Ludum Dare test

I'm going to try to enter my first Ludum Dare. It's a 48 hour game development competition. Obviously, that is an incredibly short time frame to create a game from scratch. So in order to prepare, I've decided to test what I can actually accomplish in two days.

Diamond Hunter is what I came up with. It's a very simple puzzle game where you must collect all diamonds to win. You'll also need to find certain items to get past some obstacles.

I kept it simple so code problems were not an issue, graphics not too ambitious, and music is a looped chord progression that I hope doesn't get too tiring to listen to. Overall, I think it turned out great. I'd definitely like to do another test run.

Language: Java 7 (Java 2D)
IDE: Eclipse
Graphics: Photoshop
Sound: Magical 8Bit Plug

Game:
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/59779278/Diamond%20Hunter.jar

Eclipse Project:
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/59779278/Diamond%20Hunter.rar

First test

This is not the whole game, but I really wanted to put something out there. Consider this a demo.

Game:
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/59779278/Artifact.jar

Eclipse Project:
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/59779278/Artifact.rar

Gameplay video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5pyv5qOAofI

So far I've converted the engine to use frame based timing. I know a lot of people will think this isn't the correct way to handle it. However I'm running on an extremely slow laptop with an integrated chip and it's pumping out 60 FPS consistently. The only real problem is if someone actually has a slower laptop than me--highly unlikely. It's a 2D game with no raster editing and no complicated physics. For the purposes of this game, frame based timing is more than adequate.

I've implemented an event system. This makes it easy to create cutscenes when certain requirements are met. In this scene, the gem explodes, the portal opens, and a bunch of... things... fly out.

The prologue is almost finished.

After this comes the real work: the levels. With these levels comes new tilesets, new enemies, new bosses, new music, new everything. Time to put on my seat belt.

Well, well, well. Things are looking up. I'm getting a lot more finished than I've originally anticipated. I started on a new tile set and a prototype map.

I wouldn't call myself an artist, but I do draw on occasion. However drawing pixel sprites is a whole 'nother beast.

Man oh man, I can spend a single day working and only manage to get one sprite action finished.
 It's coming along though. Slowly.

Working

I've been working through this game that I wanted to use as a tutorial for game structuring. The series has gotten to the point where the main game engine is pretty much finished. You have the tools--all that's left is to add more enemies, more levels, more music, more graphics, more content. I won't be adding another video to the series until I've finished the game created enough to make it look like an actual game. I'm working on a major overhaul right now.

Updates with game development to follow.