Learn basic C# : check.

Learn basic Unity : check.

Learn basic whatever that software to make music is called : I can make "beep" and "bop", good enough.

Learn basic whatever that software to make sound effect is called : I can make "beep" and "bop", but less music-y and more sound effect-y, good enough.

Learn basic Blender : check.

Learn basic animation : check... more or less ?

Learn how to put basic animation in Unity : wait, what does that button do ? Where did my scene go ? Why can't I change this window ? Why does it say my shoulder is an upper arm ? Why is this moving and the rest isn't ? Why is my character doing a death pose even though I haven't created a death pose yet ? confused beginner noise

4 days on the clock, let's wish us all good luck... don't know for you but guess I'm gonna need it !

So, this was my first Ludum Dare and it went awfully, from the overall mood (with someone very close to me becoming ill just a day before the LD) to software driving me mad (lost an hour because my IDE had forgotten where Unity was) to software driving even madder (Unity deciding it didn't recognize my animation until I renamed my 3D model from "humanoid" to "Jesus" for some unknown reason) to just overall not having the necessary skills for such an experience (I learned that I can't just texture stuff in Blender and have it be picked up by Unity somewhere around mid-day 2 for example).

Day One seemed "fine", but day two was so bad I really believed I wouldn't make it and in fact, 3 hours before the deadline I had a 3D model, a background, some code, but no game whatsoever, I even believed there wouldn't be enough time to get anything interactive to post. After a lot of pissed off variable name and a bit of crying, I had something to post : it is awful, the graphics are buggy, the gameplay doesn't work, nothing that I wanted to implement is there except one thing which doesn't look like it should and doesn't work like it should, and that's without talking about the fact that I didn't have time to do any music nor any sound effect : it was a painful and disappointing experience.

I feared these results, because to be honest, I wouldn't have been surprised to be in the dead-lasts for all category : my graphics are buggy, the gameplay is interactive and that's already saying a lot, there's no music, no humour, the theme was supposed to be there but not implemented right so it isn't really there : I failed and I expected these results to show that... but weirdly enough, they don't.

I'm in the sub-1000 on some of those !

Compared to the 1383 participants, that's a huge victory ! Even better : my shitty buggy 3D got me in the sub 800 on graphics, not that far away from the upper half, and that's the strong point of my submission (which is insanely reassuring for me as clearly graphics interest me way more than code or music). ld-rank-checker tells me I'm #966, sub-1000 again... it's hard to believe.

Like, seriously, I expected 1200th+ on all of those, I don't know what to say. I've no word for those 21 people who ranked my interactive experience.

Thank you so much.

... and suddenly, Unity decided to do modern art : https://youtu.be/4jqYOFBaHxA

(only the first 10s matter)

If you ask me, it's not a bug, it's questioning the hegemony of the 24h time system. Or something like that. "Unintentional feature", cause it looks buggy but also quite cool for some reason.

Second time participating, last time I managed to finish, overall... dead last, of all the ones that got notes... hoping to do better this time. I posted with like 50s left because I had forgotten that we only have an hour to post the game, that's a good start.

Am not gonna manage to be last twice in a rom am I ?

Anyway, now it's time to play your games !

Hi the community !

After a few days of being sick, I've tried to fix the biggest issues of my second LD game, without doing too much (it's still a tiny game made by a beginner ^^) : redone the movement, fixed a camera bug, played with the animations to make them a bit quicker (and make it so when you land, well, you land), fixed a bug where the enemies would still be able to attack once dead, fixed a bug which made it so the end would never spawn, and tried to do so you can't get back your jump by jumping in a wall (even though it's still the case). I've also removed the double-jump, it was buggy, didn't help in the long run, so I'll rather not have it at all.

The V2 and V1 are both available on the same page : https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/47/the-exit-is-in

I'll like to redo much more, but I think I'll end up starting from scratch and doing something entirely different as I'm not really happy with anything in there, so I think this is where I'm going to stop for this one.

My first LD I did an interactive software and that was saying a lot, second LD I did a micro-game that isn't really good or innovative or beautiful but can be described as a "game" without having to stretch the definition, I'm gonna consider this a major progress =).

~~I don't know how many games have been ranked in each category for both this and the previous LD, so I'll compare the actual scores instead~~ [Added percentage comparaison below] :

Overall : 2.211 => 2.518 (+ 0.307)

Fun : 1.921 => 2.464 (+ 0.543)

Innovation : 2.684 => 2.929 (+ 0.245)

Theme : 2.474 => 2.722 (+ 0.248)

Graphics : 3 => 2.732 (- 0.268)

Audio : None => 1.8

Humour : 2 => 2.14 (+ 0.14)

Mood : 2.395 => 2.231 (- 0.164)

There's progress, and I do understand some of those results, but the comparison still hurts a bit. My first LD could barely be described as a game, my second one was a very bad game, but at least a game, I expected a bigger jump. Graphics going down, I disagree, I feel like my first LD got a "pity boost" for its graphics, which weren't better than the second's game (n°1 had 2 animations, one of which was playing backward, n°2 has 5 or 6 and they all work ! The backgrounds are much better looking, the 3D models are better...), but meh, I get the 2.7, it still looks awful. 1.8 in audio is the one that hurts the most, but I do know that I don't know anything about music and picked random notes to try to make a song, so I don't know what I really expected. Failing to reach an average score in any category is also very frustrating (in my ratings I considered 3 stars to be average), but again, being a beginner, I'm probably placing the bar a bit too high for myself. Mood, I don't think I even understand what the word mean, I've had a very hard time judging other game on this, so I don't really care.

Overall, better scores, there's progress, the game, this time, was a game, but there's still a ton of stuff to learn before I can safely say I did something good. Next goal score-wise probably will be to get a 3 in at least one category I guess...

Edit : Thanks to @adroitconceptions I do have more stats to show ! Here are the percentage of people who did worse than me :

Overall : 0.09 => 3.65

Fun : 0.28 => 9.38

Innovation : 11.23 => 26.87

Theme : 2.88 => 11.11

Graphics : 24.64 => 13.11

Audio : None => 1.4

Humour : 5.10 => 13.76

Mood : 3.69 => 2.08

The graphics one is even more frustrating, BUT : I've managed to leave the worse quarter on one category (innovation), something I didn't manage to do for my first LD ! I also manage to not be in the worst 1% in anything, even though my audio is really close to be in that. This stat is way better for my moral. The fun rating in particular, going from 1.9 to 2.4 felt like not enough between my two entries, but going from better than 0.3% to better than 9.4% is waaaaay better. More work to do, more learning to do, but there's progress, for real. Am a bit less sad thanks to this (thank you very much adroidconceptions for your numbers !).

https://youtu.be/Y4rXunZurzI

Background is a place holder, player doesn't take damage yet, lives are not implemented, only 2/3 enemies are there (and no boss), there's still a shop to code, audio to make, UI... tomorrow will be a very long day, as Day 2s always seems to be, but right now, it's 1AM, it's sleeping time.

Good night fellow Europeans, good day to everyone else (I think) and good whatever for those who don't fit in any of these two situations !

(there was no audio during my first participation, and its overall is actually there, it's just so tiny you can't see it)

For those that prefer raw numbers :

Overall : 2.211 => 2.518 => 2.964 (+0.446)

Fun : 1.921 => 2.464 => 2.911 (+0.447)

Innovation : 2.684 => 2.929 => 2.554 (-0.375)

Theme : 2.474 => 2.722 => 2.589 (-0.133)

Graphics : 3 => 2.732 => 3.268 (+0.536)

Audio : => 1.8 => 2.786 (+0.986)

Humour : 2 => 2.14 => 2.327 (+0.187)

Mood : 2.395 => 2.231 => 2.679 (+0.448)

The relative results were calculated thanks to @abvadabra stat sheet, I just took off all Jam entries than got the last place out of each category to maths out these percentages. They each represent what percentage of people did worse than I do, so 0% means I did the worst game in this category and 100% would be the best :

Overall : 0.09 => 3.65 => 14.92 (+11.271)

Fun : 0.28 => 9.38 => 22.72 (+13.337)

Innovation : 11.23 => 26.87 => 12.58 (-14.285)

Theme : 2.88 => 11.11 => 6.68 (-4.430)

Graphics : 24.64 => 13.11 => 37.67 (+24.556)

Audio : 0.00 => 1.40 => 16.67 (+15.264)

Humour : 5.10 => 13.76 => 23.34 (+9.575)

These results are... hard to process. On one side, I'm happy to have done better than the previous two in nearly all category. I knew going into this that the theme would be an awful score (I wanted to do a Super Fantasy Zone clone, that's a shoot them up that only has horizontal scrolling and that loops, when I saw the theme I became very sad) and innovation... well, it's a shoot them up, a very bad one, but it's a "game", compared to 47's interactive software and 46's... thing. So in a sense, this being less innovative makes sense (this time, outside of a shop, everything that I wanted to put in worked, the previous two had interesting but unfinished and bugged features). Humour, there wasn't any (for the third time in a row), except the lack of invisible wall that made for a quick joke that at least one player found funny and the description which I tried to make a bit fun to read as well (with English not being my native language, that's kind of a challenge !), so again, not a good score, not a problem. The rest went way up, looking at the raw number, +.5 star nearly, that's a huge improvement and for all of that, I kinda feel happy I think. I did a game. You can play it, it won't soft-lock you, and you'll have things to do. There's an ending, a win-con (sort of, scoring is the wincon), an actual death screen. A very bad game, but it's a game. That's big progress.

But on the other hand... outside of graphics, which is the most important thing to me as that's what I want to learn and do as a job, nothing got past 3 stars and seeing "2.9" feels less like a 3 and more like a 2, so everything feels below average which... I guess is right ? Still, it feels bad. The diagrams don't help, progress seems even slower and relative place seems more random than anything else. Graphics are the only thing that don't make me too sad, 46's thing had 3 stars because of pity, it looked awful, I've managed to overcome that, but then again, I'm just slightly above a 1/3rd of all compo entries... these stats makes me sad. Graphics, even with its way better score than everything else, still makes me sad, because I know that I ran into things I couldn't do or at least couldn't do well. I did better, but better doesn't feel good enough and these final results show this very well.

So in the end... I guess this is progress. One step at a time, it'll probably not be 49 nor 50 but if I keep my slow improvements someday I might actually manage to do an average entry, who knows ?

Hi ! I'm curious. I'm trying to learn toon shaders for Unity, and I wonder if it's something I'll have to redo from scratch (as it's art-related) or can just copy and paste directly (as it's just some basic shader code found in tutorials on youtube) ?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IIOK8VJFRis

One week before the LD : "so, are you participating ?". Wait, there's an LD ? Hum, well, don't really want to, but I don't want to miss one either... well, I haven't opened Unity nor VSCode since... the last LD... but I have a week !

awful week, a close relative had major health issue, no real time nor motivation to re-learn stuff...

--

DAY ONE !

So, the theme... is not half bad. I can redo my very first LD game ! I'll see the difference, it'll be so cool, and I saw how to do custom shaders, oh I can do something so cool. So, I know I should start with the code, but I don't want to, so I'll start with the 3D models (I'm trying to learn 3D to make it my job, so it's the most important part to me).

Humanoid 3D model : check ! Cloth (learned how to do them literally yesterday) : check ! Animation : check !

So, now to bring anim... BSOD... oh, those animations are corrupted. Cool. Well. Gotta fix all of this. I can do it !

(middle of the night)

So, I'm done redoing all of this, now, I saw there was an easy way to export cloth to unity... (doesn't work, have to scrap all the cloths)... okay, but I have my cool 3D models and animations at least. Tomorrow, the code and I'm done !

--

DAY TWO !

So, I export a .fbx, I drag and dropped and... there's no animation. Why aren't there any animations ? Google, help.

(3h later)

I can't get any of my animations to Unity and my computer's crashed thrice today already. Nothing is exporting, we're 36h into this and I've got absolutely nothing usable. Well, this LD's a bust. I tap out.

(Day 2, 6h PM, making a cake to try to push away the sadness)

I suck. I really suck. WHY did I decide to go with 3D stuff ? Had I done a card game I would already be done ! In fact I could have done it in a single day ! Even less than that maybe. Wait, how many hours do I have left ?

crunch crunch crunch

(midnight)

Okay, there are two game-breaking bugs, I can fix them after, I just need to post something. So, fix this, fix that. 20min left, time to build the WebGL vers... BSOD again. F... well, going to try to push it to the limit.

00h58

I have a build to upload. Technically. It doesn't work at all for some unknown reason (javascript errors ?), and even in Unity where it kinda work... more "kinda" then "work"... it's awful, it's super buggy, but it's a thing. Post it, go cry in the bed, see stuff tomorrow.

--

DAY 2+1 !?

So, can I quickly fix a bug and call it "technically in the rules" ? Nop. Well. This LD's a bust again. I'll fix stuff later. Like, tomorrow. Or in two or three hours. Or like, after I've watched this. Why don't I try it now ?

Took me 4h to fix every bug. It's probably so much it doesn't fit in the rules anymore, I've added a big disclaimer on my entry just in case, I didn't change anything else (even though I'll love to), but I don't really care either way, if I don't get note this time it doesn't matter. I did a thing, technically.

Me 1 - 0 Depression.

Now, next time... it'll be my 5th attempt, maybe I'll try to make a game who knows ? ^^

Edit : Got them ! Thank you very much people <3 Now let's give their 20 notes to the other compo games out there that need them !

The final score doesn't matter for me this time, just having something done was a major achievement for me... but being at 18/20 makes it more worth it ! There's not much, it won't take you a lot of time, please just two more votes !

So, results are here. This time they don't really matter to me (or I'll like to think they don't...), as the name suggests this LD went awfully and in the end getting anything out was a success. Now was it something good ? Well, let's see what people thought :

(no audio this time)

This graph shows the percentage of people who did worst then me. On one hand, this is my worst score in three different categories : Graphics (only 1.7% of people did worst then me), Humour (3.5%) and Mood (1%). To be honest, there were no graphics, the only humour was on the game description and the mood... there wasn't any either, so I'm not surprised. On the other hand, this is by far my best score in Innovation (better than 36% of people). It's still far from "good", but for a random idea I had 3h after a mental breakdown while making a cake it's kinda insane.

Looking at star ratings is going to show us exactly the same things, but the differences are not as visible :

Technically not the worst Overall I ever got (2.368 vs 2.211 during my very first LD) nor the worst Fun (2.184 vs 1.921, again from my first LD). Also, for the second time in four participations I manage to get one item over 3 (3.132 in Innovation, my only other score above 3 before was last time's 3.268 in Graphics). Still, no real progress score-wise, I still suck at making video games.

If anybody's interested, the complete graphs with scores from every LD game I made is available over there : https://i.imgur.com/lG1wA2F.png

So conclusion : meh. Getting to the end still is a success to me and I'm very surprised by the Innovation score, so I'll give myself a "technically didn't fail" / 20.