6 ms·

Ludum Dare is about to start

115 points by hoffcoder 12y ago

w1ntermute 12y ago
Any word on whether Notch is participating this time around?
- netcraft 12y ago
  He just tweeted that he is, but isn't sure if he will stream. https://twitter.com/notch/status/459703644213227520 https://twitter.com/notch/status/459703644213227520
netcraft 12y ago
I always enjoy watching the streamers during this weekend. Its amazing how much you can learn by just watching someone code. This one snuck up on me, I haven't heard of a lot of streamers this time - does anyone know of any good ones to watch?
- munchor 12y ago
  Just try watching the top viewed ones on Twitch. Personally, I enjoy watching Ananace, Notch and TheCherno. Oh, and don't forget deepnight (Sebastian Bénard). He has won 3 or more Ludums and I love watching him making them.
- flexd 12y ago
  I was watching Notch coding his christmas santa game in Dart/WebGL the last time, that was fun. If you try to keep up with what he/the streamer is writing in your own editor you can get a better feeling of how certain things work. It's like a nice interactive workshop where you get no help and it's hard to keep up.
Lerc 12y ago
I did Ludum Dares 6,7,8,9,10,13,14,15,20,21,24 and 26. That's a bunch of stuff that I've made that I wouldn't have without the Ludum Dare. It let me explore ideas and learn a lot. I haven't Won a Ludum Dare, nor do I expect to (I got 1st for graphics once) The standard is extremely high. Here's a sampling of some of mine that play online. Some Games came out a bit mad http://screamingduck.com/Lerc/LD13.html http://screamingduck.com/Lerc/LD13.html Some were insanely hard http://screamingduck.com/Lerc/LD14.html http://screamingduck.com/Lerc/LD14.html Some were pretty but otherwise fairly crappy http://fingswotidun.com/Ludum20 http://fingswotidun.com/Ludum20 This one just about gave every web-browser a hernia http://www.fingswotidun.com/ld21/ http://www.fingswotidun.com/ld21/ And some were, well I don't know what the hell this is, but it was pretty neat. http://www.fingswotidun.com/ld24 http://www.fingswotidun.com/ld24
- TillE 12y ago
  I've done it twice, and while I like the concept and it was great to get feedback on my game and everything, the themes leave me cold. People vote for the most boring, broadest things. I gave up after "minimalism". A theme should inspire. It shouldn't just sit there as a framework for you to shove your existing ideas into. I'd love to be prodded into exploring new game mechanics, and LD just doesn't do that for me.
  - nimblegorilla 12y ago
    Minimalism was a great theme and that round had some of the best ludum dare games in my opinion. On the other hand, I agree that things like "You only get one" are not very inspiring.
    - laserDinosaur 12y ago
      Strangely I find the opposite - Themes like 'you only get one' imply a certain gameplay mechanic that I think leads to some real interesting games. You only get one..life? Second? What thing in games do we take for granted that we get multiple of? Themes like 'minimalism' are too broad for my liking - what does minimal even mean? Is it minimal because you only used 20 of the keys on the keyboard? Is it minimal because you didn't use every single feature in the Unreal Engine? I could submit any platformer ever made and say "it's minimal because it's limited to a 2D plane". It's so broad it quickly becomes meaningless.
      - Lockyy 12y ago
        I agree with you on the broad themes point and I really liked the 'You Only Get One' theme, at first I couldn't get past the 'one gun', 'one life', 'one minutes' ideas that I felt everyone would go for but I ended up making a simulation where you only get a single interaction after world generation and then it simulates a little village gathering food and building farms etc. and I was really happy with the result.
        12y ago
bluetshirt 12y ago
So when they say "game", do they really mean "video game"? This is a semantic shift that leaves me uncomfortable.
- jameshart 12y ago
  yes, when video game developers talk about 'games' they generally mean video game. It's a convenient shorthand in their community. Much how when a computer programmer refers to a 'file' they typically mean a 'computer file' rather than a physical one, when an electronic engineer says 'circuit' they mean an electrical circuit rather than a racing circuit.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
- zevyoura 12y ago
  Actually, there's nothing in the rules that limits the competition to video games; I wouldn't be surprised if people had created print & play physical games for previous LDs.
  - quill18 12y ago
    People have in fact done so.
  - bluetshirt 12y ago
    References to "source code" apply only to video games.
- gagege 12y ago
  Are games not a subset of video games? edited: the word "video" next to the first games
  - Kiro 12y ago
    Is that supposed to be an infinite loop?
Rusky 12y ago
I've enjoyed doing short game dev competitions many times before but I've never done LD. I'm planning on live streaming it this time if anyone's interested: http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/2014/04/25/im-in-with-a-live-stream/ http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/2014/04/25/im-in-with-a-live-...
bayesianhorse 12y ago
I sometimes think that it would be nice to know the theme in advance to know if you want to spend two days on this. The idea behind the theme revelation is to prevent cheating, but then again there is no cheating protection beyond a code of honor anyway. I've seen tons of games in LD that only barely fulfilled the theme.
quill18 12y ago
If you have any interest at all in game programming, I highly recommend that you participate. It's invigorating to have a fixed deadline that forces you to actually FINISH game instead of just add to a heap of incomplete ideas. This is going to be my 8th time participating, and I'll be livestreaming the whole thing -- which to me is at least 80% of the fun. It helps that I have a large audience to keep me motivated (I'm not Notch, but I am a YouTuber).

115 points by hoffcoder 12y ago

w1ntermute 12y ago

Any word on whether Notch is participating this time around?

netcraft 12y ago
He just tweeted that he is, but isn't sure if he will stream. https://twitter.com/notch/status/459703644213227520 https://twitter.com/notch/status/459703644213227520

netcraft 12y ago

I always enjoy watching the streamers during this weekend. Its amazing how much you can learn by just watching someone code. This one snuck up on me, I haven't heard of a lot of streamers this time - does anyone know of any good ones to watch?

munchor 12y ago
Just try watching the top viewed ones on Twitch. Personally, I enjoy watching Ananace, Notch and TheCherno. Oh, and don't forget deepnight (Sebastian Bénard). He has won 3 or more Ludums and I love watching him making them.
flexd 12y ago
I was watching Notch coding his christmas santa game in Dart/WebGL the last time, that was fun. If you try to keep up with what he/the streamer is writing in your own editor you can get a better feeling of how certain things work. It's like a nice interactive workshop where you get no help and it's hard to keep up.

Lerc 12y ago

I did Ludum Dares 6,7,8,9,10,13,14,15,20,21,24 and 26. That's a bunch of stuff that I've made that I wouldn't have without the Ludum Dare. It let me explore ideas and learn a lot. I haven't Won a Ludum Dare, nor do I expect to (I got 1st for graphics once) The standard is extremely high. Here's a sampling of some of mine that play online. Some Games came out a bit mad http://screamingduck.com/Lerc/LD13.html http://screamingduck.com/Lerc/LD13.html Some were insanely hard http://screamingduck.com/Lerc/LD14.html http://screamingduck.com/Lerc/LD14.html Some were pretty but otherwise fairly crappy http://fingswotidun.com/Ludum20 http://fingswotidun.com/Ludum20 This one just about gave every web-browser a hernia http://www.fingswotidun.com/ld21/ http://www.fingswotidun.com/ld21/ And some were, well I don't know what the hell this is, but it was pretty neat. http://www.fingswotidun.com/ld24 http://www.fingswotidun.com/ld24

TillE 12y ago
I've done it twice, and while I like the concept and it was great to get feedback on my game and everything, the themes leave me cold. People vote for the most boring, broadest things. I gave up after "minimalism". A theme should inspire. It shouldn't just sit there as a framework for you to shove your existing ideas into. I'd love to be prodded into exploring new game mechanics, and LD just doesn't do that for me.
- nimblegorilla 12y ago
  Minimalism was a great theme and that round had some of the best ludum dare games in my opinion. On the other hand, I agree that things like "You only get one" are not very inspiring.
  - laserDinosaur 12y ago
    Strangely I find the opposite - Themes like 'you only get one' imply a certain gameplay mechanic that I think leads to some real interesting games. You only get one..life? Second? What thing in games do we take for granted that we get multiple of? Themes like 'minimalism' are too broad for my liking - what does minimal even mean? Is it minimal because you only used 20 of the keys on the keyboard? Is it minimal because you didn't use every single feature in the Unreal Engine? I could submit any platformer ever made and say "it's minimal because it's limited to a 2D plane". It's so broad it quickly becomes meaningless.
    - Lockyy 12y ago
      I agree with you on the broad themes point and I really liked the 'You Only Get One' theme, at first I couldn't get past the 'one gun', 'one life', 'one minutes' ideas that I felt everyone would go for but I ended up making a simulation where you only get a single interaction after world generation and then it simulates a little village gathering food and building farms etc. and I was really happy with the result.
      - 12y ago

bluetshirt 12y ago

So when they say "game", do they really mean "video game"? This is a semantic shift that leaves me uncomfortable.

jameshart 12y ago
yes, when video game developers talk about 'games' they generally mean video game. It's a convenient shorthand in their community. Much how when a computer programmer refers to a 'file' they typically mean a 'computer file' rather than a physical one, when an electronic engineer says 'circuit' they mean an electrical circuit rather than a racing circuit.
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
zevyoura 12y ago
Actually, there's nothing in the rules that limits the competition to video games; I wouldn't be surprised if people had created print & play physical games for previous LDs.
- quill18 12y ago
  People have in fact done so.
- bluetshirt 12y ago
  References to "source code" apply only to video games.
gagege 12y ago
Are games not a subset of video games? edited: the word "video" next to the first games
- Kiro 12y ago
  Is that supposed to be an infinite loop?

Rusky 12y ago

I've enjoyed doing short game dev competitions many times before but I've never done LD. I'm planning on live streaming it this time if anyone's interested: http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/2014/04/25/im-in-with-a-live-stream/ http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/2014/04/25/im-in-with-a-live-...

bayesianhorse 12y ago

I sometimes think that it would be nice to know the theme in advance to know if you want to spend two days on this. The idea behind the theme revelation is to prevent cheating, but then again there is no cheating protection beyond a code of honor anyway. I've seen tons of games in LD that only barely fulfilled the theme.

quill18 12y ago

If you have any interest at all in game programming, I highly recommend that you participate. It's invigorating to have a fixed deadline that forces you to actually FINISH game instead of just add to a heap of incomplete ideas. This is going to be my 8th time participating, and I'll be livestreaming the whole thing -- which to me is at least 80% of the fun. It helps that I have a large audience to keep me motivated (I'm not Notch, but I am a YouTuber).