Update 1:

I decided to go for option 1, the ultra-simple 3d modeller.

The other options didn’t set my “ooh shiny!” reflex ablaze, although they are probably significantly more doable in the time frame.

In the same vein as Ludum Dare I have given it a Latin name - Carpe Lutum (Seize the Clay).

I have put all the woes I had with Flex in LD12 behind me - i had so much trouble because I was trying to treat it like normal Flash, and it will resist you every step of the way if you try that. Use it like an app platform and it purrs like a kitten.

Here is a screenshot of my interface as of hour 5:

(edited for repackaging)

Here it is… Description comes later. I’m already late because I couldn’t upload the stupid file.

All in one Windows binaries:

Get it here. Unzip. To run, drag owliver.love on love.exe

Game and engine separated (required for Linux users):

Get the game file (OS-neutral) here: http://noe.falzon.free.fr/static/owliver.love

And get the Löve engine:

• Windows users: installer is here. When it’s installed, double click on owliver.love to run the game.
• Linux (Ubuntu/Debian): a .deb is here. When installed, run “love owliver.love” in a terminal.
• Linux (other distros): sources are here. Compile, then run “love owliver.love” in a terminal.

Post deadline update:

I have been told that the game was too difficult to play some levels. I checked, and yes, a bug due to last minute savage editing made the lightnings very difficult to repair. Here is a post deadline version with this bug corrected, plus cosmetic details (level names, global offset for “correct” transition between levels).

I post it so you can enjoy the game anyway, and reach the last level, which was quasi unreachable in the other version.

You can get the Windows all in one binaries, or the Löve game file. Installation/running is the same as above, where stuff is named “owliver-postLD” instead of “owliver”.

Hola =]

Looks like I’ve finished with 10 minutes left..a new personal record! This is much nicer than finishing with 2 minutes left. Look at me writing this like I’ve got time ;]

I didn’t manage to have time for sound, which is probably good news, I was going to sing.

So Teenage Mathant Ninja Towers is a tetris clone, with numbers and addition, subtraction will be available in the retail version which hits shelves august 2012 for one million dollars MWAHAHAHA preorder now.

No, really, I could use the cash.

The file is here:

http://www.mediafire.com/?njp8o70rl5u

Let’s hope this one works! I included some redistributable files from MSVC2008 in the zip.

Good luck! Looking forward to playing some of your games!

Edit: Drat, well I found a bug, at level 3 there’s minus signs in the tower, however the code for computing minuses isn’t in, so some equations at level 3 and above will not clear. Here’s a link to a zip with no broken minuses, in case you’re really getting into the game and want to play it past level 3, but this version is not to be judged!

http://www.mediafire.com/?w9ptefdxbzc

I am no longer working on the program itself, so I’m putting this up as a FINAL. I have provided both a binary linux and binary windows version.  I have confirmed the binary linux version works under Ubuntu once the allegro lib has been linked in to the system.  The readme has the info, but there is only one step that needs to be done to run the game under linux:

./link

This will link in the library and update the dynamic linker.  The binary should run after this is done.

The win32 version is straightforward and should work as expected.

WIN32 VERSION

LINUX PRE-BUILT VERSION

Both include source.

Here is a screenie:

I’m finally finished with a version that both runs and could be classified as a game. So here it is. All important information is available in the game, really, if you just pay a bit of attention. I might include play information here later when I don’t need to sleep so much.

If you want another screenshot, here’s after having won.

The Tower of You, Windows binary download + D source.

Update after deadline: I’ve updated the above link to include zlib1.dll which was missing. The original package is still available.

There is a chance I will finish this one. Five and a half hours to go, and I pretty much only have implement win/lose conditions, and port the thing to win32.

The game looks and is a bit inspired by games like DooM or Strife. One of the reasons is that I didn’t have time to make any 3d models, sprites had to do…

I’m tired. Everywhere are cans of energy drinks. Me… Want… Sleep… … Must… Finish… Game… First… Ugh…

I’ve managed to get some game stuff into the game. So it’s possible to play it, and it’s possible to win or lose (only there’s not check for it yet). It’s not overly exciting. Or intriguing. There’s an AI that plays decently if it’s lucky, but almost never wins except if you’re stupid. But it’s something.

What’s left is to fix a few known bugs, add some kinds of instructions, and end of game check, and pack it up. Exciting, huh? I’m quite tired, so I don’t really jump around in joy, but maybe I would have been. Probably would have been more had this game turned out better.

I’ll write about how you actually play in the submission post.

And I forgot to post my lunch photo from earlier. It was lasagna.

And then I just had supper. It was toast.

And no, I did not take a lot of photos of the same toast and use them to post multiple times during the course of this compo. It really was different instances all of them!

…and I’m starting to get pretty frustrated.  I don’t have a lot left to do, but I am consistantly beset with nasty memory bugs that have to do with the way I implemented linked-list data freeing.  I’m not sure exactly WHY its happening though.  Since I’m starting to get pretty sore, my wrists are hurting, and I’m exhausted, my enthusiasm is quickly waning.  Almost tempted to put the blasted thing up as final and call it a weekend.  : P

Here’s a current screenie:

I’ve thrown out a lot of code and streamlined (simplified) gameplay. It’s still fairly pointless, but it’s pointless in a much more easygoing and fun way. Which is important.

I just need to figure out some restriction/bonus given by the tower height. And introduce an AI player. And fix some way to solve conflicts. And come up with a goal. I mean a single actual coded goal. I can think of lots of different other ones, like reach certain height in as low number of turns possible, or be the one with highest tower when resources are all out etc.

Anyway, here’s a screenshot. It looks kind of like before.

I chose to use Python with PyGame, PyOpenGL, and PyODE. (I had only written about one Python program, and had only written one OpenGL program in C++…)

The idea was a Jenga-like tower of bricks that you must defend from owls who fly by and remove pieces. It would topple with realistic physics.

Tall, proud tower:

PyODE (well, ODE itself I believe) unfortunately is apparently not up to the task of a Jenga tower. If I created more than about 8 layers of Jenga bricks, I’d get a segfault somewhere within the collision detection code.

I shortened the Jenga tower and PyODE stopped crashing.

Applying a force to one of the bricks seems not to break the tower… I think I’m just doing something wrong there, though. But PyODE slows down the program to the “watching ice melt” realm.

Pitifully short tower:

I will try to throw together a 2D version of the game idea using Pymunk today, but with less than 11 hours, I may not submit anything.

Either way: a great, fun learning experience!

Ok. So I’m done! Thanks to timezone, I’m early too.

This has been my first competition, and it’s been a lot of fun.

Download it: http://www.ingeniumdigital.com/ldimg/TowerOfDoom.zip

Readme it: http://www.ingeniumdigital.com/ldimg/readme.txt

With all hope (due to its lack of being tested) it’ll actually work. It’s written in C++ with SFML. I’ve licensed the source under the MIT license. If this is a problem, yell.

Stay tuned for a postmortem and perhaps a less broken build after I sleep.

I’ve added small icons so one can see directly where things have been ordered and where things can be done. Also improved the roads. It looks more promising than it plays though, so not sure I’ll get this stuff to be fun or not. It really needs an opponent to make any sense as it is.

I’m up and and working again. Have continued on the roads stuff so that now you can assign workers beyond influence level if it has road connection. Things missing at the moment are building fundament and expanding level of influence. And, like, and AI, decent graphics, multi-player mode etc etc.

I’ve noted that the way worker assignment is currently done is quite bothersome. Not sure how it should be instead. Thinking either that workers stay assigned and can be unassigned, or that one can just select what resources to buy for the remaining workers after having built etc. Currently it works that you select action for each hex during a road, including assigning workers. Then on next round those things are reset.

And now I need to go out in the rain on a quest to buy breakfast stuff.

I’m not done for the night, but it seemed like a good time to post a screenshot.  There isn’t much gameplay to it right now.  The idea is that monsters will progress from the left to the right towards the tower, where you are the person defending.  At your disposal is arrows that you shoot from one of three places on the tower.  Ok, so the arrows don’t do anything yet, since I didn’t implement the collision routines.  I have spent most of the past couple hours making the game look better than the black and white sketches that I’ve been using.  Now it looks like colored versions of my sketches.  I like the style, so I am going to keep it.  I think they look better than anything pixel pushed. 

Next up is probably the HUD display for the top of the screen to display the game info.

Oh, and the screenshot capturing is done from built-in code that dumps the frame before it displays it.  I think its neat.

Here’s a quick render of my tower, the game is basically shooting zombies inside a tower. The tower may not seem to be that tall, but i got time constraints dammit.

My title music loop is very simple, but I think it gets the point across. The point is: YOU ARE ABOUT TO BE KILLED BY OWLS

Title Music

I hope seeing/hearing this stuff early doesn’t kill the funny for you guys when judging comes around

The middle point has passed and I still have nothing playable. Doing 3D from scratch, combined with bad preparation are making my progress really slow. Will I be able to finish a game?

Tomorrow I’ll have to focus on gameplay at all cost.

Edit: Got a demo going! It’s Java WebStart. If you play it, let me know how it went!

Progress is going well. I have introduced an animation thread into my game so it’s not turn-based. The rendering is spotty - the player flickers just noticeably enough - but there is a lot of improvement I can make in the rendering code. Right now all sorts of things happen in the paint method, which should go elsewhere.

The camera switches direction every 1.5 seconds (it’s supposed to be a security camera). Collision detection still works, which is never taken for granted. Next thing I will do is package it up as a JNLP so I can put up a demo.

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Approaching the 24 hour mark.  Last few hours have been sluggish, as fatigue waxes and motivation wanes.  Still, here’s a screenie of current run.  Doesn’t SEEM like a big jump over the previous shot, but there’s a lot more logic going on under the bonnet now.

I don’t really now where all the time went, but at least there has been some progress. Added drawing of the tower with variable number of levels. And initial building of it. And getting and assigning workers to resources. And getting resources. And a bit of ending turn. And simple UI. … Well, so I guess I’ve done more than I remembered at first, but it’s still not a game, far from it. Here’s a screenshot.

And I’ve just had supper. What do you think it was?

That’s right. The toast subclass of bread. With a little butter. It’s really supposed to be a lot of butter, but I ran out of it, and wasn’t clever enough to buy more earlier when I was shopping. So now I have something fun to do before breakfast tomorrow! Yay!

Ok, have all my structs and such debugged and compiling, and now displaying.  So, here is a first display:

So the idea is that there’s a guy climbing up a tower, and the Kamikaze Owl Squad is trying to knock him down. Every time an owl hits the guy, he slides down a bit. The guy is climbing up at a fixed speed (slowly).

This is all great, but I haven’t decided on a way for the user to interact and kill the owls. Mouse? Keyboard? We shall see.

Ok, basic gameplay is inplace (no win conditions yet…)…

I’m trying to play it, but the game reveals itself impossible in lot’s of conditions: for instance, in the screenshot below, you can see that there’s no way I can transform that block into something that doesn’t screw everything up…

I wonder why most my games in LD48 end up like this: impossible… I should think things through better before coding…

Anyway, I’m gonna try and find a solution…

13 hours in, and I have something! It’s not much, but it can at least conceptually be seen as a building (see the levels?). The brown things are stair cases between the floors, which should probably end at the latitude where the next level up starts. But those aren’t things you think about until you try explaining it to someone.

The little stick figure is the player, and right now it goes back and forth and up and down, with reckless disregard for walls and viewable areas. Next up: collision detection.

Read on, for more trials and tribulations of the first 13 hours…

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