{"author_name": "Basilios", "cat": "LD #21", "comments": [{"author_name": "Felipe Budinich", "time": "August 23, 2011 8:08 am", "epoch": 1314104880, "text": "&#8220;Running all the way across the screen to reach a puzzle is not fun, and neither is a puzzle so dependent on perfect timing that it frustrates people.&#8221;", "spam": "N"}], "epoch": 1314067200, "likes": 0, "metadata": {"p_key": "63723", "p_author": "Basilios", "p_authorkey": "5456", "p_urlkey": "99508", "p_title": "GaolBreak – Postmortem", "p_cat": "LD #21", "p_event": "LD21", "p_time": "1314067200", "p_likes": "0", "p_comments": "1", "p_status": "UPD5", "us_key": "5456", "us_name": "Basilios", "us_username": "basilios", "event_start": "1313712000", "event_key": "7", "event_name": "LD21"}, "text": "<p>This was my first Ludum Dare competition (but not my first 48 hour competition) and I&#8217;m very happy with how my game turned out. When the theme was announced, I was disappointed &#8212; I didn&#8217;t think I could come up with anything good, but eventually settled on a sliding block puzzle with patrolling enemies.</p>\n <p>By the end of Friday, I had all the sprite-work done, a player that could move around the screen and some basic level collision stuff. Saturday was much more productive, and by mid-afternoon I had most of the game mechanics finished.  Saturday evening was divided between making music/sound effects, making title and instruction screens and trying to come up with more levels.</p>\n <p>On Sunday I made the animation smoother (originally characters moved an entire square with each step; a quick hack changed this to a fluid motion over several frames), added some <em>slightly</em> better music and introduced pressure switches.</p>\n <p>I also redesigned all of the levels except for Level 3, making them more compact and placing more emphasis on the puzzles. In hindsight, leaving Level 3 alone was a bad idea, and it seems like the game for most people ended up looking like this:</p>\n <p><a href=\"http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/2011/08/22/gaolbreak-postmortem/gaolbreak_screenshot/\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-70064\"><img class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-70064\" src=\"http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/gaolbreak_screenshot-300x262.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"262\" srcset=\"http://ludumdare.com/compo/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/gaolbreak_screenshot-300x262.png 300w, http://ludumdare.com/compo/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/gaolbreak_screenshot.png 512w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" /></a></p>\n <p>&#8230;which is a shame, because Levels 4 and 5 are my favourites.</p>\n <p><strong>Lessons:</strong></p>\n <ul>\n <li>I need more practice with LMMS/Musagi/Sfxr.  The music and sound effects definitely need work.</li>\n <li>Programmer art can sometimes be charming. 😀</li>\n <li>Running all the way across the screen to reach a puzzle is not fun, and neither is a puzzle so dependent on perfect timing that it frustrates people.</li>\n </ul>", "time": "August 22nd, 2011 9:40 pm", "title": "GaolBreak – Postmortem"}