Hopefully I will have the next ludum dare off if I do not that is okay I will participate next time in the mean time I will be working on my new game that I will be publishing 3 months from now. If you want to check it out visit my blog here simbstudio.tumblr.com or directly play the demo here http://dl.dropbox.com/u/70771337/WebPlayer.html This blog is to help me feel motivated to keep programming and having fun if you have any suggestions or useful tips or programs to use drop me a message or comment here or follow my on tumblr. I am posting this here because I know this is a great supportive community. I wish everyone luck in the next compo have fun guys

Tags: blog, development, new game, tumblr, unity3d

This will be the first time ive done the compo ive done the jam 2 times.

Tools:

IDE: Eclipse

Language: Java

Graphics: paint.net

Audio/Music: sfxr

I decided to finally finish start the doodle/mini-LD project from a few weeks ago as sort of a warmup round, and, unlike every other jam/speed-coding/short-dev-cycle attempt I’ve ever made, I actually feel like I’m not a miserable failure this time! Go me!

I’m eighteen hours in, and I’ve managed to go from some really crappy initialization code and an empty directory to a really crappy level editor and previewer, and even a crappily-animated heroine to go with. (I’m slacking off at the moment because I’m waiting for Imagemagick to finish downsampling the contents of my timelapse directory, and I really don’t feel like looking at the project at the moment, so I’m avoiding burnout.)

Things I’ve learned from this little exercise:

1. starting out with a lightweight vegan meal: definitely a huge win (I love cheeseburgers, but let’s face it, they cause torpor like nobody’s business).
2. using workrave to remind me to split my work up into 45-minute chunks so I don’t get burned out or demoralised too quickly: definitely a huge win.
3. while making tools and ‘middleware’ in situ is kind of fun, it is definitely a timewaster.
4. I need to be better at (temporarily) turning a blind eye to things that are inelegant or unpolished during ‘crunch time’.
5. Boning a catgirl: not as much fun as it sounds (see below). That took waaaay too long to make, and it still has a crappy silhouette and z-fights all over the place. A shame…

I think I’m probably going to goof off for the evening at this point, then pick up bright and early tomorrow; 12 hours would be just enough to actually make it into a real game…

I’m in…for the forth time or so i believe
I can’t wait. xD
Can anyone wait? Cause i can’t…..
AHHHHHHH….LUDUM DARE xD :0 :0

Hello everyone! 😀

This will be my third LD and I’m stoked! I’ve never submitted but I’ve always tried my best. Now, I wanna do ten times better.

• Programming Language: Java
• Libraries: LWJGL, Slick2D, and JBullet (if needed)
• IDE: Eclipse
• Sound/Music: Bfxr/WolframTones
• Graphics: GIMP, Inkscape, and Pickle
• Foodstuffs: LOTS of water, microwavable bacon cheese burgers, hot pockets, and energy drink mix

I wanna wish everyone the best of luck and I hope we make it over the 1000 game list! 😀

Be well, do good work, and keep in touch.

Okay, so I’m in for this one as well. Same plan as before. Entering the Jam, hopefully next time I’ll enter the comp.

What tools I’ll be using:

Programming: Microsoft Visual C++ Express/Microsoft Visual Studio 11 Dev Preview (Depends on which one I open when the comp starts xD)

Graphics: For the most part, MS Paint or Paint.NET

Sound: Not sure yet

Other tools: Steam for social interaction, music for motivation, and a fork to eat 😀

In the past week I’ve totally fall in love with Paper by FiftyThree. A drawing application on iPad. It’s simple, nice, get the work done and have a really awesome feeling. So as I wanted to make my game in 2D and use my Bamboo to make all the art. Then I was thinking… why not use this application to make all the art ?

And that the challenge within the challenge that is Ludum Dare (as it’s my first time). So, here’s my useless announcment : I will make all art with Paper by FiftyThree.

Well… not exactly… As I don’t yet have every in-app tool yet I can’t do some things in it (don’t have Outline and Write), and will export the line in Photoshop to colorize. They are taking ideas in consideration so it would also be great to have feature like copy/past sheet (would be great to decompose the character or other for animation) and have at least a second layer before LudumDare. If not, I guess I’ll have to work on photoshop.

As for the animation of all that. I’m considerating using Spriter. If you don’t knoow what is Spriter here’s their KickStarter page. It’s now on beta phase so I must not count on it that much, but it’s really a great software to become. I didn’t yet give anything to them but hope I can (at least $25) before the end of Kickstarter’s founding. You must check it out… now!

Anyway, I’ll say what software I use at the right moment, but that is my plan at the moment.

< Previous post: Here comes a new challenger !

Next post > LD is coming…

Tags: animation, fiftythree, paper, plans, spriter

Day One of Andrew’ s Eight Days of Game Design has ended in success! I thought about focusing on graphics today, but for the sake of other projects the first thing I need to figure out in FreeBASIC is networking. So, it made more sense to start with sockets.

I had to work off and on in between other tasks, and a lot of that time was spent reading and generally feeling like I wouldn’t get anywhere at all with it today. Most of the remainder was spent scratching my head wondering why the example worked but my modification wouldn’t compile and run… but after a bit of code voodoo and a lot of head scratching, I wound up with a bare bones (but working) TCP/IP socket server that will accept and snark at communicate with multiple clients. Yep. Typical day in the life for a programmer.

I’m not sure how useful this will be for the Ludum Dare, but it’s a huge step toward making that MUD codebase I’ve been wanting to build. I’ll have to add a lot to the mix in order to make it useful, but it’s a good start. I’m calling that a win for today.

Cheers!

I’m in, this will be the 2nd LD i’ll actually be able to take part in at all, and the first one where I’ll actually be able to be here coding for more than half the compo! (last one was more of a LD16 for me…)

• Programming Language(s): C++ / Angelscript
• Development Platform: Gentoo Linux Kernel 3.2.11 AMD64 build
• Target Platform(s): Linux x86, Linux x86_64, Win32, also OSX if i can figure out how to cross compile to it in time.
• Engine/Basecode: Aether Engine (still finalizing, documentation and download will be up within a few days, just trying to get physics fully implemented…..I procrastinated too much 😛 ) Which is built on SDL, SDL_image, SDL_mixer, OpenGL, tinyxml, zlib, angelscript, and Box2D
• Code Tools: Code::blocks, gedit, gnu make, gcc, gdb
• Sound/Music:SFXR, LMMS
• Graphics: GIMP for high res graphics/backdrops, My aptly named “Sprite Editor” for pixel art
• Food: More than likely stuffed shells w/ arabiatta sauce and a side of asparagus
• Drink: Water, rockstar recovery, newcastle, or I’ll mix a martini…all depends on the situation

Earlier I presented a list that represents the internet’s idea of the Atari 2600’s 15 best games. This is a hard list make, because there were dozens of great games made for this system. Let’s see if we can figure out what made these games so good:

1. River Raid — The premise was simple: fly a plane through a canyon while shooting down targets, avoiding collisions, and keeping fueled up. But there were some terrific complications thrown into the mix as well. A small element of strategy was introduced with the fuel gauge: not only were you flying around shooting at things and avoiding getting shot, you had to think about how badly you needed that next fuel depot. Some of the enemies could shoot back, and a few of them would shoot at you from a safe distance outside of the canyon.

This game, like many others at the time, was big on innovation. It’s a scrolling shooter played from the top down. It featured a variety of enemy types plus the additional complication of managing your fuel level. The object of the game was basically “don’t crash”, and there were a lot of things in the game that could crash you.

2. Pitfall! — The legendary Pitfall Harry was an explorer and treasure hunter. He couldn’t fight worth anything, but he could do a decent Tarzan imitation. We could possibly describe this game as an early platform explorer, and it featured one of the scariest of all game bosses (no, not the giant scorpions, although those were scary too): a time limit! I hate time limits. Maybe that’s why I never managed to find all the treasures.

A very simple design based on beating the clock and avoiding obstacles. Look this one up; there’s some interesting reading on wikipedia.

3. Space Invaders — One of the icons of the early video game era, this space shooter features a fixed screen (no scrolling) and introduces barriers to provide cover for a small strategic element. It’s also a sort of a “goal defense” type of game, because if one of your enemies touches the ground you’re done. And all of this was played to the increasingly rapid sound of your enemy’s boot steps marching toward you…

4. Combat — This is where things got a little complicated. Players patrol a battleground (represented as a maze or sky field) and shoot each other into oblivion. Highest score wins.

The innovation here is the sheer number of variations you could set for this game. Need a more complicated maze? You could get that. Want bouncing bullets? No problem. Invisible tanks? Check. With 27 variations, it was a little crazy. And infinitely replayable.

How’d they solve problems like pathfinding A.I. back then? They didn’t. This was a two player game only, which was probably necessary considering hardware limitations, and is possibly the game’s only real drawback. Not really that big a deal, considering this game made #4 on the list. People remember it quite fondly.

5. Asteroids — Another fixed field space shooter fills out The Internet’s top five Atari 2600 console games. Notice a pattern here? These games are starting simple, and mixing two or three simple elements together to make the game interesting, grab the viewer’s attention, and then put it in a headlock. Maybe that’s why we look at the clock suddenly and wonder where all the time goes when we play games like this.

In the interest of brevity, I will shut up and save the rest of the list for later. I notice a few things looking at what we’ve got so far. Four out of these five games are shooters. But mindless shooting isn’t enough. Notice the elements included that make the player think: Fuel management. Strategic cover. Rebound angle. Force field and hyperspace options with their own inherent drawbacks. Players like to shoot, but not always mindlessly. They need variations on their field of play and their objectives. They want choices, and perhaps most importantly, consequences for those choices.

What else can we glean from this list of the five most popular games? What were your favorite Atari games?

Update, April 15: Awesome! I just scored a 40% off discount code for Ludum Dare participants (it won’t last forever!): “gjttsgeb” at http://link.packtpub.com/31Eodu

Update, April 12: Apple just approved the book for the iTunes iBookstore! http://itunes.apple.com/us/book/the-game-jam-survival-guide/id516248330

WOO HOO! I’m excited to announce that my new book, The Game Jam Survival Guide has just been published! This book is essentially a love letter to the Ludum Dare community.

It includes interviews and advice from LD48 superstars such as PoV (Mike Kasprzak), Fydo (Chris Hopp), Phil Hassey, Pekuja (Pekka Kujansuu), and Chevy Ray Johnston (two time winner of LD48), as well as other game jam experts such as the people who run the Global Game Jam.

I also include the infographics from the surveys we all did last Ludum Dare, and packed the book full of the Haiku poetry and funny anecdotes that you all sent to me a few months ago. Finally, I went hardcore into the ways to achieve game jam success, including tons of “what NOT to do” as well as specific advice about tools, time management, design, how to deal with the theme, how to finish on time, and more. Right now the best price is on Kindle, and it is available in hardcover paper edition as well.

I can’t wait to join everybody later this month at LD23. Good luck and KEEP IT SIMPLE! =)

The book is available in paper hardcopy, .PDF, .mobi, and .epub formats.

You can pick up a copy right now from the publisher, as well as
Amazon,
Amazon UK,
Kindle,
Kobo,
Safari Books,
Barnes and Noble, and
iBooks on your iPad.

Here, just for fun, is all sorts of information about what I packed into the book, copy-n-pasted from the publisher’s press kit:

Overview

Enthusiastic and light-hearted, glimpse the excitement and frantic creativity of game jams.

Motivating, encouraging and infectious, it is sure to help you reach the finish line.

Follow this handbook from brainstorming an idea, over bitter obstacles and on to the sweet finish line: a complete, playable, fun game.

Each stage of game jams is described with task lists and anecdotes relating common experiences, the trials and the tribulations of past game jam champions and losers.

Packed with interviews, tips, tricks and wise words from Ludum Dare and Global Game Jam organisers among other well-known game jammers.

Table of Contents

Preface
Chapter 1: Before the Jam: Prepare Yourself for Success!
Chapter 2: Hours 1-12: Your Quest Begins!
Chapter 3: Hours 13-24: Deeper into the Jungle!
Chapter 4: Hours 25-36: Breaking Through The Wall!
Chapter 5: Hours 37-48: Getting to the Finish Line!
Chapter 6: After the Jam: Fame and Fortune!
Appendix A: Game Jams
Appendix B: Game Engines
Appendix C: Helpful Tools
Appendix D: The Community
Afterword
Index
Preface

What you will learn from this book:

• Preparing for the jam: conquer the theme, pick design aids, prototype quickly, choose the right tools for the job, and cut the right corners.
• Bombastic brainstorming: power up your idea generator and run with a theme, gain more votes and please the masses.
• Building a game jam entry: pick your weapons, follow your plan, cut the bells-n-whistles, scramble over “the wall”, submit a game on time, and with a little luck, attain fame and fortune.
• Why Mike “PoV” Kasprzak (Ludum Dare administrator) thinks game jams are a good introduction to the realities of the game industry.
• The reasons why Dr. Mike Reddy (organizer of the Global Game Jam) thinks designing on paper is essential.
• The best ways to find creative inspiration and develop an idea to fit a theme according to Eric McQuiggan (founding member of The Dirty Rectangles) and Chevy Ray Johnston (author of the FlashPunk engine).
• What Foaad Khosmood (director of the Global Game Jam) suggests you do to ensure you finish before the deadline.
• The worst way to prepare according to Pekka “pekuja” Kujansuu and the best way according to Phil Hassey (Ludum Dare administrators)
• What one piece of advice Jason P. Kaplan (founder of the Game Prototype Challenge) would give to newcomers.

I want to send a massive and grateful THANK YOU to everyone in the Ludum Dare community. This book was written for you.

Tags: Book, McFunkypants, motivation, postmortem, SuccessStory, tips

Although exam season is dawning, I can’t miss upon a chance to enter Ludum Dare. Since I’m going to be revising a lot, I’m going to focus a lot less on graphics (unlike last time) and focus more on innovation and gameplay.

•  Graphics: Photoshop CS4
• Programming: Actionscript 3
• Sound: Bfxr

I’m not sure if I’ll be entering the competition or jam – it depends if my friends are available for that weekend. Happy to be part of the 10th year anniversary!

I guess this is what we’re supposed to do. It’s the first time I’ll be participating; I have no idea how this will go, but I’m going to give it a try!

• Language: JavaScript
• Library: kilo (a JS canvas game library I’ve been working on, usable but still limited)
• Sound: bfxr (maybe others)
• Graphics: GIMP
• IDE: Eclipse (with Aptana and MercurialEclipse)
• Source Control: Mercurial, at my Ludum Dare bitbucket repo)

I’ll be developing on Linux, but JavaScript means my game should work on any OS with a decent modern browser. I’m really looking forward to this – wish me luck!

Let’s see… this will be my 4th LD… 😀

As always, because I know nothing, I’m going to be using GameMaker 8.1 for programming. I will be using SFXR and Schism Tracker for sound and music. I will be using Paint Tool SAI and Paint.NET for graphics, and the game will likely be 2D because that’s just easier to program, especially with GameMaker.

I hope that this time my game is actually fun…

Hey, all! If you’ve read my last post, you’ll know that I’ve been holding out on the I’m In thing for a while because I wasn’t sure what I’m working with. Well, I’ve decided I’m just going to go ahead and choose the tools my gut tells me to.

PROGRAMMING– Love2D. I feel like I’m comfortable enough with it to scrap something together in two days. It also turns out that the official 0.8.0 version rolled out today, which could not have been better timing.

GRAPHICS– I’ll mainly be working in Paint.net, but I might call in some help from Pickle and maybe even Aseprite.

SOUND– I’m confident with Sfxr for sound effects generation, and Audacity if I decide to record something, though I doubt it. I’ve also gone with Musagi for music with Aria Maestosa as a fallback in case I have some troubles with it.

TIMELAPSE– This whole thing just wouldn’t feel complete without a timelapse, now would it? Chronolapse is my choice here, simply because I’m not aware of anything better.

Well, glad that’s out of the way. I’ve been trying to exercise myself each day in a different area of design so that I’m completely ready for my epic showdown with destiny. I’ll be trying to update my feed more on that. Until my return.

Made a simple script for Autotracker. Can generate x amount of songs, specified by user. I’ll make it more fancy as needed. Enjoy.

Instructions

1. Download and extract
2. run frontend.py
3. Success

Updated Download Links

Download link(Rar format)

Download link(Zip format)

Hello!  First time here for me. I have some experience in video games, but almost none in what I’ll use.

For LD23, I’ll use Unity, C#, sfxr, Paint.Net, SketchUp (or mabye Blender).

For the music, I’m not sure yet. I’m not sure what is legal and what is not.
“Fonts, drum loops, drum samples, and sampled instruments are allowed IF you have the legal right to use them.”

If a friend make some 30sec. basic 8bit loop only for my game, it’s “legal”?
If it’s not ok, I’ll maybe try Musagi or just don’t have music.

Death in the family, no LD23 for me

I’ll be streaming my game at http://www.twitch.tv/pixeltoadstudios. bye

If you’d like to keep your upcoming LD entry a bit more organized, I’ve written a quick game design document template for the purpose.

If you don’t know what a game design document is, you can check out the Wikipedia entry. Although this one doesn’t fit that bill exactly, it’s designed for use either by a small independent team or the infamous one-man army. With the text blurbs, it also serves as a bit of a game design tutorial.

Anyway, you’re more than welcome to use it as well if you think it’ll help you. It never hurts to be a bit more organized, eh? ;D

This entry was posted on Monday, April 9th, 2012 at 4:45 am and is filed under LD #23. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Same toolchain as always, this time around. Next time though I’ll hopefully be running a custom SDL-based engine. 😛

IDE : FlashDevelop
Libraries : FlashPunk
Graphics : Although I’ve been meaning to migrate to a slightly more open (but equally intuitive) graphics editor… Probably Photoshop again.
Sounds : BFXR
Music : Renoise [with a bunch of tools for sound synthesis – Resynth, Custom Waveform Generator, etc.]
Encoding : WinLAME

I’ve been waiting for this since December. Good luck, everybody – and happy 10 years LD!