Hello!

I finished up with my first jam this weekend, so next I'll be trying my first Ludum Dare. Excited to find out what the theme will be! I'm sure I'll not win, but I'm entering to further my experience and gain your feedback.

I'll be using GameMaker Studio 1.4, Aseprite, and Bfxr.

Here are some free ideas you can use if you are stuck on the theme, The More You Have, the Worse It Is..

• Remake of Atari classic Plaque Attack; the more gum disease you have..
• Docker; you work at a dock where ships come in over-burdened. You have a (reverse) time limit to remove their cargo before they sink. Perhaps additional ships as levels increase.
• You work in a postal sorting office; post comes through a chute, you have to sort the post into the correct outbound slots. Points for correct, time deductions for incorrect. Get it all done before the time runs out.

As you can see here, I am starting from nothing with my (not that) amazing programmer art. Ruins of Panic will be a platform game with a few LD40 twists..

After some thought I have decided to drop out of the LD40 jam. I have a great game concept, the key features are working. The next item to work on was the game mechanic that would tie it in to theme. However, what I am more than confident I lack is the time and experience to create good artwork.

I'm just not convinced I have enough time or experience to get something that looks worthwhile finished before the end of the jam, even if the core gameplay is in place. No one wants to stare at moving cubes, right?

I'll certainly be pursuing the game idea further, just not to the 48 hour time frame that the jam enforces. If anyone can recommend tutorials and training materials on pixel art, I'm open to suggestions!