My ludum dare jam entry Under The Shade was about building a shade and getting a signal fire built. Like perhaps every participant…, I too had huge plans on what I wanted to have in the mini game.

This wasn’t working so well…

With big plans in my todo list… I saw I couldn’t get everything done. I chose certain key things (like shelter building, fire building, hacking wood and so on) and get them done (well enough for playing). The end result is an actual mini-game: you can get a higher score by building a nice shelter (that provides shade)… and the game ends when you build a big enough signal fire. It’s nowhere near where I wanted to be, but it’s OK.

The turning point was when on Sunday I was so exhausted that I just slept between 21-24… and woke up in the middle of the night. I thought.. “man, I’m so tired, I just want to sleep…” but then decided to work “one more hour”. At 2:30 am (Finnish time) I was ready, couple of hours before the final deadline.

The crucial last couple of hours helped me to get the thing done, release the game. I feel that was a hugely important achievement for me: to finish & submit the entry. Without that last hour push, my work would have not been here to rate.

I survived the contest, and it was fun time so I consider this one a successful survival scenario.

Those interested: I posted a youtube video moment ago just in case you have a minute to check out bits of gameplay.