For the last year or so I’ve thought about doing the next Ludum Dare, but always seemed to miss them somehow. Not this time! Being my first time, I thought I might try the jam… but since I probably can’t do much on Monday anyway, I’m going aim for the compo deadline and see how it goes.

I’ll be using:

Code: Java + LibGDX (maybe Box2D as well, if whatever idea the theme leads to requires such fanciness)

Graphics: Photoshop CS2

Audio: Bfxr + Bosca Ceoil

I’ll stick the code up on a GitHub account I have yet to register, and host it… somewhere.

YES.

Got off to a slow start thanks to some really silly bugs, but made some progress in the end.

The weapon is a hammer, and it’s unconventional because getting hit with it is actually a good thing. If you hit an enemy with it, they get bigger. However, if you hit the floor, it rebounds, hits you in the head, and you get bigger. If you collide with an enemy, you both shrink. If you (or an enemy) are at their smallest level, the collision kills you. New enemies are constantly spawning, to win, you have to destroy them fast enough so that there are none left on screen.

It basically works but needs a hell of a lot of polishing up, both graphics and gameplay. So that’s for tomorrow. Hopefully it will go smoothly. Been an interesting challenge so far!

Good night, and good luck

Well, I actually have a working game, when building and running from IntelliJ, but for some reason the .jar file won’t run. Furthermore, there’s no sound, because I forgot that LibGDX needs audio assets to be in the Android assets folder, and I deselected the Android option when setting up the project as I wasn’t intending to use it. Tried to make a new project using it, but… oops, seems I have an incompatible version of the SDK. So no sound. And there’s a bug which crashes the menu if you press any button other than the correct ones. I have a vague notion as to why, but as with all of these problems, I’m tired, and can’t think straight.

So, failure, I guess, unless I have time to fix it tomorrow and submit it for the jam. Not sure yet!

BUT! It has been fun and interesting, I do have a (pretty much) working game, it is by far the quickest I’ve ever made a game like this, and I have a number of thoughts on how to get things to proceed more smoothly next time. My god the source code is a horrible mess, though…

Amy and the Magic Hammer

I may well come back to this after finishing off another non Ludum Dare project I’m almost done with, as I’m quite attached to my dear little character, Amy, and her struggle to escape from an accidental detour to hell by means of repeatedly smashing herself on the head with a large hammer and running into monsters.

Well, I guess since I’m not submitting it, I won’t get to vote on everyone’s games, but I look forward to playing them as some that have been popping up look really impressive!

As mentioned in my last post, I ran into a bunch of problems last night and didn’t know if I’d get it finished. Missed the compo deadline, but went back to it this evening and… well, sleep is an excellent problem solving aid

So here it is: http://ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-32/?action=preview&uid=51830

Glad I got it done in the end. Enjoyed it and will certainly be back for another jam in the future.

Now I can have a look at some other games, finally!

Right, I’m in, for my 2nd Ludum Dare. Probably for the jam, maybe the compo, will see how things go time wise…

Shall be using Java/Photoshop/BFXR/Bosca Ceoil I expect.

FUN.