Alright, I’m gonna do it.  First one, right here.  I’ve been hemming and hawing down to the last minute.  So what am I using?… That’s a secret.  Oh, alright, you broke me down.

Program:  Flash Develop

Graphics:  Photoshop

Sfx: sfxr

Music:  Audacity, LMMS, and a lot of luck

Good luck everyone.

So I finally got around to writing one of these post-mortem/compo whatchamacallits and, looking back in a retrospective light, I probably should have chose a slightly better concept, especially for my first time.  When the theme was announced, I sat there behind my computer and thought, “You know what I should definitely do?  I should make 4 games in 48 hours and then tie them all together with transitions.”   This temporary lapse of sanity lead to literately down to the last minute (and a few minutes after) coding.

So without further ado, What didn’t not go right:

-I finished a game for the first time in 48

-I ended up with a product that was really pretty cool

-I didn’t die of sleep deprivation

-Because of my retro-esque theme, I didn’t have to worry for hours about graphics, which also plays into…

-Sound, if there is anything that has ever stopped me from finishing a game more than graphics its sound.  But with pong and space invaders as parts of my game,  sound design wasn’t really a problem.

What didn’t do definitely not didn’t go wrong

-My concept,  a mash up of several games getting progressively more advanced, did not lend itself well to a game jam.  Particularly because of the mash up of several games part, which requires several games to be made in 48 hours.

-Another issue with the down to the wire coding was the total lack of  testing.  I think I tested the game cover to cover 3 times.

-GUI, I have nothing to say about how bad that was, apparently your not supposed to throw that in as an after-thought.

-The lack of a replay button was something I spent the next hour and a half after the deadline thinking about, that’s another thing that’s usually a standard among games.

-Scaling up was impossible.  If I wanted to add another level, I would have had to spend 8 hours coding an entirely new game.

This is a game that is definitely going on my shelf, and I’ll probably end up adding more levels to it over time.  Over all this was an amazing experience, and I look forward to next time.

Almost put a semicolon after that parenthesis…

Anyway, I’m feeling much more prepared for this one than the last one.  I don’t plan on using Flash either.

Coding: Java/Eclipse

Coding Backup:   AS3/Flash Develop

Graphics:  Photoshop/Illustrator

Music:  Java Integrated MIDI/LMMS

SFX:  BFXR

The music should be fun this time, I’ve been playing with MIDI in java, so if the theme suits it, that could be a thing.  I plan on making a more scalable game than last time too, because that was fun.

Oh ya, finals are the Wednesday, Thursday, Friday after ludum, so that could get in the way too.

Good luck and have fun everybody.