, etc.). Good luck to everyone!

LevelUp Studio from Toulouse, France is ready to code.

Two teams, one with Unity and one with GameMaker.

I wasn’t sure whether or not I’d be doing LD25, but after I decided to organize the Cleveland Game Developers meetup for it, I’m looking forward to a weekend of no sleep and vigorous game development.

Hopefully the theme will be inspiring and I won’t have any major technical glitches.

My tools, once again, for this jam will be:

1. Game Maker Studio
2. bfxr
3. paint.net
4. MAYBE some other apps.  I’m tempted to try to compose something with famitracker, but I’m not confident enough to say that I’ll be doing that for sure. I also keep wanting to find a happy relationship with a purpose-built sprite editor, so I can do better animations and stuff, but I haven’t put enough time into the candidates that I’ve been learning about still.

I’m also not sure what I want my goals to be for this jam.  My previous games have featured microorganisms.  I’d like to try something different with this one.  I feel like I defaulted to microogranisms for LD24 because they’re easy to draw, and are simple enough animals that you can program them very simply. But I’d like to find ways of programming that makes other types of games possible for me to create in 48 hrs and that means figuring out ways to simplify other types of programming problems.

I’ve been reading a bit about how to implement platformer games in GameMaker, so perhaps I’ll attempt a platformer this time.  I won’t make any final decisions before the theme is announced, because I think it’s important to allow the theme as much freedom to drive the design of the game as possible, but I guess I’m hoping for a theme that inspires me to attempt a platformer this time out.

We’ll see, I guess.

Our comp entry is here: http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-24/?action=preview&uid=5234 Also embarrassingly, apparently Aqualution is a soap brand name so that’s probably not going to stick.

Evolution is actually one of my favorite game mechanics, but I was completely at a loss for what could be implemented in only a few days. That was the biggest hurdle.

A lot of game mechanics fell by the wayside and the idea of evolving powers turned into just growing into a bigger newt and surviving a hostile environment. I got most of the art done that I wanted to, but Alex of AvibeGames didn’t have enough time to code everything in and make it functional so we worked with what we have ready in the framework. Jack did the music and got it to us very quickly for the few songs we needed for gentle ambiance. It was a pleasure to work with my team and friends, I learned a lot about how to make pixelart and it’s likely this project will roll into a bigger post-Dare game or another one.

Things we succeeded at:

• Making a nice atmospheric sidescrolling game
• Simple and varied enemies
• A health and EXP system
• Smooth water floating and dashing physics

Other things that got the chopping block:

• Icebergs
• Key/Door unlock mechanic
• Longer bosses and levels
• Moray eel and giant octopus

I always look forward to Ludum Dare, succeed or fail, as motivation and a learning experience every time. Even if you don’t finish, I think it’s important to post your work—you’ll get valuable feedback for later from your peers.

The secret to my success this time was remembering to take breaks, but not too many. Sleeping, cranking the music up full blast and getting shit done. And sometimes I didn’t, so I’d rush to make up for it, but I’m proud of what we have to show already.

Haha, the build kicks my ass, but it’s wonderful seeing things gradually come to life. We’re on the jam, so we still feel the pressure of that impending deadline!

Teaming up with ButtercupSaiyan (BCS) this time, I am in for the jam!

BCS will take care most of the art part and I will be in charge of the programming/level design/sound part and perhaps do some graphics work as well in case of an emergency.

I am going with GameMaker Studio this time and planning ahead so the game will export to Windows AND HTML5 with no issues.
As such I will be possibly using WAV sounds and not use an extension for OGG, since the audio update for GameMaker is not here yet, and I wish to save time working on the gameplay instead of sinking time in implementing workarounds for both platforms.

Our goal this weekend is to have as much fun & excitement as possible together, and create a great game in 3 days that you will play and enjoy!

Good luck to everyone!

I don’t know what tools I’ll be using yet as it depends on the theme. I will likely either be using GameMaker:Studio, or if I decide to make a text adventure, likely Quest or possibly Inform 7. Any art will be done by me using Photoshop and SpriteSomething, and sound effects will probably be made with tools like AutoTracker-BU and bfxr.

Hello, I’m in!

Tools used:

• Game Maker
• Photoshop
• Pen’n'paper
• (Something for sound, possibly just a mic)

Good luck to all.

Visit here!

Hey everyone! I am glad to announce that the second Hack-a-Jam will be starting on July 14, and I am your host.

The Hack-a-Jam is a gaming jam that is different from others. Instead of one overall winner, there is an infinite amount of categories that you can win in, and there will always be multiple winners. Here are some examples of categories you can win in:

Best Graphics
Best Audio
Most extra items (dev logs, etc.)
Most Creative
Most Glitch-free
Longest Game
Shortest Game
Hardest Game
Easiest Game
Best themed
Most fun game

The amount of time given in the jam is voted on by the community, along with the theme. You can submit themes, and most of them will be sent to the Polls section, where others can vote on themes.

By winning, you will get a badge and bragging rights, along with your name listed on the website permanently as a winner. When this jam gets to be huge, you will be really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really famous! The rules are not very restricted, as the jam is purely for fun:

1. All game content must be created within the set time. Note: You can use other music, placeholder graphics, etc. as long as you are allowed to!
2. Your game is not required to follow the theme, but would greatly improve your chances of winning. Unless every other game is not following the theme, it is almost guaranteed that your game won’t win anything.
3. You must work alone, and you must create everything included in the game.
4. All game creation tools are permitted, such as GameMaker, Photoshop, Flash, Paint, etc. Note: By game creation tools, I mean any tools that can be used to create your game.
5. All game extensions/DLLs are permitted. If you want to make it multiplayer (if you are using GameMaker), go ahead and use 39dll.

The second Hack-a-Jam takes place on July 14, so you should sign up now! Good luck everyone!

My previous Ludum Dare was a disaster as I’ve bitten on more than I could chew in 48 hours. The above image is from the unfinished product.  This time around I’ll try to focus on some simple idea and hope my perfectionism doesn’t take over!

My tools

PaintTool SAI for graphics
SmithMicro Anime Studio for animation
Fruity Loops for music and some freeware instruments
GameMaker 8.1 to bring everything to life ( Using my simple blank template & framework )
Might try to export a HTML5 version (Using GameMaker HTML5) afterwards depending on
how complex the game will be.

Everything I did during LD21 was dumb, hopefully I can do better this time.
I thought I should stream again. Even if no one watches, that fact that someone can see what I’m doing at any time might make me less likely to slack off.
I will stream all my work on at http://www.justin.tv/metaknight3000

Tools:

• Gamemaker 7
• bfxr / Goldwave
• MSPaint / GraphicsGale
• pxtone Collage

First time was really fun, so taking part again would be twice as fun!

I was going to use FlashDevelop with Actionscript 3 and AIR framework, but I need more practice before I can rapidly create games with it.

So instead, I am going to use:

Hand drawn graphics using Systemax PaintTool SAI, animated with SmithMicro Anime Studio 8,
music and sound effects using Fruity Loops, possibly with using freeware instrument samples to compose simple tracks, plus original sound effects and voice (if necessary)
GameMaker HTML5 for overall development using my game codebase.

Windows version will be surely available and HTML5 as well -if there are no annoying performance issues and code compatibility problems.
My codebase is nearly fully polished & will be posted before the compo begins.

To play my first Ludum Dare entry, go here: http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-21/?action=preview&uid=5234