So here is what we were waiting for! The update is here! In this update, i have added a new 3rd map and the hitboxes are now a little bit smaller than before! (You can play my game in you browser!)
If you haven’t played our game yet, try it out now! - https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/prison-escape
So here is what we were waiting for! The update is here! In this update, i have added a new 3rd map and the hitboxes are now a little bit smaller than before! (You can play my game in you browser!)
If you haven’t played our game yet, try it out now! - https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/prison-escape
Play Necrofenser Hero now and let us know how far did your army got you!
Please play rate and comment, every feedback is welcome!
A little under a week left! Congrats and good luck to everyone competing!
Thank you to everyone who played and rated Millions of Minions! If you haven't played it yet, why don't you give it a try?
Hi, i decided to spent some minutes to extend the search for the Search Engine that you can now use keywords. Please note it only searches in the body (description text) but this should be enough for now :)
I did that as i wanted to search for VR Games (as you see below).
You can find the tool here: http://ldgamefinder.nerdvision.net/
Just a week till the end of LD45... Or a WHOLE WEEK! We still play some games from time to time, feel free to try our little game too! We appreciate any kind of comments. Thanks!
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/while-youre-here
Today, we're doing another (probably second to last, but maybe last) Dare to Play stream on Twitch. We'll be starting soon over on https://www.twitch.tv/cyberlightgames
It's been quite a ride! Ludum dare is probably the most influental game jam out there. Nothing quite brings the indie game community together, like a whole community of jammers, playing eachother games for weeks after the intial jam, giving eachother feedback and bonding! What an amazing jam. This was my first one, can't wait to participate in the next one.
I've been busy IRL so I haven't had time to play and rate very many games so far, so please leave a comment linking to your games so I can try them out!
While you're here feel free to play and rate my game here: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/v-o-i-d !
We would love to get more feedback for our game the alpaca tales. :grin:
This time around we were just 2 programmers and have just finished in the last second but it was so much fun again.
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/the-alpaca-tales
Have a nice day! :heart:
The Ludum Dare 45 was my first time participating in a game jam. It was a great experience and gave a short time frame to work on a new project. Over the last two years I've been working part-time on my "first" game. I'm getting close to finishing my current game but haven't had the opportunity to work on anything outside of that project. I have made a few small "games" but none of them were worth releasing to the public.
It was Friday evening, I was sitting in a hotel for weekend meetings, and I see that a few of my 'online friends' are working on the game jam. I think to myself "hey, I have nothing else to do the next few evenings... I can get something together in that time”. I thought about what I could do with my laptop and what the resources I had available at the time. It was a last minute decision to join the jam. I decided on a simple hangman-style word game that incorporates music from a band, Dt Surgeon, that I've been working with.
I only have experience working with 3D projects so I started making assets in Blender, imported them to Unity, and started to layout the game. I wanted to explore what could be done with Unity's Animator so I focused on that and wrote two really simple scripts to run the game. I then needed music and decided to make an audio management system that could loop individual parts of a song (i.e. drums, guitar, bass, etc.) so I can build a full song as the player progresses through the word puzzles.
Over the weekend I managed to get the game working and at the airport on Monday afternoon I got the audio into the game. Later that day I returned home with a few hours to submit the game. I had time to build the game for Windows and web, setup my jam page and itch.io, and made some art for the pages. When everything was ready I uploaded the game and submitted it to the LD45. It was a great experience finishing and releasing a game in that short of time. I ended up calling the game nothingEVERYTHING.
This is my first publicly released game and this jam gave me experience in the releasing process. The LD45 community has also been great to join and it is enjoyable to see what the other game creators have made. The response to my jam game has been better than expected and I have received some good feedback on how I can make the game better. I plan to take my game concept and apply it to another project I recently started. I think that the LD45 was great for my growth as a game developer and I encourage you to either do a solo jam or join a team if you haven't done a game jam before. The experience is great and will help your development as a game developer, artist, musician, programmer, storyteller, etc...
I'm looking forward to the Ludum Dare 46!
You can check out my LD45 game here: nothingEVERYTHING
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In my game you’d land on a planet with very little of the raw materials to support life, and you’d pick up and place the materials you did have to concentrate and combine them - by doing this, over time algae would form and fill your atmosphere with oxygen that could support more advanced forms of plants, you could then move your plants around to spread them across the planet and improve the soil conditions for so more diverse forms of life could grow and further transform the planet toward something eventually habitable for humans.
Obviously the scope of this concept is nuts and I could never nail down the exact mechanics where you could achieve this in a simple understandable and fun way that could be coded in 72 hours.
A small breakthrough was to simplify all the elements down to just three metrics, maybe soil quality / biomass or plants / air composition and each grid square of the map would have a value for each of these, maybe from 0-255 🤔
At this point I realised hey a really good intuitive non-numerical way of displaying this would be to have these three 0-255 values be displayed by a colour, assigning the three metrics to Red Green and Blue and printing the resulted additively mixed colour within the grid square 😳
At a glance you’d know if areas of the map had poor soil quality (low Red) / but good plants (high Green) / and good air (high Blue) - resulting in a cyan-y colour being drawn for that grid position.
Pretty cool visual concept, but I had trouble turning it into a game - everything felt too subtle and indirect, and play testing revealed it was actually pretty challenging to figure out the breakdown of the RGB colours on screen to make sense of the state of the planet.
In the end I enjoyed the challenge of accurately predicting the RGB colours more than playing the prototype I had made.SO - I decided to remake the game from the ground up - a really simple game where you just had to guess the colour and you’d get a % match score based on how far your guess deviated from the actual result. Feeling like this game I had made was just basically Messing Around In the Photoshop Interface ™️ and didn’t really feel like a game, I added fun goofy sliders that make sounds and help you synesthesicly gauge how much of each colour you’re adding to the mix. I added a little score table at the end so you could try to beat your average in a set of 8.
I’m very happy with the result - Valid criticisms of the game include that it’s alienating to colourblind people, that it’s not very ambitious in its scope, the sliders make irritating noises, and how does this even relate to the theme(?) but considering I lost a whole day due familyreasons and had to scrap my terraforming simulation concept 60% of the way into the time I had, I’m proud of this strange little micro game 🔬🤓
Thanks for reading!
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https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/dungeon-of-souls
I just learnt how to upload it to websites other than mine :3
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/spacecrafter https://youtu.be/V3ebWsHf3VU
We have a lot of secret mesSANDges in the game, but nobody found them… maybe you find them first! Share screensoots in comments.
🐱Find a cat here🐱
So here is what we were waiting for! The update is here! In this update, i have added a new 3rd map and the hitboxes are now a little bit smaller than before! (You can play my game in you browser!)
If you haven’t played our game yet, try it out now! - https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/prison-escape
(Play my game in you browser!)
Just made my fourth LD45 video featuring Revelator, Reworld, Sorrow Quest, Paint Rush & Small Town! Hope you enjoy!
https://youtu.be/zoLZXTxFt0w
Other videos containing Ludum Dare 45 games is under my YouTube playlist, "Ludum Dare 45"
If anyone wants me to play and rate their games, please comment below, I may not be able to record them, but I'd be happy to play them!
Have you checked out yet Minigod? A game where the developer was so lazy that he preferred to let the players write the AI!
Anyway, I just added a major update. SAVE and LOAD! This was the most requested feature. In fact, I think the game was kinda unplayable without it :stuckouttongue:
Check it out! https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/minigod
With the release of V1.1 we have also included a web and mac build!!
Check the game out here: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/hellion-is-now-finally-published
WebGL capable. Link can be found HERE.
Developer Dave has taken the humble medium of video-games and fashioned it into a thrilling and musically rich artifact of mass entertainment. As described by Developer Dave himself:
". . . the atmospheric, non-linear, open-world, puzzle-based MMORPG elements, the scenic legerdemain, the soaring melodies and the exceptional old-England feel are all at the service of an involving and piquantly offbeat epic storyline, all of it staged with brilliantly organized flair by me, back in top form in my very first game."
Given the near-hysterical anticipation aroused by this latest, big bertha Ludum Dare smash, “it’s not that good” will probably become a familiar refrain along the byways of comment sections. No, it’s not “Dark Souls”, "This War of Mine" or “Fiddler On The Roof,” but, as Developer Dave puts it:
". . . it’s a major achievement in the entertainment industry and a high water mark in my phenomenal career."
Come for the glittering technical wizardry but stay for the strong story and characters.
play it
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/war-with-nothing
Action filled twin stick shooter ! don't miss out on this cool experience !
https://youtu.be/ok9oNWN-2kA
Just made a big bug fix. Here is the complete list: - Couldn't shoot at certain directions: Fixed
Enemy's death sound didn't play: Fixed
Some enemies couldn't shoot bullets at the player: Fixed
Sometimes keys didn't appear in none of the enemies in the room : Fixed
Health bar was interactable : Fixed
Our final Livestream of Ludum Dare 45 Dare to Play is starting NOW over at https://twitch.tv/cyberlightgames
Come on over and !submit Your game in chat!
Then I've got the game just for you - Something from Nothing! https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/something-from-nothing
It features: - over 99 words to build from various nullities - saving system so that you don't have to find all these words in a single go - incremental particles - a misplaced alien - last but not least, the most essential feature in video games: toilet flushing
On a side note, if you leave a review on my entry, I'll do my best to reciprocate... which might or might not end up well for you. ^^'
While we're at the shameless promotion, check out "There was something here", it's awesome: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/there-was-something-here
If you have ever wondered how it is to be in charge of an entire planet's existence and climate, here you have possibility to try! And don't forget to leave grades ;p
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/planet-converter
I finally fixed out-of-sync!
Thanks to everyone who played, rated and left feedback!
You can play and rate here : https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/nothing-21
Here's an example of the light effect in action -
Gameplay of the Dare / Compo version
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=giNuK13kyEk
Still trying to figure out procedural trees without killing performance -
Also seeing if it's possible in the Unity engine -
Thanks to @tsjost for his super in-depth version !
https://tsjo.st/r/ld45/
Allows you to pick a random one, or search by type etc. Loads of options.
And ot @ithildin for poiting out the itch.io link
Allows you to see WAY more than on the LD rollodex
http://ludumdare.itch.io
Please put your game in the comments, and try out mine if you have a chance. Thank you!
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/ludum-and-the-lost-pages
Select your strategy here.
Maybe 🦀 into 🐟 into ⭐
Or 🐟 into 🦀 into ⭐
Or just ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ XD
Or find a winning strategy yourself!)
It’s a game about driving … But driving nothing ! XD
You can drive the air in “Nothing is my car” here : https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/nothing-is-my-car
I hope you will like it !
From birth, we have nothing.So we need to choose something. I hope you can feel my expression.
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/because-we-have-nothing-so-we-need-to-choose-what-to-get
Leave a comment and I'll play your game~
A behind-the-scenes look at my creative process for scoring the Ludum Dare 45 videogame “You Gotta Be Kitten Me”. If you haven't tried our game out yet you can play online here!
The Ludum Dare 45 theme, "start with nothing", is actually a great metaphor for game development, music production, or any other creative endeavor for that matter. This is usually how it all begins....with nothing. Nothing but an idea that is. I've seen some really creative ideas in this jam so far and it's been super interesting to see how they were executed.
We kicked it off with a group brainstorming session that led to some pretty wild scenarios. One idea I had was to create a survival game in a forest or on a desert isle using MacGuyver style crafting mechanics. Another idea was to create a strategy RPG about colonizing and terraforming a barren planet in the distant future. Last but not least, I suggested creating an escape game where the player has to find their way out of some sort of prison or cell. We actually ended up incorporating this idea, but in a completely different way than I expected.
https://youtu.be/i2Ujrd8n6gM
When I got the word we were making a game about mutant kittens escaping from a secret laboratory, I can't say that I wasn't excited. My first thoughts were to create a soundtrack with elements of synthwave mixed with spy music. Synthwave, for those who aren't familiar, is a style of electronic music inspired by 80's sci-fi films, cartoons, videogames, and cyberpunk aesthetics. I also wanted to incorporate a jazz element to the score, mainly because in the 1920s the word "cat" was also a slang term for a "cool jazz musician". That and I always thought that cats were sort of cool and "jazzy" in a way (especially the way they move and sneak around). I dunno, maybe I just like really like jazz.
https://youtu.be/kAsNHGfh88A
For the main title theme, I was heavily inspired by David Wise and the original Donkey Kong soundtracks. I remember being a kid and just sitting on the DK menu screen, scrolling through music tracks and listening in awe. I wanted to make something contemplative like that, something that would evoke the same sense of wonder and mystery I had playing these games as a child.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=slKNBP7VEvI
To begin, I started the track off with a synth pad alternating between two sustained minor chords. Then I added a funky bassline underneath, which hints at the main melody to follow. The melody riff (played by a chip-tune style synth lead) was actually composed while jamming separately on the following track; I transposed it over to this one and it worked perfectly with the new chord progression. After that I created the drum pattern, which I played live via MIDI controller. At first I planned on using an 808 or something similar, but instead I went for the most lofi, SNES-cartridge sounding drum sounds I could find. I ended up using the '94 Drumkit from the Koji VST plugin, which includes a great variety of retro 16bit style videogame samples.
Next up was the main level music. This is the music that plays when the player is sneaking around, exploring the laboratory, knocking over beakers, etc. For this track I wanted to incorporate more jazz, (for the reasons I mentioned earlier) and also an element of spy music. What I ended up with was something more along the lines of electronica, chillout, downtempo, or trip hop. First I started with some jazzy Rhodes chords, and a bassline inspired by the music from games like Perfect Dark, Goldeneye and the Metal Gear Solid series.
Most of the battles and cinematic sequences in those games have an action packed soundtrack, but when your sneaking around it's more of a hybrid of electronic and downtempo music (typically around 80 BPM or so). I tend much use a similar formula for starting out a lot of my productions: jazzy chords, funky bassline, a catchy melody and a groovy drumbeat. I also added some DJ/turntable scratches for the extra hip-hop flavor.
https://youtu.be/5th88xcaF6o
The battle theme was inspired by synthwave, Sonic The Hedgehog, and racing games like Outrun. Other influences include Drum & Bass artists like LTJ Bukem. I originally wanted to do some form of interactive or adaptive music, in which the main level or "sneaking around" music transitions seamlessly into the battle piece. That idea ended up getting scrapped because of time constraints, but both tracks still bear a lot of similarities. They are both in the same key, and both were designed to alternate smoothly between 80 and 160 BPM. In essence the battle theme is just a beefed up remix of the main level theme.
https://youtu.be/dOycxB_-6hw
The second half of the arrangement switches to a minor chord progression. and is meant to signal a departure from the high energy momentum of the first half (possibly a moment where out feline hero is struggling or trying to overcome his Roomba nemesis). This is a common technique in linear game music composition, in which the composer intentionally writes a "victorious/triumphant" section and a more darker section representing the player's decline or near defeat. Then you just kinda roll the dice hope things line up when they play the actual game (which they surprisingly do from time to time). Although the battles are pretty short in this game, this is a great trick to use when composing RPG battle themes or Boss Fights (which are usually longer and a lot more more intense). Which brings us to our next song:
Roomba's Revenge is actually a remix of the victory theme from my LD44 entry "Elevator Pitch" (I like to shamelessly reference my own work from time to time). I used mostly the same musical palette from before (drums, bass, horns, synth lead, organ) but wanted to create something a lot more dark and menacing. This track was also inspired by the opening of the final boss theme from Sonic The Hedgehog 3 (although someone else who commented said it reminded them of Sonic The Hedgehog 2: Death Egg Zone.
https://youtu.be/RyoMQg3d5cs
https://youtu.be/ojxKfBBDIGg
For the melody I interpolated some of the the main theme from the title track, starting with same progression of notes but then spiraling into something completely different.
Menu Theme (Melody)
Boss Theme (Melody)
This is my second Ludum Dare entry and I'm quite happy with the results. Our team Enigma Dragons was very organized, and I particularly enjoyed being a part of the brainstorming process. If I had more time I would have liked to contribute to the SFX department, as there's still a handful of sounds that didn't make it into the game. That said, not having to work on sound gave me the opportunity to really focus on the music. Big shout out to Austin Dhillon who did a fantastic job on the sound design.
The idea to use interactive music was probably unnecessary for this type of jam (considering the layout of the rooms was pretty straight forward). If it were a more open-map type level design I could see that making more sense. But composing the music with interactivity in mind definitely caused me to think about it differently, and I believe the transitions from exploration to battle music still feel pretty seamless even without using middleware. I would have still liked to incorporate some type of adaptive music transition (or even a low-pass filter) for the pause menu, but maybe next time. I think my favorite part of the jam overall was seeing the game come to life and playing new builds. Also the brainstorming process.
Thanks to everyone who played so far! It's been a blast playing/rating all the other LD45 entries as well :)
I'm still looking to build my game audio portfolio so if you still need music/SFX for a post-jam version of your game (or another project) I’d be happy to collaborate. You can reach me via email at amerigomusic@gmail.com or on Discord (AmerigoGazaway#4558).
And please check my game
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/there-will-be-nothing
it's a text adventure game,hope you will like it
If you want us to play and rate your game, just link it in the comments below! :)
Our exploration/baking game, Pie Witch needs just 2-3 more votes!
In it you find and collect up to 10 different ingredients which you can combine in any way you want to create up to a 1000 different pie monstrosities. Like this one!
Check it out if you haven't already, all feedback is appreciated!
I'm gonna play some HTML5/WebGL games today while working. So if you need some ratings post a link to the game page in the comments and I'll get round to playing as many as I can during compiles.
Show me what you've made :8ball:
Handee's doing well so far, but still needs some more votes. I'm gonna get to playing some more games over the weekend, but if you'd like to check mine out as well, feel free: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/handee
It's a short game, so won't take you very long!
Plus I try and give feedback to everyone who rates & comments on my game as well :slight_smile:
Take the role of a decrepit necromancer trying to protect his prized creation!
Play Necrofenser Hero now and let us know what you think! Every feedback is welcome!
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/dungeon-of-souls
While voting through the list of 'neglected compo games' I found these two gems that are too good to ignore even though their authors are too busy to participate in the rating.
| OverClerked | Subject 11 |
|------------|------------|
| 
| 
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|Action-puzzle game inspired by (?) Overcooked made by the jam veteran and winner of Ludum Dare 44 @skoggy|A platformer with pumping music, great movement and tight gameplay by first-time jammer @evergreen-games|
Also I'd appreciate if you could check out my game Tower of Minos which needs only a few more ratings to make it into the rankings. Cheers!
This compo turned out pretty great. If you haven't tried my game yet, you can try it here.
There have been a few complaints about hurt arms, so be careful. :smiley:
If you want to play on your phone, “Nothing is my car” is playable on Android here :
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/nothing-is-my-car
or here :
https://t-bo-games.itch.io/nothing-is-my-car
( You can also play on Web, Windows, Linux or Mac OS )
It’s a game about driving … But driving nothing ! XD
I hope you will like it !
.
"The pain’s always the same.”
An interrogation room. Sitting on one end of a table is a woman. On the other is you - a detective tired of asking questions, but desperate for answers.
Who is the woman? Why is she here? What has she done?
The only way to find out is to talk. Every conversation topic giving new leads to chase down. Some worthwhile. Others not so much.
Follow the rabbit hole until you reach the truth.
(Play in browser! Windows and MacOS builds as well!)
So here is what we were waiting for! The update is here! In this update, i have added a new 3rd map and the hitboxes are now a little bit smaller than before! (You can play my game in you browser!)
If you haven’t played our game yet, try it out now! - https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/prison-escape
(Play my game in you browser!)
First of all, as always: thanks to all the people who've played and reviewed Inspiration. so far! I think it got to 20 reviews faster than any of my previous entries, and I've gotten some excellent feedback. Unfortunately I've been slacking in terms of rating other people's games, and I need to start doing that over the weekend.
In the meantime, though, it's time for my regular post-mortem: what went well while making Inspiration., and what didn't?
I might, over the weekend, push out one last patch, making a few tweaks to the graphics and dialogue. Other than that, I have no real plans for Inspiration.. It's too specific to this jam for me to really do anything with it outside of this jam, plus, as I mentioned before, I'm kinda burnt out on it.
For Ludum Dare 46, I'll attempt to push my boundaries and make something that isn't an adventure game... while still telling a story, of course. I also need to set aside some time to practice using and composing in the PICO-8 music tracker, so I can finally compose proper soundtracks for my entries. I'm going to be able to start working from home soon, which should give me a lot more free time for things like that because my current commute is horrendous.
...and in future, if I go into a Ludum Dare weekend not feeling well, I will just pull out. It's better than pushing myself to the point of burnout like I did this time round.
Anyway: thanks once again to everyone who's reviewed my game so far, I wish you all the best of luck with your own entries, and see you again next Ludum Dare!
Come and play this twin stick shooter and tell us what you think about it ! https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/jareds-fresh-start
Sorry if this is a little off-topic, but something really cool happened that we want to share!
Yesterday, something amazing got crossed off of our bucket list: A famous Youtuber made a video about our game!!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sj0aY_6lRX8
Serial Dater was an old Ludum Dare 43 entry, and the first game us Cowboys ever made together. It's super surreal to see this almost one full year after its original completion, but we've been ecstatic to see that the video is now sitting at #22 Trending in Gaming!
Naturally, everyone back here is overflowing with excitement right now reading through all of the comments and watching the video over and over. We just had to share with someone! :smile:
Anyhoo, thank you for letting us indulge for a bit.
Now back to the regularly scheduled LD45 programming. :pointright: :cowboy: :pointright:
I haven't seen anybody figure this out, but you can actually do a "challenge run" of Unlock Everything by jumping over a bunch of unlocks -- most notably, the health and buster upgrades. This of course makes the game much more difficult, as one hit from anything kills you and your rate of firing is much slower.
Here's my run of the game, collecting as few upgrades as possible:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MOKBzgJpw58
Interestingly enough, the boss (which most people struggle with) is actually the easiest part of this run. Some of the earlier cannon rooms are a little difficult to get through and will require some more practice to get through without getting hit.
If I have the time I'll make some quality of life improvements to make speedruns and such easier to do (skipping cutscene dialogue, etc).
It was a great experience and i still cannot believe that i made this in compo.
If you want to play my metroidvania please check it out here: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/claimbeer
Game from the Void is a Windows command line experience- eh, or is it?
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/game-from-the-void
Hello everybody,
try it: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/no-control
Feel free to post your own shameless advertisement below, I will do my best to play your game (web based preferred).
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/palely
I'm looking for games to play & rate! If you've received less than 20 ratings, leave a comment down below and I'll come check it out shortly. :grin:
I'd also greatly appreciate it if you could do the same for my entry, "Tale of the Dreamer"! It's a short little web game, so it shouldn't take you but a moment. Thanks!
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/tale-of-the-dreamer
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/the-blue-girl
Featuring music by Brian Cavanaugh and artwork by Dr. Chung.
rate rate rate rate rate
So here is what we were waiting for! The update is here! In this update, i have added a new 3rd map and the hitboxes are now a little bit smaller than before! (You can play my game in you browser!)
If you haven’t played our game yet, try it out now! - https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/prison-escape
(Play my game in your browser!)
Well, it's been a while since I last took part in Ludum Dare. I have previously submitted three games to the Compo; Fartboy (LD32 - An Unconventional Weapon), Square Peg Round Hole (LD35 - Shapeshift) & Space Aliens Are Coming! (LD38 - A Small World). Apart from those, I have tried and failed numerous times. I don't know if I'm trying to do too much sometimes, or if I'm just too critical of myself. A couple of those failed attempts were ideas that I really liked at the time, but was unable to finish.
Because of this - being unable to submit a game when I enter Ludum Dare has become a great fear of mine. I was determined to not let that happen this time - but things got hairy indeed! I nearly did give up.
Read my LD45 Post Mortem below!
After not having programmed much for the past year because of time restrictions I was in need of refreshing my memory of coding. I did this by making a little random game idea generator based off one I found on the internet at Boardgamizer. - I always enjoy me some randomness. This was a fairly simple thing to do, but I also wanted to make it to randomize a few ideas to use for my own personal "Game Jam" scenarios. I also had plans of doing a platformer, because I've never tried that. Never got around to practicing any of that, which was probably the main reason this Ludum Dare almost went down the drain... again.
I certainly had no complaints. What I did experience, though, when the theme was released was a bit of anxiety! Why? Well, that was my suggestion that won the votes - thank you to all for voting.
It was an interesting experience for many reasons. I've been submitting that theme for many Ludum Dares before. Originally I had an idea that I wanted to make for it, but over time I had come to the conclusion that that idea would never be done in 48hrs. So, really I had no idea at all what to make.
I also found it interesting to read up some on the expected This theme sucks! comments. Some, I could sympathize with, but mostly it just goes to show how differently we all interpret and understand things. In the end - the theme is just there to inspire you to make a game, and for that I feel Start With Nothing was a good one. It doesn't tell you of any game mechanics you need to use. It does not force a specific genre. And, most importantly (to me), it is not specific enough that the majority of games will be too similar to one another.
The other thing that happens when ones own suggestion becomes the theme is pressure. I could not fail this time!
Well... not much.
I mean - I did submit a game. I did get the game to work surprisingly well and found that it was actually quite fun to play.
The other thing I would say went well is that I stuck to it. I had pretty much given up on this Ludum Dare after 20hrs or so of work - but I didn't quit. That was important to me. The last 24+ hours of work I stayed very disciplined and focused and was able to put together a game against all odds (more on that in the What Went To Hell? section below). An idea just popped into my head from out of nowhere when I was about to give up. I have been playing a lot of board games lately, and I thought I could quite quickly put something like that together.
The idea was to make an eco system game. You would start with a completely empty world (Start With Nothing), and have a hand of cards that would represent terrain and animals. Placing these on your grid, while trying to maintain a balanced eco system. There would be carnivores and herbivores and they would all have a natural habitat where they could live. They would need access to water or they would die. I liked it, and I believe I put together something that is rather fun to play and watch unfold.
For a game made in just over 24 hours - I am pleased with what I accomplished.
Did I mention above that I had wanted to try make a platformer? That I never got around to practicing doing that, and that I have never ever attempted something like that? Dumbass me still decided to make a platformer for the jam. The idea was that you would start with a character in a totally black space. There would be nothing there and your player character would talk to you - the player. He would tell you that "there is no game here", and then he would sort of suggest ideas to you - through this you would build a level from scratch based on random suggestions from the PC and what you choose to put together from that.
Well, boy did I overscope that idea. First of all, I never even got a player controller that felt smooth. I am definitely looking to make a platformer before the next LD to learn a few things. Second - for the game to be fun I would need a ton of different types of weapons, platforms and NPCs - there was absolutely no way I would finish the game when I barely had anything after 20 hours of work.
That's when I went to bed. Dejected and close to tears, deciding that I would not make a game this Ludum Dare.
Well, under the circumstances I pretty much decided to not care about the graphics side of the project. I am a terrible graphics artist and even the most simple of things take me a very long time to make. The game does suffer quite a bit from the very basic art that I put together to make the game. I did hope to make them slightly more pleasing to the eye - but of course time ran out.
I also never got time to do any sounds. I did throw in a randomly generated cgMusic track to keep you company while playing the game at the very last second (I believe I put that in the game with less than 5 minutes to go).
The other thing that could have improved the game was if I had play tested a bit more during creation. One thing that has become apparent from the comments I've received is that the map is too big and you have too many cards to play. I would agree - especially for the state of the game at that time. There is also no real way of knowing how to keep your creatures alive. And, terrain changes were way too frequent - meaning sometimes when you play a particular type of terrain, it would change to something else right away. Dryland had a tendency to take over the entire map.
I am currently working on a Post Ludum Dare version of the game. I actually find the game quite fun to play, and so I wanted to give it some more love to put it into a playable state.
Originally I intended to give it 'til the end of October and then call it finished. I'm not sure that I'll stick to that, as I feel there are more things I want to do to make it feel more polished. I do not aim to make this a game for profit - it will be free. So, I am also not looking to put too much time into completing it.
So, what have I done and what do I plan to do?
I have already replaced the tiles and made them look pretty. I have also done a good bit of balancing and bug-squashing. While I haven't yet added any new features I have made some significant changes to the existing ones.
I removed the ability to discard cards, forcing every card to be played (this required a system to ensure the player will always have playable cards in hand). I added pathfinding for the animals to help them make better decisions (previously they would just wander aimlessly and hope to find what they need to survive). I have also done some other quality of life improvements like faster World Simulation, fancier text displays and some animated UI. I also made the animals have different attributes for a bit more variety in their behavior.
Here is a sneak preview of the new tiles I made for the game:
Many more things are in the pipeline for the Post LD version. I want the highscore that I never got done for the Compo, and I am doing a complete overhaul of the points system. I'm looking to add some particle effects and a few more bells and whistles to make the game look prettier.
Of course, sounds for all events need to be done. I'm adding different map sizes for quicker games, and I hope to add some new cards as well as specific goals for the player to try to achieve for some bonus points. One of the main challenges that I have left to do is to make a new logo for the game... that should test my graphics skills.
The Post LD version will be released on itch.io, and I do hope you decide to check it out when released.
In the meantime - check out the Compo version. Rate and give feedback to help me improve the game.
Find the game here: A Brand New World.
In the initial planning phase we knew we wanted to create something simple that we could pull off. The aim wasn't really to make a good game. It was to make something that tested the limits of our tools and current skill set.
Play here: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/slave-unchained
The Beginning:
Slave: Unchained is written entirely in a custom engine. As you can imagine that makes everything a pain in the butt. At the start of the 48 hours I had a barebones, skeleton of a tool. There was no infrastructure to save or load scenes. There was very limited support for sprites and sprite animations, and tilemap functionality was... limited.
This all had to be written on top of the development of the game.
A lot of these problems were sleeper problems. I.e. they don't rear their head until later on in development. For example, how do you know what features you need until you need them?
Luckily, I knew this was going to happen, so from the outset I knew compromises had to be made in order to account for the extended time required to implement features.
The theme was the first to go. The theme made the scope too big and the scope needed to be very very small. I've been burned by scope creep too many times. Establish your scope and then half it. You'll get half of that done in double the time. You will crash and burn if you dream too big.
Another compromise was sound. I am not a sound designer, and as much I know the importance of good sound design and good music it was something I knew I could not learn, implement and then polish in time before the deadline.
The Target:
There were a few things I definitely wanted to do. The major one was tight movement. Collision response is difficult to get right. I think we did a good job here. You know when collision is an issue when the players start to notice it. If you never notice it, it means it's behaving like you expect and the suspension of disbelief is maintained. We did well in this regard.
Another goal was to implement something visceral and impactful. The gameplay had to be punchy and weighty and there had to be some consequence to your actions (not moral consequences). The permanent blood had been something I'd been thinking about for awhile. It adds an extra dimension that sells the illusion that you exist in a world. It's also astonishingly violent which actually wasn't my intention. But it felt good to play, so I made it more bombastic and extreme.
The Gripes:
OpenGL sucks. What works on some cards will not work on others. Sometimes it's your own fault. You didn't read the specification. Sometimes it's entirely openGL's fault. What is a fatal crash on one system is not on another. This will often be accompanied without a warning or error code. What is expected behaviour on one card will not be expected on others. This was a headache and soaked up the majority of the post-development and update stages.
Conclusion:
A custom engine grants you one thing and one thing only. Adaptability. The only problem is that it comes with a substantial cost. Time. What will take you N days in one engine will take you exponentially longer in your own. But in another engine you are always constrained by someone elses implementation. Rolling your own means the constraint is only yourself. Sometimes you don't want that. But for a small scope project, without real world demands it can be a rewarding experience.
A post-jam update for my game Sluggish Grind has been released! It has been published for Windows, Linux and MacOS, but not for Web (the web version is the initial release)
You can find these releases on the itch.io page.
It's built from the latest commit in the GitHub repository and has a few gameplay tweaks and new features. It's by no means a finished game (It's still devoid of any music, the only sounds are the usual SFX.) but this is a version I can actually actively update.
This release addresses lots of issues with the original jam version, so try it out even if, or rather, especially if you already played the initial release!
It has been published for Windows, Linux and MacOS, but not for Web (the web version is the initial release)
One of the new features is a scoring system. Make sure you post your score when you're done. ;P
Thanks for your time!
Jared needs YOUR help ! The barricade must come down ! It's time for Jared to face the music !! Help him find the C4 and blow up the cars blocking his way to the rest of the town ! https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/jareds-fresh-start
Hello Ludum Dare!
Ghosts and Bombs is a game that I created for LD #45.
Three weeks later, it was finalized and posted in Google Play.
Enjoy!
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.VladimirYashin.GhostsAndBombs
Link to the form: https://forms.gle/CWpHa39mQXkzGoDG6
Answer to every question should be in the form itself. You can still ask if something isn't clear. This will be a weird project of mine. If you want to make a game with 10+ people, then this is the place. I don't know if a group like this will be productive, or will it just create another digital garbage can. It will be a weird experience, that I will be making a video on. If you are interested, join.
Hey, folks. Thought I'd write down various thoughts and musings related to the making of "Oh, It's Nothing", our jam entry for LD45.
As a preface, I've been vaguely aware of the jam's existence for a long while, but the idea of actually taking part never came close to crossing my mind. Without @ein grabbing me along for the ride out of the blue, I suspect it never would have.
It all began with brainstorming, of course, and this is where we encountered our very first issue: LD45 started well past midnight for both of us on the account of accursed time zones, and while ultimately we managed to push drowsiness aside, I can't help but look back and think that the whole thing could've gone smoother and been more fruitful overall.
On top of this, we were affected by tunnel vision: right off the bat we established that the word "nothing" can be treated in a literal, abstract sense... and that's what we stuck with. We tried to move away from this take a few times, but it was definitely a "too little, too late" kind of situation. One concept I'm still fond of did pop up as a result, though, one of a game based on the Straw Millionaire tale. Alas, it was not to be.
The very first draft of the game featured nothing but randomly generated text strings appearing on the screen, and frankly, at this point I don't even remember what was the exact idea this "sketch" was based on. That's assuming there was one to begin with.
For a while we kept pursuing the following idea: "nothing" is both what you start with and the desired state of things, and yet certain external forces keep tainting the pristine void, something the player has to prevent. This is where we came up with the gameplay: you begin with a black screen containing a single word, you click on it in order to banish it, yet more words emerge, and so it goes. However, while this concept may sound intriguing enough, we weren't sure what sort of conclusion would be the most sensible here.
If it was possible to win, would preserving the nothingness feel satisfying? I'm not convinced. And if defeat was inevitable, wouldn't it be unpleasant to discover you were doomed from the start? Not saying something like this can't be pulled off, and conceptually the inevitable victory of matter over nothingness is at the very least workable, but the idea of going down this path strongly felt like shooting ourselves in our collective feet for no good reason.
Eventually the final concept of the game emerged: we decided to go for an interactive tale of creation of sorts. To accommodate this shift, the gameplay had to be changed as well: while you still could remove words, it also became possible to preserve them, and that became the point.
So, "nothing" stopped being both the destination and the starting point of the journey, and getting rid of this duality vastly simplified things for me, the writer. I can't say everything became crystal clear at once, but I've finally found myself able to move forward without having to keep migrating from one semi-coherent, woefully incomplete draft to another. A welcome change, as you can imagine.
And so we return again to the holy void. Some say this is simply our destiny, but I would have you remember always that the void EXISTS, just as surely as you or I. Is nothingness any less a miracle than substance?
— Sister Miriam Godwinson, "We must Dissent" (Accompanies discovery of the "Advanced Spaceflight" tech)
With the concept set in stone, we had to figure out the structure of the game. We had some narrative followed by one "dose" of gameplay... and that was it. As if that wasn't bad enough, the gameplay bit in question was the one that's currently used for the finale. We were going from 0 to 100 in the blink of an eye, and I guess in some way this was cool, but also incoherent. This had to change, and it did: we inserted a couple of extra "levels" in front of the finale, each with slightly different mechanics, and that filled the void nicely, I'd say.
The narrative and the gameplay weren't quite enough on their own, though. Something else was needed in order to cultivate a proper mood for the game. This is where Sleeping Dragon Forever Radio came in, a piece of music-generating software. We didn't have to spend lots of time "fishing" for the right tracks, luckily: the very first two that we got felt like a perfect fit after some minor editing. This is probably the most unusual thing about the way this game was made, and, surprisingly, the end result turned out to be fantastic.
Some ideas on how to make the game beefier didn't make it, sadly. For instance, we were thinking of implementing a "bonus stage", something that's detached from the main game to some degree and only becomes available after beating it. If you know how the game ends, it should be easy enough to guess that this hypothetical extra level would be featuring something... different, whatever that means. In the end we chose to spend more time polishing what was there instead of hastily trying to add something new, and personally I'm pleased with the outcome.
And that's all I have to say about the development process. Being rather cautious with the game's scope and culling overly ambitious and grand designs on sight certainly helped with avoiding any major issues during the jam. Playing it safe is rarely an exciting approach, I suppose, but hey, it gets the job done.
LD45 has definitely been a positive experience for us. I don't know for sure whether we'll be back for more or not, but the idea of taking part in LD46 is agreeable, this much I can tell without a shadow of a doubt.
Thanks for ~~all the fish~~ reading! Feel free to ask any questions if you have any.
(Link to the game in question: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/oh-its-nothing. Playable in browser and works on mobile platforms, shouldn't take more than 5 minutes to beat.)
Create your own little world!
ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/futhark
The time has come! Almost three days before we get the results and Dave still does not care a bit about any of your games...
Well we do! And we are going to prove it!
We are live now on Twitch and we'll be playing your games!
Join us here https://www.twitch.tv/envysoftworks and let's make some noise!
We are going to play games that are not doing so well in terms of ratings volume! If we've already played and rated a game we will not be playing it live on stream. Finally if you are in the chat your game is getting priority!
And of course don't forget to play and rate Dave's own game: "The Greatest Game in the World"!
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/the-greatest-game-in-the-world
So many awesome looking games out there that I wish I could play, but can't because I'm stuck with MacOS.
If you've only published for Windows, please consider uploading a Mac or web build for poor saps like me (even if you can't test it properly!) The wider your audience, the more ratings you can get, even if it's by a small margin.
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/charly-the-orphan
Thanks ! :)
It’s a game about driving … But driving nothing ! XD
Drive the air here : https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/nothing-is-my-car
Hello everybody,
try it: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/no-control
Feel free to post your own shameless advertisement below, I will do my best to play your game (web based preferred).
In this jam you get to... * Develop a game from scratch in just three days * Work either alone or in teams of any size * Inspire your game on a theme that will be announced at the start of the jam * Test your ability by confining yourself to the hardmode challenge (optional) * Post your theme and challenge suggestions in our Discord server * Work in any language, framework or engine
Some people said that my game was too hard, therefore I've made more easy version. You may try it. But I spend about 3 minutes to pass the original version. Maybe, you can do better? ;)
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/antivirus
Help Jared kill zombies and blow up barricades ! This is an action pacted twin stick shooter !
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/jareds-fresh-start
Only have 8 ratings on my game HeadJacker, would really appreciate any more ratings so I reach that 20 mark!!
I don't really have that much time to rate other games, so I'm just hoping people might try my game out of goodwill.!
This one will be the last post we make ^^, we've been playing and rating as much games as we could and also received very positive feedback, we thank you all for that :) For those of you who would like to try our little contribution to this jam, there is still some time (we would love to reach 30 ratings received :D).
ZERO: UNDIVIDED HERO is an arcade shooter we put a lot of love into in order to make it fun and easily understood. It is all about fighting nasty numbers using the amazing power of maths!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L-unWaw8RDk
You can play ZERO: UNDIVIDED HEROES here:
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/zero-undivided-heroes
Hi Everyone! We’d like to share a bit of process on designing the visuals of our Ludum Dare submission; バクラウ Bloodless. Check out the game on the link below;
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/bloodless
Once we agreed on the Idea we were going with, we started throwing our ideas on what story we were going to tell and then the mood started to follow and develop. We tried to not define things too strictly at this point as everything “evolved” during the development. But It’s really important to set some guidelines so you don’t get lost in the process
Someone suggested we going with black and white for colors and it matched perfectly with the mood we were going for, It kinda resembled old black-and-white samurai movies and it aligned perfectly with our ideas for the music and the game’s mood. At this point we started sketching some character ideas:
(First character sketches)
We ended up sticking with the idea of a human character and kept the bigger sprite size because of the amount of details we wanted to portray. At this point we had a very clear vision on what was going to be the main mechanic and that our character would be an old man (for story reasons). And that’s how the first “definitive” character sketch came up, along with our first enemy:
(Left = sketch; right = final version for comparisson)
At this point, we started making some stuff for environment to help us all see the bigger picture on what we were doing (visually xD)! At this point we also started laying down the character’s and enemy’s animations key poses.
:(Left = walk; right = attack preparation)
The plan was to have as much as we could ready to be implemented as placeholders so the programming and sound part of the team had more material to work with while we worked on finishing the animations and having definitive assets for the environment.
(we scraped the idea of blood on the environment after a while)
We wanted at least two kinds of backgrounds, an external environment like a garden, and an enclosed place like a dojo. So, the garden elements were easier to create, we just needed some trees and rocks, a grass tile.. But the dojo one would need some kind of walls, weapons and columns to show that it was an enclosed place.
Dojo Elements.
Also, we didn't want the game to be so serious at all, we would like to put something funny too. So, we thought the enemy animations could have something crazy when it loses the weapon or are defeated. This way we could give more personality (what a coward!) to the enemy.
These are the first finalized animations we did starting from those first key poses:
Meanwhile, our game designer was creating some cool levels using those background elements we just had finished.
Luckily, the scenario elements have matched really good with the characters.
After that we focused on finishing the remaining animations, working on the enemy variations while communicating with the rest of the team to solve any issues that appeared and getting more “juice” to the visuals xD.
As soon as we had the main character idea laid down (before the definitive sketches), the team agreed on the player being an elder man, tired of the violence, and who was a truly skilled fighter. I had a very clear idea of what kind of energy I wanted for it after that.
(Shin'ichi Chiba as Yagyu Jube)
(Jet Black from Cowboy Bebop)
As for the game itself and it’s setting, we had a couple inspirations that are very dear to us like Rurouni kenshin (Samurai X) and most recently, Sekiro - Shadows Die Twice. Many players have made the connection with one or other of our inspirations and that felt really good, because we knew we managed to evoke some of the feelings that inspired us in the first place :D
These are more like some curiosities on the impact of some art decisions. For example, sticking with a black and white + the red to highlight important features was something that had a strong relation to the game design too. And applying that to the enemies design has this increasing presence in the enemy importance. This also took some weight off the shoulders of the art team. Originally we considered having 4-directional sprites, but this soon got dropped because of the high cost of time in production. Something that is easy to overlook is that all characters have a black outline. This can sounds kinda silly since the background is mostly black, but this ensures a better a overlapping of sprites.
(left = unreadable mess, right = Look! :O Two characters!)
Well, I guess that’s everything for today :D I hope this helped in any way or just was interesting from a curiosity point of view. We are very happy on how the game turned out and I sincerely hope we continue to bring to life other games for your amusement :B
The バクラウ Bloodless’ team wishes you all a great weekend!
Daniel Clarc (https://twitter.com/DanielClarcO) Diego Almeida (https://twitter.com/di3goalmeida)
I just learned how to upload HTML5 files to other websites, so I posted mine to Newgrounds and Itch.io; Browsing a while later, suddenly I have a notification that Tom Fulp follows me, and that I now see my game on this list:
In addition to that, Bob the Brawler is edging closer and closer to 100 VOTES!! Never have I ever achieved such a thing before, and I wholeheartedly thank @AXLplosion for agreeing to Jam with me when I sent out the initial request. His amazing skills is what propelled this game; this is a BIG accomplishment for me! :grin:
If you still want to play the game, you can click this link here
@pedro-miranda was able to beat it out- WILL YOU?
I was busy the last few days and I have some catching up to do. First, I'll be playing games of people who commented on mine and then the D-D-D-ANGER ZONE. I took a quick look and there are a few games there that look pretty good.
You can link your game in the comments if you want to get one more rating and a comment, I'll be prioritizing those below 20 rates treshold!
Added gamepad support and updated 'exit metro' mechanic.
All gangs are riding a single train now - it is much simpler and allows for epic local coop battles between all 4 gangs :)
Best played with friends, since bots are still pretty stupid.
If you could help me get to 20 votes that would be greatly appreciated, THANK YOU!!!
You can play my game here: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/color-and-creativity
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IF2vFuDwVMw
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/the-blue-girl
Featuring original music by Brian Cavanaugh.
Do you want to join my stupid big team for Ludum dare 46? Fill out the form here: https://forms.gle/vwGKaufqspPDVgbM6
Tragicomedy about the life of one person… 
Help us to reach 50 reviews!
A big BIG thanks to everyone who played, reated and commented your submission ! :smiley:
We never expected so much for an experimental game !
If you want to try Shuǐmòhuà, it’s the link below :
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/shuimohua
Thanks again !
Dave is ecstatic and to be frank, so are we!
Somehow the game has managed to accumulate more than 100 votes! And not only that we are getting amazingly good words left and right. People seem to enjoy playing and this makes us real happy.
Of course if you did not have the time to check it out yet, you can find "The Greatest Game in the World" in the link bellow. Don't forget to leave a comment and a review!
https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/the-greatest-game-in-the-world
Well votes are one thing, people actually playing the game is another. We were stunned once we realized the recepetion the game was getting on itch.io. At some point we had a solid 200 new players A DAY! We've just broken the 2000 plays barrier in just under a month without really doing anything to promote the game and we are really excited about that!
Here's to more great stuff from Dave! And thank you guys for all of your support. This would not have been possible without you. We really enjoy interacting with you in the comments, so keep them comming!
Cheers!
Hello everybody,
try it: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/no-control (it's web)
Feel free to post your own shameless advertisement below, I will do my best to play your game (web based preferred).
Thanks to everyone that has played, voted and left feedback on my game, I really appreciate it =D
If you missed it here it is -> https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/nothing
It's now the final 2 and a half days. Good luck to everyone in the final stretch!
Play : http://ciriak.itch.io/missing-entry
I wanted to try something with a backend this time.
You can add the choices you want (up to 3 per event) and you decide the consequences.
You can even add an image to illustrate (url) !
The entry : https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/missing-entry
The sources : https://github.com/Ciriak/ld45
It’s a game about driving … But driving nothing ! XD
You can drive the air in “Nothing is my car” here : https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/nothing-is-my-car
I hope you will like it !
We're probably not the first Ludum Dare game to have merchandise, but I haven't so far heard of others either.
Never the less, these are pretty awesome :)
And here's the obligatory link to the game if you haven't played it already: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/ignis-universia-eternal-sister-saga
I've started rating more games but if you'd like to help then come check it out! https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/game-from-the-void
