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Hi everyone!  I haven't participated in many jams before, but this is my first opportunity to physically attend one. 

My question-- I intend to work alone, mostly because of life situations where I don't know if I can reliability contribute to a team.  What are the benefits for a person working alone to attend the jam? (I've also never been to the space before, though I've been meaning to.). Should I stop by, or would I do just as well to participate remotely?

Hello!  This is my... I think third? attempt at a MFGJ.  I ended up falling off quickly last time, but I'm hoping that maybe I'll find it in me to stick with this one.

I'm having a lot of trouble coming up with a concept for this one!  I've been giving it a lot of thought, but a problem I always have is keeping things simple enough.

I've decided that I -think- I want to try to use Adventure Game Studio, as my "first" for this My First Game Jam.  I've looked into using it before but I don't think I've actually ever really gotten into it.  The problem is going to be designing a simple, short enough adventure game to finish in this timeframe.

I want to make a game about a child having a recurring dream.  There will be a timer, and at the end, the child wakes up and you decide if you want to keep trying by sleeping again.  With the knowledge gained while figuring out puzzles, you should be able to get through things faster each time, allowing you to progress further.  Also, there will be discovered shortcuts, and possibly items or powers you get that you retain when you dream again.

This is what I've got so far, but still trying to see about simplifying it!

This is looking really nice so far! Beautiful color schemes!

Day 2 progress-

So, things are going a little slow so far, and I haven't been able to get too much done this weekend.

I didn't do much on this today, but I have been working on writing in Twine. There are a lot of paths to explore, and I still need to figure out what my minimum is here, to keep it from getting overwhelming for this timeframe. Here's a schematic of what I have so far, but it's far from complete!

I'll see what else I can get done before tonight is over. In the meantime, here's a small additional little illustration I did last night.

Wow, I'm loving those sprites! And the theme of the game sounds so pleasant. Looking forward to seeing some of the puzzles!

This sounds really interesting! Simple enough to accomplish in the short time of the jam, but very fun and cute! Looking forward to seeing progress.

Ooooh, I didn't know about that! I'll definitely check it out, thank you!

Hi! I'm Kim, but I also go by Destry and this is uh... my second My First Game Jam! I'm trying some new things this time.

Concept

An illustrated, text-based choose-your-own-adventure story about a lost dog in the wilds, trying to survive and find their way back to their human.

Game Engine

I'm hoping to use Unity for the first real time, but until I get better grips on this, I'll probably be prototyping in Twine.

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Day 1 progress (so far!)--

So I've decided that I want the game to be a series of trials that you come across while making your way up the mountain. I sketched up a mock-up map of what some of these trials could be and how they're laid out (which looks really bad and I don't intend on sharing in its current state, oops!)

Also, here is a rough sketch of our protagonist!

I intend to clean it up a little bit, but I want to leave all of the art fairly rough.

My plan for the rest of day 1-- plan out the trials more thoroughly, maybe start making some of the actual illustrations?

Plan for day 2-- start the actual writing, and continue learning Unity to prepare for building the final product.

As far as unintentional effects go, that's amazing, ahaha. It looks like the cat is trying to slowly calm the other cat's restless head.

What are your plans so far with the fighting game? I think moving the paw with the mouse seems cool!

1. Hi there! What's your name? Want to introduce yourself?

Hi! My name is Kim, but I mostly go by Destry online. I went to school for Illustration and some Animation, but I've been stagnating a lot in the couple of years since I graduated, so I'm trying to get back into making things! I'm most passionate about making games, but I have little experience so far.

2. Did you participate in the last jam we held? If so, what do you plan on doing better this time? If not, what's your reason for joining?]

I did! The game that I made for the last game (Xylia's Curse) ended up being very rough and kind of incomplete, so I want to try making something even simpler and with a clear, small scope. I'm hoping to do something mostly text based this time, to save on time. Maybe a kind of interactive short story with a few illustrations?

3. What games are your favorites? Did any of them inspire you, or made you want to make your own?

I like all kinds of games! But lately, I have been very inspired by games that try to take atypical approaches. (Especially the more recent trends towards non-violent games or games where you interact with the world in unique ways.)

4. Do you have experience with game development? What did you do/with what engine?

Very little, mostly in GameMaker. I've played around with making a couple little games, but nothing yet that I think of as a real complete project. For this jam though, I'm going to try using Unity for the first time! I've been taking some intro courses on it recently, and haven't gotten far into them yet, which is why I want to aim for something simple and text-based.

5. Tell us about something you're passionate about!

Art! Also, animals/plants are very important to me!

This was really nice! I really liked the atmosphere and the art style was very pretty, especially in the last area. I look forward to seeing it if you get around to a fuller version of it!

Okay, so with only 13 minutes left now, I just submitted my game.

It's very very rough!! And maybe impossible? To be completely honest, I haven't beaten it yet.

So, it could use a lot of work, but I am glad that I was able to learn some new things from this jam!

All feedback is appreciated! So feel free to let me know what you think about it.

Day: Last!

So, as it turns out I didn't have much time to work on this over most of the jam! But in these last few hours, I want to try to do as much as I can. Not much was done since my last update, besides running into a couple of issues. I know I'm not going to do many of the things I wanted to do, but I still want to finish it on some level.

So, here are my goals for today!

-Break the environment down into some assets to build one long room

-Add one more type of citizen??

-Make a simple objective/scoring system

-Add some text!

So we'll see how this goes.

I like this concept! Especially the gradually changing weather. It looks like it's working well so far!

Looks like it's working pretty well! And that walking animation is really cute, too.

Day 2 Progress:

Okay, so far today I've added a new citizen and gave her a slightly different path, but I want to play with more diverse behaviors.

I also finished up an ability to cover your face to avoid petrifying the innocents, but when you use it, it gradually raises suspicion.

I also added in a bar to show the suspicion level rising.

Lastly, I started work on a second room, and I guess finished making the background for it.

When the suspicion meter reaches 100%, guards are going to be summoned, so I think working on them is probably my next goal.

Hmmmm. I've been trying to figure this out, but I am not really a coder and I don't have a great grasp on all of this stuff, but I can't seem to figure out how I would deal with classes in Gamemaker? I think I'm going to leave it as is for now, but I'm trying to learn about things like that to see if I can fix it later. Thank you for the ideas!

This is really cute! It seems like a good use of the 3d/2d sprite combo. It sounds like it's going to be fun!

This is such a good look!! And I think the Jack and the Beanstalk theme has a lot of potential, too! It could be pretty cute.

I like the sprites, they have a lot of personality! Looking forward to seeing how this turns out.

Those sketches are really nice!! The color palette is excellent. Also, I think you picked good reasonable goals, and it sounds like you should be able to doing it!

I look forward to seeing how it goes!

Day 1 progress so far:

So far, I managed to get the turning-to-stone mechanic working (somewhat), and I'm working on a system where other npcs will stop upon noticing their stone friends, raising suspicion.

There's a lot that needs to be worked out even with these mechanics still, but I think it's an okay start!

One of the main problems I'm having is deciding if they should pause every time they encounter the statue. Also, as seen in this gif, it seems that only one npc will react to the statues at a time? I'm not sure why this is happening, but I'm not sure if this is a problem or not. It might be for the best, but this remains to be seen!

Evening Update:

I got my tablet working again, so here are some updated visuals and silly animations. I also tweaked all the code a little bit so things are working a little better now.

I tried to find an art style that would be quick enough for the Jam. I'm iffy on the character sprites, but I think they'll do for now. I also like how the softness of everything came out, although maybe some things are a little too soft.

I also made a vague map to plan out how many rooms I want to aim for, and how they should be arranged. I made it 17 rooms of varrying sizes, but I will probably cut some of them out.

Hi! My name is Kim, but I also go by DestryHawk, and this is the first GameJam I'll be participating in!

Experience

I mostly have experience as an artist, but I've been wanting to make games for a very long time now. I have a little bit of experience playing around with Gamemaker, so that's what I'm using for this Jam.

Concept

In this game, you play as a friendly Gorgon who is trying to get to a temple. You have to make your way through the town while causing as little impact as possible, so you need to avert your gaze to avoid turning the townspeople to stone! If you make too much of a scene, you will attract the attention of the town guards. That's the bare bones of what I want to do with this game, and it's what I'm hoping to accomplish for this game jam!

Visuals:

This is embarassing because Art is supposed to be the part I can do!! But I discovered yesterday that my tablet isn't working, so I'm throwing together some attempts at pixel stuff to at least be placeholder graphics. Hopefully I can get the tablet working well before the end of the jam!

Update: My tablet is working again, so after a bit of experimentation, I picked a style that I like, but seems quick enough to be reasonable for this jam. Here's an example of what it looks like so far:

I'm not really sure what else to put here so I'll fill it in later.