You can join me here, or if you want me to still try yours feel free to !sumbit it here: https://www.twitch.tv/basicmilky

First of all thank you to everyone that played, rate, and reviewed Space-Fix-Attack. Also, the post-game jam version is now available. Changes and additions - More enemy spawn. - 1,2, and 3 keys are now used to start fixing. - Distance meter added. - Ship speed lowered a bit. - Settings added. - Some enemies are tougher. - Score for minigame added.

https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/49/ship-unstable

Hi everyone!

Now that the 49th Ludum Dare is over, I thought it was time to write something.

Firstly. Thanks a lot to everyone who played my game. Thank you for all votes, comments and feedback. Reading them all was a lot of fun. And every time someone wrote that they liked my game, I was very happy about it. These comments are one of the two most important reasons I'm participating in Ludum Dare, so they mean a lot to me. And there were so many, 112 people, who played and rated my game. This is the best result I got so far. One more time, thank you!

And the second reason is playing and rating games. I've played a lot of them. 255 in total, beating my previous record of 236. I've spent most of my free time over the past few weeks on playing as many as possible. And every second of the time I spent playing was worth it! There wasn't a single game that I didn't like, there was something special about each of them. From simple surprise jokes to complex gameplay. From adorable programmers' art to amazing pixel art and awesome 3D graphics. Interesting stories, cool game mechanics... You've all done an amazing job with your games, and you should all be proud of it!

About the theme "Unstable". At first I thought, "I guess it's ok", but now I love it. I was expecting some common themes like nuclear reactor games, physics based moves, games about stables and so on. But there were so many themes that caught me off guard, like all games about tables. This Ludum Dare theme is my personal favorite form of all four Ludum Dares I have participated in.

About my results. I am happy with them. In all categories, I did better than the worst ranting I got so far, and worse than the best ranting I got so far. So I kept my average. Which does not surprise me, because I only work on any kind of games during Ludum Dare. And I won in something. As far as I know, just before the final rankings was announced, I was the person with the most feedback given :)

Since, I have played so many games and left a comment on each one of them. I can look at the statistics of ranting given vs ranting received. I gave 233.125 points of ranting and received 110.75. That means that only about 47.5% of the people that game I played, played my game back. Do not get me wrong. I'm not mad at them or anything. But I think that shows something. One. On average, you need to play and comment on at least 40 games to get a chance of receiving 20 rantings back. And two. I suspect people aren't well-informed enough that they need to play games! Enough of my rambling.

Thanks to everyone how participated in Ludum Dare, I hope you all had a great time. I am happy that Ludum Dare exists and that we all can have fun together. So take care and see you all in April!

I decided to wrap up PILLS post-jam this weekend, check it out: https://8aku.itch.io/pills-post-jam Thanks everyone for your support! Feedback appreciated.

Hello everyone, i figured I'd write a little post-mortem about my Ludum Dare 49 experience. i want to speculate and ponder about what i did right, and figure out what i did wrong so i can improve for next time. I love looking back on reports like this as they always seem to become quite valuable down the line.

Firstly, I want to say I learned a lot and had lots of fun during this jam. As a very novice programmer, this was the first time i felt comfortable whilst working. Usually i wrestle with my scripts and my code just absolutely refuses to work, but this time things just kinda "flowed".

The first day, i had a really hard time figuring out what to make with this years theme. I spent way to long trying to decide what to do, but as soon as the idea of a gorilla on a pogostick popped into my head, i was sold and immediately began working on the character controls. I spent the entire first day just tweaking and getting the feel of the character perfect!

I really enjoy controller mechanic based games (think games with satisfying character controls where that is the foundation of the game, something like rocket league, superflight or the "Skate" games).

After the character control's where finished, the rest of the time was spent producing the level and player assets.

My time management could have been better, because i ended up crunching away making models like a madman until the very end of the time limit. Fun fact, the Coins in the game were added the last 15 minutes of the JAM.

here is the result of all that work and crunching, the finished product:

I was very pleased with the game, i had fun making it and really enjoyed playing it, but what was the public's opinion?

pretty mediocre. Overall 3.5 out of 5.

I wasn't surprised by the score, when i showed my game to my friends i got very mixed results, some loved the game and still play it randomly even to this day, whilst others immediately closed the game and hated it.

So what did i do wrong and what can be done better?

• in the beginning phase of development i locked the camera to make the game easier. I got a lot of comments complaining about this, and at first i disagreed but have now come to the conclusion they were right. My focus was mostly on the player character doing sick flips, and i had inadvertently taken away the players ability to explore the map. This is an aspect a lot of people enjoy, so it was a mistake to get in the way of their fun. I also missed an easy opportunity for more game content by hiding Easter-eggs and treasure around the map for the player to discover.

• i messed up and did some calculations based on framerate instead of time, so the game acts completely differently for lower end computers. This completely ruined the experience for some people, and made balancing the game incredibly hard.

• Although i am not unhappy with the graphics, it could be improved a lot. The "low poly" style i was going for felt cheap and wasn't applied correctly. There are lots of big flat spaces that feel boring and unfinished. This could be improved easily with some texture, tesselation or something else to break it up a little. Some grass, different light sources and a skybox would have gone a long way here.

• some people picked the game up and intuitively understood it. But others quit the game before they could master the character controls, unfortunately that is when the game begins to become fun and interesting. I understand this type of game isn't for everyone, but i think that if i eased new players into the game with a tutorial, it would improve the likelihood of new players learning the controls and enjoying the game.

• The UI needs to communicate better with the player. Most people don't realize you get a score multiple if you do multiple flips in a row, which is a disaster because it is an integral part of the game. Nobody and i mean NOBODY realized you you could level up based on your score and jump higher.

• An Online scoreboard would have increased the replayability and give players a goal to strive for. I didn't add this because i was running out of time and hadn't done it before, so i chose not do it.

I feel like these changes would have improved "unstable pogo" substantially and the game would have been better received. All of these points are very much doable in the timeframe of a gamejam. Hindsight is 20/20 and i had plenty of fun both making and playing the game. In the end, it was a valuable experience and i learned A LOT!

so for the closing statement, i want to say this has been my favorite Ludumdare so far! I really enjoyed playing people's games this year, and i am super proud of the entries me and my friends made. Unstable Pogo has become the best game i have made so far, and despite its shortcomings i still really enjoy playing it. I had fun, learned some stuff and got to hang out with my friends, what more can you wish for.

-Hengen

Every other Monday (18:00 - 20:00) I stream "Honest Feedback" on my Twitch Channel. Its a stream dedicated to giving feedback to games that are actively being developed.

This is typically not for game jam games, since my intention is to give feedback to games that are actively being developed with the intention of publishing in the future. However, as we know with wonderful games like Dorfromantik and Inscryption, some great ideas from Ludum Dare end up being turned into a fully fledged game and getting published.

Have you got a game that you want feedback on? If so, read the rules and submit here:

https://forms.gle/uS4mmyKsKfP1dUoH8

Hey everyone! For Ludum Dare 48, I made A Taste of the Past, a narrative sidescroller about cooking Asian food and accepting your mother's passing. We've been working on our game since the jam, and we've released a trailer and Steam page.

Please consider wishlisting our project! If you are also releasing an improved version of our game, feel free to link to your game so we can support it.

Watch our trailer here: https://youtu.be/BrNtI6g74zM

Thank you to everyone who played. I can't wait till next LD so that I can do even better.

I updated the original graphics and made it a little more interesting, but it will take a little longer to add the counter since I've never done that before. That will give me more tools to use in the next LD, though, so I am looking forward to finish this.

Some time passed, voting ended, so it's a perfect time to reflect on the overall experience, analyze what was done right, what was done wrong, and how we can do better next time!

Overall the process for our team was not so difficult like it was the last time we participated, but we decided to find a few new team members - and got support from @sfts & @ri-ra. Sadly, but @ri-ra left before the end, but anyway I think that was the right decision to invite some additional people, it's always fun in the end.

What went wrong

Not a lot, compared to the problems we had during the first participation. The first thing on my list is personal. On the first day, when I was looking for a visual style of the game and was about to prepare assets to build some level I spent about 6 hrs trying to deal with quite complicated tilemap settings, which was not worth it completely. Time-wise it was the biggest fail for me, everyone who has participated in a jam knows, that time is the most important thing. And spending this amount to nothing was an absolute disaster for me personally.

From a code perspective, the biggest challenge was physics. @ramonvicious said that he has never worked with physics-based games before and it was risky, but we underestimated how painful it can be to simulate everything. In the end, we simplified the game's physics and this helped a lot, however, some issues persisted even in the final build.

The biggest pain game-wise from my perspective is the game rhythm and dynamic. We started to have something working from the game's cycle only at the very end of the second day and we didn't manage to polish this aspect. For sure we should make a simplistic prototype much earlier.

What went well

I'll start with the personal one, but, for me, it was quite a move. At the end of the second day, I've checked the project and it was a disaster. It was fractured like a hell and there was no glue to assemble something that we can call 'a game'.

I decided to cut out everything which we were not able to make in a reasonable time and focus only on things that lead to some sort of product. We have dropped physics, simplified controls, agreed on levels structure and content, and started to do only the things critical for the completion. It was harsh, but we managed, and I'm happy that I was brave enough to do the call.

I think we also did grow quite a lot from the previous game jam professional-wise, which helped with the number of things we were able to make.

And finally, thanks to @sfts, we were able to have a nice sound, which wrapped out the whole game in a nice polished way. In the very end, I think we did pretty well. We were able to wrap a nice game out of fractured parts and, what's important, did a few steps forward since the last jam.

You can try it now if you want, we are always open for feedback :) Thanks to everyone who organized, participated, posted entries, commented, etc. It was a nice experience and we'll be happy to participate in the next jam!

Hello everyone. Just a few words to say that my jam entry Take Your Meds Darling (Overall #90) has been improved with new features and some improvements. If you like solid puzzle games in non-euclidean levels, it's for you - available on itch.io for free. If you have some problems with lights, colors and flickering, forget it - vomit bag not included :)

https://geckoo1337.itch.io/take-your-meds-darling

Core was one of the last sponsors we signed for Ludum Dare 49, announced just a few days before the event. So while time was short, I’m excited to share that we had many Core games submitted to Ludum Dare 49!

Core represents a very different, but important take on game development. My generation learned to make games from the ground up, because frankly, we didn’t have another choice. But while I was making GameBoy, PlayStation, and mobile games, this whole other generation grew up in Roblox, which blossomed into its own billion dollar gaming economy. For the next generation, I think Core has so much going for it, with its modern graphics tech (Unreal Engine), multiplayer out-of-the-box, robust scripting (Lua), and its novel approach to asset creation (kitbashing).

Let’s take a look at what folks made in Core.

Galactic Card Quest

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PLIUFTEN2mo

This is a deckbuilding battle card game. You get 3 energy per turn, and you spend them to play cards. You collect items and new cards as you play.

https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/49/galactic-card-quest

This game does a great job of showcasing what the asset pipeline of Core does for you. The graphics are stunning, especially for something made over a weekend. The card game mechanics are pretty good. Once you figure out the basics, you can power through many stages, but the enemies do eventually get strong enough that you need to really plan your actions. I definitely think there’s potential here.

Creaky Castle

This game made great use of the theme. You jump between platforms collecting treasure, fighting monsters, and levelling your character. The team at Core let me know this was a solo effort from one of Core's largest creators. Nice! Welcome back randomphantom. :smile:

https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/49/creaky-castle

I really like the simple RPG mechanics here. Missing a jump can be frustrating, but it works in a “flappy bird punishment” sort of way. This was the game I spent the most time playing. I never quite made it onto the scoreboard, but I keep thinking about giving it another try.

Portal Town Rescue

This game is essentially an escape room. You can’t leave until you’ve harvested enough resources and built structures to de-corrupt the portal.

https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/49/portal-town-rescue

The team admitted to being a little lost creating this, but I think they did a fine job. Sometimes you don’t know where you’re going until you get there. I haven’t played much with Core’s physics, but I was quite amused seeing the trees flop around after cutting them down.

Corrupted Core

This endurance game has you activating machines, using your magic to uncorrupt them. Keep this going as long as you can before the reactor blows.

https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/49/corrupted-core

My best time was 1:35.

More Games

• AlchemyChaos - https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/49/alchemychaos
• Unstable Multiplayer Speed Runner - https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/49/unstable-multiplayer-core-speed-runner
• Unstable Worlds - https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/49/unstable-worlds
• The Unstable Challenge of Space Time - https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/49/the-unstable-challenge-of-space-time
• Unstable Universe - https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/49/unstable-universe

Wrap-up

Wrapping up, I want to give a big thanks to Core for sponsoring us. I’m really excited about what they’re doing, and the potential to really shake-up how games are made. I look forward to seeing what folks make in Core next time.

If you would like to check out Core before Ludum Dare 50, grab it from the Epic Game Store for free at: https://bit.ly/Core-LD49, and check out the list of tutorials and documentation in my original post about Core.

Thank you to everyone that played and gave great feedback on my second Ludum Dare entry -- 2nd Law! While I overscoped the game (very original) and didn't get in all the interactable content that I wanted to, and that ultimately hurt my score, I did excel in the categories that were most important to me when I entered the jam -- the atmosphere.

The rankings reflect that outcome, and even though I did a little more poorly than my LD47 entry, I'm learning what I need to focus on more the next time around. Onward and upward! Learn and improve!

Updates to the Jam Entry

I do like to try to get in at least one update to my entries so that people have the chance to play a more actualized version based on their feedback. While I would have loved to expand the world interactions to flesh out more of the story, that would have required more work than I was honestly prepared to put into this small project.

That said, here are the updates that I did put in. I feel like the end result is overall more polished and pleasant, with a new controller and interaction indication. Also, the addition of a "Storyline" gives more context to your interactions in the world. * Polished interaction system - You no longer have to enter the area "just right" to get the interactions to trigger. * Mouse control - Now point-and-click to move and interact!! * Storyline - A linear history of all event interactions throughout your story. * Player distance scaling - Player sprite scales as it moves forward and back * Volume control settings - Mute the music / SFX * That Fox - An alternative to the rabbit meeting a poor end ... see if you can figure it out!

So whether you played 2nd Law during the rating period, or you are just seeing it now for the first time, I hope you'll give the update a try and let me know what you think!

https://hawkinberry.itch.io/ld49-second-law (Note, sometimes the browser version takes a bit to load ... there is a Windows version as well, for those users!)

And if you are at all interested in reading a Dev Log of my experience, you can access the first entry here

_ - Hawkin _

We turned our Ludum Dare 43 game Deadline of the Dead into a full release. It's called Zombie Admin and right now it's part of the Trick-or-Treat Bundle on itch.io!

If you want to support us, you can grab Zombie Admin and 9 other amazing games in one spooky bundle: https://itch.io/b/1103/trick-or-treat-bundle-2021

Support us by buying Zombie Admin: https://hastilyassembled.itch.io/zombie-admin

Follow us on itch.io and on Twitter and on YouTube !

Well I was waiting for the Game Jam results I managed to publish my first book. I've decided to offer a special deal for Ludum Dare. Everyone who buys my book will get a copy of my book!! https://www.amazon.ca/dp/1777913705

Available on all your local Amazon's as well.

Oh yeah and you can still play my games for free. Thanks for reading this completely off-topic post.

Cheer!

felt like posting some kind of post to close my ld49 journey so I can not think about ludum dare anymore until eventually deciding to jump in ld50 out of random spontaneous whimsy again lmao.

Since this is my first jam and actually any kind of attempt at game development, I think it's kind of a "win-some, lose-some" situation.

Oh boy I don't know anything about coding but through multiple helpful tutorials, I think I did alright in making something that you can move, clip into to interact and technically lose at. But it's very... bare bones. So I guess this jam was more about a jumpstart in coding/programming and getting familiar with Godot as an engine.

Now the downside: I realize, and this is something I do a lot apparently, is I think I was too passive. I signed up 1 week before the 49th Ludum Dare and tried to follow the gdquest beginner video but it definitely wasn't enough to change me from "no experience consumer" to "marginally experienced basic starter dev" in the span of a week.

So then what happened was, the theme dropped and the first few hours was just kinda fun doodling of the ideas and stuff but eventually I started to get into the coding but my mistake was waiting for the tutorials to tell me what to do.

But I also think it's kinda unavoidable. It's more like, I'd like to have the critical thinking for what I need to absorb but also, I have no metric to figure out what's important so everything felt important and that meant: really slow pace. Which kinda eats away at the jam lmao

I guess it was necessary however as nearing the final hours of jam I realized "Hey I should make a game!" And it was the cheesiest, barely qualifying effort but it was made with the applied experience of about 69(nice) hours in the final 3 hours of rushing to pump out a low quality, but finishedish, game.

Going forward, I'm adding game development practice into my routine because I doubt I'll ever get any better if I only just last minute learn through jams only. Not sure if I'm disciplined enough to keep at it but it's a post mortem not a life crisis lmao.

With that, I say thank you to all who played and left feedback on my first attempt at making a game. I genuinely didn't expect to hit 20 at all. After the obligatory submission post, I basically just wanted to bury my entry lmao and THEN I learned there was an unfinished category! Too late for that now, but hopefully in the future if I am able to participate again, I won't have to worry about that category anymore. Cheers!

RECORD SCORE SO FAR: 37 | @itsboats

What went right

• cat in ship good
• shapes good
• A lot of people liked the atmosphere, concept, and the gravity!
• The dynamic camera movements were overall well received and added to the game experience
• A simple control scheme (just mouse) offered a lot of accessibility and added to the chill vibe!
• The cat rotating, moving, and whirling around space.
• The incentive to play again was amplified by the music and the spawn animation.

What to focus more on

• More QA work would of been beneficial as since we played the game as we worked on it, we were biased when it came to dying. Dying ended up being a deterrent for people to play more (but hopefully the animation and the music helped push them to try again).
• A quick tutorial is always needed. Need to be either in the game or immediately on the Ludum page on launch.
• Preventing the possibility of players being spawned and sent into a very close blue shape too quickly with the likely outcome of them dying without knowing what happened.
• The hitboxes of everything felt off.
• maybe having the red shape take your jump is too mean?
• actually put in the jump indicator this time lol
• less "hope for the best with you shots" and more "do your best with your shots"

What went wrong (+ what to work on)

• Making a game based on dying and dying while feeling helpless is a good idea for the unstable theme but not a longterm effective pitch for a full fledged game. Players had feelings of no control and panic - some left it up to luck if their score would be high or not.
• Way too much RNG left the player losing control. The added possibility of their ship slowly descending to their death with every hope of them being caught by a random blue shape did not help either.
• The RNG cannot be a huge part (and main reason) of the unstable theme as that is an excuse for poor game design. We want the player to have control or the ability to take control. We did not have enough of the latter.
• It was unclear how to aim and what affects your speed. (The farther your mouse was from you, the bigger push it had)

We currently have no plans to continue working on NEKONOVA'S NOT HOME however, we love to see all the feedback as we will definitely continue to design games! :D

SIDE NOTES

@binaryprinciple I forgot to say, but I really like that you called it constellations. That gave me a whole lot more ideas. That and @pkzinpo's planet idea.

@ic-rainbow sums up the strategy very well: "...not all blue things are good for you and not all those red are bad. Sometimes you’ll want to take a risk with a red one, to save yourself from riding a wrong blue."

THANK YOU ALL FOR PLAYING OUR GAME <3

Links

Game Jam Page: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/49/nekonovas-not-home

Itch (Web): https://leyamez.itch.io/nekonovas-not-home

SOUNDTRACK: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL1OFXjTpl97h3e0ZYu_c-KtndO7nctN0f

Credits

Andrei Cabungcal | https://ldjam.com/users/royalcookiex | Lead Programmer

James Hicks | https://ldjam.com/users/leyamez | Programmer

Justin Choy | https://ldjam.com/users/polkoii | Art* and Music

Joao Villela | https://ldjam.com/users/villeloso | Modelling and Programming

Josh Estillore | https://ldjam.com/users/joshthestriker | UI

Tyler Lee | https://ldjam.com/users/ | Design and Ideas

*Responsible for all animation, 2D art, graphics and most 3d modelling

Exactly one year ago today the results of LD47 were announced! @brainoid @spacey3d and I were absolutely stoked that Cattenburg finished 3rd in Graphics and 12th overall in the Jam!

Life has been busy the past year for the team, but we are making some progress on the game lately! There's a handful of recent devlogs on my youtube, such as this one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7sDaNDo4fQo

We are currently exploring deck building along with a map that you explore, similar to the pattern seen in games like Slay the Spire. Next devlog will be coming soon - so stay tuned for updates via the Youtube channel!

Hey there! We're super excited to announce that our 6th place entry for Ludum Dare 49, Rocky Rhodes and the Cracked Case, is now playable in-browser! This version of the game includes some new additions too, such as reworked art assets, sfx, and a few gameplay tweaks.

If you're interested in experiencing the mind-bending adventure download-free and polished up, you can check it out (and rate it!) right here: https://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/820067

We hope you enjoy, and thank you all again for your tremendous support this jam!

Greetings,

Back in April, me and some friends submitted a game called Blackout for LD48. We enjoyed great feedback, and learned a whole lot from the experience.

Now, Halloween is upon us, and wherever you look there are ghastly ghosts, scary skeletons or less than zestful zombies. And in true Halloween spirit we'd like to present Blackout, reimagined.

This edition features a complete overhaul of graphics, sound, and a plethora of new features and puzzles. Whether you're experiencing the game for the first time or are a returning player, there'll be lots to discover and enjoy.

Why not try it out? https://freshgames.itch.io/blackout

Happy Halloween!

Loved this jam. Was my favorite so far.

Go grab the assets I made for free here: https://mauigamestudio.itch.io/spaceship-tileset