Unexpected real life things have galumphed most of day one and a chunk of day two. I still want to enter so I’m going as fast as possible. I have the core engine for a vertical shooter, some ideas, a new version of Blender and very little time!

I spent most of last night learning why planning how the code will work is so important, with the result that I didn’t get much done and produced lots of bugs. I’ve reduced the number of features I want to implement, but I think the bugs are going to make things difficult. Oops.

There’s no point uploading a build, there’s nothing to see.

One to go.

Puppy’s ears agree!

I didn’t get nearly enough done yesterday. I hope I can pull it together today. It’ll be close, and scrappy, but oh well! Here’s a screenshot of how far I got yesterday:

Got a lot more backgrounds to draw, and some puzzles to make. We’ll see what happens.

So after a long day of working on my game by Myself!

I Finally get something im happy with.

Its Quite short and the main bad thing is that it doesnt have sound :/ ( I dont know how to make sounds )

Might try and add sounds early tomorrow.

PLAY THE GAME HERE:

http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-22/?action=preview&uid=8708

And Please tell me what you think of it 😀

Well, I feel that I have been decently productive over the last two days…

Since my last post, I fixed the runtime error, got all menus fixed, added boss fights to the game, cleaned up the HUD so it looks decent, and recreated a Touhou bullet pattern, making it more intense at the same time :).

Take a good guess which pattern:

Anyway, off to sleeps. Good night, all.

Here’s the other one of those book ends I mentioned before… Hug Monster now has both a title screen *and* an ending, both of which are programmatically animated storytelling devices. Now you can play and finish so you can watch the ending!

(-o^_^)-o Play and finish HUG MONSTER o-(^_^o-)

I have to say, that ending sequence was grueling after the long day I put in polishing up everything else. I started working on it almost immediately after my last update. Fortunately it was really easy to piggyback the existing switches and doors functionality into an animated movie, but what took more time was fiddling with the exact velocity values I wanted the little guy to use when he moved across the screen. It was harder than you think, since the monsters are all just using their normal in-game AI to achieve their seemingly smart behavior.

While the croissants bake in the oven, I find myself unsure of how I want my game to end. I think the game might become: find all the different ways in which you can die ! 😛

Of course, I will try to add kittens!

Tags: kitten-challenge

I don’t know if I am just naturally terrible at making puzzles, or if it’s the sleep deprivation.

Good thing I’m only making tutorial stages tonight, and thus are better off being stupidly obvious.

Just posting this update to let myself know that if I have any hope of making my game fun, I’m going to have to get some sleep.

(I just pray I’m not putting off more than I can chew within the final 8 hours. I better go set my alarm clock…)

Head and muscles feel full of cotton. But things are shaping up. New screenie:

Mechanics stable. Starting to re-art.

Suddenly, my game is a game! There’s things you can do, goals you can accomplish, there’s a clear beginning, middle, and end, and… well it’s not quite there yet. There’s a beginning and a middle, the end is maybe a few hours away. So, what does LD say? Want one more version updated before the “alpha”?

(Can you believe that house took me 45 minutes to make?)

Ideally I’d like to expand the gameplay, right now there’s only 2 “games” and my original plan was 4. I can probably get 3 in there, the last game I had planned might take a bit more work than I’ll have time for. It’s a good feeling that I’m at a point where I’m concerned about expanding the game than just finishing it.

Hope I’m not speaking too early, though…

Going to bed now. Today I drew graphics, added enemies, bullets, backgrounds, and particle effects.  Still lacking a ton of graphics and absolutely no audio yet. Tomorrow I will finally be able to make an actual game. (I HOPE!)

I’ve done lots of planning and sketches (most of them terrible as I’ve been on trains and coaches!). I’ve got an idea in my head and should be able to start coding by the time I get home tonight!

Also I’ll defiantly be recording myself for the whole ordeal so be sure to check that out. More updates to come.

Stepping into the final phase of the game’s development! Mechanically, the game is complete, but now the entire dungeon needs to be built using the built-in level editor. I could have the game finished hours before the deadline!

However, it is sleep time now. I’ve been working on the game for 16 consecutive hours, with some pauses here and there. I’d say things are going a lot more smoothly than last time.

Tags: jmonkeyengine, level editor

We’re getting really far along on our game. I’ve finished the engine, written a level designer, and we now have 77 tiles. However, my code is relatively short (only 638 lines), and I still have lots to do.

Just went outside to look at the stars, it’s 1:19 AM. The sky was really clear and we could easily make out Orion’s belt and some other cool constellations. Ludum Dare is fun.

Got some epic secrets being worked on, don’t want to release because it is a last resort weapon >:D

Any who, on the home front we got more bug fixes and some new content such as the promised skeleton mages (which are a tad OP, imho) as well as, yes it’s cliche but, a must have – Zombies!
Main menu, loading bar, menu-to-game transition, achievements and more storyline have been completed.

Shield spell is still in progress as there is a lot more important things, though it will get worked on for the next version.

Well hello again, I am doing well on the game front. Im having time to add little bits of polish and doing some all important bug squashing.

I am having great trouble with sound though and I was wondering if anyone could help me.

I am using Wolfram tones to make the music but I need to convert the midi files into wav or mp3. Is there a way I can do that with having to spend money on some software. I have already tried recording the midi playing but there is an astonishing drop in sound quality.

So what do I do with midi files?

Any ways this is currently what it looks like:

I am quite proud of it as I have less than years experience making games!
Anyways I will be back later!

Had a good night sleep and am ready to get cracking. Experience with the previous two LD had taught me that I often get the most done on this day. Quick time check: a little under 17 hours left until the deadline. Exciting 😛

Okay, what needs to be done:
– Come up with one more gameplay element
– Replace programmer art with graphic assets
– Add sound
– Add background music
– Design a few levels (10-ish should be enough)

Any time left will be spend on adding more special effects (particles! yay!) and GUI improvements (level select screen, instructions screen). After 4am, I will package the game up for Linux 32- and 64-bit, so anyone with a Linux box should be able to play. Windows users will probably get a 32-bit version tomorrow, but I will still try to get it done today.

Okay! Time to get to work.

It’s been a long old slog to get here, but I’m finally getting stuck into the level design.

A hint that should have been pretty obvious: Rooms that the player can move means loooads of bug potential.

Anyway, just finished my first actual level (once you find the big orb you’re done). So that’s cool. Time to crank out some more.

Had a chance to improve the look a bit last night too, auto-tiling is amazing:

10:30pm, 16.5 hours to go. I’ve made the background look a little less bloody horrible (tbqh I felt like shoving in the most horrible pattern I know of, that bloody awful one you get when you start X11), added in some spike graphics, and I think that’ll do for now.

Tomorrow I aim to have some way to die when you get hit by spikes. Goody!

The end is in sight, the game has some prettier graphics, and I’m getting stuck at level design.

Also, WTF MENUS. They don’t do what I tell them to and instead crash the game. So looks like I’ll be mashing away at the keyboard towards the end as I try and find a functional system for a menu and level selection.

See Video: Ludum Dare 17 Hours Left

Okay, got some output. My sprites still aren’t rotating properly, but I think I’ve got a hunch why. Still to go: systems icons, meters, reactor graphics, path finding, and action gameplay. Sound? Maybe! Going to be an interesting day.