Between the office last night and this topic… All I can think is: “It’s Dangerous to Go Alone, Take This” “that’s what she said!”
Will be excitedly joining in this time! Have to sleep tonight though and work most of tomorrow. Guess that just means I’ll really have to make Saturday night and Sunday count 
Just under 9 1/2 hours down in the compo, and all I’ve managed to do thus far is sleep about 8 hours and read up everything going on here. Y’all have some hilarious and awesome ideas, it never fails to amaze me what the developers here can do with a theme!!!
Shower time in a few, then work for 10 hours at my “real job”, then get some dinner. After that, it’s on! Will leave me about 25-26 hours left to work, but I’ve learned that being forced not to develop for that long has two benefits:
1) I get LOTS of time to think about what I’m going to do, get lots of ideas rolling and really plan out what I’m going to do.
2) Actually WANT to get into coding again, since I can’t for so long.
Good luck everyone, although it seems you won’t need it with all the awesome screenshots and all you’re already posting
So after almost 24 hours of the contest is over, I’m home and going to tackle this compo!! It also means I had plenty of time for conceptualization…
Think Press Your Luck (the old game show) turned into a battle system and event interface, with RPG style stats and dungeon crawling, using a board game as the method of moving around! BOOM! That just happened
Just finished the FGL 2-day competition, making a game featuring a new girl trying to become an official member of the Grammar Police by searching for grammar and spelling errors on a faux-Facebook… Now i’m ready to tackle this one too!
Postmortem(ish) Blog Post: http://cataclysmicgames.blogspot.com/2012/08/well-hello-there-again.html
Play the game here:
http://www.thecritterverse.com/secret/fgl/Found%20Ghastly%20Language.html
My big Flash game – When Asteroids Attack – just began sponsorship hunting late this month (still September!) and so my dollar should come from that *fingers tightly crossed since I’m still pretty new to game sponsorship!*
However, the game I’ll be working on in October is finishing up an old Ludum Dare entry. It was for LD18 – Enemies as Weapons – and was called The Adventures of Rubberman! The concept: defeat evil bullies with Rubberman’s bouncy superhero outfit by bouncing their insults right back at them!
I am working on finishing the game up, and the concept has changed quite a bit since then. Back then, Rubberman was a random person who fought the evils of bullying; the new game is entirely focused on the concept of bullying in schools. It features Rubberkid (a kid just like you; you even get to customize the male or female superhero with your own story) as he helps save other children from bullies, and demonstrates multiple types of bullying (from the chess-loving artistic nerd to the sports star to the teachers themselves!), as well as showing why bullying is bad (each child you help will give you a story on what became of them after helping them, and what would have happened if you hadn’t).
As far as earning my dollar goes for The Adventures of Rubberkid, my concept is to reach out to anti-bullying groups and people for sponsorship. I would like to see if they would be interested in paying a bit to get listed, with several tiers of sponsorship (name in credits; logo in credits; logo in main menu; splash screen pre-game). It’s an experiment for sure, but even if it does only make $1, it’s a concept that’s dear to me and so I really want to make the game
Hello fellow awesome game developers!
One day, when I was working to expand a game I made for the Ludum Dare 18 Challenge (enemies as weapons), it hit me… Why not try to make the world a better place with games? So many great indies have made games to make people think or make people feel strong emotions, and there have been education games forever… Why not make a game to help conquer bullying? The Adventures of Rubberkid is a colorful, cute game for elementary school children. The aim of the game is to show the player the consequences of bullying. Each level focuses on helping a particular child (or children). Once helped, the player gets to see more info about them… The most important being “What Would Have Been” if the bullies continued and “But Since You Helped”, what they’ll do with their life. This clearly demonstrates the terrifying results of bullying! Since the point of the game is to help conquer bullying, it’d be silly to charge people money to play it… So the game is entirely free! Instead of charging people to play it, it’s being funded with Kickstarter. The campaign has a low funding goal ($750) but some great stretch goals too: First the game would be translated into Spanish, then French… Then a “Cyberbullying Edition” would be made (aimed at teens), a children’s book and even a comic! With all that, pretty much everyone should be reached with the message
I really want to make this project succeed; bullying is easily one of the worst things that exists, and it’s something that affects everyone in some form. If you hate bullying like me, PLEASE share this on Facebook, Twitter, tell a friend, anything! It means the world to me!
You can find the Kickstarter here: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/thecritterverse/the-adventures-of-rubberkid
You can read the Joystiq article here: Rubberkid on Joystiq [opens in new window]
I realize that this comes just barely over 24 hours from Ludum Dare 25, but finding out about this when I woke up this morning totally made my day!
I’d started a Kickstarter campaign to promote The Adventures of Rubberkid, a game that was begun back in Ludum Dare 18 (Enemies as Weapons) that teaches kids the evils of bullying, on November 30th, and just this week had started pushing to news sites and such. The campaign crossed 20% yesterday, and then this morning I found a message from a friend on Facebook that said:
“Saw you on Joystiq. Good stuff!”
All I could think was… “WHAT?!” So I Googled “Joystiq Rubberkid” and found it!
My point with all of this is… Don’t ever give up! Ludum Dare is a magical contest that can have absolutely fantastic results! Even if your game isn’t finished in time, or you end up #1406/1406, Ludum Dare can really inspire some great ideas! Don’t feel awful if the concept doesn’t come to fruition in the weekend. Enjoy the time and follow your calling in game development!
Hi! I'm a (physical) tabletop creator, and I'll be streaming some theme slaughtering tomorrow (Friday the 30th) at 4pm eastern over at https://www.twitch.tv/weirdgiraffegames with my partner, Angel :smile:
Ludum Dare has been a HUGE part of my creative life, from back when I started making Flash games to now when I make tabletop games 🥳 And the idea of streaming the themes, talking out what we might make for some of them, and probably laughing about the wild things people submitted 🤣
I normally skip theme slaughter or, more likely, miss it because I forgot Ludum Dare was happening lol but I'm too hyped this time!!!
[EDIT: CANCELLED DUE TO TECHNICAL DIFFICULTIES cuz of course it's not a Ludum Dare if everything doesn't go wrong for no reason :rofl:]
Angel and I are gonna get on stream tomorrow from 12 - 2 eastern (approximately) to talk about the final 16 themes and just generally get HYPED UP pre-jam! We're stopping an hour before to get lunch lol but will likely get back on after that to brainstorm before making our first prototype (we make tabletop games, which means printing and/or gathering components to test it out).
Honestly the aim is to get some of our friends who might stop by to wanna join in too (I LOVE inspiring others to create) but I figured I'd get in the habit of being less shy and more social and share here too. I've always had such amazing experiences with Ludum Dare in the past (it led to me making Flash games over a decade ago and now inspires my tabletop game creation!).
Feel free to come watch, chat about your game ideas (or keep them secret and keep them safe) and just generally get HYPED UPPPPPPP!!!! --> https://www.twitch.tv/weirdgiraffegames
Angel and I uhhhh.... released like 8 things this month, which means I'm SUPER practiced at the moment but also KINDA EXHAUSTED lol.
I'm a tabletop creator so I do the jam, not the comp, which at least means my normal plan of "chill while thinking about the theme and then get rockin on Saturday" should still work 🧡
This time around, instead of just doing a print-and-play, I'll also be making a Screentop version (screentop.gg). It's basically an engine that lets people play it online, so while I'll be coding it a bit and putting my game into it, it's not MY engine. If I get it done during the jam, awesome. If not, it'll be a post-jam thing and at least people can experience it without printing if they wanna (plus I need the practice using Screentop).
I hope everyone has an awesome time and that there are loads of epic games to play during the ratings period!!! 🥳🥳🥳
LOL I'm loving this theme for coming up with ideas I can work on later because they're neat 2+ player game ideas, but nothing soloable.
I always make sure what I release during Ludum Dare can be played solo since most people aren't gonna test the game out with other people around. It's already amazing enough when people will print and play something (and I've been so delighted to get the needed ratings the last couple of LDs! 🧡)
Sooooooooo fingers crossed that we (Angel and I) think of something soon! But at least we've got some stuff we're excited to try out later 🥳
This is an idea I've had bouncing around in my head for a while and it'll finally be more than an idea!
You play as superheroes who are part of AEGIS, fighting against your arch nemesis Cutlass and her henchmen Falchion and Claymore, as well as their countless henchpeople ofc.
They're ruining things around town, to such an extent that everyone is scared to go out! Except, well, they still expect their deliveries on time. So you're superheroes fighting crime AND delivering packages!
You're invincible, but your bag isn't, so when you take damage during a fight you actually cut into your bag, damaging items and maybe even losing parts of your bag
I originally was gonna have different types of villains, like some cut the bag and some burn it and others throw you so anything fragile against the edge of the bag gets destroyed, but this'll be much more straightforward for now :D
Unfortunately, it still means people will have to print something to play it cuz of course 🤣🤣🤣🤣 Printing AND Screentop... Unless I think of something else!
I can't believe I made it in time! This was our first time making anything anywhere near this big (I say that every Ludum Dare lol but it's true!), and my first time making something in Screentop.gg all by myself (let alone in 3 days lol). PLUS we came up with several other ideas I'm really hyped to try out, but we couldn't figure out solo modes for them so we skipped them for now.
Even if I don't get any ratings, I'm proud af of what we did here and excited for the future! Definitely a really awesome, super successful Ludum Dare 🥳
I also wrote a blog piece about why I chose my theme suggestions and about Ludum Dare itself (it's been a huge part of my life for a long time).
Here's to an awesome Ludum Dare 54 everyone!!! 🥳
I was just going back over the themes I voted for during theme slaughter and I forgot about this one!
Whoever suggested this theme is my hero! I hope you have an amazing day too! 🙌
PS: I know this won't be the theme of Ludum Dare 54, but it's a winner in my book.
I wrote a big ol' blog piece full of my votes, game ideas/thoughts, and my hopes and dreams for which theme will win (along with the usual expectation that one of the themes I downvoted will win 🤣).
Note: these opinions come from someone making a tabletop game and entering the jam.
I AM SO FREAKING HYPED RN!!!! Limited Space is EXACTLY what I wanted 🥳🥳🥳🥳🥳🥳🥳🥳🥳🥳🥳🥳🥳🥳
I totally forgot about the tradition of doing this! I'm a lil different here as I'm a tabletop creator (like physical games, not digital tabletop stuff, although one of the tools below makes that possible).
My tools of the trade are: * Canva for creating rulebooks, card images, etc. It's also great for codesigning, as more than one person can mess with it at once. Note: I do NOT the AI aspects though, I don't do AI-generated stuff. * nanDeck for generating the card files if I do any cards. * Screentop.gg for a digital implementation of the game (if I do one). It's like Tabletop Simulator but free, doesn't overheat computers, and doesn't have any queerphobia like TTS does! * An HP OfficeJet 8015e printer and an HP Instant Ink for the zillion test prints I'll do. 🤣
And as for ideas, I'm looking to make one of these (or something entirely different if my brain decides to chase a different squirrel): * A space survival game with a shrinking ship: The parts of your ship are on separate cards, and you use them to adjust the dice you roll each round against the onslaught of threats that keep coming at you. As your ship takes damage, the parts flip over and are less useful; if a damaged part gets hit again, it's permanently lost and falls off, making your ship smaller and smaller. * An inventory management polyomino roll and write in which you gather items dropped in a dungeon, making them fit in a smaller and smaller space in your backpack.
I hope everyone has an amazing Ludum Dare, I am MASSIVELY HYPED myself!!!
-✨Beth, apparently one of like 5 people who are actually happy that Limited Space won
In Space, No One Can Hear You Explode! is a roguelike tabletop game that uses dice manipulation to handle threats, repair your ship, and survive until you escape the chaotic part of space you've found yourself in.
I really love reading about the design journeys of other people, and postmortems that others write always teach me so much! So I decided to combine the two and write one myself. I go into:
What I personally do is play what I can on Itch, then comment there, rate it 5 stars if I liked it, comment the same thing here on Ludum Dare (maybe adding a little more critical feedback), and then give it my honest ratings here on Ludum Dare.
Oh, and if I really like it, I absolutely follow them on Itch 🧡
I'd always heard that giving anything other than 5 stars on Itch actually hurts a game (as in, it's worse to give a game 4 stars than to not rate it at all), so what I do is: if I like a game, I rate it 5 stars. If I don't, I just don't rate it.
Obviously this isn't a requirement, and I'm NOT saying to lie about a game (or to do this for my game!). But ratings help on Itch :D And it feels nice to get notifications on there of people enjoying the game, so I'm assuming others feel the same.
With that said, I'm seeing lots of comments on a lot of the Itch pages, and that makes me so freaking happy! 🧡