{"author_name":"whilefun","cat":"LD #24","comments":[],"epoch":1346209440,"likes":0,"metadata":{"p_key":"51657","p_author":"whilefun","p_authorkey":"7424","p_urlkey":"87352","p_title":"Lessons Learned, Timelapse, and Notebook","p_cat":"LD #24","p_event":"LD24","p_time":"1346209440","p_likes":"0","p_comments":"0","p_status":"UPD5","us_key":"7424","us_name":"whilefun","us_username":"whilefun","event_start":"1345766400","event_key":"12","event_name":"LD24"},"text":"<p>Here&#8217;s a brief lessons learned from my 48 hour compo entry for LD 24:<\/p>\n <ul>\n <li>Seriously, really plan backwards from the deadline (even if to the nearest hour). And build in a couple hours of &#8220;oh yeah, that too&#8221; time. My goal was to be done and submitted by 7pm, and I pressed the submit button at 8:57pm<\/li>\n <li>If you believe in your idea, stick with it. I found the LD 24 theme to be quite intimidating in terms of doing something original. I came up with a great idea and immediately wanted to discard it. I slept on the idea and decided it was worth the effort. As a result, I am very happy with <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ludumdare.com\/compo\/ludum-dare-24\/?action=preview&amp;uid=7424\" target=\"_blank\">my entry<\/a>, and have something fairly original and fun (in my opinion)<\/li>\n <li>Automation will save you a lot of time. A put some common code snippets into Hoekey, and I would estimate it saved me 2 hours over the weekend. Pressing Ctrl+Shift+D is way easier than finding, copying, and pasting a snippet of code dozens of times (mind you, I am using Game Maker, so things like the fairly lengthy draw_sprite_ext() will kill your time like crazy)<\/li>\n <li>Scope is never as small as you think it is (related to the first point above)<\/li>\n <li>Planning is worth it. I stayed up late Saturday roughing out ideas for my story and level \u00a0structure\u00a0on paper. The next day, this brief (~1 hour or so) of planning paid off big time<\/li>\n <\/ul>\n <p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n <p><span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">Timelapse and Notepad<\/span>:<\/p>\n <ul>\n <li>I&#8217;ve finished my desktop timelapse video. It&#8217;s on youtube <a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=aTNuztENqAE\" target=\"_blank\">right over here<\/a>. (note as of 12:45am August 28 it&#8217;s still uploading&#8230;)<\/li>\n <li>I also have my notebook pages up for viewing <a href=\"http:\/\/whilefun.com\/games.php#LD24\" target=\"_blank\">over here<\/a>.<\/li>\n <\/ul>\n <p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n <p>I&#8217;ve played and rated some cool games so far, and I look forward to doing some more! <img src=\"http:\/\/ludumdare.com\/compo\/wp-includes\/images\/smilies\/simple-smile.png\" alt=\":)\" class=\"wp-smiley\" style=\"height: 1em; max-height: 1em;\" \/><\/p>\n <p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n <p>Cheers,<\/p>\n <p>Richard<\/p>\n <p>&nbsp;<\/p>","time":"August 28th, 2012 10:04 pm","title":"Lessons Learned, Timelapse, and Notebook"}