It's my third Ludum Dare participation. Someone would've guessed that by now I should have a better understanding of what I can deliver in a three days game jam duration. I became much more proficient in Unity and it takes me much quicker to figure out how to implement a specific mechanic even If it's completely new for me. Thing is - this time our type of the game was completely out of my comfort zone. So far I programmed 3 simple platformers, for this Ludum Dare our team came up with an idea of a top-down game. With stuff like inventory management, equipped items, buffs, and crafting system. I should've known that this was too much for me, but Ludum Dare jams were always supposed to be a challenge for me and the team, and the idea that we came up with was so good it would be waste to throw it away.

In every jam I participated so far, there was always a time on the last day when we decided that we need to cut-off content to make it in time. Our final product is then about half of the size that it was supposed to be. But it was made on time.

With our current idea, everything plays together so tightly that there was nothing to cut-off without the serious impact of the game. That's why when we published it, it was highly unplayable and had a lot of bugs which made completion impossible. Who would've guessed that more content is not only more stuff to design and program but also more to test. Now after a few additional days of polishing and fixing critical bugs, it's kinda ready. Ready in a shape that Ludum Dare entry deserves. There are still a lot of ideas and improvements that we want to add. But now the game could be enjoyed.

I learned so much in recent days, it's this amazing feeling of self-development that makes every LD enjoyable. It was the first time that I created a simple shader using Shader Graph, made proper use of Unity ScriptableObjects, and had so many objects interacting with each other on collision. This was also first jam when I participated in a team that had someone responsible for the sound (kudos to amazing composer Gabriel Pulcinelli). It's so good to hear music composed specifically for your game.

If you like a specific atmosphere in games I highly recommend checking our entry. If not for the gameplay (which ended up a little confusing), then for amazing music and graphics.

P.S. Singletons are evil, but also so very tempting to use, especially when the speed matters. 11 is my new record of them