I have decided, once again, to enter the ludum dare jam. I have made posts declaring my entrance in the past, but I am normally quickly overwhelmed by my lack of programming experience/knowledge and end up producing absolutely nothing.

So here I am, ready to maybe actually get something done, even if I fail to complete it!

Now, my tools:

Language: JAVA
Framework: Slick2D & LWJGL
IDE: Eclipse
GFX: Pickle, Pyxel & Paint.net
SFX: sfxr
Music: FL Studio & Audition

And, of course, the ceremonial “I’m in” post would not be complete without a picture of my current workspace:

Wish me luck! And a good luck to you!

Edit: I failed to mention that I will be entering the jam.
Edit 2: I will also be streaming via twitch.tv

The theme is minimalism and I’m sure you all already know this.  It’s an interesting theme because a lot of people will take it at surface value, as I’ve noticed in the IRC chat earlier. It seems to conjure ideas of laziness in people, or simple games where you click a button to win.

One of the beauties of the Ludum Dare is we are allowed to interpret the themes anyway we choose. I had a basic understanding of minimalism as an art form, but I decided to do a quick Google search to see what it turned up. What stood out to me was the following line, “…the work is set out to expose the essence or identity of a subject through eliminating all non-essential forms, features or concepts.” I then realized that minimalism is a vessel in which we deliver what we wish to convey. This made me really reflect on the idea. I began to put my plan together for my game and any time I had a feature or something I wanted to add I reflected on it and decided if it was excess.

I now have my idea and story for my game which I am in the middle of putting together. I hope you all of you who were having trouble with this theme earlier aren’t having too much trouble now; if you are, keep at it and remember that minimalism is simply your vessel.

Good luck!

Writing. Writing. Writing.

I find it much easier to get my ideas out on paper using a pencil, a Dixon Ticonderoga(I love these pencils), than on a computer with some text editor. My ideas just flow easier; I feel free.

Now here I am jotting down lines I will need to record while constructing the story. Although, I would love to show what I have done so far, I feel that it would just spoil the story too much. So, I will be sure to save all my scratches for my post-mortem.

Sleep. Sleep can wait. Not that it ever wants me anyway.

A simple title screen.

Keep it simple. Keep clean. Keep it minimal. No need for excess here.

I haven’t really completed a game before, since I’m still relatively new to the whole programming/game programming scene. I have, however, attempted to make games. Now, while attempting to make games I never got to the point where audio was needed, so I haven’t spent anytime learning how to do it.

Enter: The Red Circle

Like a fool, I decided that my entry into the Ludum Dare should be a game with a narration track… or tracks. Now here I am, throwing code at my game and hoping no bugs arise.

My inexperience is showing. Soooooooo much audio and music to do. What makes it worse is this nervousness I’m feeling about my game. Oh well, there’s no stopping now!

I’ve had to cut most of my game due to workflow and horrible code. Even though I would love to complete this and someday probably will, right now I just can’t. I will be submitting what I have to the jam and I hope it has somewhere close to the affect on people I was hoping.

Well, whether I like it or not my game is submitted. A lot went wrong, but I think there is something good that can be taken from it still. Anyways, give it a try.

Play here!

Oh and make sure you go right your first play through. Trust me.

This isn’t a for sure “I’m in,” but I’ll see what I can do. I’m still very new to libGDX so I can’t guarantee I’ll get anything done.

My setup:

• Language: JAVA
• Framework: libGDX
• IDE: Eclipse
• Other: Pickle, Paint.net, FL Studio, sfxr & other various software if need be.

Good luck to everyone!

I’ll be taking a swing at SharkJam this weekend. I’ll be using the following:

GM Studio
Paint.net
Pickle Editor
sfxr
FL Studio

Good luck everyone!

Tags: sharkjam

I finally have an idea and decided to keep it as simple as possible. Currently, I’m trying to get the mechanics and controls in working order before I move onto graphics and audio. Audio and graphics will follow the same idea as far as keeping them simple.

Hopefully, I’ll have something to show before the day is over and it’s somewhat enjoyable as far as gameplay goes.