Seeing how LD48 is kind-of a big deal, I thought I'd try making something, even though I'm a bit tired. :sweat_smile:

LD48 was one of the hardest events for me to prepare for in a long time, in a "oh crap I'm getting old" sort of way. The pattern I'd been used to is crunch to finish things for/before the event itself, then take the event off to relax. My sleep schedule has been erratic and garbage all week as well. Still, I mean we're not getting a "Ludum Dare 48" again in a long time. Future Mike will appreciate me if I make something.

After kicking off the theme reveal last night, I took about an hour or so to relax. I had actually been planning to spend Saturday making a slow-cooked meat sauces. Oddly this is one of my favorite little relaxing activities, preparing then tasting the sauce get better and better throughout the day. But then I remembered "Oh wait, I'm supposed to enter this event aren't I?"

I forgot that I actually had two goals for LD48 whenever it happened. The first, doing some sort of keynote, and the second actually taking part. It had been such a rough week preparation wise that the thought hadn't even crossed my mind, until I was sitting in my comfy chair after the fact.

I joked with Jenna about a couple concepts for games. A "colonoscopy simulator" was briefly considered, but I think the joke is funnier than the game would be. Understandably my time is shorter than many people, as I need to take time out to help folks get their game submitted or deal with any problems. But if say I wanted to try making a 36 to 48-hour game over a 72-hour period, that's something I could probably do.

The game concept I'm currently sitting on is simply a game about digging. It's actually probably more of a joke than a game, but I am pretty tired physically and mentally, and I'm trying to set the bar pretty low.

If I was to build this game properly, I think the way to do it would be with JavaScript and HTML5 canvas rendering. I mean yes, that's a pretty solid tech stack right there.

However, I have been reading about the Rust programming language on and off for the past few weeks, and I have been itching to make something with it. I have over 20 years of professional experience as a C++ programmer, but C++ frustrates me today. I mean even PHP has evolved in many incredibly useful real-world ways. Despite C++ getting updates throughout the years, if you try to write truly cross-platform code, you're missing out on the latest features on certain platforms. Also the features they have been adding to C++ have felt like the complete opposite of what most game developers actually need. The auto keyword, lambdas, an a few language fixes are welcome changes, but there's a lot of "what why". I also regularly criticize C# for being a worse version of C++, held up only by a better built-in library. Rust as a language however makes some radical changes, changes that legit look like they will cause you to write code with fewer memory errors. That and there are numerous good defaults constructs that let you write shorter simpler code. I am intrigued. :crab:

Last Friday I had planned to do a live streamed talk where I discuss advice about preparing for a game jam. One of those tips was going to be "use a language and tooling you know", and if you don't know it, learn it ahead of time. Learn how to get graphics on the screen, how to play sounds, how to make a binary people can download, how to host a download, etc. Well, I've never even run the Rust compiler, so I'm doing it hard mode. :laughing:

I would like to make a web game as well, so one other thing I need to do is figure out what I should use. I do know the Rust team is proud of their WebAssembly support, so making something that runs in a browser is doable, but at the time of this writing I don't know where to start. Future Mike's problem. :stuckouttongueclosedeyes:

Admittedly the day hasn't started very well. I fell asleep on the couch instead of in bed, and it is 9:00 a.m. or about 12 hours after we started. I need to find me some breakfast and distract the cat so that I can get to work.

I don't know if I'll finish yet, but at the very least I'll have tried out using Rust.

That is all. Blog post over.

We hope everyone had a good start. We are excited to see all your games.

Here is a little preview of our main character.

Any name suggestions?

Keep it up!

I'm trying to follow a linear process this time, instead of switching between coding, artwork, story, mechanics. So far it means that I've fleshed out the main story and the key beats of the story, 4 pages of text, some rough paper sketches, and a flow chart detailing how some of the mechanics will work. I just hope I will have time to implement it all :)

How's it going for you?

It is a deep sea exploration game which will - eventually - be filled with schools of peaceful fish and deadly sharks which you have to avoid. The player movement is meant to imitate swimming. I got some temporary terrain in too.

Yes I'm using this Ludum Dare to fufill my childhood dream of making 2D minecraft.

Kinda-Sorta, at least.

I think I have the atmospheric effects working pretty well, player movement for the heavy tank-drone, etc!

Finally got sprite stacking working. No 3D here, only rotating sprites. Next up, modeling stuff with MagicaVoxel, and exporting the results to sprite stack sheets.

We're working on a little action game where you collect insects as an armadillo in ruins! Roll around, avoid traps and stomp the ground to break through it and access inferior levels of the temple. 💀

🧡 Here's a mockup of our arma in its environment (big WIP):

👀 And a peek at how the rolling around will feel:

Stay motivated! 👏

12 hours for movement and a submarine... haha, btw my first jam (compo)!!

Which one is your favorite ?

I take advantage of a build to reveal our first visual research. So... Which one is your favorite ? A, B, C or D ?

Hello ! We have a good working base for our game ! Making mechanics based of fire spreading. :smile:

" An FPS where enemies are your platforms "

I'm going to be honest here. I honestly don't have much time right now cus I'm busy irl so idk if I can finish before the jam ends, but hopefully I'll have something worth uploading by the end of the jam lol.

If I don't get to work on this before the jam ends then maybe I'll try and finish it a little after

All it needs are a few decently designed towers and maybe another enemy type or two and it should be good to go.

v a p o r w a v e i s n o t d e a d

Wall jumps sorta work :)

Done with Unity + Bolt

https://www.twitch.tv/nosferathoo

After some struggle with the theme I finally have some pixels on the screen

Finally done with solving the maze.