C’mon, I want to see 200 games based on this!

Tags: motivation

I’ll be using this Processing project skeleton – the same one that I use for my weekly games – as a basis for my LD #18 compo entry. Mostly, it’s just so I don’t need to reimplement things like a main loop and particle effects for every game I make.

Other tools that are likely to feature prominently include sfxr, PXTone, Audacity, and possibly The GIMP if I bother making a game with graphics this time.

I’m thinking that I’ll probably do some kind of shmup for the compo.

I also like cyberspace as a theme. I think that no matter what the theme is, I’ll make it fit into cyberspace. Simple as that. (Tron is my favorite movie of all time)

I’m going to use very simple, semi-abstract models so that I have time to make them.

I think that cyberspace could be a fun theme for me to play with in my games. I like it.

That being said, I’m definitely not doing a platformer. I’ve made way too many of those. I’m sick of them.

I may do a roguelike, but it’d be dirt-simple if I did. Or a tactical game that would also be dirt-simple. I’m seriously leaning toward a shooter, though.

With cyberspace as a theme (With the winning theme being made to fit into that setting if “Cyberspace” doesn’t win), I feel like I ought to have a funky weapon system, which I will try to.

Procedural levels are a must for me, plain and simple. I will have them as a primary goal.

I’m going to be entering the jam instead of the compo. I want the reduced pressure.

My cyberspace will look like the cyberspace in Tron. Dark colors with glowing trim, abstracted shapes. My weapon system will look kind of like the one from Tron 2.0 (As in, a few base weapons with items that change their overall behavior)

That being said, I’m hoping I can make this happen.

Let’s imagine you’re a happy Linux user, and you’d like to create a nice chip-tune for your upcoming LD game, but you don’t have any tool for that.

You might then want to try my port of Musagi for Linux. Before the compo, preferably, because I haven’t had any feedback yet, so it might or might not work as expected…

Here is the original Musagi for Windows web site, and a tutorial.

That’s all I guess; I just thought it might be useful for some.

I’m going to try and do this this weekend.   We’ll see.  (GO TRAPS)

I’m going to do XNA, using C#, VS2008 (or 2010, but probably 2008).

I tend to use past LD entries as basecode.   My LD17 that never finished is King’s Islands.   My LD16 was Adventure Quest.

I like various parts of Nuclex Framework (Seriously, if you do C# / XNA, they have some damn cool stuff), and I’ve used the MarkovNameGenerator before.

Other then that, it’s the usual chronolapse / paint.NET, Blender (maybe)

I’m really looking forward to this weekend since it will be the first time I’m participating in a LD. I haven’t decided if I want to use XNA or pygame but I probably won’t be using any additional libraries unless physics is involved or something.

Some software I might use

• sfxr
• musagi (I’ve never composed music before!)
• GIMP
• Blender

I think I’ll broadcast on uStream my pc monitor. I’ll try to setup something on Friday to see if it works. I’ll also do a time-lapse (in HD xD) that I’ll upload each day to youtube.

Also, Python + Pygame is ready to be used. I still have to look at py2exe, does anyone knows if pygame needs anything special to be done? I want to be pretty confortable with packging the Windows binaries before the start of the compo.

I feel that this LD is going to rock! xD

I agree with the anything goes rule. This enables us to focus on our game design ideas, rather than painfully trying to open a window and making your draw_pixel() function to work with any pixel format (this is kind of a bad example since it’s kinda of trivial, but still reflects my point). But still I have this urge to learn assembly this week and do everything really from scratch 😀 (maybe in the next LD). But this time I’ll use Python + Pygame (nothing else to be kind of midway from low to high level :P).

In my opinion Python has the best productivity and Pygame is really a wrapper to SDL (with some extras) that isn’t a nightmare to cross compile across different OSs. Still both don’t give the edge that Unity, Unreal, etc give so I don’t feel so dirty 😛

Damn, now this assembly idea is stuck in my head. I still want something multi-platform… Oh, I know, NES assembly xD (with my rom running on an emulator)

Hello all! I’m Thomas Larsen (feel free to call me Tom), a programming language developer (at the moment, I’m working on Yabasic). This will be my first Ludum Dare, and it is my intention to write a fully-working, interesting, and enjoyable game in the 48 hours of the Competition.

My plan is to use either C or Yabasic as my programming language for the game, depending on which would best be suited to the kind of game I decide to create. At this stage I haven’t decided whether to make a Web-based game or not; I suppose I’ll see how I feel at the start of the competition.

I’m looking forward to it!

Tom.

Well, ive got homework to do, but i MIGHT be able to participate in LD#18!

Hope for the best

Any chance of getting that countdown ticker at the top of the page on my face book page somewhere? That’d be really neat, I think. Eh, maybe I’m being trivial here.

Sadly, the font that’s being used here is arse, but I’m assuming (hopefully) that when it comes up it’ll be in a nice, sans-serif font.

So, I’m keen to give LD18 a crack. Not sure if I’ll get something out, but nevertheless I might give it a crack.

I’m keen to do something in Java which’ll simulate the hardware of the Sega Master System to some extent (none of the memory paging crap, just the VDP and PSG). To do this, I’m making a .it-to-.vgm converter, which I hope to have finished by the time this starts, and if anyone wants it I’ll post a link if/once it’s done & uploaded.

So, speaking of software, likely software will be:

• The Diablo JDK for Java 1.6. Duh.
• Kate for editing eleventy-billion .java files.
• GIMP for graphics.
• SchismTracker for music, and maybe a few of my own tools which will be “lying around” by the start of the compo (if you want any, feel free to bug me – I made one called “AutoTracker” but I do NOT recommend use of it as it’s still pretty awful and I’ll be composing by hand, but it’s there if you need it).

If we’re doing enemies as weapons, I’ll probably make everyone* here who’s likely to make a game which won’t work on FreeBSD (or make it a downright pain in the arse to do so) a throwable weapon if I can obtain their cariacatures. This includes:

• *Any* version of Flash.
• Game Maker, at least after a certain stage (it’s a PAIN IN THE ARSE to get it to work well under wine and even then it’s BUTT SLOW).
• Java folk who decide to use jinput and/or lwjgl instead of using jogl like a normal person.
• XNA or Silverlight.
• The Microsoft dialect of C++ (you CANNOT believe how much UTTER HELL I had in the last Allegro Speedhack – I could only get about 5 to COMPILE, let alone not crash.)
• Maybe FreeBASIC. (I haven’t managed to bootstrap it for FreeBSD.)
• Later versions of DirectX.
• People who insist on using shaders (I have an nVidia GeForce 5200 FX AGP).

By the way, I was one of those who voted +1 for zombies. Sorry guys.

(*) I’m making exemptions for people who are doing it on alternative hardware. But not the Amiga (because copyright law sucks arse as it stands).

Well, after much deliberation, I’ve finally decided to go with FlatRedBall using C# and VS 2008.

I’ll use this as a basis. It is basically just a screen with a couple of working Sprites with collision detection and some sound effects.
http://www.bitjets.com/asteroids.zip

I’ll use the following tools:

Art drawn with pencil and paper
scanned with Canoscan LiDE 700F
processed, colored and animated with PS5

will probably use Ableton Live and Korg keyboard for music
will try to use foley and voice for sound effects

Let’s see how it goes!

So, this is going to be my first Ludum Dare. Ever.

I have a surprise ready, though.

Here is a quick hello!

Hello!

This is my first LD. So afraid.

I use C++ and SFML for all my game making needs. Hopefully I can come up with (and finish) something.

I will be participating in this weekend’s Ludum Dare (yay!). It’s my third LD48 and I’m looking forward to making something!

I’ll be using a custom-made engine (written in C++), the engine is rather incomplete and filled with ugly code (atm it’s mostly just an Ogre/Bullet/OpenAL wrapper with a disorganized state machine and simple event system) so I don’t recommend that anyone use it, but as per the compo rules here is the GPL-ed source.

Also: I’ll be posting a workspace pic or two once I get all cleaned up and prepared, I’ll be using chronolapse for a timelapse, and I should be hanging around IRC on and off.

Capslock Adventure - It lives!

So you know my fake entry for PoV’s test of the new layout?

Well, it’s no so fake anymore.  It includes kinda-authentic disk loading sounds!  Once I am done and it’s playable, I will post a link to it for those who dare challenge the dreaded wizard lowercase!

I’m having lots of fun putting together this little warm-up game for Ludum Dare #18.

This will be my second Ludum Dare, and this time I hope to have a playable game at the end of it.  In #17, I spent far too much time tweaking the visuals on my last entry.  It might have looked nice, but it wasn’t very playable, and for that I apologize.  I will try to pace myself this time.

I will likely be using my standard platform for quickie games, which is Flash.  For tools, it’s the usual suspects: FlashDevelop and the spiffy and lightweight 2D app library Flixel.  And for content?  Photoshop, Musagi, sfxr, the usual trio.

.. post a link to the base code I might be using to be fair.  [ Download Here ]

return 0;

So, I see people saying that they consider frameworks to be acceptable, but game engines to be objectionable. It would help to specify the differences.

Is the use of a physics engine considered a framework or a game engine?

Automated systems, like terrain generation, are considered too much by some people. However, what about tilemap systems? Is a framework that accepts input from a tile editor, is this considered in the same way, or does it have to be 3D to cause upset?

Similarly, are there any aspects of audio that people find to be too much like cheating?

Do you think 3D graphics are a problem, especially if the engine/framework enables people to import complex 3D meshes, often with animation?

I’m surprised that some people consider Flixel to be such a ‘game engine’, as it’s mostly just an SDL style framework like Pygame, and requires very ordinary coding practice.

I don’t mean this to cause an argument, I’m more curious to figure out which parts of frameworks and engines that people object to. Then people can make a conscious decision to avoid using those services, or at least they’re able to choose when they design their game.

Please let us know in the comments.

So I’ve got weekend blocked off in my schedule and am looking forward to the contest. I usually don’t have much of a basecode, I just pick bits of meat off the carcasses of my past entries, but I’m trying to organize my code a little bit this time.  Almost all my past compo entries can be found at my google code dump and my basecode is in the  subdirectory named luddite. It’s not all stuff I wrote myself, in fact it’s mostly stuff I got from other sources (all public domain or BSD or MIT licensed, of course) and adapted for my own use. A lot of this code is not well tested or flat out broken, so use with caution.

Anyways, I can’t wait. See you all this weekend, on the battlefield (or the jam-field, as they case may be).

Joel