{"author_name":"Spierek","cat":"LD #25","comments":[],"epoch":1355766000,"likes":3,"metadata":{"p_key":"47675","p_author":"Spierek","p_authorkey":"14319","p_urlkey":"83340","p_title":"Dastardly Diver \u2013 post-mortem","p_cat":"LD #25","p_event":"LD25","p_time":"1355766000","p_likes":"3","p_comments":"0","p_status":"UPD5","us_key":"14319","us_name":"Spierek","us_username":"spierek","event_start":"1355443200","event_key":"14","event_name":"LD25"},"text":"<p>Alright, here goes:<\/p>\n <p><strong>What I did well:<\/strong><\/p>\n <ul>\n <li>going with a really simple idea. I managed to barely finish it 30 minutes before the deadline, and I devoted enough time into polishing it.<\/li>\n <li>stocking my fridge full of food before the compo. Saved me time that would be lost during grocery trips.<\/li>\n <li>(mostly) choosing tools that I&#8217;ve been kind-of familiar with. I&#8217;ve dabbled a bit in SFML 2 before, I&#8217;m doing all of my other C++ work in VS2012, and I&#8217;m able to work efficiently in Photoshop, so I didn&#8217;t need to learn much. The only exception is in the BGM category &#8211; this was my first time creating music at all (except some prior experience with Audacity and voice recording), and I decided to go with <a href=\"http:\/\/soundation.com\/\">Soundation<\/a>. An hour of playing around resulted in a four seconds long loop, that &#8211; to my surprise &#8211; was actually praised in the comments. Yay for that.<\/li>\n <li>choosing an idea working for the most probable themes. This one could&#8217;ve been easily adapted to &#8220;Outer Space&#8221; (you are an alien, trying to deliver a bomb to the Earth) or &#8220;End of the World&#8221; (you&#8217;re a&#8230; actually, there wouldn&#8217;t have been any changes!). So that&#8217;s good.<\/li>\n <\/ul>\n <p>(more after the break)<\/p>\n <p><span id=\"more-213555\"><\/span><\/p>\n <p><strong>What I did wrong:<\/strong><\/p>\n <ul>\n <li>little experience with creating games. \u00a0This was actually my very first self-coded and self-released game, so I had to quickly adapt to a lot of new concepts, which has also resulted in:<\/li>\n <li>messy code. I know it&#8217;s Ludum Dare and probably more than a half of submitted projects is a mess when it comes to code, but mine is like a Jenga tower that looked fine until the 36h mark, and after that the earthquake hit, causing the blocks to fly everywhere (actually, this would&#8217;ve been a pretty good metaphore if I used Code::Blocks for programming).<\/li>\n <li>procrastination. Even though I was coding hard, there were those moments of staring at walls, trying to figure out what to do. I need to work on my concentration.<\/li>\n <li>using C++. I like the language, and it&#8217;s the one I&#8217;m most fluent in, but Web is the way to go when it comes to Ludum Dare. Next time I&#8217;ll try using Unity or Flash.<\/li>\n <\/ul>\n <p><strong>What could&#8217;ve been changed if I had more time:<\/strong><\/p>\n <ul>\n <li>mine explosion animation.<\/li>\n <li>an intro to the game (skippable, of course) that showed your submarine being lowered into the water, as the villain (you) was explaining his grand scheme.<\/li>\n <li>a satisfactory outro (and not something that was mashed up in Photoshop in five minutes right before the deadline).<\/li>\n <li>other enemies (I was on throwing in some torpedoes, or horizontal lasers for more variety)<\/li>\n <li>better enemy randomization (a matter of tweaking).<\/li>\n <li>making sure that you can&#8217;t get blocked by a wall of enemies &#8211; you should&#8217;ve been able to pass every enemy in every scenario.<\/li>\n <li>voice acting (a villain shouting &#8220;NOOOOOOOO-&#8221; during the game over screen; I was actually close to doing that).<\/li>\n <\/ul>","time":"December 17th, 2012 12:40 pm","title":"Dastardly Diver \u2013 post-mortem"}