Fire Leaf Studios

#LDJAM

@h2n0

It's finally here

Ludum Dare is currently 2 and a half hours away right now, and as promised I put up a post before hand.

Why a post just for this

Well I want to keep a sort of 'live' journal so that I can write up a better postmortem on Monday after I've recovered from doing Ludum Dare

Tools for the job

I've created a few tools over the years to make my life a little easier (or a living hell depends on how you look at it), I'll list them below and kind of explain them

  • FLS Framework
  • FLS Packer
  • FLS Spriter

Writing them down makes me question their names but they're not gonna change

FLS Framework - So around the time of my second LD I was getting annoyed with always having to write the same 20 lines of code to get up a window and have some simple input to I decided to make a framework. I'd like to say that I update this often but at it's current point I tend to use it as is and will apply a new function to one or to classes when I need them, I'll also fix or improve things when I decide to use them

FLS Packer - This is a relatively new tool, I made it about 3 days ago because I was getting annoyed with having to make new build scripts and copy a couple of files to a new directory for each new project I wanted to start so with this I can run it once and depending on the information I put it, it will generate the appropriate files for me. Fingers crossed it works for ludum first time around.

FLS Spriter - This is my homemade spriting tool using a proprietary file format. I made this tool after moving over to Linux on my development machine permanently and discovering that Paint.net wasn't supported (Not very friendly with wine), I am now using this as my default paint program for quite a few projects

What now

Well below this I do want to add updates at certain points in the jam so I'll make a contents section on top of the and update it accordingly

Day #1

Edit #1

Just arrived at the GameJam where I'll be working on Ludum for most of this weekend, and so far it's what I was expecting and I hope to enjoy it.

Edit #2

Got an idea just need to make a few things work . I'm aiming for 1 o'clock tech finish (where all of the hard bits are finished)

Edit #3

Finally got planets to spin (internal cheering), now to populate them with people and work on getting the people to vanish

Edit #4

While adding people I realised that my super hack code for plant rotation is now the cause of many issues. Oh well, I'll work it out

Edit #5

Finally got my rotation code working a little better just need to create a method to return the correct Y value at they current rotation and it'll be all up from there

Edit #6

About to head home from the game jam location, to take care of some things at home. I'll probably stay there and continue to work. At least I'll have a not pad at home

Day #2

Edit #7

So I got home yesterday a little disheartened that I managed to break my rendering code and not get it working. This really wasn't good for my time management

I later managed to get it working again although this was around 10PM a whole 9 hours to fix one mistake oh well just means that today is going to be a very long day

Edit #8

I have arrived at the jam location for day 2 with a plan that will hopefully be executed very well, just need to hope that the art section later on in the day doesn't slow me down and that my new render code holds up to the tasks I'm about to throw at it

Edit #9

Finally some art things, mocked up a little 'base' real quickly. Now to allow peons (The little people) to spawn from it on launch

Edit #10

Hit yet another snag with the renderer, can't show buildings correctly as they'll fall off the planet, but I like it so I'm gonna ignore it.

Edit #11

Wasn't expecting to ever have the terrible rendering system give me something fun. It's given me a way to draw clouds that suits the art style

In the middle of sorting out the chain of events the player has to manage (water and things) the player is going to need t be able to build a few things yet. Probably just more houses and farms, still very undecided

Edit #12

Been working on task management for the peon, they seems to be able to pull water out of no where. That's all fixed now. Just need to cobble together a simple multiplayer section later on (starting to think it's going to become redundant) and all of the core mechanics will be working :)

Edit #13

This is the final edit before I write up a postmortum. Currently 1:31AM I've got 20 minutes left to add a rocket to the game and package it all up after that I'm off to bed. Hopefully this has been a good read for those who have read it.

Until next time.

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