Hi all, looking forward to my first ever attempt at Ludum Dare, should be a learning experience at the very least

In the interest of upfrontness, and because it seems to be the done thing, have a link to the *extremely* primative base that I plan to use mrpiglet_base.zip.  It does very little, just provides a bit of a wrapper around some SDL + SDL_Mixer and OpenGL functionality.  Can’t imagine it’ll be of any use to anyone, but use/abuse as you wish anyhow.

Now I think it’s time to try and sleep off the Friday beers, see you all tomorrow for the event itself.  Cheers!

I might want to use this for my entry, so I’m putting it up for free download to avoid cheating.

Just some loader code for PSD images, you can retrieve image data for each layer in the image through pointers to regular 32-bit ARGB  pixel buffers (with individual bounding boxes and positions in the image). Haven’t tested it extensively, and it will probably crash for some images… but if it works for you then go ahead and use it. My idea is to do level layout and similar stuff in Photoshop to remove the need for a level editor. Being able to draw scenery (and collider geometry?) in multiple layers should be enough to make something interesting, and do it conveniently.

Get: psdimage.zip

For the LD4 in 2004, we did a series of preparation compos. They were much shorter as a real LD, and as theme had the remake of an agreed upon classic game. One of them was Robotron (the others were Sapce Invaders, Frogger and Spy Hunter). In the Robotron one you had 4.8 hours for the game. My entry turned out to be a much better game than the one I actually wrote with 10 times as much time for the real LD. Oh well.

The game is rather simple. One directional input (cursor keys) controls the movement of the pink blob, another one (ASDW) controls the gun. Just like in the original.

There’s 30 partially random levels, and quite a lot of different enemies with unique behaviors.

Some of them, like the crab and the spider, were added in a post-compo version. Those are really hard (but fun, this is one of the few of my games I play through occasionally), as is the final boss. The crabs circle you, and the spider tries to aim ahead when shooting - back then I was still good at calculus, apparently The final boss doesn’t shoot you directly, but takes a lot of hits and spawns random enemies.

Ludum Dare #3, theme Preparation. My game, PuffBOMB. Propel a hamster character to an end zone using bombs. Incredible Machine with explosives, burning, and screaming. :). The original compo version, unfortunately, featured only 2 levels.

PuffBOMB scored a Silver for sound, and came in 5th place for fun.

Download: Original compo version

After the compo, I continued to work on the game over a couple weekends, adding 10 actual levels to the game. Also, adding custom level support, due to Stephen Stair offering to build a level editor. The game was later featured on several on several game magazine coverdisks.

Download: Post compo version (0.8)

Eventually, in 2005, I went ahead and fancied up the original game for submission to the IGF and Slamdance competitions. Changed the graphics dramatically, toyed with some graphical effects like a cartoony fire effect, white outlining effect, and so on. Added a proper menu, and ported the game to the Mac.

PuffBOMB was a finalist for the “Popcap Casual Game Award” at Slamdance 2006.

Download: Windows, MacOS X

Today, development continues on the so called “super remake” of the game.

LD48 #3 was themed “Preparation - Set it up and let it go”. For this I originally made a game where you were a leprechaun and needed to plant traps to kill people trying to come steal your lucky charms. For some reason, despite how fun that sounds, I couldn’t get anywhere on it and quit halfway through. Then I came back on the second day, reusing some of the code and graphics and created NPC Quest! It’s a game of buying gear for a fantasy hero, and then watching him fight battles without your help. It’s actually more strategic and fun than it sounds.