The Idea Behind the Game (May 17th-19th)
The idea for the game took me a long time to figure out. I had been thinking about the game for a while. Initially, I considered creating a physics-based game due to the theme "Unstable." At the same time, I was participating in a Physical Science Fair, where I had created a chemistry app. This inspired me to create something related to chemistry or chemical mixing. After pondering for a while, I came up with the idea for Super Labs.
Development Problems (May 20th - May 23rd)
I wanted to start planning the game the day after I figured out my theme, but I had no assets, characters, or game plan. I created my game plan with pen and paper before starting production. The planning took two days because it was challenging to balance with my daily activities. On the 23rd, I tried using Anime Studio to create my art, but I failed. The art I created using Anime Studio was oversized, causing Gdevelop to crash or the preview not to work. Frustrated, I logged on to itch.io, browsed asset packs, and downloaded a few. I visited Craftpix but found that all the good assets were expensive, so I decided to use the art available on itch.io. I obtained my assets (backgrounds and scenes) and got my character from an old copy of Kenney's All-in-One pack that I had purchased on sale. I now had everything I needed.
Early Development (May 24th)
I started development on Friday. I spent most of the time working on scene development, aiming to make the game look like a real lab. Although it didn't look exactly like a lab, it was still very manageable. I finished scene development that day and did a bit of character development and camera controls. I started working on the elevator late that night, but everything I did had a major glitch. So, I stopped development and took a long nap.
Mid/Heavy Development (May 25th)
As early as 9 AM, I started working on the game. I cleared my schedule and made sure I had no distractions. I worked on color mixing, reworked the character animation, sound, and reactor. I focused on major elements that worked behind the scenes, like timers. By 3 PM, the major parts of the game were finished. After a short break, I returned at 5 PM to work on the UI and other details. My sister tried out the game and liked most parts of it, but there was a major problem: you couldn't fail in the game. Even though I had added a fail event, it wasn't working because the condition I specified was too easy to avoid. I revisited my game plan and reworked it, which took an hour and 30 minutes to complete. By 7 PM, the game was finally ready.
Late Development (May 26th)
I gathered most of the screenshots and exported files into one folder, drafted the game story/page, and uploaded it in the morning by 7 AM. After cross-checking the contents, I submitted it to the game jam.
Post-Submission
Thanks to feedback from a friend on Discord, I found out that the game had two errors: the home menu had grammatical mistakes and the songs used in the game weren't looping well. Although these were not major issues, I addressed them and fixed them. I republished the game on gd.games and re-exported and uploaded it on itch.io. Then I was certain that the game was ready.