I generally work with rather short spans of time so I am feeling somewhat confident that I can at least finish a game.
Code (very unlikely) : Python, html, css, php, javascript
Middleware : Twine, Construct 2
Sounds and graphics : Boscal Ceoil, Wolfram Tones, Sfxr, Paint.NET, Gimp, Audacity
Text : Sublime text
I just changed my vote for the final round, voting only “creation”, because I think it will bring so much diversity in the games done this weekend.
I was disappointed with this theme this morning. All the ideas I could come up with were extremely common : one weapon, one life, one level, one parachute in a crashing plane full of people… We’ll probably have thousands new games of this kind after this weekend, and hundred of them will come with effective graphics/level design/music, things I’m not good at, so I can’t compete on this level (and I’m moderately interested in extensively working on these areas). Scrolling through the community posts, the only idea I’ve read that could grab my interest include siamese twins (you get only one body for two) and the person having this idea will not use it. Beside, this has already be done by Krimelo in a game called Siamese Ennemies http://krimelogames.blogspot.fr/2010/10/siamese-enemies.html.
Seriously it’s sunny outside, I have things to do this weekend and I don’t want to spend 48 or 72 hours, or what’s left of it, working on a game I will not even like.
I now went for a run with friends and on the way back I had an idea that might be interesting. So, I will try to do this game.
What I want to do is pretty clear now… I’m very admirative of people saying they have coded game physics and this kind of things today. I use construct 2. I am making a game that will probably be called YOGO SUBMARINES or something of this taste. I’m working with Construct 2 and that’s all I need. As I said, I have no talent whatsoever for graphical work so it looks terrible, so far I’m mostly setting up the gameplay mechanics.
I’ve been a bit busy today so I could not devote so much time to Ludum Dare…but I’m pretty much done with the gameplay mechanics of my game (it’s a surprise).
As you can see, the graphics are still very bad and I do not really plan on improving them.
Did I mention the fact that there isn’t any animation outside of the Construct 2 fadeout stock effect ? Wow.
If I have time to polish this game, I may pay more attention to sound and music.
The game is a two-player seated game and I couldn’t play with anybody yet, but I would still say it’s a lot of fun.
Another busy and sunny day. I’ve been busy with other things than LD… At the same time, it’s when I go out and leave the computer that I seem to solve all the problems and make all the important choices. The game is now playable, I just decided on the last details of the gameplay. I tried to play a couple times today with someone and it went well. Tomorrow I’m free, so I’ll do *some* polishing : graphics, maybe music, fonts, etc… It will mostly depend on my inspiration. I hope I can make this game look better, because I really think the gameplay idea is interesting so I don’t want people to be put off by too awful graphics / interace.
As you can see the game already looks a little little better, now we’ve got waves and they are somehow animated. We’ve got real submarines also.
I have been working on the game a lot today! Now I just went running for a while and as usual I come back with clear ideas about what to do in the final phase!
The gameplay is ready. This is a game where you share earphones so each player get only one of the stereo channel (you get only one earset for two…you get only one earphone each…put it how you want it).
I guess the fun in this game will probably lie in exploring its gameplay mechanics. I guess this is what you call experimental gameplay…
Still, I played yesterday with my sister and we enjoyed the game a lot.
Despite, or because, of its experimental value, I want the game to provide as much playing comfort as possible to the player. In case I fail at making an enjoyable game, I also want the player to understand what I wanted to achieve. These are the reasons why I have spent time designing a cheat mode that allows you to have a clearer view on the mechanics. I have largely given the priority to this over graphics / sound / animation.
As you can see on the title screen, you can also modify some of the game settings, so if you feel like testing other ways to play the game you’ll be allowed to do so.
Time is running now. I will try to work on the following areas :
– smooth movement
– sinking and explosion animations
– nice in-game animated text display
– one more music track for the game over screen (this can take few seconds or few hours depending on my mood and inspiration)
– beautiful multicolour layered sea
I want to keep at least one hour for uploading and final testes! Hope it will be ok!
The game is online! This was a very interesting week-end.
I hope you’ll find the game interesting. The sounds are a bit harsh (especially when you listen to them for 3 days like I just did). I’ve been considering several options : musical instrument, notes, spoken words.. Words are boring (too easy to recognize). Musical notes (where you have to identify pitch or instrument) won’t be manageable for everybody. The best solution I found was to use artificial sounds that do not exist outside of the game, and they also need to be very different from each other.
In its ideal version this game would generate new sounds at the beginning of each game.
The 4 sounds generated would always be beautiful, smooth, soft, and they would be very different from each other.
I also tried this Chronolapse thing but I often forgot to turn it on when working ! So I’ll have a partial timelapse to publish. I guess it will still be a nice souvenir.
I think “Sharing earphones” have a lot more potential than tiny cute submarine games. I plan to re-use this idea in interactive fiction, twine poetry, and all kind of artistry and general weirdness.
My timelapse is bad but you can still watch it.
YOGO Submarines Timelapse #ld28 Ludum Dare Jam 28 from Pierre Chevalier on Vimeo.
I made a gameplay GIF of my game. I had to keep it under 2mb so the colors look a bit ugly (ingame colors are better).
It’s a 2 players game where you need to share earpones ! Try it there.
I’m over 100 rated games and I’ve just started to go over my rating again, starting with “fun” because it’s the easiest thing to judge. I understand “Fun” as the entertainment value of the game. Apparentlyn, most people will give “overall” high ratings when they give “fun” high ratings. However, I think there should be much more to games than entertainment. But for now, let’s check the fun.
One thing that spoils the “fun” in games is the waste of time, especially in games where you lose a lot. If you make a game where the player will lose often (and if you still want to make it “fun”), you should allow him to retry immediately. Don’t add transitions, fade in, scrolling, etc. Just do : 1. play 2. die 3. repeat, and then it becomes addictive.
Three examples of 5/5 “FUN” ratings :
I thought “Go long” was really fun because it really engaged me in its absurdly intense mood.
I was 12 years old again when playing this game. Ok, push the button, kill the enemies, jump, jump, more enemies, kill, kill. This game is exactly what it wants to be.
No way I could stop playing this before beating the last level. Because of : the music, easy movement, mechanics are simple to understand, the way the game responds to the controls is very neat, I had to actually “stop and think” about how to solve the puzzles, no waste of time when loosing, starting over, or even winning. Transitions are fast.
4This entry was posted on Thursday, December 19th, 2013 at 11:41 am and is filed under LD #28. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
I’m over 150 games so let’s have a look at 5/5 “humor” rated games.
Humor. Who can discuss it?
Ha ha ha ha! I don’t know why I’m laughing ! HA HA HA HA!
So in this game you are a cute blue little cat and you get to play a football match, you alone, against 11 gorillas all faster and stronger than you. I laughed so hard at how unfair the whole concept of the game is, and of course at how it connects to the LD theme. The best thing is that you really get to play the full match as if it was a classic football videogame from the 90’s, well, except you get stomped upon by gorillas every two second and you end up your first match with an humiliating score.
Before I comply to the exotic LD tradition of self-analysis, allow me to express my disapproval of such a choice of words, “Post-mortem”, to name the telling of one’s game development. Deeds are not dead things, and dog-latin unfunny jokes are bad nerdery. Ladies and gentlemen, let’s proceed.
Ha yes, you may want to play the game, first.
What went right
– I made a game. This game does somethings to your brain (actually, may lead to mental exhaustion if played too seriously).
– Similar games may exist, but I never played them. So I had no “model” to emulate, and that made my weekend challenging and therefore, enjoyable.
– Game looks decent enough to allow the players to focus on the gameplay.
– I like how the idea links to the theme.
– Technically, I learned a lot.
– I’m going to re-use this one-earbud-each idea in all kind of games and art projects
What went wrong
– Making a 2 players game by myself, so I couldn’t really test it in real conditions. And because of this :
– Default settings and rules are not optimized (e.g. game would be more suspenseful if the aim was to reach a score limit, the game board should be larger with more squares…).
– Most people here play solo, so they can’t get a precise idea of how playing really feels like
– Some of the sounds get unpleasant over time
Dreamingly listing the features of an hypothetical future build
– Built-in sound generator (kinda sfxr). New sounds generated for each game. The sounds are : abstract, very different from each other, and nice to listen to.
– Collectable upgrades that change the course of the game (for example : suddendly randomize the other player’s sounds)
– Fully customisable game rules (mine behaviour, level size, number of players, etc…)
– More music tracks
– Generally nicer looking
– Tutorial
– Extra modes : cooperative, adventure, solo, treasure hunt, king of the hill, turn-based…[EDIT] Counter-strike with terrorist submarines! [EDIT] UNDERWATER BOMBERMAN!!! PACMAN BUT WITH SUMBARINES!!! TOMB RAIDER MODE!!!! YOGO SUBMARINES GONE HOME!!!
We have the same thougths, and we are also late-starters.