I don’t know why an entrepreneurship forum would downvote somebody for linking to their topic relevant tool. People need to share their projects and products somewhere. It’s a good opportunity to discuss things around the ecosystem if nothing else
Woah, throwback. Construct 2 is what got me confidently interested in programming, and I'd argue that it's a key reason I'm a Software Engineering major today.
If you've never tried programming a game I would highly recommend it. There are many aspects that make a game a really interesting challenge: input, rendering, sound, and managing large global mutable state. Ludum Dare is a good excuse to dip your toes in.
Especially once you realize the difference between super purpose drive micro game code (a big event loop with lots of variables at the top) and game code with well designed scaffolding (entity component systems, etc). I think everyone is destined to make at least one gobbledegook game before they can appreciate all the benefits that a well designed system brings. I recommend pico-8 or similarly designed constraint driven virtual consoles to maximize the learning experience.
LD doesn't help learn any of this. The time constraints force most entrants to use Unity, GameMaker, or some other framework/engine that abstracts learning about any of this stuff away.
If your object is to learn, better to try out Handmade Hero, entirely from scratch: https://handmadehero.org/
I don’t know about start to finish, since finishing a real game is a massive task, but it’s a good way to learn a specific subtopic of interest. My own game I figure has 16-24 months of full time work to go on it. Even though it looks fairly full featured at the moment, “finishing” it is still a huge task
Been working on a 2D game engine. I haven't "show HN" it yet because there is still some work to before MVP. Sadly for LD you really need a browser game basically.feedback appreciated
This looks super cool and polished for an engine made by one person. You should put an image of the IDE higher up the readme though, it’ll help people browsing evaluate it immediately more than a bullet list of features.
When I’m evaluating an engine I also like some kind of high level overview of how games are made in it. You have some of that mixed in with more how-to levels of detail. Pulling out that high level info into a short intro will help attract people when you’re ready for more eyes.
Looking forward to seeing this pop up again on HN!
It’s my opinion that good games for these sorts of competitions start off as sketches and high fidelity random mock-ups of screenshots of interesting potential games, and then imagining what the possible game mechanics and objectives of it would be. Start with the end in mind or you’ll fall into feature creep.
I can never be sure if I can participate, real life puts many constraints on availability (and quality) of free time. But I try. I usually tweet a "game design document" on saturday evening, and try to squeeze 5-8 hours over the weekend to get something done. I always try to keep the games web based and compatible with mobile.
The "unstability" property can be added to any existing game, with the single pass of a vertex shader ;)
Some themes simply lend themselves to engendering more "creativity" than others. I knew it was going to be "unstable", because it's universally hated / feared. But was chagrined to see "One tool, Many uses". It's really the ideal theme for a game jam with time constraint. The inspiration just flows. And really the themes are vague enough to get away with anything.
I'm always excited to see what comes out of these game jams and seeing how people ship their one off game. I've noticed games with web versions typically rate higher than games with only locally executable versions (for obvious reasons). Web games being compiled into wasm also frequently handroll a lot of standard library logic that doesn't otherwise work out of the box, and I'm looking forward to seeing what they come up with.
[+] [-] AshleysBrain|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Rd6n6|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ngold|4 years ago|reply
I really enjoyed programming an entire games in construct 2 in 100 lines of code. A decade ago
http://violetgaming.byethost10.com/MartyOmegaFull/index.html
http://violetgaming.byethost10.com/PhysicFalls/index.html
[+] [-] wds|4 years ago|reply
Kudos!
[+] [-] ngc248|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kris-s|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tmountain|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] caeril|4 years ago|reply
If your object is to learn, better to try out Handmade Hero, entirely from scratch: https://handmadehero.org/
[+] [-] poulpy123|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rex64|4 years ago|reply
If you're interested, I wrote a post recounting my experience participating in Ludum Dare:
https://alessandrocuzzocrea.com/ludum-dare-47/
[+] [-] Rd6n6|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ensiferum|4 years ago|reply
https://github.com/ensisoft/gamestudio
[+] [-] meheleventyone|4 years ago|reply
When I’m evaluating an engine I also like some kind of high level overview of how games are made in it. You have some of that mixed in with more how-to levels of detail. Pulling out that high level info into a short intro will help attract people when you’re ready for more eyes.
Looking forward to seeing this pop up again on HN!
[+] [-] xwdv|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Jare|4 years ago|reply
This entry: https://twitter.com/TheJare/status/1444240947487944707
Previous: https://ldjam.com/users/jare/games
[+] [-] sail0rm00n|4 years ago|reply
You’re able to cross-compile to mobile + web as well so you’re not just stuck on the desktop.
[+] [-] ArtWomb|4 years ago|reply
Some themes simply lend themselves to engendering more "creativity" than others. I knew it was going to be "unstable", because it's universally hated / feared. But was chagrined to see "One tool, Many uses". It's really the ideal theme for a game jam with time constraint. The inspiration just flows. And really the themes are vague enough to get away with anything.
[+] [-] postalrat|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] olliej|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mooman219|4 years ago|reply