I understand that rating takes time, but please rate at least 20 games as well! If everyone does that ALL games would be rated*. (And if all games are rated your potential victory gets much sweeter)
That number should be >20.
P.S. That is my page, working on it as you read!
*best-case, I'm aware, so rate those in the danger zone!
From all of us: Xavier Ekkel, Bram van Elderen, Kenric D’Souza, Kirk Markarian, and Ben Lee - we had a blast making the game together, and we're really happy you enjoyed it so much!
Here's a link to the page: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/39/batteryman-recharges-the-world
We've begun to gather a collection of the video reviews we've received so far here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0h96zVEKpAc&list=PLkcHh8AASAKcD7mSV1l3aqwGJaGEeGXYN
Hi everyone, post your games below, I would like to play them. Please post games for Windows or HTML5, because I do not have any consoles and other operating systems. If you like you can check out our game here: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/39/no-sorcerers-sky
Ok, I think one week after the release of the ludum dare version of Bead on the moon, I am able to write a post mortem about the game. At first, I need to tell : this is the first game jam I participate in, and it is also the first non-web-game I release. So it was a huge (and great) experience making this game. So; here we go !
At the very begining, I wanted to make the game isometric. I didn't knew how to do it but it could have been pretty good. I forgot the idea because I thought it was going to take me more time. I was true : It's "easy" to program (for the use I wanted), however, it's long to draw. Today (yes, today, this afternoon, I tried. And let me tell you something : the result was good, indeed. But it didn't reflected the feeling I wanted for my game. This is the lesson I got : always follow your instinct. This permit me to save 4 hours and, - god -, thank for it.
When I first saw the theme - saturday, 5AM where I live -, I told myself "YES I KNOW EXACTLY WHAT TO DO", and I immediatly beginned to programm my game. But the problem is that I wanted a game too complex : and the concept around the theme needed a strong client/monster system, already done. So at the end, I haven't any time to add the power system - at the end of the compo, I haven't any monster at all, I added them during the jam extra-time -. So, the game you'r seing doesn't contain everything I wanted. Beginner error for sure.
As you (don't) know, because you haven't any source code, I've used JSON to make the dialogues and the cooking system. It is a great way to stock informations, and I'm going to use the same system everytime I'll need it, because it's awesome and "simple". Yes, simple but i've encountered a problem : when I've first exported my game as a standalone version / webgl version (at the end of the compo, 1 hour and half before the end)... It didn't worked, because the game was unable to find the file path for every JSON files. Panic. I open google chrome, search a way to fix it QUICKLY... But nothing work. Fortunately, there is a ludum dare server on discord, in wich I could ask for help - and thank to Apace and JorgeGameDev, I found a way - wich required to reprogram some aspect of the game, but it was quick). However, when I finished it and was able to upload the game... The submision was "closed" since 10 minutes. Well, I could still upload my game because they were (in reality) still open (because of a bug or something, the creator decided to let the compo submission open during all the event). But to be fair, it was too late. So yeah, guys, here's the conclusion of the story : don't content yourself to test your game in the unity's editor. (yes, I agree, it's a beginner error, once again.)
Everyone tell it in the comment section of my game. I agree with that. The cooking system is not very intuitive, as we can see in the Togis's test. Not intuitive at all. That's something I'm looking at very closely to find a way to make it waaaayyy better, and thank to the feedbacks players sent me, I now have something to work with...
Everything is in the title. Nothing to add. Made me sick and hard to follow the last day. Beginner error once again. Shame on me.
I'm proud of what I've done about it, the art is pretty good and reflect what I wanted about the universe - something both "normal" and "fantastic", with... Funny haircuts, because funny haircuts. However, a four frame animation isn't enough - for me - for a walk cycle like that... I'm already working on new animations for every clients in eight frames - and even more animations for more interactios !). Also, I've changed my mind a bit. I don't know how to handle vector art that well to do a game with it in 48 (and I've spent only 12H on the art so it was just unthinkable), but now that I have more time, i'm doing it with vector graphics. It won't change that much to the aspect of the game - preserve the forms, and the repartition of shadows -.
To be honest : i've never done any music BEFORE this ludum dare. Never. I've composed 6 music for the whole game in 4 hours with bosca ceoil. And you guys tell me they are good. Well, I'm going to take more time to make them even better. (and improve them a lot, because they can be improved a lot)
It's something that need to be worked a little bit more - to add more different interactions - but I'm already proud of it.
Also a short thing, but I LOVE the universe my game is placed in. I'm going to work a bit more on it to enhance it - because it's something I can do easily -. But I have soooo much possibilities at the moment ! However I wanted the universe to be a lot more uncomfortable. The bar needs to be a "safe place" for the clients (well at least the player need to keep it safe as much as posible). And it needs to be a safe place for the player too. I won't say too much about it - I'm working on it too.
As you may have understood, I'm working on a post-jam version of the game wich will be AWESOME. A full BIG game (not only a polished version). The game is going to have a new rythm : at the moment, you must act quickly. This is because for a Ludum Dare game, I thought it wasn't a good idea to make a game where you play in a game that evolve slowly. But for a full game, I can (and it will improve the gameplay a lot). To know more about the full version of Bead On The Moon, please read the tumblr ! If you want, please follow Bead On The Moon to know what's going on !
:bird: Twitter : https://twitter.com/beadonthemoon
:unicorn: Tumblr : https://beadonthemoon.tumblr.com (yes it's a unicorn, because magical girls are unicorns)
Hi everybody!
In case you missed it, Power Brawler League can be played here: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/39/power-brawler-league
Available for Windows, Mac and WebGL. You can play with your friend or against the AI!! We've got some beautiful feedback and we'd like to see if we can get a bit more. This is our first jam entry and it would be lovely to know what you think about it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ID_LQmtJQv8
Thanks everybody and keep it up!!!
come play here: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/39/power-outage-1
Hey everyone, please come play my game, Messy Getaway. I know it's a little bug-ridden and way too easy, but I would like the feedback nonetheless. I still need 10 votes, so... I'd be happy with anything at this point.
Thanks!
Hello everyone.
At first: we want to say thanks to all people who played our game!
At second: while another developers make posts asking for "more ratings please"
We are working on making our game better!
And we play your games and rate them as well!
We just want YOU to play our game! We make it for playing! Not just "raaateee us"
Also: here is concept art on what we are working on, and we make it our NEW logo!
Thank you for playing Defender of the "Energy"
Sorry for bad English :)
https://schu-box.itch.io/lost-in-the-dark
Try to escape 10 mazes by using your spatial awareness and memory as your field of view constantly shrinks. But watch out... if you make it far enough then there are lasers you can only see in the dark!
Please help me get to 10 votes! Your reviews are greatly appreciated and if you link your game in the comments I'll be sure to check it out!
https://schu-box.itch.io/lost-in-the-dark
I'm starting expanding my entry called * Plug Me* by adding new levels and maybe release it on Steam in a while...
Do you think it is a good idea or it should be relegated only to the flash market? I like the concept but I don't know if it is suitable to the Steam market. :thinking:
I hope you like it! :grin:
Hey guys, thanks to your feedback, we've been working and improving the game and now we got a brand new web build 0.4c !
Check it out HERE
Don't forget to give us your impressions on our Entry Page it really helped us improve things so far, but we'd like to get as many as we can to see what we could still be missing, and also simply have more people try it out and tell us how they felt about the game
See ya guys around the site testing some games :)
Welcome to the second entry in GLOWs Post-Mortem series. I've analysed my workflow and it boils down to two tips. People commented that the "immersion" of "the little world" I made was really great, and that they would love to come back. So this entry is about how I did quick design that has a certain degree of "very polished". While it is very simple on purpose (WASD only) has no text or explanation in the game itself, making level design the only way of communication to the user. I will first explain to you how I designed the world, then I will give you some examples of how it worked out: The good, the bad, and, sure why not, the ugly.
A relink on my article on Audio (from/for noobs) was summoned. So check it here.
Level design for Game Jams, especially during the ones that are over in the blink of an eye like LD, can be quite challenging if the approach is not very well prepared. However I learned that it is quite possible when you use the right approach, the hard way though. I think I did it with two main thinks I could describe as: 1. Teach as you go 2. Meaningfully Reuse
These two will dictate that you find a process that works great for you. Finding a great workflow is key. It speeds everything up, and forces you to think your design through at every step, while KISSing (Keeping It Simple, Stupid). Even if, like me, you always try to go with completely different art styles, game genres and team compositions. Right between coming up with your idea and actually starting you should define which tools you are going to use, and design a workflow. Last week for me this was picking Illustrator, which I never used in game development before and getting it in Unity (Illustrator->Photoshop->Unity). Idem for GarageBand (GB4iPad->GB4macOS->Unity).
You are getting a PhD in your own game, you discovered its laws and how they all work together, what's there to teach yourself? Well, getting a PhD is about learning, discovery, what elements will work together. Getting a PhD is also about explaining your findings to others. For each law, and interaction between them think of a way to explain it to someone who doesn't know anything about your world. While you might feel that that is the most important rule in game design, it is certainly something not getting enough care when you are in a rush. So, as you explore the possibilities of your discovered laws, think of ways to show others how they work, and make a level on how you would explain this. Make puzzles like you would make slides for a presentation, just keep in mind that there is no time for questions. If you do it this way, you automatically create some sort of workflow, one based on exploration that helps you generate levels.
Only slightly modify the assets you have, don't make new ones. Rotate, scale, skew, warp your sprites, it will look differently. Making a grid based game? Add some detail sprites, which you randomly place of others, don't make ten by hand, just do some simple but clever programming and maybe get hundreds. This also goes for music, just do a quick reorder your notes to quickly make it more interesting, lower your a few octaves and poof a bass line. And even designed gameplay elements, e.g. simple mixing and change the distance between others.
Of course it should be meaningful. Does it make sense? Well, I think this can be answered with the previous tip: If you think you can teach it, it probably makes sense (or its just plain funny) and thus meaningful. Does it make sense to the player to find this plant in this area?
Some things are not obliviously things that can be meaningful. E.g. what colour schemes work, what kind of instruments sound well together. I think things like that boil down to spectra. Colours convey meaning, so thats definitely meaningful. Colour schemes should be well spread-out, but still have some connection to each other, e.g. different colour, same brightness or vice versa. There I think meaning comes from the relation between the colours. Similarly this works for audio. Does it make sense to make this sound when you hit something or pick up that orb. Does this bass line add meaning to the other instruments? I think those are questions that you can ask yourself to make even such abstract choices easier.
For programming this is a tad different: programming at its core, especially Object Oriented is reusing all the way. My tip here is, to embrace simple copy-pasting of code, its only 48 hours. Keep it simple by not over-engineering your game. And in this timeframe you should be able to memorize where you reused code when resolving bugs.
Don't feel like slightly modifying it? Just reuse it. Then mutate it a bit. (e.g. different distance between other elements, increased speed, different size) Especially if are you stuck with design, art, music, programming? The player will recognise it, and know what to do. This is actually a clever core mechanic that will test if the player learned what you want them to learn.
If you get stuck and depleted your resources, go to you stack of brilliant ideas and pick one. Then generate some new ideas and mix it with the others.
Again, tips for your workflow; don't overthink things, it will make you stuck. You don't have time for it and it is not required. Just make sure you teach each element and make sure it's meaningful. (I'm open for alternatives to the term 'meaningful', I'm not 100% happy with the word.)
The Good
Coffee Beans (my preferred of many names, thanks @timbeaudet). Coffee Beans have the same color as the player's light. In addition they are spread around like breadcrumbs showing the path you can move. After picking them up the players light get's brigher. When picked up they emit a chime in the scale of the music. This is the core mechanic of the game, so I am really happy it worked out really well. They teach how light affects the player.
The Bad Switches, Jellyfish and Evil Fish, all initially green are effected by the good color emitted by your bubbles. But it turned out it takes too many bubbles to show the effect of the bubbles. There is some ambiguity in the color green. Fish and Jellyfish deal damage when touched, while the Switches do not. Also green rocks cannot be affected by the bubbles but only deal damage, mixing in 2 different meanings to the color, that are mixed between the enemy type (In binary: Fish:11, Switches:10, Rocks:01). Amiguity is very bad! (Especially since I was aware of it but thought "Ah, who's gonna have problems with that". Rookie "PhD" mistake.).
The Ugly I personally love the movement in my game, to me it really feels like you are swimming through the water; floaty with a very soft gravity. However the way I introduced it can cause many problems. Firstly there is a short animation at the beginning that is supposed to show the three icons that should be collected. However, during this time the player movment is disabled. Because of this being disabled players are focussing on trying to figure out how to move during this animation, often ignoreing the entire animation explaining the goal of the game. A second problem is that the fish rotates towards the direction you are steering in. However if you move to the opposite direction there is no single shortest rotation so the fish just flips, making it harder how the movement actually works. People will figure it out in the end, but it's a very ugly way of teaching.
The Good (from Bad)
Initially I was trying to make my level from specially crafted blocks. Being afraid that people might notic too many repititions. Luckily I quickly changed my mind. (I still made about 20 different building blocks, but 50% of the entire game is made from one single rock). No one noticed and allowed me to make a full "immersive" world in only a couple of hours. Ofcourse I did make some simple changes to some of the same rocks, but that was just quick reshaping for the level design. The rocks that can easily be reused have more meaning (wall, rock,
The Ugly The code for all bubble absorbers is practically the same. On touch: kill bubble, change color and a conditional reaction. Instead of nicely engineering this I just copy-pasted the code. This appreoach works fast and pretty good. Forces me to refactor (actually fully rewrite) most code if I continue. And since this game is so small, modifying all pieces of the code was easy with more quick copy-pastas. Ugly, but gets the job done quickly during a jam.
I hope you learned something from my approach and perhaps it can be benifcial for your workflow too. I will be doing a few more of these articles, and I will be highlighting some game clever Ludum Dare designs as GIFs on twitter. I only have small hand full of followers, so if you liked it (which is safe to assume; you are reading an obvious shameless plug), want more insights and want to make my day, follow me there: https://twitter.com/abductypus
It's my first ever LD ,so I 'am really happy for just to rates :smile:
Check it here: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/39/cubed
Hunt for the glory of Ull, the god of winter, in this nordic-themed action game !
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/39/berzerk-hunt
Your Fury is the only thing that keeps you alive in this harsh environment. How long will you maintain it to survive ? Squash rabbits and fight wild animals using your powerful abilities !
We dearly hope you enjoy our creation. Have fun !
Thank you so much for this great event, and this great community!! This was our first Ludum Dare, and we already received over 20 rates!! Thank you so much!! Also, we received very positive and empowering comments. A really motivating experience.
You will see us in the next LD, that's for sure!! R&M
I am going to stream live 8/9/17 at 8pm PDT (just 5 more minutes!) playing and giving feedback on HTML5 entries. Please link your game below if you would like me to check out your game. Looking forward to seeing what you have submitted!
I would really appreciate it if you could check out my game and leave some feedback:
So don’t delay, we can’t afford to not have you!
Update: Position is unpaid. Also, we ask you not to contact us directly or at all for any questions regarding meaning or purpose of this position, thank you for understanding!
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/39/battery-low/android-app-to-notify-for-new-ratings-and-comments-on-your-ld-entry
I made a completely free, open source app to check and notify(background) for new ratings and comments on your LD entry. It lacked many features and polish and was available for download only through Github. Announcing it's update, which eliminates almost all its limitations.
About text | Markdown Support
:------------------------------------:|:-------------------------:
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Alternatively you can get it from Github, if you prefer it: https://github.com/RishiRaj22/LD-Notify-App/releases
Feel free to contribute to the Github repo and maybe leave some stars :wink: : https://github.com/RishiRaj22/LD-Notify-App
PS : If you want to contact me, or ask for feature request comment on this thread, or raise an issue on Github, or even send me an e-mail.
If you made a browser game, comment a link and I'll give it a rating (again!)
:arrowscounterclockwise: Cave of no Return :arrowscounterclockwise:
Greetings fools. This is my postmortem for Cave of no Return, the game I made LD39 in the format of the Jam. This was my second time participating (the first being with Pieni Saari for LD38), and I think I am pretty happy with the result. It features a tiny cloaked skeleton, searching a dark cave for his grave. In order to get to your goal, you must find terminals, which let you turn the world around, so you can traverse other parts of the caves.
:bulb: The Jam :bulb:
I got the idea for the turning level mechanic when I tripped off the stairs and fell on my face. As I lay there on the floor, regretting my decision to use the stairs in the first place, I thought "well from my perspective, the floor is the wall now". What followed was a 3 minute long attempt to walk on walls. I'm glad nobody was around to see it. I guess the idea stuck with me. I took out the embarrassing "falling on your face"-part and kept the turning of the perspective.
Since my core mechanic is pretty simple, I got the basics working fairly quick. Admittedly, there's a few bugs, but I think that on a technical level, everything works okay. I mean everything is functional right? Something I regretted last time when I was working on Pieni Saari, is that I had to divide my attention too much on the many different subjects of development (game design, code, art, etc) so that I was not able to focus on level design as much as I wanted. Well I'm glad that this time around, most of my time went into designing the cave. I made some cool sketches on paper (I wish I could show you but I ate them) which helped me visualize how the player would be able to access the different halls of the cave, from different perspectives. There are certainly a few things I would change (make the caves less linear, especially the second half), and I feel the tileset for the cave definitely could use some variation, but it's finished and I don't like coming back to a project that I ended.
For the music I have the amazing Daniel McCulloch to thank, who jumped in halfway the jam and composed me those sexy bleeps and bloops you hear while exploring. The game certainly wouldn't be the same without the track and for that, Danny goes on my nice-guy list.
:thumbsup: What went good :thumbsup:
For the duration of the jam, I kept a cool head. Feels good, to not worry about whether I'll make the deadline or not. Just a weekend of relaxed working on a small game. How did I not get stressed out like usual? I have no fucking clue! If you think you might know, tell me! It could be the key to becoming a more focused developer.
Adding the cool shit like a seamless transition from menu to game, and easter eggs (did you find them all?) was the most fun, and I think that those will be things that people remember after playing the game. I certainly will enjoy them when I replay my game in 10 years.
On the second day I spent quite a lot of time thinking about the ending. At first it involved a puzzle where you tried to climb the branches of a large ash tree. It proved to be a lot of work both art and design wise and I'm glad I realized this early enough to scratch what I had and rethink the ending. The fade out at the grave is much simpler, and somehow fits the game more.
:thumbsdown: What went bad :thumbsdown:
"Well I've been going type-type for a while, now let me just take a little break and-WHOA I JUST TOOK A 3 HOUR BREAK WHAT?" I'm sure a lot of people have had this happen as well. Side effect of feeling so relaxed, is that I didn't feel pressured enough to shorten my breaks. Time spent laying on the couch or playing a video game could have been spent working on the game. I can definitely improve at structuring my time better.
Here is a tip directed towards future-me. When it's the second evening of the jam, and you're pretty focused on your work and actually getting some stuff done, it's okay to say no when your friend shows up at your doorstep with a bottle of wine. Trust me, you are not getting any more work done for that day.
Next time I should plan in some time for testing and potentially reworking parts of the game. While I am working I am constantly testing, but in the end there are a bunch of issues that I know off, but end up not fixing. I don't like going back after the jam, so I should make sure I tie up as many lose ends as I can.
:coffin: Conclusion :coffin:
Wow, what a fucking piece of shit postmortem, don't you think? Reading this thing probably takes longer than playing the dumbass game. Still, it's nice to reflect on things through writing for once, and I had a lot of fun working on the game. If you haven't yet, you should try playing it. Or else I'll come haunt you when you get up to take a piss at night.
I hope to be around for LD40. It would be cool to be able to participate three times in a row, you know? Until then, I'm staying away from the stairs. Peace out.