I haven't done any game jams in a long time, but my girlfriend bugged me enough to join this one that I finally decided to give it a shot. And wow, was it fun! Everyone was super nice, the community is excellent, and there are SO MANY AMAZING GAMES!!! I had a ton of fun playing as many as I could (and I'm gonna keep playing more of them) because I just love the theme so much. I'm glad it popped off the way that it did - over 500 projects with even more participants. Congrats to everyone who submitted, and even if you didn't manage to get there in time, I'm still proud of you for trying :) I saw a ton of first-time jammers as well, and I gotta say, I look forward to seeing all of you in future jams!!
Making JFHFX (my jam game) was a real roller coaster. I was in a general slump creatively, so when I was staring at that blank page trying to come up with what I wanted to make, it felt like I'd been asked to throw a boulder across the Atlantic. Around the same time, though, I rediscovered the musical stylings of Hideki Naganuma, best known for his work on the Jet Set Radio games. Listening to those joy-filled tracks made me realize that the thing I was missing was... energy! What we bring into our lives is what we get out of them, and I hadn't been doing anything that brought excitement to me as a person. So what was a gamedev to do? I wanted to make something intense, that would get my neurons dancing and my fingers tapping. I needed to make something stylish and funky like the Naganuma I was listening to.
Now, it's not all that easy, and roller coasters don't only have one twist. It was tough to shake off the rust, and between that and life's obligations, I only ended up using about three evenings out of the whole week given. The first two were at the start of the jam, and truth be told, I nearly gave up after I realized all I still had to do... but then, boom, Sunday night, I found my resolve and banged out the start screen, game over functionality, points system, and lives system in the space of three hours. And it was totally worth it!
Once the voting period is over, I want to keep working on JFHFX and get it to the place I envisioned when I started coding. That, and I want to participate in more jams!!!! I totally forgot how good they are for getting your butt in gear. Thanks again to PossiblyAxolotl and to everyone who submitted, voted, commented, anything during this jam!