{"author_name":"lectvs","cat":"LD #27","comments":[],"epoch":1377560040,"likes":2,"metadata":{"p_key":"38388","p_author":"lectvs","p_authorkey":"4882","p_urlkey":"74006","p_title":"LD27 Postmortem: Coin Rush","p_cat":"LD #27","p_event":"LD27","p_time":"1377560040","p_likes":"2","p_comments":"0","p_status":"UPD5","us_key":"4882","us_name":"lectvs","us_username":"lectvs","event_start":"1377216000","event_key":"18","event_name":"LD27"},"text":"

\"coinrush1\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Hey there! This Ludum Dare I made a game called Coin Rush; you might have heard of it. It’s a fast-paced action-arcade arena game where the goal is to bounce on enemy heads and collect as many coins as possible.<\/p>\n

If you’re awesome, you can play it here:\u00a0http:\/\/www.ludumdare.com\/compo\/ludum-dare-27\/?action=preview&uid=488<\/a>2<\/p>\n

Anyway, on to the postmortem.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"coinrush3\"<\/a><\/p>\n

What went right?<\/strong><\/p>\n

– The part of the game that I’m most proud of is the art. I’ve never made art like this before, most times it just flops and looks like crap.<\/p>\n

– I finished most of the game in a timely manner, and I wasn’t feeling too rushed at the end.<\/p>\n

– I succeeding in making exactly what I imagined it being, with only a few changes necessary.<\/p>\n

– I had almost no time to make the music, but from the feedback I’m getting, I’d say the short loop isn’t that bad.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"coinrush2\"<\/a><\/p>\n

What went wrong?<\/strong><\/p>\n

– I didn’t take time to actually play my game during development. After the compo ended, I realized how broken and unbalanced it really was.<\/p>\n

– The collisions. This has two parts. The first is that it is very hard to land on an enemy’s head. This is due to both the high-friction movement and the collision code. Second, the weapon collisions. I didn’t have time to think of how to do them, so I just made a circle around the weapons and detected it from there. The problem is that the circle is a lot bigger than the weapon itself, resulting in pretty much invincibility very early in the game.<\/p>\n

– I had to learn JDBC. I wanted to add online high scores, but I didn’t know how to do that in Java. So it took a while to figure that out.<\/p>\n

– I couldn’t deploy to web. This actually has two sides to it. First, I wasted about an hour or two trying to figure out web deployment, in vain. But I turned it around with a quirky html file that actually ENCOURAGES people to download it. Some people completely skip over an entry just because they have to download something. Since I couldn’t web deploy myself, I had to think of a way to keep people from moving on.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Overall, I feel like this is my best effort so far in a Ludum Dare compo. Lots of things went right for me, I stayed focused more than any compo before, and I took what knowledge I have of game design to try and make a game that’s a fun and enjoyable experience.<\/p>","time":"August 26th, 2013 6:34 pm","title":"LD27 Postmortem: Coin Rush"}