So, I wake up not as early as expected this morning to discover the theme. Great, it is not the only one that inspired me. Not so surprised. After a quick breakfast, I’ve struggled with the theme, brainstorming with myself, realising how much “hard fun” is really a Ludum Dare.

I finally came out with an idea. Not THE idea, but one  that satisfied me enough to give it a go. Wrote a few line to fix what will be the gameplay, and try to organize myself a little.

I’m currently in the graphics creation phase, one that I really suxx at. But, i’m quite satisfed with one of the asset, so I thought I should share it.

Some carrots at various state.

I have to say that the other assets are FAR from that “good”, but I will have to do with this… And I should go back to them if I want some progress to be done !

See ya !

Okko

Well, it has been a tough day, but I’m pretty happy with what I have done. I currently have a playable version. Tomorrow should be dedicated to animation of characters, and monday should be used for some polish and maybe some new features.

A screenshot of what the game is currently looking :

Day One progress

I may play a little before to go to sleep. See you tomorrow LD folks !

Okko

Well, I still have time, but I need a break. Today has run pretty smoothly :

• Woke up with a title for the game, good point.
• Worked on animations and some additionnal graphics, still with my “dev graph” skills… So it is pretty crappy but I’m almost happy with.
• Made some tweak here and there. You know… stuff.
• Struggle with sound. I first search and found some free “ambiant” sound, but didn’t feel comfortable with this. So I get to Bxfr.net, and tried to create some sound. Tested it, decided most of them were irritating, so I just left two of them.
• Done a list of “things to add and polish”. Yeah, todo lists are a great tool.

So, hopefully I will stroke some items from this list tonight, but now, I’m going to rest a little (and have lunch !). I let you with my title screen.

Title Screen !

Okko

1 Day, 4 hours left for the Jam.  As stated in my previous post, I’m almost done, only have a list of “add-on and polish”. Well, believe or not, while polishing, I made that tiny little change that just reveal a pretty nasty bug. A bug that have been here since the beginning, well hidden. Time for some refactoring \o/

And in a shocking last minute twist, I’ve decide to not wait for the 72h, and submit the playable version I have to reach the 48h goal. I still plan to had the additionnal things tomorrow, but it won’t be on the version submitted.

Well, I guess it’s time for a little post mortem… WHAT A BLAST FOR A FISRT TIME ! When I decided to get in, I was hoping to have something near playable at the end of the 72h… I’m far beyong my expectation on this point.

Of course, my game won’t be a futur best seller. It’s really simple, for two reason : the theme wasn’t inspiring me and I didn’t want to start something to ambitious, due to my nearly noob skills. So I jumped on the first idea that seemed possible to me during my brainstorm.

I think I was well organised, with a SCRUM-like plannign, which allowed me to not panic and get things done in order and in time. Having the graph done quickly than I expect really helped me. And I even like them a little, surprisingly.

Beside the last minute bug that made me change a part of my code, technical things went well. Looks like my two month learning to use Unity were not a waste.

The most positive point about this experience is that I have the will to make some change to this game, I want to make some change to my previous mini-game (with which I’ve learned Unity) and… I have ideas and motivation for my next game (Day & Night theme has inspired me more…)

It was really fun, stressfull and motivating to see all your posts here and tweets during those 48h hours. There are tons of games, most of them greater than mine, and it’s an honor to be part of this experience.

See you next time, and until there : create more games !

Okko

PS : note to self, you should have sleep before to write this boring thing… shouldn’t you ?

Well, looks like I got a game done, I guess. Time for a little “post mortem”.

What went well

The coding part went pretty smoothly, partly because the game is simple. I had some struggles but more because of how tired I am than of any other reason.

I’m also quite satisfied with how the graphics render in this final version. Even if I find myself silly to not have tried to use unity features to create real lights… thought of it in the last few hours, not the right time to start something new. I used pixlr.com for all my graphics, and despite some weird tricks to know to do stuff, I liked this tool and will probably use it again.

My overall workflow seems to work pretty well too : once the idea is found, I made a todo list (with a mini scrum-like in mind) and tried to start with basic mechanics, to only start “options” on day 2. I worked with iteration, and I should have been able to release the game after each (see, scrum oriented guy here). But of course the last is the sexiest !

What went wrong

I am NOT satisfied by my final game. I mean, it is playable, finished with no known bugs. But it is far more simpler than what I expected to do for this Ludum Dare. The theme didn’t ring a bell, but once again it is probably due to my tiredness. I have seen over those two days many WIP from you guys that made me go “how did I not think to that !?”

I think I still lack of experience to get “good” ideas in a short time. And still lack of confidence to try to get myself in something bigger.

Music went…. silent.  I’ve tried in the last 3 hour to get something ok with SoundHelix (because sample on their site sounds cool). But I didn’t manage to get anything good. I will play with it until next time, to become able to have music in my games !

What I should change next time

I think… I REALLY THINK I should try to get some graphist friend of mine into it next time, and go for the Jam. It could help me go bigger, better.

Now, if you excuse me, I have a bed to talk to.

Tags: postmortem

First of all, I would like to thank every body that have given me feedback on Squareon , it really motivated and helped me !

So, as many of you, I’m now working on a post jam version. Unfortunately, I’m progressing far more slower than in Jam

The current #WIP of this version can be tested there : http://okowalczyk.free.fr/LudumDare/31/PostJam.html

Differences are :

• New mode : time attack , where you earn additionnal time for each good answer, and lost time for each bad. Goal is to play the longer than you can.
• New mode : relax infinity, where there is ending condition, no scores. You just play to relax
• Difficulties is a bit more progressive, no more billions colors from the beginning
• Some bonus combo thing in the “classic” score mode
• A more understandable “end screen”
• Fw bug fixes

What is planned and not done yet :

• Music. I have to find a way to create a music that match with the game… and give some feedback when the time is about to reach out
• Colorblind friendly option, I already have ideas for two solutions, just need more time to test and to implement
• Maybe a tutorial or some help screen
• A clean GUI with one unified font, and more appealing button…
• Leaderboard
• More bug fixes
• … and maybe some other ideas that I need to try or that will come up along the way

Once again, thank you all for your comments !

On another hand, I’ve tested 133 games until now, and I can’t help being amazed by the quality and variety of games this LD once again bring to life. Kudos to all of you !

Okko L.O.B.R.

PS : and feel free to keep on testing, commenting, voting for the original LD entry :

Let’s jump into the last-minute-call-to-rate thing !

Squareon – with neon squares !

http://ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-31/?action=preview&uid=26489

Thank you !

... I got nothing yet. But I'm only starting. So I guess it's ok.

By the way, I'm in.

Good luck everyone, have fun.

My compo has been submitted yesterday. Not so happy with what I've done : it feels like I set my goal to low. Next LD I will have to go on with more ambitious ideas instead of scratching them because “I won’t manage to finish them”. Give it a try dammit !

To ALL of you who were in the compo : great job, we did it ! To ALL of you running low in remaining time for your jam : KEEP IT ON !

Now, for me, it's time to..... PLAY !

A very long time ago, I made a game for Ludum Dare 31. And I wanted to finish it properly, and publish it. After 6 years of doubt, issues, bit of procrastination, it is finally done.

You can find it here : https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.okkoInc.Squareon Give it a try, it's free !

It is that time again ! While we're thankful for the rating and comments we've received, we're still missing 7 votes to get to the needed 20.

https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/53/the-mailgun-man

This is our third LD in team with @kaijiro . For first our participation we used pixel "art", our second was with photos.. so we decided to try 3D for this iteration ! We've both learned some blender basics during this LD. Of course it costed us some time, and we couldn't finished all the features we planned, but we're still happy with what we've done. Give it a try and tell us what you think !

Thank you !

... create a new branch to refacto kind of the core mechanic ?

We said yes.

Let's go

Hello there !

As usual, it's been a blast to test your take on the theme !

Did you have a chance to try ours : https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/56/midnight-parade-the-light-chant ?

For this fourth LD teaming up with @kaijiro , we've decided to try something new. And by something I mean a new engine. Until now we used Unity, and this time we went with Godot ! We've learned a lot during those 3 days, and are eager to dig it for more projects !