I’m terrible when it comes to game making. But that doesn’t hinder me to join up anyway!

So. Here we… wait for the theme.

Everyone is posting screenshots, so I think I should too.

Here it is!

It makes sense.

Right, let’s continue working.

Since that question fell just now, yes, I indeed stole Notch’s idea of having a livestream. Mine does have sound though! Har har har!

Beginner’s Livestream!

Heres another screenshot, just for pure self-motivation

I wouldn’t have thought it, but game development is going pretty well. I refrain from posting another screenshot.

Things I need to do

• Games Ending. This will take a bit
• A few levels
• After that, Polish
• Polish so people get the game
• Polish till it shines.

I think I will work for another half hour and then go to bed for the final rush.

Here, another Screenshot.

It says a lot more than the other two, doesn’t it?

Well, let’s finish this little game.

Holy fishsticks, I’m done!

Now go! Please try it out!

Man. I have made a game! Thats pretty unbelievable. Wow.

Why the heck did I join Ludum Dare? And why now?

Hm. I guess Notch simply, or just accidently pushed me over to it. Also everyone else that randomly yells “JOIN LUDUM DARE”. Theres quite a lof of those people.

And there I was, having a registered account, voting for themes, hoping it wouldn’t be Twilight Fandom, with barely any game making experience more complex than if statements.

But it turns out I had an idea for exploration. A simple one even I could realize with a bit of experimenting around. How that idea came, I don’t know anymore. I think it was a fluent process after opening Game Maker and simply starting by making a platformer engine, kind of. Saturday was kind of depressing in the beginning. I think Iwas trying to figure out how I could use FMOD to use the simple stuff I wanted it to do. That took about 6 hours of my time. I have found simple solutions to my problems by not using examples of how it could work but instead of just doing my own shitty code. But it worked like I wanted it to! And that makes me… a tad happy.

If I would make another game like this, I probably would rely more on the 3D stuff FMOD has. It gives you more of a feeling where you are going to. Would I have tried to figure it out while being in Ludum Dare, I guess it would have sucked all my blood, eh, time away.

The way the game looks was something that evolved naturally too. At first I had some kind of placeholder graphics for the very beginning. But the rest never changed.

Hm, I seem to have overwritten most of it. Ah, here is how the game start initially looked like. After I got to the endings on sunday, changing the cheesy look of this was kind of a good idea.

I think most of the time was spent on sound. I didn’t notice, but making 36 sound effects and master them so they kind of have the same volume or destroy speakers, that takes a lot of time.

Look at the mess of project files I created.

For people that are interested, I used Ableton Live Suite 8. Lots of it’s internal Synthesizers and Effects. Also FM8, Absynth 4, Reaktor 5 and Massive. All VSTi from Native Instruments. Yeah, I own that shit. God damn, I’ve spent too much money on this.

I’m very happy with the sound results. I think some loops are really cool.

What else… after I got my code working, everything was just straightforward work. I actually worked most of the Ludum Dare. Although it’s such a small game. I blame my shitty coding. I could have made scripts so I don’t have to repeat steps over and over. But I was fast enough to finish what I have initially kind of planned, so it’s not that bad. Okay, to the pros and the cons!

PRO!

• I MADE A GAME.
• Good sound!
• Interesting experimental experience!
• Happily finding out 2 days are exactly the time needed
• Replay value!
• I MADE A GAME.

CON?

• The controls are confusing. Some people get it instantly, some don’t even know there are in total 8 different routes.
• The sound is sometimes confusing. Sometimes you don’t really get the difference. Using “3D” sounds or panning would have deminished this.
• The game is quite short. Some people might give it a shot once and then never open it again.
• The visuals could have been more involved.

Do I have something else to say?

APRIL.

Includes a trailer.

Very interesting. Can’t think what else to say, really!

Yeah, me neither!

Wow, a very original idea! It’s exploration, but not in the visual way. You made it incredible! The music is fantastic. I found two endings!

,o/\o,

This is a cool little experience. The audio is TOP NOTCH, as it should be. Good implementation of theme!

Okay, responding to compliments was a bad idea.

This was refreshing. I can just imagine what may be done with this given more time…

I tried to think of something, came up with some crazy ideas and thought it would be a bad idea to try that out with my missing programming knowledge, so I migth try … later.

Excellent use of audio and minimalistic graphics.

I say!

Five stars for audio from me – I really like it. I like the visuals as well, very nicely styled minimalistic graphics.
The game itself doesn’t feel all that much like a game.

I don’t have mushrooms you jump on. But I may or may not have, well, you do the interpretation

I like this game! And it remains me, how much atmosphere i have lost by not being able to add music and sfx in my game… are there just two endings or more?

Eight D:

Concept is shore interesting.
Not shore game play is tough. Passed it in two ways. Not shore there are others and not shore sounds are that expressive on where you should go. May be it would have been better if there were 3 buttons. 2 for turning right or left and two for going in current direction + going somewhere and turning changing direction from which sounds go.
Or my be I do not get it…

Problem was, controls were the least issue I had, so I didn’t experiment with the around. And as I’m inexperienced, I didn’t want to try out other stuff while having a Ludum Dare. I have ideas now, but now it’s too late.

Original idea and good use of a minimalistic approach. The sounds are great!

Can I marry you?

Very compelling. Interesting use of sound. Interesting experimental game concept. I’d like a little more feedback as to how much I’m supposed to change directions, or what input are required from me. I got 2 different endings, anyway.

As I said, didn’t experiment enough with how to control the game.

Ive played a game like this before somewhere….But this was better 😀

Ezo Ripoff?!

A very simple idea. Though I don’t like not having a sort of character visible onscreen, but I guess this is just what the game is meant to be like.

I like those sounds/music! Really nice!

Yeah, I guess that was the idea of the game. I should ask the responsible person, wait a second.

Oh, and are you married yet?

I liked this.

Marry me?

I *love* the idea here, and hope you continue to pursue this… I think you could end up with something really incredible. As it stands, very nice prototype. Will definitely pop open your source code at some point, as I’m interested in exactly what going on down there. I’m curious: did you have any particular inspiration(s) for this? In any case, kudos.

NO. DON’T DO THAT. You would see the horrible, HORRIBLE smileys to try out the controls. DON’T!

PS: You mentioned that you were having trouble finishing 5 Colors: Pandora, and I just wanted to let you know that I now have a walkthrough up.

Not having troubles really. I accidently found the next room button and felt cheated by myself and didn’t want to start all over again. But I should play it again I guess. It was good.