{"author_link":"\/users\/elendow","author_name":"Elendow","author_uid":"elendow","comments":[],"epoch":1512726879,"event":"LD40","format":"md","ldjam_node_id":70216,"likes":13,"metadata":{"p_key":"106805","p_author":"Elendow","p_authorkey":"1001381","p_urlkey":"322615","p_title":"Postmortem \"A Platformer for Ants\".","p_cat":"LDJam ","p_event":"LD40","p_time":"1512726879","p_likes":"13","p_comments":"0","p_status":"WAYBACK","us_key":"1001381","us_name":"Elendow","us_username":"elendow","event_start":"1512086400","event_key":"70","event_name":"LD 40"},"node":{"_collation":{"body_sanitizer":"TextUtils::SanitizeHTML via existing importer","event":"LD40","removed_author":false},"_superparent":49883,"_trust":4,"author":1381,"body":"This is the first time I'm doing a postmortem, but I think this time the game really deserves it.\n\n[You can play it here!](https:\/\/ldjam.com\/events\/ludum-dare\/40\/a-platformer-for-ants)\n\nI participated alone in the Jam modality. I wanted to participate in the Compo, but I really wasn't feeling that I was able to achieve something, so I taked it easy. I woke up at 9am, the LD starts here at 3am but I needed the sleep. When I saw the theme, \"The more you have, the worse it is\" I really liked it. But every idea I had was \"if you pick up this items, that you NEED to pick up, the game becomes harder!\". I really hated that kind of ideas. I started to procastinate a little, It wasn't until 11am that I got the idea of \"the more you explore, the less (or more) you see\".\n\nI felt a huge motivation after having an original idea for once. I'm not the best of designers and generally my ideas suck. This time was different, I got something cool to work on it. So, I started to prototype the core mechanic: the zoom of the camera.\n\n![first prototype.gif](\/\/\/raw\/565\/z\/e446.gif)\n\nI got it working in no time. After lunch I got the zoom working and a few stages made. I was trying the new Unity 2017 tilemap editor and it really made the things easier. In the other hand, I don't know why, Visual Studio 2017 didn't work as well as it did Visual Studio 2015. That pushed me back a little trying to solve those errors (with no results...). Anyway, the core mechanic was made and I started to make some sprites to make the thing pretty.\n\n![9c75.gif](\/\/\/raw\/565\/z\/e449.gif)\n\nLong story short, I'm no artist and I always feel very frustrated trying to reproduce my vision of the game to actual assets. This time was no different. I spent hours and hours (the entire evening and night) making the sprites you see in the gif. Only the tileset, the character is from OpenGameArt. I wanted to change it, but the times I tried to make something moving were always a waste of time.\n\n![photo_2017-12-03_01-24-25.jpg](\/\/\/raw\/565\/z\/e44b.jpg)\n\nI went to bed very frustrated: \"I have an amazing idea, but in the end the game will be ugly and nobody will play it\". That depressed me a lot. I didn't wanted to continue the game. That's always the reason I don't finish my projects.\n\nBut in the morning the tweets and comments telling me that the game looked cool helped me a little. I spent the morning working in the family business so I couldn't work in the game, but after lunch I started to work again. I made more sprites and give some light to the scene to improve the looks a bit.\n\nThat went nice, the sprites were still ugly but the light always help to see everything better (well, that has some logic thinking of it).\n\n![ezgif-4-5f078b49f6.gif](\/\/\/raw\/565\/z\/e44d.gif)\n\nThe motivation went out when I wasn't sure what more to do with the game. I didn't have a name either. So, my girlfriend told me \"do some more stages, give a final to the game, and then we'll see\". And I did that. Some final efforts to \"finish\" the game. I made an enemy, I made some stages and I put a timer to see how well you did.\n\nThe name went after that, when she told me that the game was for ants. The game was baptized. After that I polished it a bit on monday, I've added the music, some sounds and fixed some bugs.\n\n**What went well**\n- I got an amazing idea\n- I implemented it very fast\n- I slept my hours\n\n**What went wrong**\n- Problems with Visual Studio\n- Getting down with my insecurities multiple times\n- Getting stuck with art\n\n**Tools**\n- Unity 2017\n- Visual Studio 2017\n- Aseprite\n\nAfter the jam I improved the game with better platforming and some suggestions and the game improved a lot. I'm really happy and overwhelmed with the reception and good comments.\n\n\n![ezgif-4-8762f9b3bc.gif](\/\/\/raw\/565\/z\/e452.gif)\n\nThanks a lot for reading me and for playing my game. It really means something. Here you go a behind the scenes screenshot!\n\n![photo_2017-12-03_03-10-15.jpg](\/\/\/raw\/565\/z\/e453.jpg)\n","comments":3,"comments-timestamp":"2018-01-19T15:55:58Z","created":"2017-12-08T08:39:38Z","files":[],"files-timestamp":0,"id":70216,"love":13,"love-timestamp":"2017-12-26T01:26:53Z","meta":[],"modified":"2018-01-19T15:55:58Z","name":"Postmortem \"A Platformer for Ants\".","node-timestamp":"2017-12-08T10:39:33Z","parent":59483,"parents":[1,5,9,49883,59483],"path":"\/events\/ludum-dare\/40\/a-platformer-for-ants\/postmortem-a-platformer-for-ants","published":"2017-12-08T09:54:39Z","scope":"public","slug":"postmortem-a-platformer-for-ants","subsubtype":"","subtype":"","type":"post","version":205138},"node_metadata":{"n_key":"70216","n_urlkey":"322615","n_parent":"59483","n_path":"\/events\/ludum-dare\/40\/a-platformer-for-ants\/postmortem-a-platformer-for-ants","n_slug":"postmortem-a-platformer-for-ants","n_type":"post","n_subtype":"","n_subsubtype":"","n_author":"1381","n_created":"1512722378","n_modified":"1516377358","n_version":"205138","n_status":"WAYBACK"},"source_url":"https:\/\/ldjam.com\/events\/ludum-dare\/40\/a-platformer-for-ants\/postmortem-a-platformer-for-ants","text":"This is the first time I'm doing a postmortem, but I think this time the game really deserves it.\n\n[You can play it here!](https:\/\/ldjam.com\/events\/ludum-dare\/40\/a-platformer-for-ants)\n\nI participated alone in the Jam modality. I wanted to participate in the Compo, but I really wasn't feeling that I was able to achieve something, so I taked it easy. I woke up at 9am, the LD starts here at 3am but I needed the sleep. When I saw the theme, \"The more you have, the worse it is\" I really liked it. But every idea I had was \"if you pick up this items, that you NEED to pick up, the game becomes harder!\". I really hated that kind of ideas. I started to procastinate a little, It wasn't until 11am that I got the idea of \"the more you explore, the less (or more) you see\".\n\nI felt a huge motivation after having an original idea for once. I'm not the best of designers and generally my ideas suck. This time was different, I got something cool to work on it. So, I started to prototype the core mechanic: the zoom of the camera.\n\n![first prototype.gif](\/\/\/raw\/565\/z\/e446.gif)\n\nI got it working in no time. After lunch I got the zoom working and a few stages made. I was trying the new Unity 2017 tilemap editor and it really made the things easier. In the other hand, I don't know why, Visual Studio 2017 didn't work as well as it did Visual Studio 2015. That pushed me back a little trying to solve those errors (with no results...). Anyway, the core mechanic was made and I started to make some sprites to make the thing pretty.\n\n![9c75.gif](\/\/\/raw\/565\/z\/e449.gif)\n\nLong story short, I'm no artist and I always feel very frustrated trying to reproduce my vision of the game to actual assets. This time was no different. I spent hours and hours (the entire evening and night) making the sprites you see in the gif. Only the tileset, the character is from OpenGameArt. I wanted to change it, but the times I tried to make something moving were always a waste of time.\n\n![photo_2017-12-03_01-24-25.jpg](\/\/\/raw\/565\/z\/e44b.jpg)\n\nI went to bed very frustrated: \"I have an amazing idea, but in the end the game will be ugly and nobody will play it\". That depressed me a lot. I didn't wanted to continue the game. That's always the reason I don't finish my projects.\n\nBut in the morning the tweets and comments telling me that the game looked cool helped me a little. I spent the morning working in the family business so I couldn't work in the game, but after lunch I started to work again. I made more sprites and give some light to the scene to improve the looks a bit.\n\nThat went nice, the sprites were still ugly but the light always help to see everything better (well, that has some logic thinking of it).\n\n![ezgif-4-5f078b49f6.gif](\/\/\/raw\/565\/z\/e44d.gif)\n\nThe motivation went out when I wasn't sure what more to do with the game. I didn't have a name either. So, my girlfriend told me \"do some more stages, give a final to the game, and then we'll see\". And I did that. Some final efforts to \"finish\" the game. I made an enemy, I made some stages and I put a timer to see how well you did.\n\nThe name went after that, when she told me that the game was for ants. The game was baptized. After that I polished it a bit on monday, I've added the music, some sounds and fixed some bugs.\n\n**What went well**\n- I got an amazing idea\n- I implemented it very fast\n- I slept my hours\n\n**What went wrong**\n- Problems with Visual Studio\n- Getting down with my insecurities multiple times\n- Getting stuck with art\n\n**Tools**\n- Unity 2017\n- Visual Studio 2017\n- Aseprite\n\nAfter the jam I improved the game with better platforming and some suggestions and the game improved a lot. I'm really happy and overwhelmed with the reception and good comments.\n\n\n![ezgif-4-8762f9b3bc.gif](\/\/\/raw\/565\/z\/e452.gif)\n\nThanks a lot for reading me and for playing my game. It really means something. Here you go a behind the scenes screenshot!\n\n![photo_2017-12-03_03-10-15.jpg](\/\/\/raw\/565\/z\/e453.jpg)\n","title":"Postmortem \"A Platformer for Ants\".","wayback_source":[]}