I thought about it for a while and always had a different excuse to not take part, but now I’m finally in the next Ludum Dare.
My tools of choice will be:
Looking forward to sleeping even less than usual!
First time Ludum Dare!
I’m in a weird mood – let’s make a weird game. Since I couldn’t make it last time, I hope this time will be a blast.
I got my priorities straight:
1. Finish
2. Make the game my unique, little princess
Good luck everyone!
Time to recap on the results of a day full of work.
Mistakes I decided to do this time around:
Working on art before gameplay, as a programmer. I got the feel of the game down, but no prototype gameplay. Realizing that made me almost quit a few hours ago. (Screenshots, though!)
Making a multiplayer puzzle game for Ludum Dare. I'm expecting to get the heck trolled out of it. Be nice, guys.
That being said, I am doing good progress! Time to sleep for now. Good night and good luck to all of you guys.
So here is my somewhat late Post Mortem of my Compo game, A Small Hell. You can try it here, if you have not yet: https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/38/a-small-hell
The game: The games goal is to escape an overpopulated, tiny, triangular hell by solving the mystery around your own death. Sadly you can't remember much of it, so you need to interrogate the other dead souls that populate hell.
What went right: I am pretty satisfied with the look and feel of the game. My plan was pretty solid and could have worked out...
What went wrong: I didn't plan for pesky RL interruptions. Also I designed a multiplayer game before even checking the health of my servers. Needless to say, they had issues. I ended up canceling the multiplayer feature, that the game was built around. Players were supposed to remember only small hints of their death and had the ability to leave messages for other players. They would then appear as ghosts in other hells. Scrapping the main feature left me with an unpolished game.
Lessons learned: * check tools before the event starts * plan for interruptions * next time, I will design a game that is featured around one single core mechanic and polish the hell out of it
Almost two weeks since Ludum Dare 42. Time to write one of these. Here is my Post Mortem on my Compo entry:
Wallifornication is a puzzle game in which you try to clear several levels. You navigate a space ship that blocks its own path by leaving behind a solid wall. If you haven't yet, please play and rate the game here and tell me what you think.
So before I entered Ludum Dare this time around, I recapitulated my last two LD entries. "Angry Man", my first ever Ludum Dare entry für LD34, was a weird platformer with hand drawn and scanned doodle graphics. I spent most of my time on that game on art, since I figured that was by far my weakest point. The game was clunky and had little content, but was enjoyed for its weird art style. (Glad I spent most of my school days doodling instead of being a good student now.) "A Small Hell" was my second entry. Online features, strong sense of atmosphere and mood were the aim for the game back then. Needless to say, I had server issues and was forced to dumb down the gameplay in the last few hours. Once again, mostly praised for its look.
The goal for this LD was clear: - polish - smaller scope - less time wasted on graphics (I am not an artist anyway) - polish
I had my first shock, when I took a look at the LD page the night before LD at 1am. The jam was supposed to start at 12am in my timezone. Turns out 12am isn't noon, but midnight. You learn something new every day. :scream: So the theme was "Running out of space". Not too bad. I was tired and slightly tipsy, starting anything serious at this hour was not a possibility. Still, I could let my fantasy go wild - and that I did. Naturally I couldn't sleep until I had an idea set in my mind: A puzzle game, where you leave a wall on your path, that blocks your path, a nod to Tron and Snake alike.
I felt the idea was solid and could finally sleep - and as it turned out, it was indeed not bad at all. I barely changed any of the gameplay elements which I initially thought of. I changed it so that time paused when you planned your next move and that enemies didn't collide with your walls, making the whole gameplay more predictable, which I soon found out was crucial for this kind of game. I quickly cut all the "nice to have" features from my mind, determined to focus on the core mechanics and finally made a simple two day plan, which turned out to be very realistic:
Day one: core gameplay, graphics, animation, screen shake Day two: levels, sound, shaders, additional content, ???
Check! I felt that was all I needed - and it was! This was probably the first time in LD that I felt like I had really finished an entry. Sure, the music was rushed in the very last hour before submission, the game is missing some sounds, has a pesky music bug and could've used another level - but it is fun! Naturally, there are lessons to be learned.
What went right: - focus on main gameplay - polish - simple aesthetics - planning - content
What went wrong: - no testing, other than by myself - tutorial levels not obvious enough
Yes, that is right. I asked people beforehand if they would test my game, kept them at hand... and never actually let them do their job, because I didn't want to let them test the 'unfinished' game. Silly, isn't it? I realized it was too late when Submission Hour was less than an hour away and I had no music. The result of that mistake is a game, that keeps most people initially puzzled of the game mechanics and can, despite its simple mechanics, be frustrating if realization doesn't come early enough. I thought the tutorial levels made it painfully clear that speeding into a wall would kill you, but in hindsight that was naive. Testing. Would. Have. Prevented. This. A simple marker, indicating the deadly travel distance, would've been a dead simple fix.
All in all, I am happy to have achieved my goals for this Ludum Dare and to see a progress, compared to my other two games.
Do you like the game? Would you enjoy the game mechanic in a full game? I am currently rewriting and reimagining it and plan to make it my new project. Please let me know your opinion.
LD has been a great experience, like every time I took part so far. Thanks to everyone who played and rated my game Wallifornication and submitted one of the countless, awesome games this LD. LD42 was pretty successful for me, since I created a game (mechanic) that I feel honestly excited about. That's why I decided that my entry will be rewritten and reimagined from scratch and turned into a full game. I'll be posting my progress on Twitter, so feel free to follow me there.
Now, I noticed that many people seem to be upset about ratings being skewed, all over the place or generally too low. My advice to you is to forget about score and placement for a moment and think about this: - what did people like about my game? - what didn't they like? - do I agree? - did I expect this? - did I reach my goal for this LD?
I for my part have set my goals for next LD already, ready to improve on some of the mistakes I made this time around and act on the things I learned from ratings.
See you there. :wave: