"Going into this game jam I prepared myself for criticism knowing that I am a noob myself, but I was surprised by the positivity and supportiveness of this community. "
Stack Overflow took all the toxic ones, the positive ones are what's left on itch.
Nah I jest, this was a great jam to participate in as a first jam, and in fact that's what my team and I did too. We decided after messing around with some design principles for a while we'd finally put something out to the world, and despite it being a little under the radar I'm actually really happy with it. We proved that we could get something out under pressure, and proved it to ourselves more than anyone else. I think we needed the confidence boost of getting something started, made, and done. This jam is a great place to build some development confidence and I'm glad it sounds like you had a really good experience too!
Also very much enjoyed your game- I loved the control swaps and the almost surreal techgore snippets. The soundtrack warping halfway scared the absolute living ghost out of me while playing it in dark at midnight lol.
I think Swagturtle made an excellent point about scope by the way! For example, in our project Vale, we were running out of time pretty badly (working full time jobs on top of development is a rough balancing act). Like you, we were also in the last 5 minute club, and I honestly thought our build wasn't going to make it in time. Thank God it did!
We had a lot of things planned for the final project that never made it in, things that had DAYS of work put towards making that just couldn't reasonably fit in. For example, Vale was originally supposed to have an opening and closing cutscene- for which we took LIVE footage of ourselves as the "actors" and rotoscoped abstract pixel frames over to create short animations for the project. When it came down to implementation- there simply put was no feasible way to incorporate it in the timeframe that felt like it belonged in the game, and we had to scrap it, effectively making the only thing we got out of all that recording and animation the experience we got from doing it (which to be honest, is worth it's weight in gold). Scrapping those parts, which at the time seemed vital, eventually allowed us to actually finish the project in time.
Also, not an experienced developer myself quite yet, but I think I'm starting to realize that just talking about your games, ideas, shortcomings, successes, all of it- keeping the communication open between yourself and other people in the game design field- keeps the ideas fresh in your mind and sets bars for yourself to continue to reach and accomplish. Chatting with other people who also make games will give you fresh perspectives and might even help you think past roadblocks that might come up. Oh- and like Brackey's says- if you ever find yourself working on a problem that seems to defy the very laws of the universe- it might mean it's time to take a break and come back to it refreshed. The answer might be easier than you think.
If you ever feel like chatting on some concepts or anything really feel free to reach out! I quite like the direction your games seem to be going and would love to check out any other works you put out too!
Vale (For anyone interested)
