Okay, let’s do this. After doing the Compo of the Ludum Dare 47, here are my thoughts postmortem:

1. Getting ready

For this jam, I decided to use Godot Engine. It’s my favourite engine, and it’s great to create content fast. I also needed to have a repository to make my code available, so I setup a Github repository, with Git for version control.

I wasn’t sure at first of what style I was going to settle on, but I ended up using Gravit Designer for vector graphics, Gimp for image manipulation and Blender for 3D models.

My biggest mistake was not planning the softwares I was going to use for the SFX and music. Since I’m not used to do them at all, the time it took me to understand SFXR really did impact the game in the end - and I didn’t have time to create music.

1. Getting ideas

The theme… really didn’t inspire me. I had a bunch of aborted ideas, didn’t want to make another puzzle-platformer although it’s what I do best. So, since I didn’t have any great idea I decided: “Why not make multiple small ones ?” - this is where I added the theme, stuck in a loop.

A collection of minigames, each one worth of a small jam game, centered around the control scheme of turning around a circle. It was a big gamble, as it still takes time to create a minigame, and they all needed different designs.

I regret not taking more time to flesh out a better design, and a lot of interesting idea came to me after the jam, with a well-rested head.

1. Making the game(s)

The circle wasn’t so hard to make. Using Godot’s scene instancing and signals system I could create a single scene that passed its angle to the game and let each game handle it its way… So after the circle was done and I knew how to handle inputs with it, the rest was straightformard.

At first, I went for a different style for each game. The first one was a clean, vector art game. The second, a pixelated 3D game. The third, a drawing on paper. But in the end, I settled on a clean art for every game, recreating most of the assets in a vector drawing software.

The art was a bit rushed in the third game though, as changing its style was radical - every asset had to be replaced !

The SFX and music are my biggest regrets. As stated before, it’s my weakest domain, but once I started using SFXR I understood how to use it rather quickly. But it was already too late, so I wish I tried using it before.

1. In the end

So, a quick rundown… Even if you don’t like it, take more time to know your tools ! I had to familiarize myself with a new software halfway through the jam, and it was a big mistake. Also, give yourself time to come up with ideas, try to eat and sleep well ! All-nighters kill your creativity and productivity.

Welp, with that… I’m out !