#ldcompo

If you have not seen it yet, I spend last weekend participating in the ludum dare game jam. Which means I created this little game and all the required assets within 48h:

I finished my Ludum Dare 34 game: 'The Winter'!

You can play it here. (Web, Windows, Mac and Linux. Let me know if there are any issues!)

Winter Demo

Playable Demo

You are the Wintershaman. It is your duty to defend your home against the hellish demon that fell from the sky at midnight. Plant the essence of sacred guardians and let them grow with LMB or Z, dash away from the demon's attacks with RMB or X.

I’m looking for people to try this out and give feedback based on the current progress! If you like testing unfinished games then give it a go and let me know what you think! 

So as I think of what engine I want to use this weekend the thought occurred to me that I always have this same debate with myself before each and every Ludum Dare. Sadly, the debate is usually chocked up to whether or not it's going to be a 2D or 3D project.

So what is the right approach to this question? Is there a "right" approach or are we just looking for the "better" approach? Regardless of whether your toolset includes Unity or not, this is a question that almost every LDer will face. You just hope you can solve it sooner rather than later(as in before tomorrow's announcement).

What I can tell you is there is most certainly a "right" approach. That approach is one that balances comfort and desire. Too much comfort means you're likely not putting your all into it - whereas too little comfort means you'll be wasting time learning instead of doing. Likewise, desire can make for a more rewarding and enjoyable experience - but too much can really screw up your expectations and keep you from getting the game done.

This is where my dilemma is occurring. I usually decide between Construct 2 or Unity3D after the theme is announced and I have some ideas - which is generally the better way to do it.

If you find yourself having a similar mental snafu, here are some things to consider:

If your fear is timing, air on the side of comfort - if time management is something you're still working on, you're not going to want to use tools you have little to no knowledge of, period; we all want to try something new sometimes but Ludum Dare is not the best place to do it

Builds that work vs. builds that are accessible - some people prefer toolsets due to the reliability of its builds - others prefer the accessibility of their builds; go with what you know here; when it comes time to publish your game do you want it to be accessible? What good is accessibility if your builds crash or only work in certain browsers? This is an issue that often can arise too late to correct, so it's good to know of any issues or concerns with your tools before publishing time

Do I update? Should I update? - the beauty of digital software nowadays is the constant maintenance and patches that developers can provide; as some of us have painfully experienced, these updates sometimes bring bugs, breaks, and slow downs that are just not good for LD; unless you're certain there are no breaking changes to your workflow don't bother upgrading (although with improved WebGL support, it might be wise to upgrade Unity to 5.3)

Teamwork and tools - some of you who decide to compete in the jam can work as a team, and depending on the level of coherence in your workflows there's always the potential that you and your teammates tools run into some issues; most software saves things into common file formats, so this will likely be a really simple issue to solve should it arise during development - but it's good to consider nonetheless

Do I want to use this? - this ties in to the concept of balancing desire; you're going to want to use certain tools, for one reason or another - I would suggest that if they don't pass any of the previous questions you should really consider something else; for example: I use Construct 2 at work developing learning simulations for adult education - part of me says, "I'm really proficient in C2 and can get a lot done fast, know its pipeline forwards and backwards, and have completed projects with it." The other part of me says, "Dammit, I use C2 all the time and it's idiosyncrasies piss me off to no end - I want to use Unity!"

So you see where that takes you?

Right back to the top of list, trying to vet whether or not we should now use another tool. And to be honest, I haven't decided - for me, personally, this is a tough decision.

I move quite fast in C2 and will likely generate the most polished results by using it. Given this, however, I generally dislike the Construct 2 "way" of doing things, mostly because there is no code and the editor really fails at making iteration and repetitive tasks (debugging, mostly) a CHORE. Couple that with boredom and you have a lack of desire that can really hamper development this weekend.

But what about Unity? I move a little bit slower, which is a red flag. I'm more proficient of a 3D developer than a 2D developer in Unity (strange, I know, I've just spent more time with 3D projects than I have 2D). Now for the contrast - I love Unity's editor. It's more nimble, more tuned for the repetitive tweaks and the batch editing that game development often entails. That, put together with the fact that I can use a code editor like Sublime Text, it becomes arguable that I can actually move faster in Unity when everything is said and done.

The last nail in the coffin, is debugging and building.

For most of you, this isn't much of a thing. You code gods, who will essentially be in your IDEs for 48 hours straight, are often at the behest of your software's tools. For me, I have to consider what my tools bring to the table for debugging and building.

Construct 2 has a great 'Debug preview' which allows me to view all loaded game objects, variables, and system info (like FPS and CPU speed). Also, I can go in and add breakpoints to my events to keep track of things - which can cumbersome and still requires me to map my events out specifically how I'd like them to run. This is great for large projects where I spend a lot of time designing my events to work like Classes, Objects, and Functions - but could cost me lots of time in a LD compo. In application, Construct 2 bugs have sometimes taking me hours to find and only seconds to fix - that's a problem.

In Unity, standard code debugging rules apply. Couple that with some of the new debugging tools in UnityVS and MonoDevelop and you can really quickly and easily find and start working on issues. For me, as well, I'll be doing most of the writing in Sublime Text 3 because I'm incredibly fast and know how to leverage shortcuts and snippets to make coding quicker. I also have my Sublime instance set up with the OmniSharp plugin which gives me Intellisense and other awesome C# tools. Unless I run into some really scary bugs, I'll likely not have to open VisualStudio or MonoDevelop. This is what is really attracting me to Unity right now. I feel like I will be speedier - but will I be successful?

These are all the questions I will be losing sleep over tonight - and hopefully can find brain time to settle on tomorrow evening...

I really want to run 3D this time. Want. Depending on the theme, we'll have to wait and see. Good luck and hopefully you can use these tips to smooth out any kinks in your workflow.

Let me know what you think!

Ludum Dare 33 is donzo!

Final project name is Homebound Spirits, what happens when you get 99 spirits? who knows!

you can download the full game and try it out yourself here (sorry windows only):