Finally I can say – I’m in! I wanted to join for so many years now, and this weekend my dreams come true! ( No idea how it will work out, but that is quite the reason, why we all do it I’ve been part of PyWeek couple of times. I’m gonna use these tools:

Coding: C#, VS 2013, Wave Engine (new engine to learn)

Graphics: Gimp, Inkscape (I do suck at this >:D)

Sounds: FL Studio 11, (I am missing my keyboard, where I compose usually), Mic, Ukulele, Violin, Harmonica etc.

My university (Charles University in Prague) has offered all LD participants a shelter in our school building (right under the Prague castle), for the whole time. How cool is that?

Tags: #gamedev #ludumdare #imin

In Prague, Czech Republic the compo started at 3a.m., so I decided to have a good sleep and started about 8 hours into the competition. I like the theme, and I very soon had my idea of the ultimate unconventional weapon – eyes!

I don’t know what it is about eyes that I simply love, but I chose them to be my weapon, same as my older game, where bad guys were spitting eyes at the hero. They are easy to draw, funny when flying around, easy to make them either cute or evil, so it’s my clear choice.

I want both music and graphics to entertain, so I need to spend some time with that, so I decided that the game should be fun, but super-simple.

First idea – 2D platformer, two weird ufo-characters against each other playing dodge ball – with their own eyes. Player can throw the eye at the other player like a dodge ball player would throw the ball. The eye will bounce like a ball and stay at the place.

Funny thing about that – the player really loses his only eye – he can’t see and his controls are inverted (that sucks, but it’s part of the strategy). When the eye stops somewhere, player can pick it up and shoot again. When he picks it up again, he can finally move normally (arrows, w a s d…). He can pick also eye of the other player.

Other ideas:

• there can be extra eyes around the map as an ammo
• different kinds of players (different eyes, multiple eyes)
• different eyes = different weapon (bazooka eye – explosion -> one-time weapon)

For sounds I plan to record some sounds with my mouth and edit it in FL studio to really sound funny. The main music will be all done by my ukulele, I am looking forward to that part!

This logo basically explains, what the game is going to be about :0)

After some very tiring bugfixing I finally managed to render first alpha map. Wave Engine has some very cool image effects, check this Fish Eye lens

Haha, I know I should be submitting already, but I am finishing the installation file etc… Excuse me, it’s my first LD! :0)

I personaly think that “An Unconventional Weapon” theme was very lucky one, because I saw many great ideas that came out of that, and I think I haven’t seen to completely same weapons, which is impressive. Anyways, I made a short list of games that really caught me:

SpaceSharp by jsmars

Cool remake of Space Invaders controlled completely by text commands. Requires fingers fast as hell and is fun also thanks to a online high score table.

God’s Going to Cut Em Down by emmelineprufrock

Very well written text game that has no connection to the topic, but its atmosphere is drawing you in and makes you imagine all about the world of this very short and also unfinished story. Very nice graphics as well.

LiceCity by Blister

Simple but fun idea about an unending war with lice. Cute graphics and fun gameplay, bit tough to control and way too hard to pass second level, but with just a bit of polishing, this could be amazing game.

Soulstealer by SilentNight

Very complete and fun game connecting many nice ideas into very engaging and consistent experience. My second favourite game.

Just my own two cents by NekuSoul

My very favourite game. So simple idea but made very fun and believable. Fluent connection of two worlds. Definitely worth trying and also finishing, estimated game time is five minutes, took me about 7.

For the Heart of Europe! by jakub.gemrot

Game by a fellow I worked along on our local Prague jam. Fun politics game about current propaganda waves that are very strong in Europe nowadays, especially on the internet. Make Putin’s Russia go loving USA and enjoy various quotes of Europian leaders that became memes now.

Eyed by Marek Lisý

My personal entry that came out much better than I expected. Fun local multiplayer game, I will make post-compo version with score counters and hilarious sounds (already recorded) and soundtrack (completely made by single ukulele).

If you have a buddy around and feel like having some fun, make sure you play my game Eyed. It came out exactly like I intended – an eye dodgeball, so let’s say dodge-eye.

The rules are simple, but a bit tricky at first – you throw your eye in direction of your movement, and it immediately becomes “angry”, therefore killing your enemies and even you. You have to wait until it slows down and becomes calm again and then you can pick it up. But, you can also pick an eye of your enemy, and that’s the biggest fun! The big eyes watches you!

Play here!

I feel a bit guilty about not yet releasing the post-compo version yet, because I have already a ton of hilarious sounds recorded and edited (took about 12 hours already) plus soundtrack samples recorded, but the time is so precious nowadays, so it will come in a week or so… Also, I would like to add score counter, add more maps with some extra eyes around etc. If you like it, make sure to check out the post-compo later on!