This is my first Ludum Dare and I have to admit that it’s been fun but hard at the same time.
I wanted to ship something and here’s the result:

http://ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-34/?action=preview&uid=48604

Here are some random facts about what went wrong and what went right:

• I wanted to try a different framework. I usually work with Unity, but I felt I owed to give the latest framework from Mike a go and see if I could make something with it. So I set myself on making a game with MonoGame + Nez. The good is that I’m familiar with C# so code was flowing quite easily. On the other hand, I had to deal with the Pipeline Tool of MonoGame that I didn’t know as well as I should have before venturing further.
• MonoGame is good, but it’s not so easy to make a portable game. I worked on Mac and ported it to Windows at the end, and I faced some issues with the stable version of MG using some DLLs that were not included in the final build of the game. That took a few hours to figure out.
• Nez is a wonderful framework and it made it quick and easy to work with 2D from a programmer’s point of view. Did I mention that I can code, but that I can’t draw?
• I wish I had a web target. It would have been a lot quicker to get things up and running for everyone with something that doesn’t require to pack up the game and distribute it before people can actually play.
• I settled for simple sprites with no animations. All animations are just stretches and particles handled by code. It really helped in cutting down the time I spent creating the assets
• Making the sound effects has been a lot of fun. If you’re wondering where I took them.. well.. I didn’t. It’s just me and my wife screaming like a pork and mumbling like a farmer 😀
• I made some beginners mistakes and I completely forgot about some of the basics about communicating back to the user when he’s doing something right and when he’s not. I should have put more attention in the details, but they completely slipped under my fingers
• I wanted the final game to have different levels subdivided in waves that become harder as you progress. I wanted to have bonuses like crates that spawn for a brief time and that you have to click as quickly as possible to pick up. I wanted to have some background music. I just didn’t make it all in time.