I’m in for LD#32!

It’ll be my first time developing for LD and on my own…. I would like to participate in miniLD but I don’t think I’m ready yet ^^;

Good word everyone!

First LD and first update! Already one day passed and so many things to do >.< But enjoying a lot the experience!

When thinking about an unconventional weapon to my game I thought “Why choose only one?”. So my scenario is a Bar Fight, where everything can become an improvised weapon! The objective is to survive X nights against drunk people and your own drunkness!

I got basic mechanics working, and VERY basic sprites (design is really not my strength). For my tests I made 2 initial weapons: spoon and piano.

To do:

• Main Screen
• More Nights
• Better AI
• Tons of Weapons
• SoundEffects
• Learn how to make gifs

Good work everyone!

Well, it’s near the end but I submitted a while ago xp

It was really fun doing this first LD and I’ll certainly participate again! The game itself isn’t as fun as I imagined, but I think it turned out ok. So many things to learn! Hope next time I can deliver a more complete game!

Great work everyone!

Bar Fight

Minutes to LD32 end and I finally made my post mortem xp. I edited my entry with it and I will post it too. Of course everyone is always welcome to take a look at it~!

Post-mortem:
First of all thank you for all of you who played/rated my game! I was really nervous since it was my first time but I got surprised by the positive feedback ^^.

Again, as my first game I had lots of limitations such as lack of skills and just inexperience. Still I’m proud of what I was able to do and happy to make people have fun with my work.

What went well:
– The concept of the game came really fast, which made possible to start programing ASAP.
– Programing was smooth, specially because a lot of code (and engine) of my training to LD was useful to make this game.
– Pixel art, although very simple, I developed my skills while drawing them.
– I was able to make a lot of weapons and make it chaotic, which was the plan.
– The time management was quite good. I was able to get decent sleep and eat well. Of course more time would be better, but I prioritized my health to make to the end of the jam. I got a bit behind the schedule but still delivered most of what I wanted.

What went wrong:
– Pixel art, still needs improvement.
– UI didn’t seem quite helpful.
– Sound and Music, still need to learn how to make them properly.
– Bad AI, need to learn more about implementing them.
– Collision detector is not quite right, I assumed most objects to be circles to make implementation easier but it doesn’t seem right

What’s next:
– Study more!
– Develop more the engine
– Practice art concepts
– Learn how to use a music/sound maker

I’m in for my 2nd ludumdare!

I really enjoyed my first LD but I couldn’t make decent art work nor music. So for this one I tried to practice a lot those aspects… not very successful, but still I did improve xp. Couldn’t improve my engine much too, but it’s still usable! Untill it begins I will still practice!

Good luck everybody! See you guys in two weeks!

• Language: C++ (My own engine!)
• IDE: Visual Studio
• Graphics (pixel art): GIMP
• Music: LMMS
• SFX: BFXR

What magical adventure is awaiting for me?

Anya is fully animated! And I’m really tired xp maybe it’s time for little break?

This is one of the guards of the city! I always feel safe when they are around!

(I’m not sure if I’m going to use him as it is…. something feels off… what do you guys think?)

“Mom, why the houses are on fire?”

“Just pack quickly Anya….”

I should really learn how to animate fire… but so many things to do yet >.<

“Just run Anya, and take this elven knife with you… Use it only to protect yourself… now run!”

Things running better than expected, could be smoothier though. Getting core features done, then actually make the level, some more assets (BGM, SFX, maybe an extra shader), and then polishment!

“Where do you think you’re going, you little monster?”

Core mecahnics doen, nwo just ahve to finihs the lveel….. yeah… I need a nap… Hopefully I can finish everything before the deadline xp

OMG I can’t belive I actually finished it!

I would write some comments about the jam, a post mortem and all, but I reaaally need a shower and some rest.

For any one interested in Anya’s quest : http://ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-33/?action=preview&uid=49665

Good job everybody (even if you couldn’t finish!)!!! And those for the Jam, keep up with the good work!!!

So, I was trying to play some entries but can’t download them because dropbox is giving error 500, it seems that the whole service is down. Anyone else having the same trouble?

Well, two weeks past the submission, I guess it’s time to finally write my post-mortem! If you want to checkout the game here’s the link!

Preparations

So, this was my 2nd entry on LD! I’m still learning how to develop games, and LD is where I see how my skills developed and what are the next steps (aside from the challenge itself).

My last entry was really fun to make, but I was really frustrated in two aspects: graphics and audio. I have a programmer background and although I love drawing and playing music, I know I suck at them ^^; So in the last three months I trained both of them…at least tried to xp These last months had been really tiresome and since those are skills that I’m not very good at it was really hard to get progress. My drawing and pixelart training demanded a lot of time, but it was worth it, while my music training is still on progress~. Since I was so focused on them I barely developed programming skills though, and it reflected on the game.

So as LD33 came, I really didn’t feel confident, but well, that’s just life, and I wouldn’t miss it by any chance!

Planning the game

So came the theme announcement, and I was pretty lost. I wrote a bunch of ideas in my whiteboard, couldn’t decide on anything… all of them seemed so… trivial… So I went to take a shower, and there I had the idea of the game xp

The player would be a little elven girl named Anya, but now the humans see elves as monsters, so they began a slaughter. And so Anya had to make a choice to escape the city avoiding all humans or become the monster they feared and kill them.

The monster the humans feared.

The mood was clear, it had to be dark, the player should feel the city burning. It would be hard to kill humans, Anya is just a girl after all. Escape without killing would be even harder. Too many humans watching the road, so Anya would have to use the shadows and be as quiet as possible to get past the guards.

But of course, there wasn’t enough time to do everything I wanted ^^; Let’s see then what went right and what went wrong!

What went right

The art

The long time I spent training my pixelart skill was really worth it! I was finally able to make decent animation that I was satisfied with. Of course I wasn’t sure if people would like it, but I had a lot of great feedback on the style!

Finally she was fully animated!

On my training I learned a lot of important concepts that I applied when making the art. The most important one I think was coherence. Even though I can’t make better things than pixelart, since everything is in the same style it just feels right.

The music

Although I really like to play music, I never really composed anything. I did learn music theory but I was never able to apply it to anything really. And since I didn’t had time to make any serious composition before the LD I was pretty scared to make something. But I knew it was crucial to give the right feeling to the game.

At first I was going to use LMMS to make my music, but when I started composing I decided to use BoscaCeoil instead, and that was a great decision! It was way easier to make something fast in BoscaCeoil, and I was able to use their built-in midi and the Chinese scale, so composing was much more smooth. I wasn’t entirely with what I composed, but I received positive feedback on the mood, so I’m still happy for accomplishing it!

The mood

The mood had to be just right. It didn’t really matter if I ended up with poor mechanics. For this entry the most important thing for me was how players perceived my interpretation on the theme. It wouldn’t make sense for me making a great stealth game but without any meaning nor impact. I spent a lot of time choosing the elements, the colors and so on to give the players the right atmosphere of the game, and I think I managed to do it ^^

The city on fire, the blood graffiti. What a pleasant sight!

What went wrong

The art

Yeah… So I was able to make fine pixelart, but at the cost of my first 24 hours. Since I’m not really use to making art and I still didn’t master GIMP, it was really time consuming and tiresome. I almost gave up while I still didn’t finished it >_<. I also still don’t know very well how to place or animate sprites, so my program was really inefficient. I had some problems with the light shader too, something that I still didn’t learn properly.

The mechanics

As I said before, I didn’t have much progress in my programming skills. So when I made the game it was my first platformer. Had several bugs, I had to program the stage manually, placing every element, and I didn’t really know how to use Box2D T_T. I didn’t have time to implement all features that I wanted too, such as hiding in shadows, noise mechanics, more light mechanics, but you can only do much in 48 hours ^^;

The big mistake

And so, after much testing, making sure everything was in their correct place I submitted the entry with less than 15 minutes to deadline… And I didn’t playtest with anyone else beside me >_<. I had a lot of complaints about the controller that I didn’t realize since I tested it so much and got used to it. Of course the controls were suppose to be hard, but I didn’t want to frustrate people… Some more things such as font color, some simple stuff like skipping intro, and some bugs could have been solved if I had playtested in other computers and other people…

What’s next

And thus I finished a very challenging LD for me. I got a lot of things right, and I’m very glad for it! But also many things that I still need to learn! My next steps will be learn more about music composition, rewrite my engine, studying more thoroughly  OpenGL and shading, and practice more pixelart! As for my game, I really think I should continue developing it, but I still have much to learn… Maybe after my new engine is made I will try to publish it ^^~

Great job everybody!!

Very excited for LD34, which will be my 3rd!

Last LD I learned a lot! I hope I can deliver an even better game this time! So, I decided to remake my engine so it was more structured and support 3d (though I think I’ll stick to 2d for this LD). Not finished yet, but I think I can get something done with it~ Didn’t get any other new skill either… Sooo yeah… Regardless let’s do our best!!

Anyyyway, here are my tools:

• Language: C++
• IDE: Code::Blocks
• Engine: My own (Taengine)
• Art: GIMP and mayybe Krita
• SFX: bfxr and Audacity
• Music: BoscaCeoil

Well, I actually took some time to get a concept that I was happy with, but it finally came!

Still very basic, just mechanics xp but maybe soon a test release?

Hey LDers!

I made a prototype release of my entry! Just mechanics, but if you’re interested in testing: http://bit.ly/1O1S515

Continue the awesome work!!

After so many setbacks today, the game is finally coming together! All the basis is ready, just need to polish some more stuffs! I’d be glad if you had a look ! http://nihilaleph.itch.io/ld34

And yet another gif xp

Just submitted my entry!! Wow, that was a really intense LD! Congratulations for everyone that participated somehow!

Now, a shower, some tea, and maybe play some games~

Feel free to have a look at my game! http://ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-34/?action=preview&uid=49665

I added a walkthrough video for my game, so if you don’t have the patience to beat it at least you can see all the waves and the ending!

If you didn’t checkout my game yet, but got interested you can just click here to have a look! I’d be glad if you did~ ^^