I worked on a chess game several years ago. Before that, I have always thought that chess is just for people with pretensions of being smart, but during that project I learned a bit more of the game and became somewhat fascinated by it. The rules are simple, but there’s a lot of strategy in the game. All that is missing, I thought, is a bit more action, power-ups and a level progression.

I never got around to make that game. I won’t really have time to do that during this LD either, but I’m at least making a chess game. Not your grandfathers chess game though. This is “Pawn to King – chess evolved”.

Or at least I hope it will be something playable tomorrow. Here’s what it looks like right now, early Sunday morning.

IT’s an  MMO* made with node.js/backbone/three.js/tween.js/underscore/…

… and all the good parts of javascript.

http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-23/?action=preview&uid=12078

What is it all about?

You are in charge of an evergrowing world in a universe full of evergrowing discs.
But growth comes at a terrible price.

In the advent of your great growth-inducing politics the general disc-populace grows weary of overpopulation and overproduction.
You decide to take the best way forward.
WAR.
War against the unknowingly weak non-blue discs.
Carefully you plan your next aquisitions while balancing your infrastructure spendings with your investitions in green energy and hauntingly large disc-machines of war.

What does work:

• Support for up to 51.00000000000002 players
• Planets indicate their current production capacity by growing
• Planets may revolt (red tint)
• Military and a good investition in green technology help to overcome riots.
• Attacking

What doesn’t work:

• There is no chat or ranking.
• You cannot transfer your all-killing-war-machines to a friendly planet
• If you tab out there is a high chance your browser might die.
• Simulation is a bit rough. Hadn’t had time to make animations
• Same for graphics.
• Player starting positions can be compromised from time to time. If you can’t grow your disc: reload the page

Oh, and the code is horrible. Iam not uber experienced and furthermore obviously needed to reassure myself that Diablo3 won’t ever become a game i could be happy with.

Thanks for your time. Have a blast!

If you still haven’t played it yet, here is a screen with lots of circles for you.

f this s. iam going to be a potato!

http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-23/?action=preview&uid=12078

*at least in a realtivély tiny world it would be a MASSIVELY MULTIPLAYER ONLINE experience. Here it’s somewhat of a medium scale multiplayer app.

I’ve been in competitions before, but this is my first Ludum Dare. I’m Martin Vilcans from Stockholm, Sweden. I’m hoping to gather a few other local participants for a meetup during the compo.

I am planning to go against conventional wisdom and use tools that I’m not 100% confident with, but I really want to do something with WebGL. I’ll be using three.js and some base code. Since I’m no big fan of JavaScript, I’ll be using CoffeeScript instead. There is an built version of the code online. It’s not very exciting yet, but it should display a gray 3D box that you can move by clicking and dragging the mouse. In case your browser or graphics card drivers doesn’t support WebGL, an informational message will be displayed and it’s time for you to upgrade! Please let me know in a comment if you have other problems and I may be able to fix it before Saturday.

WebGL is new and exciting, and this could become a great tech demo and an excellent game. Or a lousy tech demo and a crappy game.

Or I’ll just chicken out and use PyGame to create something simple but be sure to finish something. We’ll see when the compo starts.

This will be my second fullblown dare, and I really look forward to it.

As I’ve done earlier, I will be writing my entry using JavaScript. I will most likely be using ImpactJS or Three.js for my entry depending on the theme and what game I will be making. I’ve learned from my earlier mistakes, and will not try to learn a new library for this compo. I will also be using Paint.NET for graphics, possibly Blender if I go 3D. For sound I will be using the awesome BFXR. Music will most probably be generated using Wolfram Tunes, simply because I suck at music. If I get to make an explosive game, I will also be using the Explosion Generator. I haven’t used this tool before, but it looks promising.

Good luck to you all !!