So this is my intro post for LD 29.  My name is Mark and I’m a programmer based in Chicago.  This is my first LD and my second game jam total.  I made a game called Swifty Beams for the Flappy Jam back in February, and have subsequently released it – you can check it out here.  I’ve been coding since I was about 10 years old, but I’ve only  been getting back into “proper” games since about July of last year.

My toolset:

• Custom game engine written in JavaScript and HTML 5
• Aptana Studio
• Adobe Fireworks
• As3fxr

I’m looking forward to it but I’m also terrified of the short schedule.  I had about two weeks to do Swifty Beams but this is more like two DAYS.  It’s way less time than I’ve had for anything else and I’m hoping I can put something cool together!

I post some stuff on twitter at @markdoesnttweet.  I’ll try to tweet interesting things during the weekend but hopefully I’ll manage to stay away from it long enough to actually be productive!

I’m publicly releasing my Javascript / HTML5 game library, along with a (partially completed) tech demo.  It supports spritesheets, tile-based collisions readable from CSV, parallax background images, and sounds.  Get the goods here!

So the theme that we decided on is similar to the myth of Scylla + Charybdis, with a bit of Siren thrown in.  You swim around the ocean trying to lure sailors to their deaths, by singing to them to placate them, then grabbing them and pulling them in.  You have to avoid getting hit by cannonballs that they fire at you, as well as managing your health and breath (which you spend to sing and swim underwater).

I’m making some good progress so far.  The tech demo thus far allows you to swim around and leap out of the water in a really satisfying way, and models your breath meter correctly.  The next thing is to work on is generating boats with cannons and sailors attached.

So I’m pretty much done coding for the day.  Here’s a prototype of what Gerry and I have so far:

Scylla and Charybdis

Gerry just added a kick-ass background to the game, as you can see here:

Coming soon – skulls.

Siren Song has been submitted!  GO GO GO GO GO.

And here’s the full entry.

Title screen.

I…I…I think I’m in love!

Big ships, little ships.

MEET YOUR DOOM.

Bullet hell, Greek navy style.