itch.io

Hi, I believe there are three key reasons we managed to pull this off:

1. Experience
2. Organization
3. Collaboration
4. Experience This isn’t our first rodeo. If you check my itch.io page, you'll see we've participated in several game jams over the past two years. We've learned a lot about what can cause delays or issues, and we've become much more familiar with our tools, especially Unity and Adventure Creator. For example, last year the main menu for Midnight Bloodbath took me an entire day because I made mistakes during setup. This time around, we focused on sticking to simple, familiar things but using them in more creative ways.
5. Organization We were a team of three this year, and from day one, we divided the tasks efficiently. I had a rough idea of the story and quickly decided which dialogue topics each character would discuss. I then wrote the dialogues for each character accordingly. I even cut some characters to simplify both the development and the player experience. I kept the animations simple, with most characters standing in place. I knew the final fight scene would be the most complex, so I tackled that immediately and saved the easier tasks for later. This time, I also set up the entire structure of the game in Unity right away with empty scenes, and we filled them in as we progressed. Having LBRTY handle all the amazing backgrounds took a lot of pressure off me, allowing me to focus more on the story and characters.
6. Collaboration Finding the right people to collaborate with is crucial, and I was extremely lucky. I met Hankworx last year while working on Midnight Bloodbath (this is our "anniversary" game!). I was blown away by his talent and work ethic. For the game jam, he even took time off from work, recording music on real instruments and always setting the bar high. He's a superstar! This was my first time working with LBRTY, who I met through other game jams. We found out we used to live nearby, which was a cool coincidence! He's an incredible pixel art designer and produced a large number of backgrounds in a short time, which really sped up the process for us. A special shout-out goes to the voice artists, who we contacted in advance to ask them to keep some time free during the jam week for recording. We focused on the dialogue right away so we could send them the scripts as early as possible. They all recorded their parts quickly and professionally, delivering excellent quality. From there, it was just a matter of dropping the files into the right folders. Even though we made some mistakes, we were able to help each other fix them quickly and efficiently.

To sum it up, my recommendations are:

1. Participate in lots of game jams
2. Organize your workflow as much as possible from day one
3. Find the right people to collaborate with

And a note I feel is worth adding and absolutely relevant to the question: Duck's vision for this project was incredibly clear from the start.