First-timer readying my weapons for the coming battle!

After an hour or so of brainstorming, I've narrowed my options to two potential storylines to develop into a piece of interactive fiction. One involves a ghost trapped in a haunted house (world is confined to a couple of rooms), or a lonely watchstander at a remote space outpost who must make hard choices when proximity alarms go off indicating an alien threat approaching our precious little planet.

I cannot decide which one offers a greater gaming experience, so I will sleep on it and decide first thing in the morning.

I've created the floorplan and basic navigation for the setting of my ghostly IF piece. I also have a rudimentary objective and obstacles to face, which is the next part to code. Current thinking is that the more interactions (picking/touching/using stuff) they try to do, the quicker they will fade and have to restart at the beginning. The tricky part is making the system "remember" what they've done up until they restart.

Twine as a programming language is both simple and infuriating. It took a while but I managed to make the game minimally functional -- all rooms work and most of the core actions are in place. I even have the introduction and endgame elements installed with placeholder text.

I really wanted to add more features over the course of the day and kept telling myself to hold off until the basic game was complete. Now that I am here, I am going back through the code to identify where new features can be inserted without breaking the whole darned thing. I also can see just the text parts so I can improve the readability and add in important story to explain what the heck you're doing (and why!)

Can I get all of this done by tomorrow? Probably. It won't have cool graphics, but I think I can boost the look and feel of it. I may even try some mood music too.

The game is functionally complete, but ugly as sin. Fortunately I am doing the Jam version and will be spending a portion of my day tomorrow cleaning up the layout (and minor grammatical errors that crop up when you're busy coding.) It doesn't look like I'll get the audio sweetening I'd like, but I'll settle for better fonts and background images that enhance my IF.

See you tomorrow!

The game is submitted, despite a million little things I wished I could have done differently. I think that is the point, though. If you waited until your creations were perfect, they never would see the light of day.

If you like interactive fiction, or ghosts, take a look at it!

Gonna use either Construct 2 or Twine, depending on the next burst of inspiration.

Stay tuned.

Took last year off, but I'm back and ready to dive into the 72-hour gamedev wood chipper!

Initial thoughts go to movies like Out of Time, where citizens trade minutes of their life for goods and services, and an Outer Limits episode where people sold old memories for cash. I also can imagine a Zelda-like game where your HP can be converted to gems just like arrows were automatically transferred from gems in the original version.

These ideas are likely to be popular, which means I need to dig a bit deeper. Currency is usually a transferable commodity of little comparable value itself (like base metal coins). If life holds a similar position, then it must have little comparable value too. The theme says "YOUR life...", so I guess it could mean: - Vampires trading blood for favors? - Demons accepting souls for wishes? - People selling plasma for cash? - Robots using their battery to power critical systems?

I just remembered an old idea I had for a re-written novel "Brass Badge of Courage", a take on the Civil War book about bravery and humanity, but this one is where injuries in battle are replaced with mechanical parts and seasoned veterans are barely human anymore.

BINGO -- I think I have a winner! This idea goes well with a narrative format (I'm using Ink to create this game) and I already have a clear notion of how the story should make the player feel.

"Keep it alive" didn't help much with the brainstorming, until I remembered an idea to recreate Taito's classic 'Elevator Action' arcade game for my education in Unity.

There are a lot of things that can 'die', such as a car, laptop, or even something larger like a city. Well, I'm not creating a city -- far too ambitious for a one-person game jam entry. A game where you try to keep your car on the road sounds like a horrid cross between a racing simulator and an endless runner. That leaves a computer system -- maybe a system in control of an entire building?

Damn, I'm back to 'Elevator Action' again. Better sleep on it and see what comes of it tomorrow.