{"author_name":"conormn","cat":"LD #28","comments":[{"author_name":"Waffle","time":"January 4, 2014 6:40 pm","epoch":1388878800,"text":"the game is really fun and the music is a joy to listen to. great job!","spam":"N"}],"epoch":1388731140,"likes":3,"metadata":{"p_key":"34038","p_author":"conormn","p_authorkey":"31095","p_urlkey":"69582","p_title":"System Control Post-Mortem","p_cat":"LD #28","p_event":"LD28","p_time":"1388731140","p_likes":"3","p_comments":"1","p_status":"UPD5","us_key":"31095","us_name":"conormn","us_username":"conormn","event_start":"1386892800","event_key":"20","event_name":"LD28"},"text":"

A kinda quick-ish post mortum for System Control<\/a>.<\/p>\n

This was the first game thing I have programmed by myself as well as my first game jam. For a long time now these are two things that I’ve very much wanted to accomplish, so when I saw a post for Ludum Dare #28 I thought it was probably high time to dive in.<\/p>\n

After the theme “You Only Get One” was announced I decided to make a simulation about controlling a test subjects internal organs, giving players the chance to keep him alive for as long as they choose. This is an odd idea I’ve toyed around with for awhile and seemed simple enough to complete in the timeframe. Plus think how fun it is to repeat the same basic tasks at the same time over and over and over…<\/p>\n

The initial animations and design were created in Flash and went fairly quickly as these skills are part of my profession. In general I’m really pleased with how they turned out, tho I would have loved to animate the test subjects escape from the underground facility. In the end I had to settle for him talking to you via text bubbles to create a short narrative. This part came fairly late in the weekend and was a bit rushed. I’ve since gone back and tweaked some of the dialogue in the post-compo version.<\/p>\n

Coding for the simulation was very very simple and done in Flash AS3. The test subjects lifespan (healthy to death) moves forward on the timeline while pressing buttons for each of the systems (digestive, circulatory and respiratory) moves the playhead back several frames. So pressing buttons will buy you a little time, but again the test subjects playhead is constantly moving towards death. The controls were a bit wonky and there was nothing preventing players from mashing buttons to keep him alive. In the end wether you mashed the buttons or not doesn’t really matter, the point was how long do you want to keep doing these repetitive actions. Tho for fun, in the post-compo version I tightened the controls a little and made the pressing of some buttons at the wrong time advance the subject closer to death. Haha. The longest part during the weekend was probably setting up the introduction which I think also turned out nice. Maybe a little long, but nice.<\/p>\n

Music was created on my iPhone using Figure by Propellerhead<\/a>. This amazing app only creates short little loops, so I made three that could easily transition into each other. After exporting those I stitched them together in Sound Studio 4<\/a>. The pseudo song was really one of my favorite things to come out of this. The few sound effects that made it in were made by cutting up some misc sound clips.<\/p>\n

All in all this was a truly great experience and I can’t wait to participate in another Ludum Dare. I am still incredibly limited in my programing skills, so next time I’ll create something crazy like a text adventure or something.<\/p>\n

Thanks for reading.<\/p>","time":"January 3rd, 2014 1:39 am","title":"System Control Post-Mortem"}