{"author_link":"\/users\/laminariy","author_name":"Laminariy","author_uid":"laminariy","comments":[],"epoch":1776776123,"event":"LD59","format":"md","ldjam_node_id":431213,"likes":16,"metadata":{"p_key":"96294","p_author":"Laminariy","p_authorkey":"1103938","p_urlkey":"311933","p_title":"On the last day, I thought we wouldn\u2019t make it.","p_cat":"LDJam ","p_event":"LD59","p_time":"1776776123","p_likes":"16","p_comments":"0","p_status":"WAYBACK","us_key":"1103938","us_name":"Laminariy","us_username":"laminariy","event_start":"1776470400","event_key":"113","event_name":"Ludum Dare 59"},"node":{"_collation":{"body_sanitizer":"TextUtils::SanitizeHTML via existing importer","event":"LD59","removed_author":false},"_superparent":424249,"_trust":1,"author":103938,"body":"![Banner.png](\/\/\/raw\/206\/91\/z\/71e01.png)\n## Hi everyone! I want to tell you a bit about how the development of our game \"Jim's Quest for Birthday Present\" went during the jam!\n\n---\n\n## What's this game about?\nYou play as Jim - a small but brave boy. Jim really loves his mother and wants to give her the best birthday present he can. Unfortunately, he's running out of time and money.\n\nJim hears a rumor that a local fisherman, Old Jack, once found the Rainbow Pearl Shell - the most beautiful shell in the world. So Jim decides to take his dusty metal detector, earn some money, and buy a present for his mother.\n\n![Screenshot from 2026-04-21 13-29-48.png](\/\/\/raw\/206\/91\/z\/71e76.png)\n\n## Who are we?\nWe are a team of passionate industry professionals. We had never worked together before this jam - in fact, we had never even met before!\n\n@sobigdrasil - all the art  \n@tim-medvedev - all the sound  \n@laminariy (me) - turning ideas into reality (i.e., the programmer)\n\n## Day 1 - Finding the Game\nWe actually started even before the jam officially began - during the theme voting phase.\n\nOur artist was really excited about making something dark and occult, and we tried to push the voting in that direction as much as we could. We voted for themes like \u201cparasite\u201d and other similar ideas, hoping one of them would win.\n\nBut when the final theme was revealed, none of the options we had in mind could possibly fit. All of our early ideas immediately became irrelevant. So we had to throw everything away and start from scratch.\n\nAt that point, I decided to go with something much simpler. Incremental-style games are quite popular right now, and I thought it might be a good direction. That\u2019s when the idea came up: a game where the player walks along a beach, scanning the ground with a metal detector in search of buried treasures.\n\nVery quickly we landed on the core mechanic - a ping-based scan. The metal detector sends out pulses like a sonar, and when a pulse hits buried treasure, it sends a response back - a kind of ping-pong interaction. It was easy to understand, although I wasn\u2019t entirely sure at first how to implement it. Should the pulses go only in the direction the detector is facing, or expand outward like ripples on water?\n\n### Like this?\n![Screenshot from 2026-04-21 14-52-19.png](\/\/\/raw\/206\/91\/z\/71edf.png)\n### Or this?\n![Screenshot from 2026-04-18 23-40-07.png](\/\/\/raw\/206\/91\/z\/71edc.png)\nBy the end of the first day, we had a basic prototype: you could walk around, scan the area, and get feedback from the detector. It wasn\u2019t much, but it already felt like there was a game hiding in there.\n\n## Day 2 - Building the Foundations\nThe second day was focused on building out the systems behind the game. I implemented the digging mechanic, forming the basic game loop:\n\n**send ping -> get pong -> dig -> NUMBER GO BRRR**\n\nHowever, at that point, the game still felt extremely empty. There were no real visuals yet - mostly debug rendering and a character moving around. Despite having the core systems in place, it didn\u2019t feel like a real game at all.\n\n**I remember feeling very uncertain that day**\n\nAt the same time, I worked on preparing the foundation for upgrades and progression. Most of it wasn\u2019t visible yet, but internally the structure was coming together. The idea was that once everything was in place, we could rapidly integrate content on the final day.\n\nBy the end of Day 2, we had the systems ready - but the game itself still didn\u2019t exist in any meaningful way.\n![Screenshot from 2026-04-21 14-59-15.png](\/\/\/raw\/206\/91\/z\/71ee6.png)\n\n## Day 3 - Are we quitting?\nThe third day was\u2026 rough.\n\nI barely slept and felt terrible. At the same time, there was still an overwhelming amount of work left: integrating art and sound, implementing progression and upgrades, scripting the UI, and polishing all the interactions and animations.\n\nAt that point, we had a working prototype, but almost no real content. Everything had to come together at once.\n\n**I genuinely wasn\u2019t sure we would finish anything at all.**\n\nLuckily at some point, I managed to take two short 30-minute naps during the day. That helped more than I expected - I felt a bit more functional and able to continue.\n\nHowever, when our artist assembled the final scene, something changed. I suddenly saw the game as a whole. It felt cohesive, atmospheric, and honestly - special. That moment gave me a second wind. I realized that we actually had something worth finishing, and that I had to push through and make it in time for the jam.\n\n### JUST LOOK AT THIS!\n![scene.jpg](\/\/\/raw\/206\/91\/z\/71ef8.jpg)\n\nFrom there, it became a matter of focus. I spent the remaining time integrating assets, wiring up progression, and adding small but critical details - tweens, UI feedback, transitions.\n\nPiece by piece, it all came together. Not perfectly, but enough to feel complete.\n\n## Tech Breakdown\n\n**Game engine: Defold**  \n**Language: Lua**\n\nFor this project, I went with an ECS-inspired approach - but not a strict implementation: all runtime game data is stored in a central \u201cworld\u201d structure, which acts like a database. It contains only data, without any attached logic (aside from simple access and iteration utilities).\n\nAll gameplay logic is implemented as commands. You can think of them as small transactions: each function takes the world state, performs some operations, and updates it.\n\nCommands can call other commands or defer their execution until some point in time. Because of that, there is no single global update loop, and no rigid flat system ordering like in traditional ECS architectures.\n\nThis approach worked well for a jam:  \n* it kept systems loosely coupled\n* allowed for very modular, bottom-up development\n* and avoided the usual headaches with update order and flow dependencies\n\nI think this is a solid architecture. The implementation wasn\u2019t perfect, but with some refinement it could become a very strong framework capable of supporting much larger-scale games.\n\n## Final Thoughts\nDespite how close it felt to failure on the last day, we managed to finish the game.\n\nThis jam was a great experience - especially considering that we started as a team of complete strangers. Everything came together surprisingly well at the last moment, and I\u2019m really happy with what we achieved in such a short time.\n\n## You can check our game here:\n\n### [itch:](https:\/\/sobigdrasil.itch.io\/jims-quest-for-birthday-present) https:\/\/sobigdrasil.itch.io\/jims-quest-for-birthday-present\n\n### [ldjam:](https:\/\/ldjam.com\/events\/ludum-dare\/59\/jims-quest-for-birthday-present) https:\/\/ldjam.com\/events\/ludum-dare\/59\/jims-quest-for-birthday-present\n\n![Screenshot from 2026-04-21 15-16-37.png](\/\/\/raw\/206\/91\/z\/71f02.png)\n### Thanks for reading!","comments":2,"comments-timestamp":"2026-04-21T14:02:47Z","created":"2026-04-21T08:50:27Z","files":[],"files-timestamp":0,"id":431213,"love":16,"love-timestamp":"2026-04-21T18:05:47Z","meta":[],"modified":"2026-04-21T18:05:47Z","name":"On the last day, I thought we wouldn\u2019t make it.","node-timestamp":"2026-04-21T13:03:48Z","parent":424425,"parents":[1,5,9,424249,424425],"path":"\/events\/ludum-dare\/59\/jims-quest-for-birthday-present\/on-the-last-day-i-thought-we-wouldnt-make-it","published":"2026-04-21T12:55:23Z","scope":"public","slug":"on-the-last-day-i-thought-we-wouldnt-make-it","subsubtype":"","subtype":"","type":"post","version":1367266},"node_metadata":{"n_key":"431213","n_urlkey":"311933","n_parent":"424425","n_path":"\/events\/ludum-dare\/59\/jims-quest-for-birthday-present\/on-the-last-day-i-thought-we-wouldnt-make-it","n_slug":"on-the-last-day-i-thought-we-wou","n_type":"post","n_subtype":"","n_subsubtype":"","n_author":"103938","n_created":"1776761427","n_modified":"1776794747","n_version":"1367266","n_status":"WAYBACK"},"source_url":"https:\/\/ldjam.com\/events\/ludum-dare\/59\/jims-quest-for-birthday-present\/on-the-last-day-i-thought-we-wouldnt-make-it","text":"![Banner.png](\/\/\/raw\/206\/91\/z\/71e01.png)\n## Hi everyone! I want to tell you a bit about how the development of our game \"Jim's Quest for Birthday Present\" went during the jam!\n\n---\n\n## What's this game about?\nYou play as Jim - a small but brave boy. Jim really loves his mother and wants to give her the best birthday present he can. Unfortunately, he's running out of time and money.\n\nJim hears a rumor that a local fisherman, Old Jack, once found the Rainbow Pearl Shell - the most beautiful shell in the world. So Jim decides to take his dusty metal detector, earn some money, and buy a present for his mother.\n\n![Screenshot from 2026-04-21 13-29-48.png](\/\/\/raw\/206\/91\/z\/71e76.png)\n\n## Who are we?\nWe are a team of passionate industry professionals. We had never worked together before this jam - in fact, we had never even met before!\n\n@sobigdrasil - all the art  \n@tim-medvedev - all the sound  \n@laminariy (me) - turning ideas into reality (i.e., the programmer)\n\n## Day 1 - Finding the Game\nWe actually started even before the jam officially began - during the theme voting phase.\n\nOur artist was really excited about making something dark and occult, and we tried to push the voting in that direction as much as we could. We voted for themes like \u201cparasite\u201d and other similar ideas, hoping one of them would win.\n\nBut when the final theme was revealed, none of the options we had in mind could possibly fit. All of our early ideas immediately became irrelevant. So we had to throw everything away and start from scratch.\n\nAt that point, I decided to go with something much simpler. Incremental-style games are quite popular right now, and I thought it might be a good direction. That\u2019s when the idea came up: a game where the player walks along a beach, scanning the ground with a metal detector in search of buried treasures.\n\nVery quickly we landed on the core mechanic - a ping-based scan. The metal detector sends out pulses like a sonar, and when a pulse hits buried treasure, it sends a response back - a kind of ping-pong interaction. It was easy to understand, although I wasn\u2019t entirely sure at first how to implement it. Should the pulses go only in the direction the detector is facing, or expand outward like ripples on water?\n\n### Like this?\n![Screenshot from 2026-04-21 14-52-19.png](\/\/\/raw\/206\/91\/z\/71edf.png)\n### Or this?\n![Screenshot from 2026-04-18 23-40-07.png](\/\/\/raw\/206\/91\/z\/71edc.png)\nBy the end of the first day, we had a basic prototype: you could walk around, scan the area, and get feedback from the detector. It wasn\u2019t much, but it already felt like there was a game hiding in there.\n\n## Day 2 - Building the Foundations\nThe second day was focused on building out the systems behind the game. I implemented the digging mechanic, forming the basic game loop:\n\n**send ping -> get pong -> dig -> NUMBER GO BRRR**\n\nHowever, at that point, the game still felt extremely empty. There were no real visuals yet - mostly debug rendering and a character moving around. Despite having the core systems in place, it didn\u2019t feel like a real game at all.\n\n**I remember feeling very uncertain that day**\n\nAt the same time, I worked on preparing the foundation for upgrades and progression. Most of it wasn\u2019t visible yet, but internally the structure was coming together. The idea was that once everything was in place, we could rapidly integrate content on the final day.\n\nBy the end of Day 2, we had the systems ready - but the game itself still didn\u2019t exist in any meaningful way.\n![Screenshot from 2026-04-21 14-59-15.png](\/\/\/raw\/206\/91\/z\/71ee6.png)\n\n## Day 3 - Are we quitting?\nThe third day was\u2026 rough.\n\nI barely slept and felt terrible. At the same time, there was still an overwhelming amount of work left: integrating art and sound, implementing progression and upgrades, scripting the UI, and polishing all the interactions and animations.\n\nAt that point, we had a working prototype, but almost no real content. Everything had to come together at once.\n\n**I genuinely wasn\u2019t sure we would finish anything at all.**\n\nLuckily at some point, I managed to take two short 30-minute naps during the day. That helped more than I expected - I felt a bit more functional and able to continue.\n\nHowever, when our artist assembled the final scene, something changed. I suddenly saw the game as a whole. It felt cohesive, atmospheric, and honestly - special. That moment gave me a second wind. I realized that we actually had something worth finishing, and that I had to push through and make it in time for the jam.\n\n### JUST LOOK AT THIS!\n![scene.jpg](\/\/\/raw\/206\/91\/z\/71ef8.jpg)\n\nFrom there, it became a matter of focus. I spent the remaining time integrating assets, wiring up progression, and adding small but critical details - tweens, UI feedback, transitions.\n\nPiece by piece, it all came together. Not perfectly, but enough to feel complete.\n\n## Tech Breakdown\n\n**Game engine: Defold**  \n**Language: Lua**\n\nFor this project, I went with an ECS-inspired approach - but not a strict implementation: all runtime game data is stored in a central \u201cworld\u201d structure, which acts like a database. It contains only data, without any attached logic (aside from simple access and iteration utilities).\n\nAll gameplay logic is implemented as commands. You can think of them as small transactions: each function takes the world state, performs some operations, and updates it.\n\nCommands can call other commands or defer their execution until some point in time. Because of that, there is no single global update loop, and no rigid flat system ordering like in traditional ECS architectures.\n\nThis approach worked well for a jam:  \n* it kept systems loosely coupled\n* allowed for very modular, bottom-up development\n* and avoided the usual headaches with update order and flow dependencies\n\nI think this is a solid architecture. The implementation wasn\u2019t perfect, but with some refinement it could become a very strong framework capable of supporting much larger-scale games.\n\n## Final Thoughts\nDespite how close it felt to failure on the last day, we managed to finish the game.\n\nThis jam was a great experience - especially considering that we started as a team of complete strangers. Everything came together surprisingly well at the last moment, and I\u2019m really happy with what we achieved in such a short time.\n\n## You can check our game here:\n\n### [itch:](https:\/\/sobigdrasil.itch.io\/jims-quest-for-birthday-present) https:\/\/sobigdrasil.itch.io\/jims-quest-for-birthday-present\n\n### [ldjam:](https:\/\/ldjam.com\/events\/ludum-dare\/59\/jims-quest-for-birthday-present) https:\/\/ldjam.com\/events\/ludum-dare\/59\/jims-quest-for-birthday-present\n\n![Screenshot from 2026-04-21 15-16-37.png](\/\/\/raw\/206\/91\/z\/71f02.png)\n### Thanks for reading!","title":"On the last day, I thought we wouldn\u2019t make it.","wayback_source":[]}