With the jam winding down, it's time for my traditional post-mortem, looking at what went well with my LD53 entry, what went badly, and what I can improve upon for next time. If you haven't played my LD53 entry yet, please do, and I'll make every effort to uphold my usual promise of rating everyone who leaves a review.

Without further ado, let's get started.

What Went Well

• I was very busy over the jam weekend, to the extent that I didn't think I'd be able to submit anything at all, but I was just barely able to finish the game in time without cutting anything. The scoping was absolutely spot-on.
• This is the first time I've experimented with single-screen level design, and it seems to have gone very well. I was able to include a substantial number of levels and mechanics, and quite a few reviewers were impressed at the size of the game.

What Went Badly

• After Fruit Fall was my first completely bug-free release, I unfortunately reverted to type and released Deliver Us From Evil with multiple collision bugs, all of which were easy fixes. My decision not to embed the version with the bug fixes also feels like a mistake, because people are just playing that version and feeding back about bugs that I've already fixed, which is not helpful.
• The second-most common bit of feedback (after the collision bugs) is "this is a bit of a stretch theme-wise", or just plain "this doesn't fit the theme". I think I got a little too creative with the interpretation on this occasion, and I'll have to hear that in mind.
• I wanted to make enemies with more complex behaviours, like shooting at the player, but ran out of time. This particularly affects the final boss, which isn't a very interesting fight: you can easily cheese it by just staying on the ladder and swiping at it when it approaches.

What Comes Next

I have another patch coming out shortly, with a few minor tweaks, and might see if I can get a third one out before the end of the jam. After that, I think Deliver Us From Evil will be truly finished (though I said that about Fruit Fall and ended up making an enhanced version three months later, so you never know). For next Ludum Dare, I should consider creating something a bit more story-focused than my last few entries have been.

In seven days' time, it'll be Prism Indigo's 1-year anniversary, and I'll be celebrating with a brand-new update and sale. After that, I'll be resuming work on Prism Warriors, taking it off hiatus and beginning work on a brand new game mode.

Good luck to everyone when the ratings come out!