{"assets":[{"original":"http:\/\/ludumdare.com\/compo\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/3-drummers.png","local":"\/data\/posts\/2015\/08\/db7763c90b95a579a70571d1e47c68c6.png"},{"original":"http:\/\/ludumdare.com\/compo\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/3-drummers.png","local":"\/data\/posts\/2015\/08\/db7763c90b95a579a70571d1e47c68c6.png"}],"author_link":"author\/soulgame\/","author_name":"SoulGame","cat":"LD #33","categories":["LD #33"],"comments":[],"epoch":1440683520,"event":"LD33","likes":14,"metadata":{"p_key":"83048","p_author":"SoulGame","p_authorkey":"0","p_urlkey":"293780","p_title":"DRUMSTER \u2013 Post Mortem","p_cat":"LD #33","p_event":"LD33","p_time":"1440683520","p_likes":"14","p_comments":"0","p_status":"WAYBACK","us_key":null,"us_name":null,"us_username":null,"event_start":"1440115200","event_key":"29","event_name":"LD33"},"source_url":"2015\/08\/27\/drumster-post-mortem\/","text":"<p>Just wanted to share a few words on our experience during the jam, working on <a href=\"http:\/\/ludumdare.com\/compo\/ludum-dare-33\/?action=preview&amp;uid=42398\" target=\"_blank\">DRUMSTER<\/a>!<\/p>\n<h3>Our team (recruited with a beer, completely on the go)<\/h3>\n<p>We were four people here in Toulouse-France:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><em>Art\/UI<\/em> \u2013 Van N\u2019Guyen<\/li>\n<li><em>Programming<\/em> \u2013 Yannick Elahee (@Tavrox_)<\/li>\n<li><em>Art\/Animation<\/em> \u2013 Alexandre Deny-Pasquier (@Moyen_2)<\/li>\n<li><em>Game Design\/Music<\/em> \u2013 S\u00e9verin Larose (me) (@SoulGameStudio)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h3>Idea &amp; Concept (on an A5 paper with my phone light)<\/h3>\n<p>I wrote 3 games ideas right after the theme was announced, and proposed them to the team. We picked the Crazy Drummer idea as it was the most fun and original for us. It was also a big challenge: non of us has ever worked on a musical game!<\/p>\n<p>Concept was simple : You play drum, and the more you play the more you go crazy on the drum kit, building up your evilness from Jazz to Heavy Metal, to finally turn yourself into some kind of black demon!<a href=\"\/data\/posts\/2015\/08\/db7763c90b95a579a70571d1e47c68c6.png\"><img alt=\"3 drummers\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-496528 aligncenter\" height=\"650\" sizes=\"(max-width: 500px) 100vw, 500px\" src=\"\/data\/posts\/2015\/08\/db7763c90b95a579a70571d1e47c68c6.png\" srcset=\"http:\/\/ludumdare.com\/compo\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/3-drummers-231x300.png 231w, http:\/\/ludumdare.com\/compo\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/3-drummers.png 500w\" width=\"500\"\/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>As a drummer I wanted to be very accurate so <strong>each drum hit <\/strong>must be <strong>played <\/strong>by the player to be <strong>heard <\/strong>in the music. No buttons pressed? No drum sound! So player basically plays <strong>everything<\/strong> (well, try to\u2026). That sounds simple but most rhythm game aren\u2019t that accurate with the original instrument. I hoped that it would really help players feel like their inputs matter and mostly would help them feeling like they were playing drum <img alt=\":)\" class=\"wp-smiley\" src=\"http:\/\/ludumdare.com\/compo\/wp-includes\/images\/smilies\/simple-smile.png\" style=\"height: 1em; max-height: 1em;\"\/> Here\u2019s an example, every notes played in the song are displayed on the screen for the correct part of the drum kit:<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/ludumdare.com\/compo\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/screen9.png\"><img alt=\"screen\" class=\"size-full wp-image-496534 aligncenter\" height=\"450\" sizes=\"(max-width: 344px) 100vw, 344px\" src=\"http:\/\/ludumdare.com\/compo\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/screen9.png\" srcset=\"http:\/\/ludumdare.com\/compo\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/screen9-229x300.png 229w, http:\/\/ludumdare.com\/compo\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/screen9.png 344w\" width=\"344\"\/><\/a><\/p>\n<h3>Process &amp; Difficulties (what is rhythm\u2026 ?)<\/h3>\n<p>Basically, everyone went on his task and worked hard with around 5-6 hours of sleep each night (that was very comfortable compared to my previous Jam :D). Quickly we met with lots of difficulties and challenge in all areas:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>How could we be sure that each note is synchronized with the music?<\/li>\n<li>How moves a drummer? What instrument should he be allowed to reach with which hands?<\/li>\n<li>How create nices animations when the drummer has to react almost instantly to the music?<\/li>\n<li>How could we represent notes so they are the clearer possible and help the player coordination?<\/li>\n<li>Etc.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Long story short, after 2 days of work we could barely play the first loop of the Jazz section\u2026 The animations were quite done, which were awesome and motivating, the UI was quite finished as well, but we missed a game\u2026 So the last night was a real rush and we finally managed to play the game entirely! Problem is we didn\u2019t have time to balance level design (I couldn\u2019t possibly rebuild all the songs)! So we added the more polish we could thanks to our cool artists, and that was it =&gt; we\u2019re playing freakin\u2019 drum on our screens \\o\/<\/p>\n<p><em>\u201cThus stopped the teamwork and started the high score competition\u2026\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<h3>Conclusion &amp; Future?<\/h3>\n<p>We\u2019re super proud of our little game. We had tons of fun playing it (some more than others^^) and hope you\u2019ll feel the same. It\u2019s a shame we didn\u2019t have time to balance the difficulty (my bad). But in any case that was super cool, we\u2019ll do it again.<\/p>\n<p>As I have cool fun playing the prototype we build, I decided to go on with the project for mobile and web with the help of the artist animator. Hopefully, I\u2019ll have the time to balance difficulties!<\/p>\n<p>Thank you all for playing and commenting, I\u2019ll continue to post feedback on as many games as I can, I\u2019ve already seen some pretty neat work, but it takes me a while as I try to post constructive thoughts!<\/p>\n<p>Anyway, see you for LD34!<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: center\"><strong><a href=\"http:\/\/ludumdare.com\/compo\/ludum-dare-33\/?action=preview&amp;uid=42398\" target=\"_blank\">Play the Game<\/a><\/strong><\/h2>","time":"August 27th, 2015 1:52 pm","title":"DRUMSTER \u2013 Post Mortem","title_was_empty":false}