{"author_name":"FrikaC","cat":"LD #21","comments":[{"author_name":"","time":"May 12, 2012 3:09 am","epoch":1336810140,"text":"Are you the same FrikaC from frikqcc & frikbot fame?","spam":"N"}],"epoch":1313983440,"likes":3,"metadata":{"p_key":"63872","p_author":"FrikaC","p_authorkey":"4867","p_urlkey":"99657","p_title":"Escape Cat","p_cat":"LD #21","p_event":"LD21","p_time":"1313983440","p_likes":"3","p_comments":"1","p_status":"UPD5","us_key":"4867","us_name":"FrikaC","us_username":"frikac","event_start":"1313712000","event_key":"7","event_name":"LD21"},"text":"

I didn’t do much posting during development due to the site being mostly down and\/or begging us not to use it. So, where do I start? “Escape” was not the theme I would’ve liked. When it was announced at 9pm my local time, I attempted to just get started because I had a bunch of boilerplate code to write. During my typing I thought of what I could possibly do with the theme. Prior to the competition I had made a promise to myself that I would make something arcadey and simple. The reason for this, I think was obvious: arcade games, once you have the basic mechanics down, you’re pretty much done.<\/p>\n

After some deep thought over writing main(), creating a window and handling events, I arrived at a simple notion of “The escape of the Esc key”. You’d have to maneuver your Esc key (handling kind of like a top down vehicle) through a keyboard being typed on by an AI. Fortunately, you’d know what sentence the AI was typing, so you could anticipate the pattern. After some initial tests, this proved to be neither fun, challenging or interesting. Real sentences use far too little of the keyboard to make it a good obstacle test, and just random patterns screw up the notion of anticipation.<\/p>\n

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The blue background for some reason reminded me of Nyan Cat, and as a joke to myself I drew the some of the elements of the original video. Such as the background sprites and the Nyan Cat’s head. I made a little Escape key body for it, thinking maybe I could make this into the character sprite for the above mention game. The scale was completely off, but I didn’t care because it was meant to be temporary graphics and a joke to myself. I went to bed thinking “Well, I’ll sleep on it and probably will have a real idea in the morning.”. Well, not so much. I woke up the next morning and still had no idea whatsoever. After some contemplation I decided since the base code I was working from is actually a stripped down version of my side scroller game from years back, I’d make a side scroller. I set about making that a reality:<\/p>\n

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In this rather rushed concept you were a convict (in a prison orange jumpsuit, as illustrated by the fact you were solid orange)..who was…escaping. There’s was nothing really interesting about the design, and that was my problem. Had I seen it to its end, it would just be another kind of generic platformer. I had no hook to make it interesting. I had Elevator Action without the elevators. Also, no action. Add to that indecision, the fact I had to tackle a bunch of new, weird physics bugs that cropped up and I started to despair.<\/p>\n

I thought back to the Nyan Cat I drew and oddly enough went back and attempted to flesh that design out better. Gone was the idea of evading an onscreen keyboard, replaced with a dirt simple typing speed test. It was a complete 180 degree turn around in the gameplay and genre I was originally trying for, but with 24 hours left and sleep between here and submission time, I had no choice. I had to make something, and something very very small. So I began hacking together code as fast as I could and, long story short, made a respectable little typing game despite its flaws.<\/p>\n

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Now typing games aren’t my cup of tea, and I’m pretty sure they’re not anyone else’s either. I went looking back through Ludum Dare archives and I could find only one other previous example of one. I expect that it won’t get much in the way of votes, but that’s not what I’m in it for. I was in it to prove to myself I could make a game in a weekend. In it, not for the glory, but for the satisfaction. And if anyone says anything positive, well that’s gravy really.<\/p>\n

The whole ordeal can be seen in my timelapse<\/a><\/p>\n

Check out my entry here: link<\/a><\/p>","time":"August 21st, 2011 10:24 pm","title":"Escape Cat"}