Oh the choices... I guess let's see what the theme is, and maybe I'll plan a game while playing magic. If I have a fun idea, I might skip the other prereleases? Hmm...

I don't know what I'm doing, so here's some random thoughts to help future-me figure out what to do with that theme you have no idea how to handle. Good luck, and I'm sorry if I haven't done laundry yet.

Space exploration - It'd be cool to do a play on words, and turn this into a "how close can you get to someone without making them uncomfortable" thing, while exploring personal space. Unsure if that'd be fun, or just make me laugh. Probably neither.

Everything has a price - Maybe you're a shopkeeper, selling things. idk, I need to think more about this one.

No upgrades, only downgrades - You start the game wildly powerful, but after every battle you receive items that you MUST equip (instead of just hiding in your inventory somewhere). The further you get, the worse your equipment is. Cursed items could make this hilarious.

Color changes everything - Scanner Sombre, except not pitch black, there's a swarm of zombies coming, and as you hit them with color-changing light, they shift into allies, or different enemies, or stop swarming and start commanding the nearby enemies, or have lights of their own to change things near them. This sounds boring at first, but could probably be super sweet with a little thought (...and more time than I'll probably have lol).

Four elements - I get it, you want Captain Planet but without Heart. Or you want Avatar, the Last JamBender. Nah, the magic elements will be something wacky like Porridge, Mustard, Soup (various types), and Milk. Combining your elements in different ways allows you to craft a meal that COULD STUN A GOD

Mutation - I hope this doesn't win, because all I can think about is like the Pandemic board game, or Contagion. Conway's Game of Life with some mild adjustments could be a decent way to go with this.

Floating worlds - How does a world float? Don't all worlds float... in space? Maybe like use "world" less specifically, and use it to mean just "biome", and have radically different islands that happen to be near each other? "float" could mean in the air, or just in the water. idk maybe each "world" is a cork "floating" in a bathtub and the whole game is a daydream of a toddler, imagining all the little things happening in the air pockets within the cork.

Limited memory - Memento? Or like a computer? I don't really get how memory applies. If this wins, would I just make the "Simon" game, where you have to remember the color patterns? That sounds boring, needs more thought.

Your life is currency - This can be cool. An rpg, but you buy items with your blood, and need to do quests to earn transfusions to replenish it.

Symbiotic relationship - Venom was a cool movie. Feed the beast, the beast does the hard work for ya. Probably you wouldn't have any control over what the symbiote does, and you'd try to satisfy it's urges so that it "chooses" to do something beneficial for you.

Control the environment, not the player - This sounds very similar to the Symbiotic relationship. Player is trying to do Thing, and you're trying to guide them to do Other Thing by knocking trees down in front of them. Ever play Black and White?

Old technology - something that feels like Mega Man Legends. I don't really like the "we're so far in the future that our technology is bad again" thing, so I'd rather do like a cave exploration type thing with weird technology that's worse than what you have, but also different enough where you don't know how to handle it.

You have 30 seconds - Bullet hell seems like the obvious answer. Just fill the screen with projectiles and say "good luck". What could also be cool would be like a detective story, where you only have 30 seconds to study a scene before needing to move on to the next area, so you have to try to look for clues quickly (or else Plot Device happens... bad guy gets on a plane and escapes or something).

Unusual magic system - Two or three of the above things also fit with this. Or maybe have it based on dancing. Crypt of the Necrodancer is neat, but I mean like a 3x3 grid or you list a few moves (left leg in, right leg out, spin, small hop, duck, arms together in front -> Shockwave of Shame). Can't use fire based attacks, since it's "unusual"... unless the activation is purely the unusual part. You know, that all sounds complicated and not fun, future me can figure something else out that's better (sorry)

You can't kill the enemies - This sounds like a cruel joke. Maybe it's like the opposite of Lemmings, and you need to push them in to holes so they get out of your way? Or just try to rush to the end of the level before taking damage? Or you use your Unusual Magic System dance to convince them not to fight you anymore? Wow, are we making Undertale?

Parallel worlds - Stranger Things? A Link to the Past? Actually, a super slimmed down version of Tales of Symphonia could be cool. Like, there's an alternate world that's full of magic, specifically because they've been syphening it all away from our world, but now magic is starting to flow back into our world, which is killing theirs?

Cards are your weapons - Gambit, from X-Men. I love deckbuilders, Slay the Spire is a blast, but making a roguelike game where you frisbee cards with various abilities at enemies sounds sweet.

The butterfly effect - I don't think there's enough time to do this any sort of justice at all, so I sincerely hope it doesn't win. It'd be cool, but I'd be disappointed with anything I tried to do. So for that reason, future me, I suggest that you build a Mothra-simulator, and use "the butterfly effect" as a euphemism for rampant destruction via a giant butterfly.

Only one enemy - You know the bad guy. You know his strengths and weaknesses. Choose your weapons, go to the gym and beat up a punching bag, then sit down for a Final Fantasy style 45-minute boss fight. Actually, probably skip all the training, that's boring.

Light as a weapon - Luigi's Mansion? Nah, let's go nuts. Super focused light is a laser. This is a game about using lasers to build nightclubs of death. Also, you're the bad guy, and don't like dancing.

One room - Almost anything above can fit here. Why not dodge lethal lasers in a Nightclub of Death to reach the evil parallel version of yourself and beat them up?

Regular jobs, but in Space - Babylon 5 had an episode that was just two random maintenance guys, walking around the station fixing it up, while wacky things were happening in the background. That could be fun. For me, I don't know how it'd be fun for the player. Maybe it's part-survival game. "dodge the sudden hull breach!"

The environment is a weapon - One of the things above is about how you control the environment, not the player. This is the same as that. Or, that new video from Unreal during GDC? Where they shoot up a building, so the collapsing bridge destroys the enemies? Yeah, knock trees over to accomplish things.

Change the genre of a classic video game - Please no, this would just make me feel dirty. Tetris, except instead of completing lines, you're dropping words into a sentence to have correct grammar? I'm boring myself by writing that. Pac-Man with a chainsaw sounds better. Turn the workers into ghosts before they collect all the balls!

Decay - RPG, and items have durability? Actually no, just go up and read whatever past-me wrote about "Mutation". Decay is just another version of mutations.

Stay in the dark - This is the opposite of "Light as a weapon". Dodge the death lasers! Or maybe a stealth game. ...with lasers.

Side effects - Sure, that sword is pretty strong. Might even crackle with electricity. But using it could cause all your other items to melt? Dumb. How about, you have a choice of quests to do, and they all accidentally do something else, like further the plot of Villian #2? That sounds like it has more unpredictable "I'll figure it out later" applications.

Two-button game - Two buttons. An action for pressing, an action for releasing, another for holding, and others for pressing them in various sequences. No mouse. All movement based on the two buttons. ...probably no movement. Does a choose-your-own-adventure count as a game?

Time is the currency - I don't know what to say. Good luck, my dude.

Risky powerups - This sounds like Side Effects. And it also sounds like "No upgrades, only downgrades". Maybe things you pickup have a chance of just straight up exploding, dealing damage instead of helping? Could be a neat Galaga-type game.

Permanent damage - Sounds simple enough. It's Thursday night, you're a god chillin in the heavens with your godbros, and you decide to shoot some pool, using our solar system as the balls. No matter who wins, them planets have PERMANENT DAMAGE

Don't let it escape - Ok hear me out. You're a zookeeper, a monkey got out of the cage, and it's playing a rousing game of hide and seek with you.

Ridiculously overpowered - One hit defeats the enemy. But it also blasts their body through the wall, and demolishes a building from the nearby town. The town guard is mobilized to subdue you, but you easily handle all of them... accidentally. No no no. Let's go nuts. Let's go Shadow of the Colossus "you only fight bosses". You're so powerful, you just walk past the minions. Even the bosses seem easy. We're going Final Fantasy now. This is a game about fighting Gods. But to make it fair (for them), they'll be teaming up against you. I just got a weird mental image of PunchOut with Hera. Would Gods fight in a boxing ring?

You're the final boss - Ever play Dungeon Keeper? Yo, build a sweet dungeon, then fight the "heros" who come to rain on your parade.

Everything is a weapon - This is literally the same as "the environment is a weapon".

You are a side character - This is literally the same as the Symbiotic relationship one. I'm glad we have duplicates, I'm running low on ideas.

Shelter - I honestly don't know how close to the theme we need to be. Like, can I take "Shelter", and extrapolate it to mean "Gimme Shelter" by the Rolling Stones, and then extrapolate THAT to make a game based in Vietnam?

The more you die, the more the world dies - Unsure what to make of this. Good luck.

You can't save them all - Ever play Lemmings?

You are the quest giver - Congrats, you own a tavern. Hire a bard, make people happy, and get them set to venture out to certain death.

Contagious - See Mutation/Decay above.

You control the enemies - This could be an interesting puzzle game, where you and the enemies move at the same time, so you need to make them walk into traps or something?

Alchemy - I shouldn't have started at the top of the list, I'm about fried at this point.

Break the cycle - You're a pothole in the road. Break that bicycle!

Underground - make literally any game, then put it in a spooky cave.

Nontraditional boss battles - Does playing patty cake count as nontraditional? What about a dance off, and you need to judge which moves to use based on audience reaction? Can I even do that in time?

Two characters, one player - This is kind of like "You control the enemies", but with less death.

Tiny town - Are you tiny? Is this a town for ants? Can you see large blades of grass gently swaying overhead? Or maybe you're a turtle, and the town is on your back, and the point of the game is to move them to a new spot so a flood doesn't kill them, all while they're living their lives, in their tiny town, on your turtle back. Let's not do turtles, let's put the town in a bottle, and throw the bottle in the ocean. Something interesting might happen that way.

I swear, it started with only 3 lol

A big complaint I heard last time, is that the theme was too narrow, so most games ended up very similar. So does that mean a good theme is broad enough to be interpreted in many different ways?

Here's where I'm at now, but I expect it'll change lol