Yes, I am.

Be ready. I’m going all out on this one. Also, hi. My name is Adam. This is my first Ludum Dare. It’s also my first game development contest.

GL, HF everyone else!

So I’ve got everything set up to start! One problem though, I have a soccer match to play at 1:00 pm (sydney time, LD starts at 12:00 here) which means I’ll be a couple hours late to start. Not only that, I have a family obligation that needs to be attended to at 6:00 meaning I’ve got a little bit of a 7 hour penalty because of life. No matter, life happens and I’ll make do. In the meantime I’ve got my desk ready to go, complete with:

• Water bottle (important)
• Spare sheets of paper
• Phone(s)
• Headphones (for composing music later)
• Wacom Bamboo Fun tablet (circa 2009)
• 500GB Hard-drive because reasons
• Glasses because of myopia.
• Trusty Computer (core i5, 4GB RAM, 1TB HDD, 1GB Nvidia GTX460)
• Generic 2.1 logitech speaker setup

It’s a bright sunny day outside right now but you can’t tell from this picture because I live in darkness.

The tools I’ll be using are:

• Code: Flash CS5/6 (never touched as3 before) OR Processing.js
• Graphics: Flash CS5/6, Photoshop
• Sound: (FL Studio 8)

So I just wanted to take a break and recap where I’m at after 4-5 hours of work.   Somehow, the stars have aligned and my rash decision to use a programming language I’ve never even touched before has proven incredibly successful. Who knew Actionscript 3 was basically Java? I didn’t, that’s for sure. So with that in mind, most of my time building this game has been “I’m great at this!” rather than “WHY WON’T IT WORK UGH”, which is a change. Box2D with flash works a charm, and everything translates fairly easily. I think CS5 has a great code editor, the code completion is far less intrusive than eclipse.

Bonus progress screenshot for you!

No clues on what the game is though, or how it relates to the theme. You’ll find out later.

Okay, you got me.

I’ve spend the last 24 hours working on this game almost non stop and I’m afraid I just won’t be ready to submit on time. That said, I’m incredibly pleased with what i came up with, and I’m oh so close to being able to show it off. It’s just not there yet. In the near future I’ll upload my completed work to Newgrounds so it has the chance it deserves to be enjoyed by people other than me.

Here’s a pic of the title screen/logo: I decided on the name “Tandoku”, which means “solo” in japanese

Tandoku’s Quest Episode 12: The Lesson of Less

Coming Soon…

I really enjoyed last Ludum Dare. Granted, I sucked but I had fun. A lot has happened since then…Definitely not enough for me to win or anything but it’s not like I won’t be trying again. I won’t say perseverance is my middle name (it’s Charles) but I will say that I’m more determined than last time and I’ve got more experience since last time. I should be better equipped this time.

Very keen. Super keen, even.

What I like about game jams (this will be my second) is that there’s always another around the corner. It becomes less about winning and more an excuse to get out there and push yourself into territory you’ve never been before. That’s what I feel more excited about. The promise that I’ll have an opportunity to learn Unity (which I’ve had lying around for a while now but have been reluctant to try it out). After attending PAX AUS this year, it became really clear that the indie-stry (I’m so sorry) standard has become Unity really quickly. I mean like 90% of indie games at PAX were made in Unity. It was insane.

Here’s hoping my schedule remains empty for the coming weekend.

Me again!

So I’ve gone ahead and used the fancy new cheapo fixed zoom lens I bought recently to show off the gear I’ll be using this Ludum Dare. Just a bit of fun, knowing that 24 hours from now I’ll be in meltdown.

Take a look!

I’m really excited; I know my entry will be so much better than last time. I can’t wait to get started. Lets do this!

Hey all,

Here’s a little video I threw together in the prep for this LD. It’s a bit late, since the comp started like half an hour ago but I thought it’d still be worthwhile uploading.

Good luck and have fun, everyone!

So here we are again, it’s always such a pleasure. This is a special Ludum Dare for me.

As an Australian, I usually a really difficult time with the scheduling of Ludum Dare for a couple of reasons:

1. The compo starts at 1PM on a Saturday. This means that over the 48 hours, the two nights are placed smack bang in the middle of the comp. Most of the work has to happen on Sunday, relegating Saturday evening for ramp-up and Monday morning for wind-down.
2. The compo ends at 1pm on a Monday. For anyone working full-time, this means the compo actually ends at 36 hours (Sunday night) or you have to come to work very sleepy on Monday morning, ending the compo at something like 42 hours. Either way you miss out.

I’m really happy to say I’ve been able to take Monday off work this time, so this will almost be a full LD48 for me! One bummer is that I’ve got a doctor’s appointment an hour after the compo starts, so I lose a bit of time there but I’ve tried to compensate by doing some extra prep in advance. I’ve already got my project timeline set out, as well as a shopping list (which mostly consists of instant noodles).

All in all, it should be a really fun jam,
Good luck everyone!

Oooh almost forgot here’s what I’m using:
Art – Aseprite
Tile Editor – Tiled
Engine – Unity2D
Sound – FL Studio