First time participating! Using Game Maker: Studio and threw together a bit of a prototype for the game I'm thinking about making. Don't have the details down yet, but I'm sure it'll turn out ok-ish. Screenshot!
Got a nice title grahpic:
Just made my first "full" playthrough, things aren't looking too bad!
It's 4:00am, so I know almost for a fact that I'll find something small to patch tomorrow when I wake up which I will be compelled to do like a demon before a holy cross. But right now, it seems pretty done! If I have time tomorrow (besides for patching tiny infuriating bugs that come up) it would be cool to add a couple of more features that I had planned in the back of my mind, but it's not a big deal if I don't get around to it. Not sure how much time I'll have on a Monday.
Was able to get a little update pushed out that put in a bit more content (two more disaster types) and of course a few tweaks. The game is far from perfect, it's amazing how quickly things get very complicated when you go down the simulation route (even a silly simulation). I'm just happy it turned out to be playable at all!
I thought I'd make a little aftermath post for my game and my first experience participating in a game jam. Although I'm new to the jam, I have been fiddling with Game Maker for years and have become extremely familiar with it. I've made (and half-baked) several small games over the years but I've never shared any of them publicly, so this will be my first experience getting feedback from potentially many people I don't know.
Tiny Terraformer is a game where you are in charge of terraforming a small planet that colonists will be arriving at soon. Build generators that spit different substances into the atmosphere to create an environment suitable for plant growth, and cultivate flora to form a foundation for a healthy ecosystem. Sometimes unexpected stuff happens, so be prepared to put out a few fires or kill a few alien space weeds.
This jam's theme had me scratching my head for a bit, but a boss fight from the SNES game Yoshi's Island kept popping into my mind (along with The Little Prince), so I decided to go with a tiny planet style game.
My first idea was to make a shoot-em-up style defense game where you run around defending a small planet against invading aliens. However, while testing an early prototype (shown below), my softy side punched me with a dose of peaceful wonderment. So I made the decision to switch gears and go for more of a building/simulation style game where combat was not the primary feature.
I've always been a sucker for complicated games in the RTS and simulation genres. Naturally I tend to want to create games similar to ones I like to play.
I think it was a bit of a risk going with a simulation concept and at several points I wasn't sure it would work out. Even a simple system can be very hard to balance to make it fair and fun for the player, and I spent a ton of time on tedious tweak-test-tweak-test cycles. Small changes had cascading effects. Kids, just Keep It Simple, Stupid.
One nice thing about it being a game jam was that I was willing to finish out the weekend even when I had my doubts just to see if it would turn out. In any normal self-motivated solo development, I might have dropped it forever early on.
Probably due to my being a shut-in nerd (and maybe also high familiarity with my tools), the jam was a lot less stressful than I thought it would be. I also tried my best to keep my concepts simple; I've had plenty of experience in the past with illusions of grandeur, even without any time constraints. I was lucky enough to be able to get all of my ideas into code, plus write my own music (thank you, high school and college band!).
Overall it was a really great experience, and I feel like I lucked out. The one thing I can readily think of to do different next time would be to round up a team and share the experience!
I've seen so many awesome looking games published for this jam and I'm looking forward to playing them!
Got a fancy .gif and a nice preview video up now!
Thanks to everyone who has already given support and feedback! I'm having a ton of fun playing everyone's games. As a first-time jammer, I'm having a blast!
I haven't seen a ton of this but I've seen it more than a few times, specifically with games that involve tiny planets and a player avatar that runs around them (guilty as charged). Naturally with my game being an offender I feel it's quite a disadvantage if a judge, after playing many games in a row that involve similar mechanics, gets annoyed and it affects feedback but only for the unlucky tail end of his/her judging spree.
Obviously I can't see anyone else's ratings so I have no idea if that's actually happening. But we all came up with ideas around the same time, so the likelihood of straight-up copying or mimicking is low (it's possible with people blogging early though). Maybe instead of docking overly-used mechanics that lots of people felt inspired to do by the theme, just give positive feedback for games that managed to have unique mechanics.
Not a big thing, but I thought I'd mention it. I'm sure we all thought we were geniuses as we each independently invented the wheel.
"like", "game", "really", I think every LD word cloud has these? Amazing!
It's that time again.
Me: OMG I only have 45 minutes until compo ends! I really wanted to add this last piece of content, but I guess I'm out of time if I want to get it submitted before the deadline!
Me 45 minutes later: Phew got it uploaded on time! Wait, the clock reset... there's a dedicated submission hour? Oh. Derp.
Second LD, first compo entry! Not having that extra day really puts the hurt on. Managed to get a decent working product out, though, even if it's not nearly as content-complete as I would have hoped!
Try out Lamplight if you're interested (windows)
One of the things I specifically wanted to do this time around was design the game to be easily ported to mobile. It worked! Just had to make a few tweaks and was pretty easily able to pop out an APK. It feels pretty good on my phone, like it belongs there.
For all you dozens of Linux users, got my game ported to Linux! (How many of you rely on Linux as your primary OS?) I've only tested it in a VM so far, so feel free to give feedback if there are any problems. Have fun!
Thanks to the latest humble bundle, I was able to port my entry to HTML5. Now it's... a browser game I guess? Geez, it seems so much more legit running natively :thinking:
Oh well, wider audience and easier access!
Had a great experience with my first Compo entry!
Considering I had no sound and very primitive music last time, I feel especially good about the audio score I got this time around. It was really fun and I played a lot of great games. Will definitely be returning.
I'm in
Was able to work all weekend and bust out this little guy. I'm happy with how it turned out. Will probably post some videos later of early development. For now, time to relax!
Didn't end up taking as much video as I originally planned to during development, but at least I got some this time! I made a short progression video with some final-product footage at the end. Had tons of fun this weekend, time to relax!
https://youtu.be/ZpMRgW0NaiA
I love the days right after the jam weekend, relaxing and playing games after a stressful few days. Have played some great games so far and have gotten some great feedback. I appreciate the great community!
Will continue to check out everyone's stuff. Drop by and try Sanguinite if you feel inclined :)
