Hey fellow Jammers! It's that time of the quarter again, 48 hours of pain, regret and pizza... and gamedev.

This would be my fourth Ludum Dare, which I guess means it's my anniversary - woo me. Ludum Dare is always an awesome way of tracking progress and of course, bettering your own gamedev skills.

My action plan this time round - is to do better than last time round. Now that that's done, let's get to the theme suggestions!

*Don't worry that awful spelling mistake has been fixed.

The "Similar Themes" feature seems really useful for (hopefully) cutting down the amount of repeat themes in the slaughter (looking at you: colours, parallel and buttons) and also giving people a heads up if their idea is already in use, so thanks @pov

Anyway, I can't wait for the Jam to start, 22 days to go. I'm all fired up!

Spent some of my evening making a wallpaper for you all. I always have fun with this kind of stuff, so if you're into the wallpaper game (I still have a LD42 wallpaper), then enjoy!

If you want a version without the border, I got you covered!

Man that felt much longer than it probably should've but it's finally done. I tried to be more... "generous" this time round but I just ended up being as strict as always.

For reference, last time I upped 108 themes. So I'm proud to say that I have become 0.8% more lenient since the last LD woo! To be fair the last slaughter had around 400 more themes (No that's NOT necessarily a good thing) but I really felt kind while going through these. Well, little did I know.

Surprisingly few of the usual, "colour", "old theme", or "memes" but I noticed a rise in "islands" and "control based". If the slaughter had an auto-no filter (type in "colour" and all "colour" themes get no'd) mwah that would be so useful. The theme will suck anyway, yadiyadiya you know the drill.

Here are some of my favourites(ish):

• Color (Colour)

• Running out of Running out of Themes

• Just keeps getting worse

• Quickie with a Stiffi UGH

• Gamophobia (Game+phobia=Gamophobia=fear of commitment XD)

• James Edward Oglethorpe

• Indie AAA Game

• Cats in space with Lasers

• Are you sure?

• Worst Game Ever

• portals (not teleporters, but Portals!)

• Will Smith

Did not expect the rounds to start now. Anyway! Mildly optimistic Nutty is in the flow ready for the final build to LD43!

*Useless Superpowers (-1): *Very uninspiring. I don't mind themes which are heavily based around an adjective + noun combo but this doesn't strike me as very "interesting"

*Break the Cycle (+1): *Glad to see that one of the themes I upped in the slaughter made it to the theme voting rounds, one of my big favorites. So many possible interpretations, just on the base-line there are questions to be answered, "What Cycle?", "What does it mean to 'break' this cycle" "How, do I break this cycle". Love this theme.

*Don't trust the game (-1): *Very 'meh' for me. I'm just thinking of the amount of purposefully irritating games that could come from this.

*Absorb your enemies (-1): *Too specific. Moving on.

*No killing allowed (-1): *Too restrictive. Moving on.

*One item, many uses (0): *Getting kind of sick of seeing this theme every single Dare. It has potential, not even a bad theme, just not my thing.

You are the princesses waiting to be - NO - NO - NO (-1)

*Take one leave one (0): *Maybe too specific. Probably too specific. I just think nothing with this one.

*Scavenger (0): *I really like games that have a scavenging aspect to them, however I feel as a theme it's slightly to specific. You can slap the adventure/ collect genre on nearly anything. But I'll probably like the games that will come from it.

*You Control the Environment, not the player (0): *A theme I've grown an odd pseudo-relationship with since again it's appeared on every single LD I've participated in. I used to love it, but now I feel way too restricted by the noun 'environment', replace it with 'scene' or 'world' and I'll prefer it.

*Indirect Combat (0): *It's a fun idea. Really everything I want in a theme, but then again I'm thinking of those who don't wish to make violent games in general. Maybe I'm getting too much into the specifics but "Indirect Damage" would be a better theme.

*You are the final boss (-1): *Trash.

*Permanent Damage (0): *Ugh. Too much of a mechanic, luckily for it, it uses the noun "Damage", but. Ugh. I don't know. Slap a 0 on it.

*Automation (+1): *Just a solid theme. Open for interpretation, specifies at least 'one thing' that needs to exist in your game, not boring or gimmicky, just good.

*Discovery (-1): *Too vague. WAY too vague. Every game ever made has some sort of 'discovery'. Me finding a new enemy in a platformer is 'discovery', knowing how to get points is 'discovery', me finding out that one must press "X" to jump is 'discovery'. Nothing here for me.

*It only changes when you aren't looking (-1): *Man I love sentence long themes so much. Especially ones that describe a game that already exists (hint hint Red Light, Green Light). Just boring.

Well, it's better than that one time I didn't +1 a single theme last time round (no I'm not negative (OK? LEAVE ME ALONE) the themes were genuinely THAT bad). Also, quickly placing my bet that "Islands" will be in Round 2 and that "Button" will be in Round 3, I'm placing all of my -1's on it (haha).

Slightly optimistic Nutty here! Round 2! Here we go! Bit more decisive than last time... uh.. yeah!

*you can only move or see, not both (-1): *I see @pov hates this theme too (unless the theme names were never fixed for grammar/ English anyway). I mean, it's basically everything I hate in a theme: too confusing, too long, too boring. Not much else to say.

*Magic, but at what cost? (0): * Very simple theme with a potential for a lot of variety: story wise and game play wise, Magic is a bit too general and generic for me, this has a nice pointer added to it, though it's not exactly my thing. I abstain!

*Alchemy (0): *I decided to do some research for a quick definition. All definitions point to the use of "Magic" which automatically drifts me away from this one. I would much prefer 'mixing' over Alchemy as there's a lot more variety that could be found right out of the bag (granted, it is a bit vague). Very meh for me.

*Darkness is your friend (-1): *Specifies that there must be darkness. Specifies that this darkness must be useful to the player in one way or another. Too restrictive for me, "Light" would have been a better noun to use since Light is generally used as a more general term (blasting with light, dim light, even no light which is basically darkness) while Darkness simply refers to a 'lack of' light.

*Gameplay described by title of a song (-1): *Stupid, Gimmicky, No - Moving on.

Ancient Technology (-1): sigh

*60 seconds (-1): *60 seconds what? 60 seconds to eat? 60 seconds to finish? 60 seconds to - it's too vague WAY too vague. Let me think of 3 games which are all wildly different to each other and barely use this theme but still fall under 60 seconds:

• A stock exchange game where depending on the way your characters interact with the world will affect how rival companies perform. Oh yeah, stock markets update every 60 seconds.
• A top down production line game where every 60 seconds more raw material is provided by you
• A simple web-page which has a counter which continuously goes down from 60 seconds to 0.

This theme will only work for meta-joke games.

*Fragile (+1): *I can see how some people will call this theme 'one word vague' however compared to themes such as, "Discovery" or "Magic", Fragile is definitely something with a more 'set' definition. While Electronic could almost be described as "Magic", Fragile doesn't have that same reach. Also I really like the idea of making a game where something breaks, or breaks easily. I like breaking things damn it!

*Corruption (+1): *I always liked games which explore the idea of corruption; Papers Please, Tropico, Just Cause; it's one of those things that's just perfect for a video-game, because no one wants to experience corruption, but the corrupt'er' is the one having all the fun. Less vague than Fragile too. So... there's that.

*Making Connections (+1): *A perfect theme if you ask me. Open for interpretations, services practically every genre while still clearly defining what the main purpose of the game should be. I hope this makes it to the finals. Connections could be seen as: physical, mental, implied. And then the question of "how" these connections are made. Favorite one of the bunch!

*Floating Islands (-1): *FOR GOD'S SAKE, WHY CAN'T THIS STUPID PISSING THEME JUST GO AWAY? WHY FLOATING ISLANDS? WHY MUST THE ISLAND BE FLOATING? WHY NOT JUST ISLANDS? IS THERE SOMETHING SO ATTRACTIVE ABOUT 'FLOATING' ISLANDS? AM I MISSING SOMETHING HERE? EVERY. SINGLE. DAMN. LUDUM DARE.

*Mythology (-1): *Ehh. Not my thing. Probably won't be attractive to a lot of other people either.

*Every play through builds on the last (-1): *Verging on game mechanic, just slightly off, still restricting as hell, also every time I read this theme I think of rogue-lites. Not the best impression for an 'interesting' theme.

*It's not a bug it's a feature (-1): *The word 'trash' isn't enough to describe this theme let me quickly hop on Thesaurus.com (not sponsored ;)) to find something synonymous. Ehh... balderdash, hogwash... malarkey? Sure!

*Decay (+1): *Basically the same as last LD:

This theme has amazing “Fill in the Blanks” potential. What - is decaying? Why - is it decaying? How - will it affect the game? Filling in the “it” part and in general answering the questions will create a huge pool of potential games. It also doesn’t completely dictate the flow of the game. You could make a game where one of the major game mechanics involve decay and it still would be in the bounds of the theme.

*Limited Resources (-1): *Too specific. I'm not sure how one measures how limited you are of resources especially since in most games your resource gain scales with how far you've made it. In Civ, if you make just +3 gold a turn at the start but then by the end you make +450 gold a turn (since that's just how the game works) how am I actively meant to measure how scarce I am of resources? It's not a measurable theme.

I'm honestly tempted to just go out next time round, suggest "Floating Islands", "4 Elements" and "Two Buttons" just so I can proudly say all 3 of my themes made it through. Every single time.

I had to find something that rhymes with 3 ok? Anyway, last round is most certainly upon us. Optimistic Nutty is in for the scoop. Here we go!

*You are what you eat (-1): *Too specific. Eating is a very definitive verb, "eat", of course you can also interpret it as "consume" and while that does give you some more possible ideas to work with the more I think about the 'you are' part the more I realise that all this is is a "consume entity and get some parts of this entity" game mechanic.

*Sacrifices must be made (+1): * I love games where there is a certain struggle. FTL, XCOM etc. and this theme is basically that. Yes, it could be seen as vague but unlike some other vague themes this one is actually measurable, instead of '60 seconds' which is basically a tick box, with this theme you can actually determine how much of the theme you want to incorporate into your game.

*Everything Grows (-1): *More specific and garbage version of a previous LD theme.

*Inputs are expensive (-1): *There had to be an input based one somewhere among the pile. Here it is! I find this theme quiet dull and can already see pages upon pages of games where basic movement is punished.

*1 v 100 (-1): *Too Restrictive. Moving on.

*Evolve (+1): *I just like this theme. Yes it's vague I know, I know, but I just love games based around 'something' growing to 'something' throughout the game. So this one is just completely out of personal favorites.

*Work with your enemy (-1): *Nice paradox. If you're working with your enemies then they aren't your enemies. I mean, unless you're thinking of the time old "The enemy of my enemy is my friend" but re-read that quote and note the part where it says "my friend". Maybe I'm interpreting this incorrectly but in that case this theme is too confusing for me to care.

*Transform your surroundings (+1): *I will be honest. Originally I called this off because I was thinking of terrain or building games. But then I re-wrote the theme in my head using some synonyms and I came to, "Change your world" and then I realised this is actually a really good theme. Maybe a game about changing the views of the local people. Maybe a game about making anyone who passes you in-game a hot sexy boi. Loads of possible interpretations.

*Symbiosis (-1): *Don't exactly wish to do research for a theme, and I'm sure those who are less versed in English would want to either.

*Two connected places (-1): *Down this theme, go back to round 2 and up "Making Connections". Thanks.

*Mistakes are permanent (-1): *Again, pages upon pages of games that will be based around "haha, couldn't kill that one guy? Well enjoy having him screw you over for your whole play session". Uninspired, basically.

*Only one shot (+1): *Actually not a bad theme. Reminds me of "Running out of Power" since if you look at the theme literally, it would look garbage, but then when you start twisting the theme some other ideas may arise. I, personally was thinking of real life situations where you may only have 'one shot' such as job interviews, or life-changing opportunities. Me likey!

*Non-Traditional Magic (-1): *I really hope magic based themes don't just start becoming a trend. Anyway, this is basically "Inconvenient Superpowers" but wrapped under a different name... so... yeah!

*Self-Replicating (-1): *Not my taste. An, ok theme but doesn't strike me as very interesting, that's just my thought process though.

*Nothing is permanent (-1): *Just another dumb theme. Yeah. 99% of things in video games aren't permanent. That's not a theme, that's just a fact of games. This theme is so vague that someone could just make any old game and there would be a pretty high chance that it would accidentally work with this 'theme'.

*Symmetry (-1): *Meh. Too mathsy for me. All I can think of is building, architecture and maths and I'm not really interested in any of those things.

Surprised we didn't get Buttons or Colour anywhere in these rounds. Not complaining. Not complaining. At least some actually GOOD themes replaced them. Anyway, we're nearly here! Not long to go now.

Here we go! Almost there! Let's hope the theme doesn't suck (even though it will), I'm ready for my 4th Compo and I can assure, my most successful one (confidence is the key to success), I barely even know what I'm saying anymore I'm too excited. I won't actually know about the theme until 5 hours after its annoucement because I'm not staying up until 2am just to find out what the theme is (also I learnt from last time where I literally couldn't sleep because of how much I was thinking about the theme).

I got my schedule ready to go! I've been adapting it since the very first compo I took part in. Comparing this schedule to my last one, this iteration focuses more on polish and less on thinking time/ breaks (a compromise I had to make) instead I'll be doing more 5 minute(ish) long breaks with two, one hour breaks sprinkled between both days.

Looking back at all of my previous LD submissions I've noticed clear flaws in all of their developments:

• *LD40: "Jonny: Life of a Procrastinator": *To be fair, this was my first actual game ever but my biggest mistake which I could still make now is over-scoping and trying to do something that's WAY, WAY out of my area of expertise (never be scared to restart).

• *LD41: "Jump and Draw": *My first platformer. This one mainly struggled because of how inexperienced I was with platformers at the time (though this game has probably taught me the most out of any project I've ever worked on), otherwise creating a foundation which was riddled with poor implementation. Another big flaw was as the bugs started pilling on at the end, rushing through my code and leaving parts of it uncommented or in general poorly written.

• *LD42: "DOS: Deletion (of) old stuff": *Another platformer! However this time round I actually knew how to make a platformer. Again, this one struggled with poor implementation, in fact so bad that I genuinely had no clue how to add proper art for the building blocks of the stage so I just used Gray box sprites. Biggest issue by FAR however was making the game WAY too difficult, like, unbelievably difficult according to some people.

Ahh, isn't self-reflection nice? Anyway! Strap your seatbelts, arm yourself with your drink and food of choice and get ready for 48 (72) hours of ~~HEEEEEEEELLLLL~~ FUN!

Also for anyone new I recommend you check out some tips I wrote last LD for anyone new

For the first time in anything ever the theme that I actually wanted to win... won. Awesome!

I just woke up so I haven't done any brainstorming yet but I'm damn excited anyway.

Here we go. 40 minutes in I found my idea, spent the last hour building it up on some paper. It's going to be a top-down galaga-like bullet hell game with a fun twist. Gonna go out and buy some supplies (pizza) and get going with the prototype. Good luck to you all!

As always, every project starts as a basic prototype.

Squares, Triangles. That's never changed. And after one hour of development my Firing and Movement mechanic are actually complete already. I was actually on schedule with that, crazy. With the lazors I tried to implement object pooling initially (something I've never done before) but then I realised that 1. Time 2. It's literally a sprite that has a few variables and adds some forces upon instantiation.

I did learn something though, cooldown between shots (at least how to implement it properly) so that's fun! Time to program my first baddie, "The Midget Cruiser"

Tea Counter: 0

Awesome! After around 4 or so hours of intense programming I have completed all of the basic systems and more! I was intending to only have done the enemy AI, oxygen and friendly ship AI in the last 4 hours but I actually got those done AND the crew mechanic AND some of the basic UI. Super proud at the pace that I'm going at. My Trello is actually starting to look a bit depressing. BUT BUT... in a good way B).

So! I gave myself an hour break and when I return I shall work on some art so my basic little game - looks a bit less 'basic' and 'little'. See you in like 3 hours!

I'm getting serious flashbacks to LD41 and LD40 here; confident as balls by the end of Saturday, one bug BAM! Whole Sunday gone trying to fix it. Before we get to THAT though, let's look at the positives! I spent around an hour getting most of the art done and, well, the game definitely doesn't look like a prototype anymore. (I also decided to test out triple guns since that's something I actually implemented pretty well; just stick a few guns on the player and it works out of the box). I think the game looks pretty kewl for what it is, decided to use an NES Colour Pallet so there was at least some consistency. Otherwise I'm probably going to light up the lasers so they stand out more.

Ok, now all I have to do is add in the 'round finished' area and then it's just trying to cram in as much general content as possible. Since I'm not inept at programming anymore I shouldn't run across as many painfully obvious bugs as I did in earlier Compos' as I move forward. Fingers crossed. 3 - 4 more hours of Saturday left.

Also, I forgot last time,

Tea Counter: 2

Wanted to stop at 10PM, ended up working till midnight. sigh well, at least I got literally all of the main mechanics done. The post-round area is complete and I've polished up some of the pre-existing mechanics with minimal balancing. That reminds me that I haven't explained the game at all.

Essentially, galaga-like bullet-hell game where you must keep your oxygen levels high enough so your crew doesn't die. You lose some Oxygen: at the end of every round (determined by your crew number, the thing under the O2 value is the amount lost) and when you're hit by enemy attacks. You can reduce the amount Oxygen lose by ejecting your crew reducing your Oxygen loss, though your fire rate will suffer as a result or at the end of every round destroying a ship which grants you some instant oxygen though they can't aid you in the fight now. That's the bulk of it.

I can now spend the whole of Sunday polishing the balls out of this game as it feels extremely flat right now. But it's been some really successful hours of game dev today. See you tomorrow!

This is probably the best I've ever felt waking up on a Sunday during an LD Jam. I tend to be pretty groggy and pessimistic around this time but I'm feeling super confident that I'll get this game in a good state. I added a new enemy and ally over an amazing BLT and Tea (Tea Counter: 4). The "Bouncytier" fires projectiles that ricochet of walls forcing the player to watch his flanks. The "Blanket Mobile" sits back on the players side and fires three lazors at random towards the enemy.

You know what they say. You can't win wars without allies.

Main things I'll be focusing on now is sound, juice, balancing and the preliminaries. I'll do the simple things first like a game over screen, a home screen and a tutorial. That'll probably take me around an hour or so then I'll move on to just making the game feel awesome to play.

May the motivation be with you fellow Jammers!

7 hours of straight work with no break. I impress myself too much sometimes. Though I'm not sure how healthy that is... ANYWAY. I am ALMOST - ALMOST done. Over the past 7 hours I have: - Gotten all the sound work done (except one sound I forgot to record, I'll do that later) - Finished the main menu (Find it down below) - Done some balancing - Fixed an extremely irritating bug (sometimes I despise Unity's physics engine) - Rescaled the game to 1024x768 (html5 reasons)

Now all that's left to do is to just polish the literal balls out of the game. I've learnt an invaluable amount from this game so far and now I shall be entering a world I've never had the opportunity to enter. Actual. Polish. I have a little checklist on my Trello which I'll be running down on. If I get the game to a "feels good to play" state I'll add some fun weapon pick-ups that the player can use to mow down some bad boyz.

Just looked back on my previous post, "I’ll do the simple things first like a game over screen, a home screen and a tutorial. That’ll probably take me around an hour or so" - classic programmer speech.

Oh yeah my game has a name now. "Sirius" sounds like the name of a planet and "Galactica" is a cool word.

~3 hours of polish later my game definitely plays a lot better than before I would say.

Before

After

Man it feels so good to actually have time in a Compo to do any polishing. I should be pretty damn thankful that I have this luxury. For example since the allied ships come forward at the end of a round there's sometimes a chance that they'll clip making it difficult to shoot them if you want quick oxygen, after around 20 minutes of time I found a work-around and a mini-fix. Press "R" and they'll reposition!

I'm more or less done now. Only a few tidbits now. Better explanation of the game mechanics, balancing, and I STILL haven't added the game over menu (for whatever reasons). I'll be doing that over the next hour or so and then I'll spend the next few packing it all up ready to be released to the world!

Tea Counter: 5

Finally. It is over. I have endured another Dare... successfully!

This is by far my most successful Ludum Dare.

It was a very ambitious project for only 48 hours and I pulled off everything I had planned in this time period (EVERYTHING) and I thought LD42 was very successful for me. Of course, shameless plug; you can play the game here.. I have a set of exams starting from tomorrow so I'm going to get some rest now, however I'll begin playing your guys' games sometime tomorrow. I'll also release a quick patch once I got some of the minor issues sorted out. Anyway! I hope the rest of you Jammers a good day and a Goodnight ;)

(Oh god I just remembered Smash Bros comes out next week and my friend will be over on Saturday and that's all we'll play. I'll take that as a reward)

Hello everyone!

I hope you've all had a good time so far; rating games, playing games, potentially even thinking about continuing your own games (:O). I've personally waited painfully for Smash to come out (only a few hours now!) while rating some games on the side and I must say, in return some of the feedback I've gotten on my game has been incredible. Anyone who would go out of their way to give me feedback about my game whether it may be positive or negative deserves a big fat :thumbsup: (and I don't do emojis often).

I would love to keep working on my game in the future (hopefully I don't get stuck in the vicious cycle of burnout like I did LD42). While I love everyone who played my game there are some special people out there who not only gave me awesome feedback but also gave me some amazing pointers and tips for what I could do for a potential post-jam version so a big baby's thwank you to: - @shawn-moore - @fre - @imphenzia - @cute-dog-irl

You are all awesome people and I <3 to bits.

Anyway! I've also been working on a new update for Sirius Galactica. Of course, under Jam rules, during the voting period there shall be no major additions to my game so this update mainly fixes some bugs I spotted during and after development and some necessary improvements to some parts of the game.

Version 1.1: December 12th 2018:

• Added Version number to main menu

• Spelling mistakes sorted out
• Allied ships actually flicker now when shot in the after round screen
• Enemy projectiles now get cleared at the end of a round
• Made the enemy hit sounds louder (way too quiet last time)
• Made instructions slightly more concise
• Unity did a slightly better job at compressing the music this time round (still off in some sections, thanks Unity)
• Next round button is now on Q (Thanks @cute-dog-irl!)
• Screen shake is slightly more subtle (Thanks @manimal!)

• Player hit sound now plays
• Can no longer fail at trying to advance to the next stage at the end of a game
• Game doesn't grind to a halt when attempting to restart after a win
• Ricocheting Projectiles don't get stuck at the bottom of the screen anymore if they didn't ricochet already

Have an awesome day people!

I was going to post this a bit later in the week, included with my Post-Mortem (which I'm still writing) but with these results I HAD to do a premature celebration.

The trend continues I see. Once again the best results I've ever had in the Compo and this time by a WIDE margin. Making it into Top 50 for Fun is an amazing thought knowing that out of all, the game succeeds most at being fun. That is truly awesome :).

Here's a fun (pun possibly intended) progress chart as is tradition.

Here's a sneaky little tidbit at 2.0 ;)

(Yeah I've been working on a dialogue system)

As you can see I'm still in the process of re-designing the visuals. UI got a complete overhaul (Crew part hasn't been added yet which is why there's a little guy peeking in at the bottom), actual backgrounds are being added and soon I'll be reworking the particles. Also trails and lighting (so the lazors are more like lazors) will also be added. ALSO, all current sprites are going to be re-drawn, potentially with a new colour pallete as well (The current one is pretty limiting).

... Basically... I probably won't be done until Mid - Late Februrary; right around Birthday Time :D

Thanks to everyone who played and rated my game. The Post-Mortem is coming soon, but for now. Have a good day Commander!

Woo, it's been a while now hasn't it? But I'm pretty pumped up for my 4th installment of 48 hours of Game Dev ~~hell~~ fun!

I have been getting some good work done on Sirius Galactica (my last entry). I've been working quite hard on pushing out a major post-jam update, 2.0 which will be out... soon, there's still a lot of work to be done content and polish wise, but if I had to make a wild and insane prediction now, how about... around 1 1/2 months? Let's get a fun and exciting GIF to showcase my progress!

Before (V 1.0)

Current (V 2.0 in dev)

A bit more hectic, intense and looks a lot sweeter don't you agree? :3

Also, if you're curious, these are my theme suggestions: