I’ve been waiting for it sooooo loooong and it has finally happend! We’ve just released Ghostly Me – post-compo version of my MiniLD #36 game which was originally called Eruption. It’s free as I promised, and you can play it on Newgrounds. I’ll be happy to get your comments, thanks!

Also, cupquake made a lets-play video for the game and she’s really cute, I had a lot of fun watching it.

I considered calling this post a postmortem… but I believe my LD entry My Little Robo is pretty successful for a first timer so “postmortem” would sound too pessimistic. Hence “after action report” – sounds way more upbeat, doesn’t it? Later I will also prepare a sort of “pre compo checklist” based around my experiences.

What went wrong?

• Integrating physics engine with cocos2d-x html5 – I was foolish enough to assume that if I would need physics engine I would figure out how to use it as I go along. How difficult could it be? It turns out that engines are not that difficult, but oh the documentation. It might not references the same API version as yours. It might not be written with Javascript in mind. It might turn out some stuff is not mentioned at all (like the namespaces). Figuring it all out I wasted several hours I could have used for other things.
• Javascript can make you cry – I am used to programming in C++ and encountering certain bugs like a mistaken variable name, or a lost comma in class definition at runtime was a bit nerve wrecking, especially combined with cryptic error messages.
• No sounds or music – I really hoped I will have time to make some music and sounds for the game, but because of physics engine integration problem I did not have time to do that.
• Physics instability – getting real time physics simulations to be stable can be difficult, especially when using physics to create gameplay – again something I could have done better if I did not waste time setting up the engine.
• Submission – Screenshots? I need my own place to host the zip file? Oh shit. I’ve got a shared server but I couldn’t find an option to upload anything to it, dropbox for some reason couldn’t finish uploads because my bloody ISP was apparently doing some late night infrastructure repairs. After a while I remembered that my wordpress blog allows uploading a zip file and used that, but that was about 5 minutes before the deadline.

What went right?

• Picking an innovative and extendable game idea – I’ve spent about 2 hours considering various ideas before I settled on the minimalistic robot. Compared to other options it was a bit more ambitious and risky, but the risks totally payed off. Judging by the comments, LD crowd likes innovation even if it is not perfectly executed and being praised for an original idea feels awesome.  Also LD judging can be considered a “free focus group”. And it showed me that, yes, my idea is worthy of a longer game. Which is exactly what I plan to do now – have I picked a simpler idea or made a demake expanding would be more problematic.
• Using a web based platform – Javascript might be a bit difficult to get used to, but making a web based game was the right choice. Judging other entries I’ve quickly noticed that I am always relieved to see the web option. Also this should make it easier to publish the improved game later on.
• Javascript – While Javascript is irritating at times, it allows for quick iterations, debugging tools are nice and Javascript platform forces open source code. This last thing was a life saver, since it allowed me to dive in and debug inside the engine and to get to the bottom of the issues faster.
• Detailed running TODO list – this is a technique I’ve developed long time ago for dealing with having to code fast under a lot of stress and fatigue. I first write down the features, then break them down into essential implementation steps. If during development I get any idea of extra check that I should make, or another place in code where something should be changed – I add this to the list. It all works like a charm – frees up the short term memory, prevents forgetting important details and crossing out stuff that’s done is a great morale boost.
• Source control – a pretty obvious thing. More than once I was really grateful I took those few extra seconds to setup mercurial before starting coding. Also frequent checkins should be practiced – you never know when your tired brain will fsck something up.
• Precooking – cooking a lot of food before the compo that can be later reheated. It turned out to be a really good idea, eating a proper tasty lunch or dinner is a great morale and energy booster when you are programming for 8 hours straight. I should have secured  stash of some healthy snacks too.
• Taking part – this was overall the best idea of all. Even though my submission was not as polished as I would like it to be, still many people enjoyed it and I very much needed such a confidence booster.

One Game A Month loves Ludum Dare. You see, #1GAM is not a game jam. It is the gamification of gamedev. You earn XP and achievements for doing what you love. We rely on game jams to motivate us. Like doing workouts, the goal is to become stronger, faster, better gamedevs by releasing many small games.  We’d love to have you join us – 5000 strong and growing! Please SHARE YOUR LD48 GAME with us!

My entry is complete! Minimally.

Match Set Game

Check it out!

LD26 / Minimalism / Dehoarder Retrospective

It was very exciting participating in my first ever Ludum Dare. I had written a couple of games in the past using very few hours, but never had I tried to do it in 48 consecutive hours. I wasn’t sure if I was going to be successful or not. It turns out, as I write this, there are still 4 more hours in the compo, and my submission is already entered. Honestly, I thought I would be scrambling madly to get things done right now, not working on my retrospective.

What went well?

Pretty much the whole thing. But here are some specific highlights.

At first, I was concerned about the theme. I didn’t want to just make a game with minimalist artwork and gameplay. I wanted to actually use the theme within my game. I looked up minimalism through Google, and from there, came up with the meta-concepts “Elmininate all X” and “Do X using as few Y as possible”. I stared at the Google results some more, and was noticing that more were about minimalist lifestyles, i.e. living without junk, than about minimalist art. Bingo. My “Eliminate all X” meta-concept quickly became “Eliminate as much junk from your hoard as possible”. Theme ideation success.

By 4 hours into the compo, I had a working prototype where you could walk about a room, and zap newspapers with your mouse. Having an early working prototype was a huge win, as always. I could turn in for the night satisfied that I was well underway.

I was very glad that I had recently done some work in blender 3D. I always have so much trouble with that program, as I find it very not-user-friendly. Fortunately, I remembered how to do most of what I needed to do. At first I wished I could pull in models from prior projects, but then later in the weekend I realized that I had actually created several general-purpose models that I can use in all of my future projects (except future Ludum Dares). Another win.

Keeping scope limited is key to something like a Ludum Dare, and I managed to limit scope very well. I did not feel a need for any kind of supplemental game engine with this project. I didn’t even have to pull in my code generator, though it was all warmed up and ready to go. There was even one point where Unity forced me to reign in my scope – originally, I had planned to model a 2-bedroom house, have specific types of junk for specific rooms, etc. It was immediately apparent upon a proof-of-concept test on my prototype, though, that Unity would not support the number of physics rigidbodies necessary to populate an entire house with junk. There would be no time to write any sort of complex custom engine to augment Unity physics to make it possible. So I had to scale back to a single-room design.

Since the project continued to go well all weekend, I was able to ensure myself adequate rest, and even spend some time with my wife, which contributed to my productivity at the keyboard. At no time this weekend did I feel harried or stressed about getting the game done. I was able to work at a comfortable pace and explore some tangents that bore results, such as the generated background music. This is how knowledge work should be done.

Speaking of the generated background music: the music was at the very bottom of my priority list. I think music is very important to a video game experience. It is a very effective tool for setting a mood. However, with no access to my Creative Commons resources, I had doubts that I would be able to put together something listenable for the music. I did some research before the compo, but did not find a tool that worked for me, until near the end of my work when I found cgMusic. I was able to quickly put together a soothing, generated piano piece that to me, was somewhat reminiscent of some of the Minecraft background music.

Keeping a constant, prioritized list of what needed to be done next helped to keep focus on important tasks and prevent scope creep. Constant integration and testing made sure that the project never strayed too far off track.

Unity3D continues to be a solid game development engine. Without it, such rapid development of a 3D game would not be possible. Everything just worked, as it usually does.

What Could Have Went Better?

It’s hard to come up with much for this category. There were no epic fails, no cases where hours of work had to be thrown away, no stubborn bugs to chase deep into the night.

I struggled for quite some time with how to balance/utilize the money mechanic. In my testing, I had quickly concluded that the dominant strategy in early prototype builds was to completely ignore the selling and money mechanic and focus solely on trashing. I was worried that I was going to have to remove these interesting details in the name of minimalism when I figured out to use some of the special events (one of the last features implemented) to give the player some motivation to keep some money on hand.

In conclusion

Ludum Dare was a lot of fun, and I’m glad I did it. I now have another game under my belt, another portfolio piece to showcase, some art assets I can re-use elsewhere, and the confidence of knowing I can deliver a game based on a given theme inside of 48 hours. I would recommend this experience to any journeyman game developer.

If you haven’t already, check out (and vote when the time comes) on Dehoarder in the compo entries! Thanks!

I am proud to announce to the Ludum Dare community that I have finished my entry in the 2011 October Challenge.

The game is “Project: Wheatgrinder” and can be had for the unbelievable price of $2 here!

Zephyr, my game from LD 23 is now available on the iTunes App Store.

When I originally created the game a few people commented on how well it work with a touch screen, so I’m happy to finally have a version that runs on iPad and iPad mini.

I ported the game from Flash to iOS using the Sparrow framework. I wrote up some more in-depth development notes in this post at The Pencil Farm, if anyone is interested.

I’m keeping the game free until after LD 26, so get it while it’s fresh if you want to try it out.

Links:

Zephyr Touch on the iTunes App Store

Zephyr Touch Development Notes

Original LD 23 entry page

And by finally I mean… I started it in the ludum dare 23

Maybe some of you might remember it, so I’m posting the end result here:

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.kikillosoft.memebasket

it’s a very simple game but at least kind of addictive:

“The type of game you can play for 20 minutes without noticing” is the best review I got here, and that’s great because that’s what I was going for.

The web version is here:

http://bitly.com/memebasket

My goal for the October Challenge was to successfully Kickstart my game Another Castle. Well, it took a bit longer than expected, but it just reached it’s $12,000 goal on Kickstarter!

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/uncadedave/another-castle

I’m glad I took more time to work on my pitch, as I was able to make the prototype much nicer, and I even got approved as a Nintendo developer so the game’s coming to the Wii U! I know Kickstarting a game isn’t quite making a full game for the challenge, but I’ve been wanting to work on a much more ambitious project, and Kickstarter has been a fantastic way to give me the freedom to do so. The Kickstarter’s still going on for about a week, so check it out!

Back in October 2012 I had the bold idea of taking part in Ludum Dare’s October Challenge. Having done game engine and game development projects in the past I knew what kind of huge challenge this was going to be. Nonetheless I still knew I wanted to do it.

Already being in a game idea research phase, after having completed the circle of my last game Pop Corny, I comforted myself by thinking that this was a cool way to take one of the many ideas in my head and really try it out. The worst thing that could happen was to add one more idea to the “crappy game ideas bin”.

What I had was a game idea and a custom game engine. I arranged a meeting with his majesty Thanasis Lightbridge (the mastermind behind the Dol Ammad and Dol Theeta bands), and convinced him to take on the graphics, music and sound design of the game. How little he knew of the horror and torture I was going to put him through for the next 30 days!

With no time to lose I described the idea of a sandbox type game, where you can freely combine simple gadgets to create elaborate flying machines. Before the day was over and through a crazy brainstorming session we were able to find a theme to dress this concept, and that was how Mr. Herbie, the male ladybug, was born. We were going to make a game for a lazy, chubby, ladybug that is too bored to fly with its own wings. Perfect…

The crafting part of the game

Having high standards and only one month is never a good combination when making a game. What most people don’t understand is that games are not created in a linear fashion. You don’t start with an exact game design in your mind, you write it down, split it up in tasks, make a list, start checking out entries on it, and when all are checked publish your game. Game designing is more of a tree building that a list building. You start with an idea and from there you have a number of separate ways to go on. Each one of these ideas then give you more ways. So this way you build a huge tree with branches about every aspect of how the game can be. If we had infinite time, it would be possible to go down every single different path in that tree and actually find the game that works best for us. That is never the case in the real world, and definitely not the case when you only have one month to do it. It is obvious that the key to success in such cases is having a good “greedy algorithm” (as it is called in computer science) that will decide early which way down the tree is not worth going -and be mostly right about it so you don’t miss the next big thing in games-, and being quick to iterate implementing ideas. This is important since you will have to go down to branches only to find out that it will not work. You should be able to quickly backup and try another branch. Yes, the games you play are what is left after you distill all the ideas that don’t work.

Thanasis recording the click wheel sound effect

That was exactly what I did. I chopped ideas as early on as possible. When an idea seemed worth trying out, I did a quick prototype of and tuned it until it was good enough. If it felt wrong it was dropped and I back tracked to other ideas. The chopping of ideas is mostly a craft and I can’t really tell you how its done. Its mostly about experience that is gained the hard way. The quick iterations on the other hand are a combination of discipline and having the right tools.

Discipline is about being able to focus on what you really want make, not being distracted and being ready to dispose hard work when things don’t turn out as fun as intended. And that is harder that it seems, because as humans we have a tendency of thinking better of things we worked for. It takes great discipline to also cut the feature you think is uber awesome but you probably can’t make it in time and you will have to cut down other features of the game, resulting in a grand total that is less of what it would be without the uber awesome feature.

Having the right tools is greatly important. How can you quickly iterate when your processes take hours? You need to find ways to make iterations as efficient as possible. I live in a different city that Thanasis, so what would happen if every change had to be transmitted by email? You easily solve that with dropbox for example. But we can do better than that. For example I had build a system that was constantly deploying (incrementally) the game through dropbox to any number of computers. The game engine also supported hot loading of game assets and scripts. I could actually press save on the script editor and the change was effective immediately on all testing devices running… anywhere in the world. Action games require a lot of “tuning” to achieve the maximum fun effect, and doing it through a build-run-test cycle is not going to work. You will either not tune it, or it will take you enormous amounts of time. Both bad.

Lots of soda cans wasted to get the the right sound effect recorded

Doing this really allowed to save time for the artwork to get prepared and to try out lots of things. It wasn’t until the last 10 days that the game was exactly as I wanted it to be for a months project. All the fun parts of creating your flying machines and crashing them to the ground was there. In the last 10 days we had all the stuff around that made. The leaderboards, the settings, the menus, the gameover screens, item unlocking and progression, etc. Artwork finalization also took place during that period, along with the final sound effects.

The final weekend to the release was crazy. I probably slept for 2-3 hours, fixing the final bugs and glitches. It was then that I had to cut one of what I considered a major feature of the game. The flight replay. It was a long shot because determinism is a delicate thing, and requires paying a lot of attention while developing the system, which was clearly not an option during one month. The system was not 100% correct at that point, and I had to cut it during that phase. It was stressful. Lots of work had gone into it and I had to cut it. Thankfully not completely as I was going to revisit it after the original release when there was time. So I did and now flight replay is supported and you can even share replays with friends.

The development was done on a BlackBerry PlayBook at the time, as I needed a very stable platform. I knew I didn’t have the luxury of trying out different screen resolutions etc. The PlayBook was ideal as it was a very specific system with an app store and many users willing to buy a good game. Don’t forget that the October Challenge requires that you make a buck out of your game!

Alec Saunders presenting FlyCraft on stage at BlackBerry Developers Conference 2013 in Amsterdam

Also during that last days I prepared the ground for the coming of FlyCraft. I setup a website announcing the release and setup a mailing list for those interested. I created a teaser video and made a post about it on Ludum Dare website. People seemed intrigued…

The game was submitted for review and got available on the BlackBerry World on October 30th, where it sold about 700 copies at $1.99 that single day. Users really loved it, and 5 star reviews were hitting the store constantly. The game being a BlackBerry exclusive also got the attention of BlackBerry oriented press that covered the event as something extraordinary, bringing in more traffic and sales. It even managed to be voted “Best new game” in Crackberry’s Readers Choice Awards for 2012. The October Challenge 2012 was a success for FlyCraft! But things didn’t stop there, as fate had more for Herbie. FlyCraft was mentioned in BlackBerry’s Developer Conference in Amsterdam during the keynote. I think that this was the biggest highlight of FlyCraft’s path. Alec Saunders in the keynote stood up in front of a huge video wall with FlyCraft on it and he talked about the game and the story behind it. I honestly don’t know how I am going to top that in the future!

Looking back at the challenge and the events that followed, I often try to fully grasp the benefits of this competition. I now believe that learning to self constrain yourself is one of the major powers you can harness for getting better and achieving your goals. Ludum Dare teaches you exactly that. I really believe that without the mental goal of the challenge FlyCraft would have taken longer to complete (if ever) and it would be a lesser game. Big part of FlyCraft’s excellence comes from its simplicity and focused execution. That would surely be missing without the challenge.

[This post was also posted on my blog here]

The title pretty much says it all. I’m very excited about this, more so than I can convey in a post like this!

I finished up Mr Wizard for my January #1GAM game, releasing with 3 difficulty levels and an endless mode. Please, check it out here: http://www.indievania.com/games/mr-wizard-vs-world

It’s pay-what-you-want ($1 minimum). If you can’t afford it, or just aren’t interested in that type of game, please just spread the word! I’d really appreciate anything: tweets, reviews, complaints, anything.

Thank you for taking time to read this. Long live the Ludum Dare community!

Today I released MidBoss (v0.5 beta), because stuff might still change and/or break) as a feature complete game. It’s an overhauled, rebalanced version of my LD25 game, and my January entry for One Game a Month.

MidBoss is a game about possessing your defeated enemies in order to become stronger. You play the weakest of the dungeon denizens, an imp with no ability other than possessing other creatures. Your goal is to defeat and possess increasingly stronger creatures, unlocking their abilities for yourself and becoming stronger as you go along, and eventually defeat and become the dungeon’s ultimate endboss.

Features now include:

• Possess your enemy and gain their strengths and skills
• Dynamic music system with more frenetic music to accompany action
• Line of sight and fog of war systems
• A total of 15 monsters to defeat and 10 skills to unlock
• Randomly generated dungeon floors
• Single-file save and resume
• Permanent death, if you die your save is gone (save-scumming is available)
• Full options menu including key rebinding

If you like it or have feedback, feel free to leave comments here or let me known on Twitter @enichan. Also in case anyone’s curious, here’s my 1GAM profile.

It’s here! After a lot of hard work, I’ve turned my Ludum Dare 25 entry into January’s One Game A Month, and released it for sale!

Check out the page on my blog here for more information, as well as a link to purchase it. Among other new features is an endless mode in which, quite fittingly, you must defeat heroes endlessly until you are defeated. Go for a new record!

I have two codes, each for 33% off!

Hey, I guess I should have written this update a few weeks ago… Bad hotel, a game that I made back in LD20 and then remade for iOS in a more finished version with my company has been nominated for a IGF award in the audio category. Super exciting, off to GDC!

Entry: Speedrun

As this was my first Ludum Dare, I only had two goals: to finish a game, and to make sure I was able to sleep both nights.

I met both goals (yay), but I was truly blown away by the judging results: my humble game placed 7th overall, and highly in other categories, too. Thanks to everyone who rated my game, and kudos to everyone else who submitted one! It was really great to meet a few of you on IRC.

What Went Well

• I finished! It may seem obvious, but this is really the primary challenge of any game jam. The beauty of the 48-hour format is that it forces me to lower my expectations — in a good way.
• Development strategy. My goal was to budget the first 50% of the time to getting the game fully playable (feature complete), then spend the rest of the time on polish (graphics, sound, tweaking gameplay, etc.). Although I fell slightly behind schedule, having a plan made it much easier to get a full night’s sleep both nights, knowing that a playable, submittable game was within reach.
• Simple gameplay. Although the theme inspired a lot of ambitious, complex ideas, I chose the simplest one that I felt would make a fun game. In fact, I initially wanted to make a one-button game, but I added steering once I decided to do a driving game. It was easy to prototype and tweak because it was so simple.
• Graphics. At first, I struggled to get a look that I liked. Luckily, things eventually felt right and the graphics came together rather quickly.
• Audio. I had trouble figuring out how to synthesize a convincing engine sound. At the last second, I managed to create decent loops from an actual recording of a Ferrari F355.
• Testing. I played the game a lot during development. Not only did this help me iron out some bugs and refine the gameplay, it helped reassure me that there was actually some replay value to the game.
• The community. On the evening of the deadline, the IRC channel was full of other participants who were eager to play each others’ games. It was a very friendly, constructive atmosphere.

What To Improve

• Make sure the game includes instructions. I planned to create a title/instruction screen as part of the polish phase, but I ran out of time. It really should’ve been included with the “core” game functionality. That way, it won’t be missing if (that is, when) I run out of time.
• Ask others to test — early and often. Although the importance of instructions seems obvious in hindsight, I totally overlooked it because I was so focused on other details. If I had asked others to playtest the game before it was ready for submission, I would’ve realized it sooner.
• Stick to familiar tech. I started out with Flixel, which I had only toyed prior to the competition, and quickly found myself frustrated and unproductive. I wasted several hours before starting over from scratch with Love2D.
• Build a web version. It’s hard to overstate the value of instant gratification. Games that are playable in the browser are much more likely to be played than other ones, which is why I initially wanted to use Flixel. I did try the Love2D WebPlayer, but there were just too many unsupported features and little issues.
• Keep my weekend clear. Easier said than done, of course.

Results

I was stunned to see that how well my game scored out of all 1,327 games (wow!). It was rated 7th best overall, 9th best in fun, and 17th best in graphics!

Of course, positive feedback is always nice, but the real reward is finally participating in Ludum Dare after procrastinating for so long. Up to the last minute, I couldn’t decide whether I was going to join in or not — but I’m so glad that I did.

I’m definitely hooked now … see you all next time!

Hello everyone! I am here today to share with you a game that was born here, in the Ludum Dare, as a warmup game, and now I completed it as a fully playable game with everything a real game needs; Achievements, story, infinite mode, unlockable weapons, highscores, etcetera, etcetera!

Promotional poster

The original game, formerly ‘Earth Defenders’ was a crappy minigame I made as a warmup for my first Ludum Dare, under an interesting mechanic: A 360º Space invaders twisted clone. at the moment with my little game design skills and motivation it ended up being fun, but not fun nough, and definately not as pleasant!

So, three months ago and three years after that initial minigame I decided to completely remake it from scratch, I dumped every bit of that old minigame and started writing this new, enhanced version of it, with High definition graphics, a touch-screen friendly interface, and cross-platform. The result was Earth Defenders HD, and it is now complete

You can obviously play it on Google Play for free here:

Enjoy it and dont forget to share it with your friends, thanks everyone!

This is the postmortem for my game Trina of the Depths  ( play it! ).

::: Development Notes :::
I worked alone on this one, because I couldn’t find a coder to partner with.
It’s the first game I ever made myself. I’m an illustrator by trade, and have never been (and probably will never be) a hardcore coder.
It was very hard work, since Saturday morning through Monday evening, I slept about 10 hours total.

I used Construct 2, FL studio,  Photoshop and Flash.

About the theme: I couldn’t top my last LD submission, which was about an evil dungeon lord trying to destroy a hero, using traps. So I thought I’d go with my second idea, controlling an evil octopus. So this whole RPG/metroidvania idea developed in my head, about Trina, daughter of the evil Sea King and the secret of her birthright. And it really worked for me, to the point that I’m going to make it an actual game.

Gameplay Video:

:::How I spent the time:::

I really wanted a control scheme that captured the feel of an octopus slicing through water. Therefore I spent some 8 hours developing the control scheme.
Trina, the heroine, is controlled via cursor keys, in a unique way. Pressing a direction doesn’t move Trina, instead it charges her corresponding vector, horizontal, vertical or both. Movement occurs after the release of the cursor key(s), and the muscle meter on the bottom left is accordingly drained by the effort.

Since Trina seemed to be falling too fast (she is in the sea, and this just wouldn’t do), I also implemented some resistance to gravity, not in the form of passive Lift, but in the form of a last strain of her muscles/parachute action. For 30msecs after finishing her ‘jump’, trina will try to stay afloat, giving the muscle meter time to recharge.

This simulates a movement that requires judgement and thinking-ahead, like an octopus might plan. After you’ve made your mind about your target, you jump towards it.  The result is a very exact, very elegant control scheme, that most players so far hated?? Wait, what? More on that later.

When I was satisfied with the control scheme, I added an enemy, a cute fish, which naturally hurts (and annoys) evil Trina. I struggled with its behavior, AI and patrolling patterns, and in the end managed to only get one to spawn…

Graphics came on the end of Day 2. I animated Trina’s animations in Flash (just penciling) and inked/colored each frame in photoshop.

Music-writing sessions were interspersed throughout Days 2 and 3, to ensure maximum inspiration, and time to go back and re-do things. I ended up with three themes, a main tune, an encounter scherzo and a battle theme , using old soundfonts and a sampled gameboy Bass sound.

Day 3 was about damage control (since I hadn’t succeeded in properly implementing enemies) and level design. I also made rapidly prototyped level blocks. For this I took one giant background and start painting directly on it, taking care that assets do not overlap, so I can lasso them and export them later. This way I work super-fast without overthinking everything, I have a good idea of what my assets will look like when overlaid on the game background, and I don’t have to worry about layers and CPU performance at all. It’s the technique I’ve used since my first LD#23 and I wholly recommend it.

Here’s a screenshot of my almost final assets file:

And what my final stage looks like:

:::What went right:::

• my first ever solo game!
• the control scheme: having extensively playtested the game, I find that Trina moves in a much more refined, much more interesting way than if I had used plain 8 direction movement or mouseclick-to-move. After getting the first power-up, Trina controls like a charm, cutting through water like the evil princess she is.
• animation/character design. It’s as fluid as I envisioned. Like all animators, I was mimicking an octopus in the mirror the whole time.
• the music: I thoroughly enjoyed taking a soundfont of women singing “ooohs” and another of women singing “aaahs” and writing parts for them to sing, so that they sound like one chorus that sings both. I loved the battle theme, which I injected a sample of a rhino snorting into. I think it makes the mood more intense.
• the backstory and foundations for expanding this into a proper game. I couldn’t help daydreaming and scribbling notes about how I want the game to be, after LD is over

:::What went wrong:::

• the control scheme! From what I see in my comments section, many people don’t get it at all, can’t maneuver, and/or believe gravity to be too harsh. In my opinion, it may actually be too lenient; it’s a platformer, and you can (with some effort) ‘fly’ to wherever you want to. How is this harsh? Ok, it’s not Owlboy, but it’s not supposed to be. That having been said, I’ve been convinced that up-front giving Trina the powerup that nobody bothers to get  will do its part in coaxing new players into playing, and is a good game design move.
• coding. I’m not a coder, and even though the Construct 2 forums are full of good FAQ and solutions (thank you, community!) , I seriously messed up the code that spawns new enemies, and even though I finally managed to pinpoint the cause, this left my game with only one enemy
• time: because of my coding set-backs, I didn’t implement the larger level I had in mind, the metroidvania “get the item and go back to unlock a new area” portion of the game, and the boss battle. I decided to make it as fun to play as possible with the assets at my disposal.
• backstory/dialogues. It’s not apparent why Trina is a villain. She hates all people (fish) in this part of the world, where she was brought unwillingly, and will scheme and plot against Good King Triton. All this is lost, since I didn’t want to cheapen the mood by inserting plain text using a plain font (Construct 2 doesn’t support embedding, and using webfonts was a big risk)

And that was my entry. I hope you enjoyed it

So! I, like the thousand-odd other people who’ve slid their games under the door at the last moment, just participated in Ludum Dare. No kidding! It’s not like I’d be writing a post on this site for any other reason! But it’s still true. This was my first Ludum Dare, but not my first GameJam in general. I’ve been doing them all year, so I’m pretty gosh-darned familiar with the whole idea of making a game in 48 hours.

Not so familiar with the whole idea of do it all yourself, though! I’ve had artists, musicians, and sometimes other programmers, working with me on every GameJam I’ve done so far. So…this time was a little nerve-wracking! Combine that with the fact that I was out at a family get together for the first six or so hours of LD, and I was feeling pretty friggin nervous when I started!

But it all came together in the end

(more…)

I did it! My first LD entry has been submitted. It is a game in which you try to win, but not by too much. As an Evil Overlord, you don’t want the Hero to ruin your plans, but you don’t want him to die either, because that would spoil the fun! More on the submission page.

That was most intense coding I remember ever having done. Towards the end I had to start heavily cutting corners. There are so many global variables and redundant checks, and so much duplicated code that I don’t ever want to look at the code again

I had some time to spare but was too exhausted to start implementing anything – testing my game is pretty tedious. So there’s no sound, no starting screen, and most placeholder art is better than what you see in the game. Still, I completed what I set out to do – to create a game with many AI controlled agents and player only having global control over their behavior.

I feel I was very lucky with the theme, planning the game took only about 15 minutes. And I even managed to include a goat!

If he didn’t have a cute (but deadly) pet goat, he wouldn’t be an Evil Overlord. On the left, you can see Igor and Dmitri, trusted associates of the Evil Overlord.

The game is controlled by giving orders to your minions by choosing one of three available random choices. There are three levels, at the end of each level there are special choices.

See you in next LD!

The Charity Game Jam was a huge success. Our initial fundraising goal was $250 and as you can see, we destroyed it! Mission accomplished. Achievement unlocked. Boss battle won. Princess saved. THANK YOU VERY MUCH, EVERYONE! I’m humbled and grateful for all your enthusiasm, hard work, and generosity. Should we do this again next year?
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