I ludum dare'd

[Eerongal he/him]

I just submitted my entry for ludum dare #48

For those who don't know, Ludum dare is a game making competition where you have 48 hours to make a game from beginning to end, solo.

The theme for this one was "Alone". I made a relatively simple maze-type game with a small twist, you can "swap" the maze lay-out at will. I made everything from the sound to graphics to the code, all from scratch using C#, XNA 4.0, photoshop and fruity loops. I probably could have used some sort of game maker software to make things faster, but by the same token, I enjoy the challenge of making things from the ground up (i didn't even use any personal libraries of code to speed things up).

Unfortunately, I forgot about the competition and started about 14 hours late, so i wasn't quite able to implement everything I wanted to.

And yes, in case you're wondering, this was basically every waking minute of my weekend.

[Emeralis00 she/her]

I've heard about this but I don't feel like I have enough skill for it. Yet.

I would also take a look at your link but my browser is being impertinent as of right now.

Edited December 19, 2011 by Emeralis00

[Eerongal he/him]

I've heard about this but I don't feel like I have enough skill for it. Yet.

I would also take a look at your link but my browser is being impertinent as of right now.

well, the ludum dare site isn't exactly the best, and around competitions it can usually get pretty slow, so it could just be the site.

[Emeralis00 she/her]

Downloaded it and played it.

Pros:

• The concept was very original
• The ending was nice and unexpected
• I like what you did with the treasure

Cons:

• the screechy music wasn't very pleasant
• Can you add a run option?
• When I started the game a second time, it put me outside the maze

A very nice game, can I has sequel?

The ending was nice. The teddy bear reminded me of a book I read where this little kid had the ability to unmake things by disbelieving them. The only thing that stopped her rampage was a teddy bear that she lost a long time ago.

[Eerongal he/him]

Downloaded it and played it.

Pros:

• The concept was very original
• The ending was nice and unexpected
• I like what you did with the treasure

heh, thanks. The concept kinda just came together as i was making it. Last year in my last ludum dare, i tried to set up a maze generation algorithm, but it didn't work quite right, so I ended up scrapping the idea. This year, I decided I was going to make it work.

Cons:

• the screechy music wasn't very pleasant
• Can you add a run option?
• When I started the game a second time, it put me outside the maze

I'm very very far from a musician. My music creation skills are....lacking. And yeah, I considered putting in a "run" button (actually, i should have just sped up movement, probably). And yeah, I'm aware of the bug that starts outside of the maze, but I was running a bit short on time, so I had to leave it in the name of being done on time. I'm pretty sure it's happening because i'm offsetting the positioning of the maze based on the hero starting position, i'm essentially "moving" the maze around the hero (to keep the hero centered) and I think that there's a small bug that causes you to be outside of the maze initially when it calculates the maze starting position, what seems like maybe 1/5th of the time.

A very nice game, can I has sequel?

The ending was nice. The teddy bear reminded me of a book I read where this little kid had the ability to unmake things by disbelieving them. The only thing that stopped her rampage was a teddy bear that she lost a long time ago.

I didn't really think it was sequel worthy, but I am overall happy with how it turned out. I may fiddle with it some more in the future to iron out some kinks and add a few new features to it (there were a few things I ended up cutting due to time constraints). I thought it fit pretty well into the "alone" theme of this one. There's also an "easter egg" of sorts on every single "movie" sequence. A buddy of mine apparently noticed it right off the bat.

Also, i'm actually really happy with the way all the art turned out. It's not awesome, but given my limited graphical abilities, i thought they turned out pretty well. I was afraid it was going to look really crap and impede the story (what little there is of one) a bit...

[Emeralis00 she/her]

I'm very very far from a musician. My music creation skills are....lacking.

That is what I figured.

I didn't really think it was sequel worthy, but I am overall happy with how it turned out. I may fiddle with it some more in the future to iron out some kinks and add a few new features to it (there were a few things I ended up cutting due to time constraints). I thought it fit pretty well into the "alone" theme of this one.

Its just one of those games. Sometimes it is nice to play a game that can be beaten in one sitting.

There's also an "easter egg" of sorts on every single "movie" sequence. A buddy of mine apparently noticed it right off the bat.

Was it the troll face?

Also, i'm actually really happy with the way all the art turned out. It's not awesome, but given my limited graphical abilities, i thought they turned out pretty well. I was afraid it was going to look really crap and impede the story (what little there is of one) a bit...

The graphics were nice. It fit well with the game.

[Eerongal he/him]

Its just one of those games. Sometimes it is nice to play a game that can be beaten in one sitting.

Yeah, but it's honestly more of a semi-interactive story, really. Like I said, I may do a few things with it, we'll see. For now, though, it's on the shelf while i cool off from a loooooong weekend.

Was it the troll face?

yeah, it was the forever alone face

[Eerongal he/him]

Heh, so votings over, and I got overall pretty poor scores (expected, since by my own admission it was sort of rushed and not very polished and/or creative), however, checking my entry, I just noticed that it got commented on by notch (creator of minecraft, who usually participates in ludum dare). Awesome.