{"author_name":"Dietrich Epp","cat":"LD #24","comments":[],"epoch":1346042700,"likes":0,"metadata":{"p_key":"51963","p_author":"Dietrich Epp","p_authorkey":"7606","p_urlkey":"87661","p_title":"Digital Generation post-mortem","p_cat":"LD #24","p_event":"LD24","p_time":"1346042700","p_likes":"0","p_comments":"0","p_status":"UPD5","us_key":"7606","us_name":"Dietrich Epp","us_username":"depp","event_start":"1345766400","event_key":"12","event_name":"LD24"},"text":"<p>I&#8217;ll do my post-mortem for <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ludumdare.com\/compo\/ludum-dare-24\/?action=preview&amp;uid=7606\">Digital Generation<\/a> now, rather than putting it off until never.<\/p>\n <p><strong>What went right:<\/strong><\/p>\n <ul>\n <li><strong>Gameplay:<\/strong> I focused more on simple, achievable gameplay this time.  I focused on making the game start out easy, and introduce new elements that you can figure out one at a time rather than all at once.  My last Ludum Dare game just dropped you into the middle of everything.<\/li>\n <li><strong>Sound effects:<\/strong> I was hoping for music (see below), but I settled for sound effects.  Even though some of them are shrill and annoying, they make it feel &#8220;real&#8221;.  (Turn your volume down when playing my game.)<\/li>\n <li><strong>In-game help:<\/strong> In the final hour, at the bottom of my TODO list, was an in-game help system.  Each level has a list of strings which get printed at the bottom of the screen as help messages.  People don&#8217;t read READMEs, after all.<\/li>\n <li><strong>AI behavior on level 2:<\/strong> I just get such a kick out of how the AI behaves on level 2.<\/li>\n <\/ul>\n <p><strong>What went wrong:<\/strong><\/p>\n <ul>\n <li><strong>Audio subsystem:<\/strong> The audio subsystem is my most recent addition to the base code library, and it&#8217;s got some problems.  There are a couple bugs in it that I <em>know for certain<\/em> can cause crashes.  The resampler is also total garbage, and the game only sounds decent at 48 kHz.  If your system is set to 44.1 kHz, it sounds terrible.<\/li>\n <li><strong>Music:<\/strong> I wrote background music, but the audio subsystem doesn&#8217;t support it &#8212; so it goes to waste.  The soundtrack is available as a separate download.<\/li>\n <li><strong>Sleep:<\/strong> I felt seriously ill half the time I was working on the game, and I think it was due to a combination of excitement and bad sleep patterns.  Or I could have been genuinely ill, who knows?  If I do Ludum Dare next time, I&#8217;m keeping to a strict sleep schedule.  It doesn&#8217;t help that I&#8217;m trying to prepare for 8 hours of jet lag.<\/li>\n <\/ul>\n \n <p>Tags: <a href=\"http:\/\/ludumdare.com\/compo\/tag\/postmortem\/\" rel=\"tag\">postmortem<\/a><\/p>","time":"August 26th, 2012 11:45 pm","title":"Digital Generation post-mortem"}