Ludum Dare 20: Dev Log 1

I'm making a game for the "make a video game in 48 hours" challenge, Ludum Dare, even though I have a final project to do for school. (They never said I was the smartest.) Cross-posted from http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/2011/04/30/condom-sniper-update-2/

Unity3D Webplayer test build:
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/19887116/Condom1/index.html

Skybox art is kinda done, mostly photosourced from Unity standard assets / NASA / CGtextures / Creative Commons on Flickr. Still need to turn off fog for the moon, hmm. All full bright textures for performance reasons; I’m going to be using a lot of point lights in the actual game area, so I want to save my GPU stuff for where it counts.

Mouselook is clamped because you’re mostly just going to be sniping within that rectangle in front of you, delivering condoms to the city’s horniest / most desperate.

Looking to implement the actual mechanics and building generation tomorrow night. I don’t foresee many problems, but we’ll see…

New MapCore Compo: "The Door Challenge"

Attention! There's a new level design compo about to start at MapCore:

The Door Challenge, Friday, April 29th - Sunday, May 22nd.

"Using the included prefab in the engine of your choice, script a puzzle to creatively open the door! As this is a scripting challenge, you are encouraged to use dev textures and only what art assets are absolutely necessary to communicate key ideas."



Open to Source and UDK users! (And other engines, if you're willing to port the prefab yourself. I might port it to Unity, as self-proclaimed minister of Source-Unity relations.)

New faces are, as always, a welcome sight.

And remember: the "4 week timespan" doesn't mean you need to spend 4 weeks on it; last time, Thiago made his in 24 hours and won the Cube Compo with dm_zest. (Granted, he already made the textures, but still!...)

Still think it's too much of a time commitment? We're also thinking of doing shorter "weekend" challenges, so chime in there if you like that idea.

MapCore "Cube" Compo: Done.

Well, we're done. We got entries in UDK / Source / Prey for your perusal. (Yeah, a map for Prey. Seriously. Andrew Weldon's weird like that.)

See / download entries here.

Voting is open for a week too.

And if you didn't enter this time, then consider entering next time. It's good practice for starting and finishing something... Just look at these awesome people and what they accomplished in a month.

As for a post-mortem of sorts with my own entry, "Tintern":

I went gameplay first, which is weird for me. Usually I prototype a basic mechanic, then do a fairly substantial art pass, then I design some puzzles / level flow and finish another art pass. This time I went from mechanics to puzzles to an incomplete art pass.

In terms of art style, I was going for a mixture of Giorgio de Chirico's paintings with some architecture from Luis Barragan. You might recall Barragan's influence in my previous Mapcore compo entry; the colors, dude. The colors. Plus, I recently saw Chirico's "The Melancholy of Departure" at the New York Museum of Modern Art so I guess that was still fresh on my mind.

The main gimmick is from a previous project I was working on, which had you fighting a hunter that had a scanner following it around. The scanner would drop mines and generally be a nuisance, while the hunter was fast and would pressure you into running into the mines -- and the key to beating them would be to exploit their relationship.

You had to grab the scanner and basically hold it hostage or something. However, it was difficult to develop the relationship between the two when you're too busy fighting them. So why not make them allies? And following the Halo AI rule, maybe then the player can watch them do cool stuff, and they'll seem smarter?

Oh, and I kind of slipped in some Wordsworth on a lark. And if you happen to hate English Romantic poets and think the inclusion is too pretentious: it's okay, it's just the tip.

New MapCore Compo: "The Cube"

Last time, we did a 20 brush compo. This time, it's THE CUBE; make a single player or multiplayer level, any game / mod / engine, as long as it's within a 1024 x 1024 x 1024 cube (or whatever engine equivalent.) That's it.

You have about a month. Get cracking!

Oh, and for reference, here's Duncan Blair's winning entry from the last cube compo we did. Ooooh shiny:

20 Brush Challenge @ MapCore: Vote Now!

"Ludonarrative Dissonance," by Matthew "Lunaran" Breit

The MapCore 20 Brush Challenge (as previously mentioned) has wrapped up and we saw some really awesome turnout (as well as some really talented new users!) submit maps. There are four (4) categories: best overall, coolest visuals, awesomest layout, and most creative brushwork. Guidelines / advice for voting is included in each thread.

Voting is open to the public (though I think you'll need an account) and it's more or less a screenshot contest -- but some of these entries really do deserve to be played, if not simply just to see them in motion, as with Lunaran's "Take On Me"-esque entry pictured above.

Anyway, please have a look and vote! You have 47 hours! (And stick around MapCore too, you might enjoy yourself...)

(Oh, and credit for running everything / being awesome goes to Mr. Weldon)

20 Brush Challenge @ MapCore: wrapping up!

This post shall serve as your last reminder to make something awesome for the 20 Brush MapCore compo. You have until this Sunday (January 23rd).

We're seeing lots of new faces / less than regular faces popping up and putting out amazing work, so you owe it to yourself to join our illustrious level design community and revel in the virtual camaraderie of a lifetime. (... But don't go into EOT. Don't don't don't go into EOT.)

Here's some stuff being thrown around in the WIP thread. (Note: I did not make any of these levels)...

Look at all this raw creativity oozing out of your monitor right now. Can you feel it? Can you smell it? Yes, it's urine -- but it's the urine of joy.

So if you know how to use Hammer, Radiant or UnrealEd, just whip up a crazy-looking 20 brush map and throw-in! You won't regret it. And it probably won't take you too long either.

20 Brush Challenge @ MapCore

The impressive (and rightful) winner of the leveldesign.nl compo, a Q3A CTF map by Corsair.

Most previous-gen FPS engines (i.e. of Quake / Unreal genealogies) extensively used "brushes" -- basic geometric primitives -- to rough out the basic structure of a level. Increasingly, today's game engines are relying less on brushes (even for blocking out levels!) and more on static, pre-fabricated modular props created in a modeling package. To some degree, we're forgetting the power of the brush.

So when I saw this competition at leveldesign.nl, which tasked people with making small MP maps with only 20 brushes, I was excited... but it was too late to enter. Agh! (The best entries remind me of the GeoComp2 maps.)

Instead, I asked around MapCore for interest -- and there seemed to be a lot -- in running our own 20 brush compo. And now we're doing it. It's open to anyone using any FPS game engine that uses brushes / BSP. Rules are here.

I'm giving myself a constraint of building one map per weekend, up until the deadline. It's going alright so far, it's easy to take risks and try crazy stuff I wouldn't normally build:

(That second level is an attempted tribute to the legendary Mexican architect Luis Barragan)