I never participated in a 48 hour game jam before? Does anybody have any suggestions? Thanks :-)

Hello!

I'm a novice when it comes to Unity, but I have an Associate's degree in Computer Science and I'm pursuing a Bachelor's degree at UMD College Park! I read that Ludum Dare has a discord, but I couldn't find the link for it. Does anyone know where I can find the discord link? Looking forward to working with you all!

Hello!

I'm a novice when it comes to Unity, but I have an Associate's degree in Computer Science and I'm pursuing my Bachelor's degree at UMD College Park. I read that this group has a discord, but I couldn't find the discord link. Does anyone know where I can find the link to the discord? Looking forward to working with all of you!

(Sorry for the double post. It didn't immediately show up on the feed so I wasn't sure I had published it. First time posting on the site haha)

Hope you like it too

LD47 will be my seventh consecutive Ludum Dare, but I'm going on holiday on the Saturday it starts, and will be spending the jam period in a caravan in the Cotswolds, with an ancient laptop and an Internet connection that likely won't be much better. I'll still try and get something done during that time - for the Jam, if I have to - but it might be a bit trickier than normal.

I'm willing to team up with someone again, to make life easier for me.

As always, I'll be using either PICO-8 or TIC-80, but most likely PICO-8.

I've said my goodbyes to friends and family, got most of my affairs in order, and now I'm preparing myself for it. 48 hours of absolute madness. I really can't wait. :sweat_smile:

I'm taking some time off work, both before and after. I'm practicing using my tools, and making sure I actually understand how to use Unity's animation suite this time. In short... I'm in!

Coding Environment: Unity Language: C# Sleep Replacement: A palette of Monster energy drinks Graphics: Probably Aseprite, maybe a voxel editor Cheerleaders: Many Music: ??? SFX: sFXr

Can't wait to stream the dev process, and play your games!

i cant wait to know the theme its os exciting to find out what it is

I wish tonight i sleep for 10 days and when i wake up the might have started :D

As I couldn't finish the game the last time, I'm really looking forward to LD47. I feel like after four LDs and one DJam I more or less understand what's the most enjoyable workflow for me in a 48h game jam.

I'll leave some thoughts on the whole process here. Feel free to discuss .)

1. Scope

I always think too far ahead, making up systems far too complex for 48 hours. I think that's okay, as long as you can keep yourself in check and finish the damn thing, but I tried to make a Darkest Dungeon clone for LD 46 and it didn't go that well. I tried to finish it in time for jam, but it was unbalanced, and the gameplay was hard to understand.

One way that paradoxically improved the overall quality of my work was constraining my timeframe to 20 hours. I did this for DJam4 in 19 hours or so. I used stock audio, so maybe I'll focus more on that this time, since it really improved the overall quality and feeling of the game. In the end, I like that last game a lot more than all my previous submissions.

So this time I'm making something that I can finish in 20 hours or so, and then use the remaining day to polish it.

2. Avoid crunch

This might sound silly since the whole LD is kind of a crunch simulator, but it goes with the whole "constraint your time". I spent the whole 48 hours of past LDs, with about 6-8 hours of sleep, and found that I'm not really able to work efficiently for a month or two after LD. I avoided the burnout after DJam4, and not being strung with anxiety for the whole weekend makes it more enjoyable, not to mention I actually finished the game, and was quite satisfied with the result. Keep the game as simple as possible, and then relax and polisih.

3. Prepare yourself

I'm talking about pre-LD preparations. Like clean your table, stock up on food, and then decide what technologies you'll use. Prepare your libs in a new project (I work with Unity), and practice drawing what you know how to draw a few days before LD, so you can make assets quickly. I've heard it's a good idea to have menus and fonts ready as well, but I think I'm a bit too disorganized to manage that.

4. People and stuff

I like to hang around the LD discord voice chat. I don't talk much, but I like to listen. It's one of the best part of the whole LD. I'd probably wouldn't participate if there wasn't a community this strong. But it's also good to mute the chat from time to time if you want to get anything done.

5. Balance trying new things and doing things you know how to do

I like to try some small new thing on each LD, but also do and use things I did many times before. It improves the overall quality, and takes a lot less time to do what you know how to do.

6. Theme

I don't think too hard on the theme. I make up a few ideas, pick one, and make it happen. Sometimes it's better, sometimes it's worse. I never manage to fully realize it anyway, so I just make the best game I can, and it's more than enough for me.

Okay, enough of me rambling. Let's go already!

THE HYPE IS REAL

(Extra note: I just realized this is my 10th Ludum Dare event I attend to! Sounds symbolic, I better make it good.)

Inspired by @kuro 's post about his process and thoughs during the event, I decided to do a similar thing and maybe these posts will inspire both new atendees as well as some veterans.

0) Pre-LD Mindset

Before I start the event I already have in mind a picture of the structure of the game. Well, it is easy for me because I make only point and click adventure games. So I know that my game will be an adventure. I also know that my main focus is always graphics and story. I don't try to make any revolutionary mechanics, nor I try to shock people with some out-of-this-world gameplay. I simply want to deliver an interesting story with a couple of puzzles and most importantly fitting mood. So maybe this can give you some ideas about how to approach the progress. Maybe you can decide up front what genre you want to do no matter what theme wins.

1) Theme handling

I almost always use the theme for story purposes, not gameplay mechanics. This gives me a looot of freedom to make something interesting with it.

2) Step by step process

• I start with a very vague idea (Story about and old man going shopping and something happens along the way)
• I start making graphics (characters, environment, items...) and because it takes a lot of time to make these pictures, I use this time to think about all the dialogues and the story details on the run.
• Then I write all the dialogues and story I was brainstorming during my graphic sessions.
• In the end I just glue everything together.

3) Polishing

Now that I have basically the whole game finished I check for bugs, polish some dialogues, add some minor details and that's it. I know it sounds easy, because it kinda is when you are making adventure games, in comparison to someone working on let's say an RPG fighting game, but that's just how I do it.

So I hope you got some ideas for your own working process now. And don't forget, LD is not about winning, it's about the experience and fun!

First Time Picking Themes.

So LD for me has always been a case of wait until the top ten then hope. But this time around I've actually submitted my own themes for considderation. I thought less about what I wanted or had an idea for and more on what I would look for in the finals. If that makes sense. I wanted something that was open enough that it could inpire but not so constricting that everyone makes the same game.

Under The Sea

This I feel has a potential for an adventure game, Find the golden trident, or an exploration game, similar to subnautica.

A Classic Novel

I think the mixing of the two forms of media could lead to some great game ideas, I imagine a count of monte cristo-esque story driven game for this.

Mythology

The world has amazing mythologies, some are so well known. Greek, Roman, Egyptian, Some a lot less so like the Irish / Celtic pantheon.

Im in again this time around. Im going to try to make my game smaller in scope to try to have a finished product. My wife is also having surgery on the 5th, so im effectively down a day. Fingers crossed.

last ld i was in i joined 5 hours after it started dont know when theme slaughter or what ever its called happens

My second attempt at ldjam. Goals for this time are:

1. Focus tightly on one or two ideas - last time I tried to make something 'epic' in scope, and the end result was kind of messy and boring.
2. Introduce some basic animations to the graphics.

I'll be using: 1. Godot Engine 2. Photoshop 3. Spine 4. Logic Pro X 5. sfxr

Hello, this is my first Game Jam! Looking forward to Oct 2nd!

My Theme Suggestions are A living maze Music soothes the... Future Echoes