Hi everyone!

I'll be joining Ludum Dare 39 and it's going to be my first. As a trial by fire of sorts.

The girlfriend was notified about it, and she's okay with it. That's kinda a relief for me, since I'll be home, but not really available for extended/meaningful interaction. I do plan to watch Formula 1 together on sunday. Just the race though. Can't idle too much...

That brings me to my schedule. Or rather, the lack of one. I'm not sure how to plan the weekend by the hour. I will for sure take my naps, but I don't know how much time should be spend on brainstorming, prototyping, art, music, polish, etc.

Does anyone have any schedules to share? Thanks in advance!

Planned tools to use: -Gamemaker Studio Standard 1.4 -Inkscape & Gimp -Milkytracker -SFXR / my voice

So, we're past the halfway mark for the compo, and I'm guestimating that my game is too!

The core gameplay is done and scoring system in place.

All that it needs now is pollish on all aspects. As I'm using placeholder artwork and there are no sounds, music or menus.

I plan on staying up late all the way into the submission hour. For me, that's at 3 am, so I wonder how I'll cope...

Listening to some 80s songs to keep me awake. I'd say it's working!

So, I'm not sure if it's against the posting rules, but since I think it's relevant and kinda our thing here, I'll post it anyway.

I found out today that the current Humble Bundle is all about GameMaker. 1.4 to be precise. An oldie, I know, but a steal! Hear me out.

Pay what you want and you get GM Professional. Pay more than the average, currently $10.90 and you get the HTML5 module too. Pay $15 and you get the Android, iOS and UWP modules as well! I'll let you do the math...

Some people may have GM 1.4 but no extra modules, so compiling an HTML5 version, for instance, is out of the question. Which is a shame, as it fits splendidly with Ludum Dare!

I found myself in this position this weekend. I only had 1.4 Standard, so today, I took the jump and bought the bundle, ported my game Buzzy :bee: and published it!

Check either out if you want.

The results for our games are in and so is mine.

Buzzy Bee did okay I guess!
Considering it was my first complete game and first Ludum Dare, I'm pretty pleased.

Overall: 633rd (2.553 average from 49 ratings)
Fun: 625th (2.298 average from 49 ratings)
Innovation: 596th (2.383 average from 49 ratings)
Theme: 618th (2.553 average from 49 ratings)
Graphics: 559th (2.511 average from 49 ratings)
Audio: 478th (2.128 average from 49 ratings)
Mood: 561st (2.295 average from 46 ratings)

All ratings are pretty much near each other.
Considering about 1503 got rated, that puts me between the top 31% and 41%. It's not precise, but it gives me a rough estimate of were I'm at.
Placement aside, I'm most happy that I even got over 20 ratings. I tried rating and commenting others every day, so that may have helped. At the very least, I got to know the community.

Concluding, not too shabby, but there's lots of room for improvement.
I'm going to train hard, because Ludum Dare 40 is definitely going into my agenda!