I'm probably not the typical Ludum Dare participant - I've had a couple careers in acting and recruiting, but I've love video games ever since getting my Atari 2600 as a kid. I've been learning some basics of coding and game design, doing lots of tutorials, but I hadn't gotten the nerve to build a game yet. Then my friend Carl told me about Ludum Dare and I said, let's do it!

Carl is an experienced game developer but I am a first timer, so I felt a little out of my league. We started with brainstorming on Friday night, using post-its to write down ideas. Once we settled on one - a 3D platformer with a vacuuming mechanic - we got a bite to eat and divided responsibilities using Trello. He would do most of the coding and i would focus on level design.

Saturday we worked all day - the hardest part was the first step, just putting the first objects down to build a level. At first I had no idea what I was doing, and the first version I built showed it! But the second one was much better and the third a little better. Time passed quickly and before we knew it we had a few levels, a main character who vacuums things up for a living, and a winnable game. Some polishing on Sunday, adding a tutorial level and fleshing out the player character, Main Menu UI and we had our game.

Congrats to everyone who built a game! I imagine, if you are like me, the rush of building a game from scratch in a matter of hours was worth it. I'll add another post going over some features of the game.

I think I'm hooked. When is Ludum Dare 41?