{"author_name":"Blodyavenger","cat":"LD #20 - It's Dangerous to go Alone! Take This!","comments":[],"epoch":1304376000,"likes":1,"metadata":{"p_key":"65786","p_author":"Blodyavenger","p_authorkey":"3804","p_urlkey":"101582","p_title":"Courier of the Crypts \u2013 Post Mortem","p_cat":"LD #20 - It's Dangerous to go Alone! Take This!","p_event":"LD20","p_time":"1304376000","p_likes":"1","p_comments":"0","p_status":"UPD5","us_key":"3804","us_name":"Blodyavenger","us_username":"blodyavenger","event_start":"1304035200","event_key":"6","event_name":"LD20"},"text":"

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It’s time to gather all the moments of the last two days in a short yet interesting post mortem. So much happened in these days that it’s kinda hard to decide which are worth mentioning the most. I better start with quick reconstruction of both days.<\/p>\n

Ludum Dare – Day 1<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Competition started at 4:00AM (here in Slovenia). I fell to sleep at 1:00 AM and woke up at 3:30 AM then I’ve prepared some coffee and soon after that, theme was announced! “It’s Dangerous to go alone! Take this”…what to do now. Idea shouldn’t be too complex yet fun and I took my cup with a coffee and lit a cigarete. While I was watching the trees in the dark that crazy idea got over me – Darkness, light, creepy, item, old man = Lead a character trough a dark place and let him have a torch from an old man. That’s it, plan was made and ready to be excecuted!<\/p>\n

First I drew my humble design document with character vizuality, hud elements, goals, plans, how will the map look like and that kind of stuff. All that on a single page to keep it simple, and I was ready.<\/p>\n

Development in order (1st day):<\/span>
\n – Map editor (drawing, loading and saving maps)
\n – Game engine (loading maps and support sidescrolling)
\n – Player (red dot on start)
\n – Collision detection
\n – Some graphics
\n – Particle system
\n – Lighting (which wasn’t successful on the first day)
\n – More graphics<\/p>\n

Lunch:<\/span> Pasta with tuna
\n Dinner:<\/span> Pizza with pepperoni
\n Coffee drank:<\/span> 4 – 6 cups<\/p>\n

Day was over and I went to bed around 1:00 AM planning to wake up at 6:00 AM. At that time I went over the day at myself and there was satisfaction because I made a lot of things. So I fell asleep…<\/p>\n

Ludum Dare – Day 2<\/strong><\/p>\n

Plans didn’t work out. I overslept\u00a0 from 6:00 AM to 9:00 PM and I got nervous and went back into action with cup of coffee next to me. I’ve made a quick ToDo list for more organized work and clocked started to run like crazy – it didn’t stop. <\/strong><\/p>\n

Development in order (2nd day):<\/span>
\n – Flame system (flame bar getting lower and coal refuellig the torch)<\/a>\"\"<\/a>
\n – Lighting (I still had problems but it was implemented afterall)
\n – Character animations
\n – Enemies and their fear before the flame
\n – More tiles
\n – Death\/victory condition
\n – Main menu and level selection
\n – Making maps
\n – Story dialogs (for beginning and ending)
\n – Adding 1 single SFX for picking up coal and lame repeating music (I can’t do music, don’t judge!)
\n – Entry was submitted 30 seconds before the end.<\/p>\n

Lunch:<\/span> Pasta again
\n Dinner:<\/span> Toasts with cheese, tuna and pomodori
\n Coffee drank:<\/span> 4 – 6 cups<\/p>\n

Clock pointer said “It’s over” and I made a toast to the victory! It was over, I was among other strong souls that have made it to the end. I did something like that for the first time, game in 48 hours even if I had some doubts on start. I believed in my game concept and at the end, I had that realized even if it didn’t include all features. Ludum Dare chat was full of joy and I stayed around for a bit more and went to bed later at the dawn.<\/p>\n

What went well<\/strong><\/p>\n

First of all, I’m glad that idea was born few minutes after the announcment which was huge advantage. Trough the competition I wasn’t distracted much and I just kept doing my work. <\/strong>Experience from the past helped me a lot because few things took me less time than I predicted. Overall, I think two main factors were idea at the start<\/span> and experience from the past<\/span>. <\/strong><\/p>\n

What went wrong<\/strong><\/p>\n

First problem that I’ve encountered were lights. I’ve never done fake lighting in 2D world before and so I was trying different stuff and functions without success. I’ve lost nearly 4 hours at that part if not more – I’ll have to concentrate on that part now. Maybe I did set my goals too high because some features were cut off and those that are in the game right now are bugged or poorly done (or at least some of them). Music is another weak factor. I’m artist and programmer but I can’t do music so I’ve tried to make something with Inudge but I’ve encountered problem to record from my speakers (records were too silent) and so the lame piece of music was born! (If you try the game out, you’ll know what I’m talking about<\/em>). Next time I have to prepare my framework properly<\/span> to save some time and I shouldn’t be learning new stuff at the competition<\/span>.<\/p>\n

Conclusion<\/strong><\/p>\n

It was first “Make a game” competition for me and it was exciting, especialy when I saw all the people working on their projects and in the same time together as a community. It’s obvious that we’re not here to win but to participate and have fun at what we like to do the most in our lifes.<\/p>\n

I invite you to try my game out and rank it if you will
\n [ RATE GAME<\/a> |\u00a0 DOWNLOAD GAME<\/a> ]<\/strong><\/p>\n