The theme kind of surprised me! I didn’t see it in the final round I think but it’s better than what I feared the most! Actually, I like it. It made me think about couple of games which utilized world ‘island’ as the core concept. Games like Adventure Island, that indie game Stranded 2, the less known IslandBiz game and a couple of others.

In short, I’m interested and would like to finish my entry this time.

I will keep you updated.

–Miroslav

Don’t want to spoil it now but I’ll write down some keywords.

RPG, screen-by-screen, neon, weird, phobic protagonist, clubbing, city

Now making screenies.

I had a summer course and couldn’t enter at the time, and then I decided to fix every design flaw, but increpare said (and confirmed ) the deadline is not-too-strict so that’s okay.

I have no experience with domestic violence, so it’s more about that one time I was in a bad mood.

Play until the end!

Download (Windows)

Also, the game is finally finished. Play the release version.

Game evolution

On a scale from “Amorphous Blob” to “Rigid Idea”, this is where my idea fits in:

In other words, I had pretty much settled on what idea to use. I was also pretty certain I would be using Java as the language, Slick (an OpenGL-based 2D library) for graphics rendering and SFXR for sound. Despite being relatively sure about what I was going to do, I didn’t get as far in the first day as I have in past contests. I more or less had my technology working, but no game to speak of. The second day, I woke up with a terrible headache that prevented me from working on the game for a couple of hours. Something was clearly wrong (see the image to the right).

A bit of technology

Before discussing a few gameplay issues, I’ll try to explain how the underlying technology used for the arrows and stars works. The stars are in fact controlled by a vector field with relatively sparse density (every 20 or 30 pixels or so). Each vector will turn downwards and change its length according to the strength of gravity over time. When an arrow is drawn, a new vector (that points along the arrow) is added to the vector field at every point in the arrow. This means that multiple arrows will create a stronger effect. For each star, the closest four vectors are then interpolated and added to its velocity once per frame.

The vector field without gravity looks something like in the screenshot below. Note that the arrows faded out a bit too quickly compared to the vectors when I took this screenshot.

What went wrong

Shooting mechanics: I spent a fair bit of time tweaking the rain, gravity and arrow effect mechanics, trying to make it fun. Despite this, a lot of people have said that the arrows did not work as expected. The general sentiment seems to be “I expected the stars to follow the arrows closely”. I can appreciate this, and I did have this plan in mind briefly. In retrospect, I should probably have abandoned my attempt at making a somewhat more “correct” physics model, and instead let stars follow the arrows.

Rain: Having the stars fall down from above seemed like a great idea, but in reality it just made sure that the bottom of the screen never got any “ammunition” to use. A few alternative approches that I could have used are:

• Letting the stars be “attached” to the sky, leaving a limited amount of ammunition per screen. With this approach, one would need to be more careful with arrow drawing (to avoid wasting ammunition). Perhaps stars could also grow back over time.
• Having stars come from particle sources to the left or right, thus avoiding the “no stars in a given area” problem.
• Creating stars for each arrow – perhaps they’d stick for a while and fire a couple of stars before disappearing? This could be coupled with more limited arrow-drawing and enemies that can only be shot from below, or behind, or at a certain point.

Lack of variation: The game lacks variation. There needs to be more enemy types and more variation in the shapes you’ll use for the arrows.

What went right

Visuals: I am primarily a coder, and not an artist. Despite this, several people have said that they liked the visuals of the game, and that is something I am happy with. While the arrows don’t quite match the pixelated style of the rest of the game, I think that the overall style is rather coherent.

Proof of concept: Having more or less settled on the idea in advance, I knew turning it into a fun game would be a challenge. However, I think I got at least halfway there, and I feel confident that further experimentation with the concept could yield a fun game. Several people have also told me that the mechanics may be suitable for touch screen or Wiimote-style controls.

Polish: Even if I didn’t have time to fully develop the gameplay, I think the game feels relatively polished; I’m happy with both the title screen and game over effect. I often skip both of these when making games, but taking the time to make them was well worth it.

Conclusions

Visually and polish-wise, I am happy with the results. I’m also relatively satisfied with how the game turned out overall, but I feel the gameplay could have used another day or two. A little bit of variation and better shooting mechanics could’ve made this game a lot better!

This was my third time participating in Ludum Dare. Once again, it’s been a lot of fun! I’m looking forward to competing again soon.

Here’s a screenshot of the title screen from the final version:

…Okay, I exaggerated a bit in the post title. There’s just one stick figure. Sorry :/

Not very exciting, but I did make two games during that time, so there’s that.

edit: Forgot to mention that I used keeyai’s handy Chronolapse.

I also made another game yesterday, in two hours, during the Klik of the Month. It’s called ‘Hope!’, and since I also followed the Ludum Dare theme with it, why not share it with you, guys.

Download Hope! (Windows)

Download for Windows

Edit: It’s a lot easier if you use F5 to save and F6 to load! It’s possible to make it to the tip of the black/grey line, but not to get onto the second set of dots. But you can win if you press O!

Clarification edit: The dark grey lines are the floor and the light grey background is an infinite void hole. As long as some part of you is touching the dark grey, you won’t fall into the hole. Unfortunately, I made the level in the very last two minutes of the compo, so I didn’t have time to test it; the result is that the level is impossible, and most of it is extremely hard. If you want to find some enjoyment in the game, try getting onto the first dot; that’s actually a reasonable challenge. As it is, this game mostly functions as a demo of the controls.

http://willhostforfood.com/users/X/Xionight/Harbinger.exe

I hope I did this right.

original (linux)

Windows Port

It’s actually not done, but it’s as done as it’ll get within these 48 hours. It’s mostly done, though! Enjoy.

Play (Flash)

Directions

• We control the purple creature. Use the arrow keys to move.
• The large yellowish green creatures are your allies.
• Collect followers (other purple creatures) for more firepower.
• Collect blue eggs. Plant an egg with space to create a new ally!
• Take over the board to win.

Play the game

My motivation is at its peak, I even enjoy playing what I made so far, but I am so tired I want to sleep so badly.

Which means – deja vu – I failed to meet the deadline. However, I hope to finish the game and post it some other day here. Pity I wasn’t able to make it within set time-frame.

Cheers everyone

The wall’s coming, honestly..

http://up.servut.us/14746.2jlwrw

I’m just coming back from doctor and guys I have very important news to tell you – she’s pregnant. I am very happy, but kinda surprised. I am already thinking about name. I hope it will be beautiful, but I think I can live even if it’s the ugliest baby in the world. We don’t know when she’s going to come to our world, but we are routing for very soon.

I’ll let you know if anything new happens.

Cheers