For anyone who needs some more inspiration for good theme ideas, here are the recent Ludum Dares sorted by how many people submitted a project compared to how many signed up.

Both the Jam and the Compo allow you to use existing base code so you don't need to wait to start coding your game. You can use placeholder art/music/sounds/etc. to test. Even if you end up wanting to switch genres for the specific theme, you'll be able to reuse a lot of your base code.

Check out all the rules here: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/rules

And the FAQ, which covers A.I. use too: https://ludumdare.com/resources/questions/

The 55 in the font lines up well, with some minor tweaks.

Summoning is pretty far ahead in the poll. Of course that's no guarantee of anything but if it wins, do you know what you'll make yet?

The good news is that I have a great idea for this theme (I think). The bad news is that I have to ditch the base code I was prepping for the 2D platformer and start from scratch. But that's OK. It'll be worth it!

I think a lot can be done with either one.

Communication can be done any number of ways: talk, sign language, telepathy, leaving notes or messages on signs, smoke signals, morse code, cryptic patterns and clues and many more.

Direction is a course and also guidance/instruction. Lead or follow which way to go, cook meals by following recipes, take advice from the right (or wrong) NPCs, travel from planet to planet or town to town, go step by step with a treasure map, etc.

I've seen a few duplicates during the Slaughter Round (I want to say my own suggestion, Communication, was there at least twice).

What happens in this case? I think some people will not vote for a second copy of the same theme so duplicate themes will have less votes than they should, right? Has this been addressed before? Is it somehow corrected after the slaughter round?

Lot of fun possibilities but a few themes were a bit too limiting imo. Even wild magic, which I could have enjoyed making a game around, I didn't find any variety in. Garden is too much like harvest from 2 years ago, but with less options.

That said, I'm probably a hypocrite as trade is somewhat limiting but the theme is interesting to me and still has multiple interpretations.

This is why you make sure everything works ahead of time, people. Don't be like me! Haha. Still, it's a fun learning experience so no real regrets.