That was a close call!
It’s 5.30 am here, and I have college from 8, dunno how I’ll not sleep through classes. @_@
Anyway, here’s our entry – Angry Guards!

And here’s a screenie!

The game is about controlling different characters for 10 seconds each to coordinate a prison break. Must admit, it was too ambitous, but then again, we did get something up and running, and we had a lot of fun with this, so yeah, all feedback is welcome!

I’ll get to rating other games after college today.

And oh, best of luck everyone!

So this was our first LD, and I must say, it was an awesome experience!

On day 1, after declaration of the theme, the first problem was, of course, coming up with a game idea that could stand out. Add to that 6 people from 6 different parts of the country, without Skype (’cause of slow net), this took a pretty good part of day 1. 10 second levels, shooter with stuff changing after 10 secs (everyone loves shooters!), 10 second powerups – a lot of stuff popped up, but we finally decided on controlling different characters for 10 seconds to coordinate a prison break idea.  Granted, this was way too ambitious, but it seemed like a good idea, even if we managed a small prototype. Most of the day was spent on coding the basic engine, and coming up with level designs, and then discarding them due to complexity.

Day 2 and day 3 were huge! Specially day 3, with all of us having college and all. Stuff didn’t go according to plan, cut off many of the ideas, decided on 5 short levels, showing the core mechanic pretty well nevertheless. We wanted it to be real time at first, but later decided against that. So the game as it is now, is more like setting up the pieces before letting it all play out.
Our artists did an excellent job with the art, even if I say so myself. We got a friend to do the soundtrack on late notice, which he surprisingly produced really fast.
We didn’t get enough time to do proper cutscenes or tutorials in the end, and pretty much everyone else was against having a serious story to this, so we skipped that.
Finally, with 2 hours to spare (that’s 4.30 am here), I barely managed to complete it. Didn’t have much time to playtest for all the scenarios that may pop up however. (Updated the game with crash fixes later.)

The final result is pretty much a prototype rather than a full game, but I think we pulled it off quite well. And of course, it’d be awesome if you guys check it out. We may develop this further based on the feedback we get: http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-27/?action=preview&uid=25325

And now, time to start rating all these awesome games I see up here!

All right, so NitroX from Diptoman’s team here.(3 of the team members are out to rate the games)

So looks like we’ve played about 200 games in total, I haven’t been keeping count of how many games I played individually. But it’s still quite a lot, and here are the most noteworthy titles I came across.

Wing

The feel to this was absolutely amazing. The idea’s pretty original, too. Has a steep learning curve, but you get used to it.

Seconds x Seconds

Probably the most innovative use of the theme(out of the ones I’ve played), makes for an awesome puzzle/action combo.

Hyper Furball

This game is addictive as hell!

Argentum Form

Not a fan of creppy/horror games but this one just blew my mind. An amazing entry.

Solitude

The graphics with the interlaced filter on the pixel art and dynamic lighting, plus the aesthetic soundtrack create a great atmosphere. The story kept me hooked to the end.

Well, those were my top 5. Look forward to more posts like these from our team! If we haven’t played and rated your game yet, let us know!

And oh, how could I forget inserting a link to our game here(aka shameless self promotion): Angry Guards

So after a few hours of brainstorming ideas (ok, that took way more time than I wanted) – we decided to settle on “You only have one planet”, so don’t let it go to waste!
The game is about saving earth from pollution, overpopulation, and… aliens. Also, asteroids.
In case the genre isn’t obvious from that – the game is a tower defense-ish thing, where you have to build stuff (from giant mutated redwood for controlling pollution to hugeass nuclear reactor for gathering energy to laser cannons for killing aliens), while keeping in mind your population and pollution problem (which are related themselves). Too much of any, and your only planet goes to waste!
Here’s a screenie (Yeah, I know, not much work done today):

Lots of balancing to do tomorrow. And UI. @_@

After some gruelling hours, our entry’s finally done! And I can honestly say I’m really proud of the end result!
Well anyways, off to sleep! Best of luck guys, will start playing all the awesome games tomorrow!

Check out the game here: http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-28/?action=preview&uid=25325
Oh, and here’s a screenshot from the final version!

So I’ve played over 50 games so far, time to make a post about the most awesome ones I played! Found loads of great entries this time around, so choosing isn’t easy, but here goes!

1. ORBITALIS

Gravity defying game, quite literally! Wonderful visuals with an equally impressive gravity based mechanic, this is an ideal Compo entry!

2. Ballkeeper

Easy to pick up and play, graphically minimalistic and employing a simple mechanic, this game is loads of fun! The only downside will be the use of theme is rather weak.

3. blomster

Beautiful and atmospheric, this game will leave you awestruck at how this was achieved in 48 hours. This is as good as a puzzle platformer can get in 48 hours!

4. YOGO PATH

Randomly generated paths, clever platformer mechanics – having to coordinate movement, pleasing visuals. What more do you need?

5. COR

I’m a sucker for atmospheric platformers, so here’s one that fits with the theme perfectly. It’s about life in general, and I’d rather not spoil anything else – just give it a try!

6. One Touch Of Music

A wonderful mechanic based on tunes, accompanied by soothing visuals – this is a must try!

I will continue posting about more great stuff I’ve found, but that’s it for now! Great to see so many good games, keep up the good work everyone!
Oh, and a shameless plug: do try out our game – Uno Terra!

This entry was posted on Wednesday, December 18th, 2013 at 12:04 pm and is filed under LD #28. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

…And time to start with the sad ones!

So I was down with fever most of the day, couldn’t much, and hence decided to finish up whatever we had.

Here’s a screenshot from the final thing:

Play it here!

Time to put on the level design hat and make me some levels!

So we tried to do something new this time and go for an atmospheric story thing, instead of the usual arcade/puzzle games we do for jams. Pretty happy with how it came about - I think we nailed the atmosphere we were going for. Would love to work on it some more, but office beckons.

Meanwhile, here's an end of the world gif from the game:

Link: Glass Houses

Will do a full post-mortem later. (Record for least number of bugs in any of our jam entries!... I think)

Can't wait till the site is updated to start playing other games!

Game Link

This time round, unlike my last Ludum Dare (36) - I really liked the theme. It can be interpreted in a lot of ways - which is obvious from the number of games that has the "tiny planet" interpretation to the number of games that have the more story-driven "it's a small world" interpretation.

The Origins

The team was me, @pranjalbisht (art) and @joelMontpetit (audio). We had worked together for over 4 years, having done ~15 jams together, so we were comfortable with the team setup - everyone knew their roles. This time though, we decided that we'd make something different, and take a break from the usual arcade or puzzle-kind of games we usually make for jams. Our decision was that we'd either make something 3D since we're now more comfortable with it (I work in Unity in my day job), or make a story-driven thing. That we did in the end!

What went right

1. The team: Naturally, we were very comfortable with each other. It has been a little pain ever since I moved to Canada, to co-ordinate with a teammate in India 12 hours away, but I work mostly at night anyway - so we kind of covered that.

2. The idea: It was comparatively novel (avoiding talking about it in case you haven't played the game), had a social message in the current context, and our main goal was to tell it in such a way that the message would not be lost. I think it paid off in the end, considering the comments for the most part.

3. The polish and the mood: This is something I personally heavily emphasize on, with jam games - I'd keep things small and polished than big and unpolished - just because past experience has shown that higher polish usually attracts more feedback, which is an essential reason for the jam. This time too, we had originally planned for 5 days, and some more things happening each day - but cut down on them to polish the other stuff. I think we nailed the mood in this respect.

4. Scoping: There wasn't a whole lot to program here - just scripting events, and since I basically had a day less this time (can't skip work on Monday!), that was maintained pretty well. Could have been better, but it didn't affect much.

What went wrong

1. Time management: As with human nature, while we made the task list early, I did 60% of the work on Sunday. So did our artist. Which resulted in us being awake for most of the night on Sunday, and going to work as zombies on Monday. This could have very easily been avoided by doing more things earlier.

2. Nuances: We wanted to have some nuanced foreshadowing in the backdrop, and included it in the game - to let on what is going to happen at the end, as well as an explanation for why the player is doing what they are doing, while leaving some parts to their imagination. I don't particularly think it has worked very well (from the video playthroughs at least, when some people were a bit visibly confused). It is to be expected when you're speedrunning through jam games and not paying attention to the little details, and we should have expected that.

3. Interaction: We originally planned more interaction apart from the two basic ones that currently exist, but decided to cut them out gradually, to maintain the pacing and avoiding shifting the focus from the story. This has led to the experience being hit and miss. Some people would appreciate the slow pace without interaction, while others would try to find things to interact with - expecting a more traditional game. One particular nasty effect of this is near the ending - where we take control away from the player for a little bit (because time did not permit to make an animation/UI for that interaction), and players think that the next part is a cutscene, but it's really not - and which ending you get depend on this part.

Well, that's about it! I hope you guys like our game!

We've already been playing other awesome games, and will keep playing!

...but we did make it in time!

And while the character has a battery synthesizer, we don't - so I'll head off to sleep and recharge now! Good games everyone, looking forward to playing a lot of them and finding hidden gems!

Oh, and link to our entry: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/39/zapdune

Managed to put out an HTML5 build up! Putting out a post-jam version soon (will be marked as such) with some quality of life changes, nothing major. (Link: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/39/zapdune)

Now that I've recharged, started playing them games!

Every jam, we follow a certain tradition - we say "we're gonna make something minimalistic so we can do a more relaxed jam" and usually end up with "this is the farthest thing from minimalism". This time was no different. The only difference this time was in the sense that I had even less time to work on this (work on Monday, had a gathering to attend on Friday), so it was effectively 2 days. This also compounded with our usual problem of teammates being 6 and 12 hours apart from each other timezone-wise.

Instead of the usual detailed what went wrongs and right list, I'll mainly talk about our process this time (from my perspective as the programmer / designer).

Post theme reveal, ideas were thrown around - starting from kings losing power to running after batteries. Someone at some point mentioned grappling hooks like the ones in Attack On Titan (maneuver gear) are cool. And everyone else was like YAS GRAPPLING HOOKS ARE COOL WE'RE GONNA MAKE A GAME WITH THAT!

Didn't take long to come up with an idea around that, since we went with the least nuanced and most literal interpretation of the theme. Our original idea had the player running, jumping and hooking around, building, recharging and upgrading turrets, as well as attacking enemies with the hook.

This may have been our first mistake. We built a game around a feature because we thought it was cool, cramming the theme in. We didn't ask "Why do we need this feature again?" (I asked it actually, the reply was because it's cool.)

This was a mistake, not because it's a bad idea - but I spent almost the entire 1st day getting the player movement and hooking just right, trying out several combinations.

This left the 2nd day for... literally everything else from turrets, AI, player attacking, recharging, a building and upgrading system etc. Around midway through Sunday, after I programmed the system for turret upgrading in, I decided - screw this. I wouldn't be getting enough time to balance anything with different upgrade levels, seeing as I'd barely have any time to finish programming all of the systems. I could forget about designing a level and waves.

At that point, we decided to scrap the upgrade, building and player attacking systems (even if I had the upgrade system programmed in). We'd be doing just the core running around with hooks (cuz it's fun), recharging turrets and managing resources. We decided to take away control from the player.

This led to our 2nd mistake - taking away agency from the player to some extent. The player never had any direct interaction with the enemies, and basically once enemies ganged up - you'd have nothing to do but hopelessly watch things get destroyed (it also didn't help that it's not the most balanced game, considering I had like an hour to program the waves).

By Sunday 4 am, I finished programming everything - but the game looked like this.

I had to go to sleep, and the artists in our team are 12 hours away from me timezone-wise, so I told them that I'm gonna go to sleep and you guys need to make it beautiful by tomorrow.

I woke up to this.

Quite a change huh? I love having teammates I can trust without telling them what to do. :) (Ignore the background, it's controlled through code.)

And I proceeded to upload the game after that, which is where the jam version is at. Sure, the artists changed some depth layers over the UI and you can see the UI arrows going beneath walls in the jam version, but that wasn't a big deal considering I had to push the level's design almost entirely up to them this time. Are we satisfied with the end product? Can't say on behalf of the others, but yeah - to an extent for me. I keep thinking whether we should've kept all the features and removed the hooking, or kept the hooking and removed features (like we did). Giving weight to these tradeoffs are the hardest decisions in a jam.

Protip for next jam: Make it minimalistic for once.

Oh, and you can play our game here: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/39/zapdune

Thanks for reading!

"Hey guys, we're gonna make something simple this time because last time was too hectic."

(A few hours later) "This... is simple enough"

Making some actual levels now!

Went with the name Bonding Bad! No cookies for guessing the references. Give the game a shot!

HTML5 version is broken (downloadable works fine), will hopefully manage to fix tomorrow. drops dead

Alright - fixed and uploaded the HTML5 version of the game! It's running smoothly! Give the game a shot!

A note to GameMaker: Studio (1.4) users - this is apparently a thing for the HTML5 version: https://www.reddit.com/r/gamemaker/comments/4u3rn0/lessonsinhtml5/

instance_find works differently for HTML5 and other platforms, since the destruction list is updated differently (affects other destruction code too). Just a heads up for future projects - since that might be the reason your game's working unexpectedly in HTML5.

Well, we bit off a bit more than we can chew this time, but we managed. Got the HTML5 build working too!

So behold - our bullet-hell x deckbuilding game mashup Magic the Shattering, which you can play here!

Will be posting detailed breakdowns soon. Stoked to try out all these other weird games!