#myfirstgamejam

[tehstripe]

Weekend game accomplishments! This game now has SOUND now! Plus a main menu with an options and credits screen. Tomorrow the goal will be to make a pause screen and a little blurb that pops up at the beginning to tell you how to play the game. After that it's just adding as many new clothes as possible until the deadline!

[marzgamez]

HI!!!!!

I DID THE ITCH MY FIRST GAME JAM!!!

My Last Speed Date - The dating sim for people who love deranged characters.

Disclaimer: NONE of the dateable characters are based off of real people. Anything similar to real life, regarding dateable characters, is a coincidence.

Desperate for a love life, you decide to give speed dating a chance. What you had hoped to be a normal evening of trying to find the love of your life, was far from normal. Though, you could hopefully still find the love of your life among these (mostly)non-human killers.

Please check it out if you are intrested!!!

[lazytunes]

Doing a gamejam game about a witch going out to get milk. Had to make her kinda fast but shes a cutie!

[bernadinesweetspot]

Day 2: My First Game Jam!

At the end of my last blog post, I had decided I wanted to achieve two things today:

1. implement some CSS;

2. expand and randomise sections of text.

I feel like I can safely say I met both of those goals today!

Most of the morning and afternoon were taken up by reading through CSS documentation, mainly using W3 schools as reference. I then put what I had learned (or relearned... lots of my knowledge of CSS and HTML coding came from my college years, which I can admit was about... 12 years ago~) into a simple stylesheet that my twine game can use.

This involved thinking about certain design aspects. Whilst I could easily decide on what fonts would be used for headers vs text, the sizing of borders and styling of hyperlinks, I had not yet chosen what colour palette I wanted to use for my game.

I frequently use pinterest as a low effort mood and idea board, and I already had a board that I had saved plenty of my favourite colour schemes in. These have mainly been used as inspiration for bitsy games or games that use less than 8 channels of colour. However, when browsing the ones I had saved over the years, I found none had that post box aesthetic (whatever that actually is...). so I searched for palettes with a post box/mail type theme.

I limited it down to three options, but I most liked the last palette I had referenced (it's always the same, it's the last one you try!). This probably wont be my final colour palette, but it's been nice to not have to think about it again, and should I wish to change the hex values, I know exactly where and how to make those changes.

After mucking about with CSS, I switched over to randomising my text segments. This was easily than I had imagined, only using the either() function in sugarcube. Now each point defining passage has a 50% chance of having different text in the storyline! I hope that with this change, my game could be a bit more replayable.

Randomising my suspicious scores alongside my happiness meter proved a bit more tricky... and I wish I could tell you how I fixed it but I don't quite know what I did?

At some point I was super embarrassed because I had a functional game before, which then changed to a non-functional game and when trying to troubleshoot why, I was greeted with a  whole ass page of + 4 repeating. I wish I got a screenshot but I also am grateful I no longer have to look at an entire screen of + 4 + 4 + 4 over and over and over...

Finally, after losing some steam since it is currently midnight over here, I jiggled around my twine wysiwyg passages into a more readable format. This wasn't particularly hard but my fiance had a good point about flow chart readability, and I trusted his opinion due to his history and experience with other pieces of software that depended on flow charts (for example, Magic).

Other than that, I might call it a day! What I'd like to do tomorrow is:

Refining score probabilities using maths (will likely need a helping hand to make gameplay balanced);

Adding more functionality and random text segments;

Creating a new level wherein your suspicion meter could advance you to a promotion? Unsure... stay tuned!

Over and out!-

[myfirstgamejam]

🌱 My First Game Jam: Winter 2023 is finished! 🌱

Go play some games!

Over 430 games have been submitted for this jam! It’s an incredible effort to learn something new and create a project under a two week deadline–especially for first time (and learning) game creators! This year had a few changes, so thanks for bearing with us while we shift things around a bit!

🌱 Play some games!

Your fellow jammers made some incredible games! Be sure to check them out and leave constructive comments. We’ve also created a playtesting thread if you would like some specific feedback!

🌱 Share your game!

If you get the chance, be sure to post your game to the #MyFirstGameJam, #ScreenshotSaturday and #gamedev tags!

🌱 Fix some bugs?

We’ve gotten this question a couple times: Yes, it’s perfectly okay to update your game post-jam! Feel free to continue working on your jam games.

🌱 Continuing a project or starting a new one?

It can be tough to keep up your productive momentum after a deadline. Check out these suggestions for wrapping up your game or continuing it in the future!

Check out these productivity tools!

Don’t forget to back up your work!

Learn version control!

Write a post-mortem!

Connect with other devs from the jam!

Check out upcoming jams happening on itch.io!

Great job everyone! See you again in the summer!

[violentlydefending]

“It’s Not You, It’s Your Trauma”, a.k.a. “I Was Transported to Another World to do Mundane Tasks!?”

The world’s most prosaic isekai.

---

Stuck in an unfamiliar world inside a library that records the entirety of its history through mysteriously magical means, Sammy Baxa must... dust the shelves? Well, at least she's got a friend to accompany her while she waits for a way back home.

"It's Not You, It's Your Trauma" is a short character-focused game with lots of dialogue and lots of silly faces and just a little bit of drama.

If you’re interested, please feel free to check it out on itch.io HERE!

[petricakegames]

My First Game Jam Devlog: Post-mortem

First off, a huge thank you and virtual hug-with-consent to all the folks who encouraged me throughout this process. The kind words and likes bolstered my spirits and filled me with creative vim and vigor *strikes heroic pose on a cliffside as waves crash in the background*

A look back at the last two weeks!: My first idea for this jam was enormously out of scope. Unsurprisingly. It started--as so many of my ideas do--with the title. I had this grandiose idea of the words This. Change. Everything. smacking the player in the face. And I was like, 'kay what's the game there? First to mind was a device that literally changes everything--though the original idea was more subtle, with environmental storytelling more akin to Gone Home or What Remains of Edith Finch. The device would make subtle changes to the environment but completely change the broader narrative elements--year of the setting, relationships, weather and time of year, genders and appearance of the MC. But with only 2 weeks (!) subtlety got tossed out the window and in like a wrecking ball comes a genre-hopping game instead! I also liked this idea and it's not one I feel like I see a lot of? (Feel free to drop in some recs if you know of one you like!)

Took a personal route for the theme of the jam, "Heal." Question that had come up in therapy lately (no better healing than therapy) was why I need permission to do things I want to do. Logically, I know I don't need permission--I have the key I need. So why do I need someone to tell me it's okay to do them? Not sure I found an answer, but that was the spark behind the story.

It lacked refinement, as many jam games do, and I would've liked to develop the ideas and mechanics a bit better. Would've LOVED music, but that's way outside my current skill level. I had a great time making the puzzle game portion. Definitely my favorite part.

Will I revisit the game? Probably not this one specifically. I think I'll call it done where it is. The idea, though--absolutely.

Overall, really happy with the result of the jam. I got a complete game done in two weeks. I grew my skills with game development and pixel art, like I'd wanted to and I had fun with it.

What's up next? I've got a bigger GB Studio project that's been dormant for a while. It's about 2/3 done and I'd like to see it through. There's another tileset I started before the jam to finish. And I'd really like to make a Twine/IF game.

Stay tuned! <3

[bruisedconscience]

I cannot submit my game to @myfirstgamejam because the itch.io Image Servers are down, and my game, though published, isn't showing up as an "Existing Project" for submittal.

I really hope this is because of the server errors and not because my game is listed as a prototype...

Needless to say I am worried about whether I'll be able to submit my game before the Saturday Night deadline for sure... I'll have to reach out to itch.io tomorrow if I am still having trouble!!

edit: the images still won't load in my final devlog for the prototype (they appear as broken images) but I GOT THIS CONFIRMATION SO!

[mondaysandwich]

Would there be anyone interested in throwing together a little visual novel with me for @myfirstgamejam? 👀

[puffyartist]

Satyr Girl and the Escape From Hell

You’re a Satyr Girl who grew up in hell with her family, but never really felt like she fit in.  A passing angel seems to be your best chance to escape and join a world that understands you better. Is it the best choice to make, though? It's up to you to decide!

I heard about the My First Game Jam years ago, but I never took part in it until now! In 2 weeks I taught myself a lot of Game Maker basics and made a short adventure rpg game, with the hopes that I could figure out how to code the mechanics for my More Ambitious Game Idea. Key thing I learnt: Even what you think is a super small touch can easily take A Lot More Time Then You Expect To Code.

You can play the game on itchio here (windows only I’m afraid)! 

It’s not the tidiest game, but you can get 2 different endings, there’s a bunch of dialogue, and I’m proud of how much I managed to get done in my first attempt! I would like to keep using it as a way to figure out how to code what I want; if you notice any major bugs, I’d appreciate it if you’d let me know!

[tehstripe]

I haven't uploaded a progress video the past couple of days since most of it's just been adding new clothing options and not much else, but there IS now a store that you can access to buy some of the new clothes I've been building out.

Going to switch gears over the weekend to doing some basic things like adding sound/music and a title screen, so hopefully it'll start to come together and feel like a real game!

[eveningrelics]

-drags hands down face-

So, I am nowhere close to being done with the first scenario.

I tried but three and a half days were unusable due to illness and pain and then most of today has gone to finishing up a project I had previously committed to. Not to mention some technical hiccups along the way.

BUT.

I am having fun learning Ren’py.

I have learned how to do choices and branching paths, so that’s fun.

Slowly learning how to edit the menus.

So I intend to finish these two scenarios at least regardless as both a learning experience and for fun.

Turns out though that nothing makes you self-conscious of your writing quite like putting it in a game.

Still, we’ll see how it goes!

[sushis-first-game-jam]

not so poggers. due to irl issues I wont be able to finish my game in this jam even though I really want to. I'm a minor and even though its school holidays (which is why I joined this jam) I'm moving so I have been busy packing up the house. I also wont have access to my pc during the last days of the jam, which I didn't plan for as I wasn't sure the dates where I had important events going on. I am not giving up on my game though! I have a big project with a topic of my choosing that I need to do for school next year, and I think I want to make a game for it. So I have to have a demo for this game finished before ~August 12. Its much more time than a 2 week jam, but it should give me enough time! I want a demo of this one finished so that I can have some experience and a project already in my belt before I work on a year long assignment.

I wont be posting on itch.io anymore cause,, I'm not making this game for the jam anymore, but I will still be posting here! Wont be able to work on it too much because of how busy I will be, but when things get done they will be posted here :)

so I guess this is goodbye, goodluck to everyone! I'll be sure to check out the games when the jam ends :D

[bernadinesweetspot]

Day 1: My First Game Jam!

On the evening of July 20th, I set my alarm for 8am. This is because I want to participate in My First Game Jam summer 2023, for some reason.

The theme was announced at 8am sharp in my time zone. Whilst entirely optional, the theme they agreed upon to inspire jammers was 'cycles'.

I wanted to brainstorm a little before attempting something anywhere near coding, so I browsed some story prompts, opened up OneNote and attempted to map out a story arc, as well as defining characters and locations, and additionally writing up a reference section to link to any resources and credit any assets.

I had decided to use Twine as my engine of choice. The last time My First Game Jam was hosted, I had planned to learn and use Unity but unfortunately bit off more than I could chew, which resulted in me not submitting a game at all and shamefully lurking in the discord's #general channel.

At first I was intimidated but as my answer to the @daily question in the discord, my second goal was to "actually read the documentation" of my chosen engine, which unsurprisingly was very helpful. I managed to whip up a prototype for the entirety of the prologue for this small game whilst learning to use conditional variables.

My first goal though was to "actually submit something this time" which, with the way things had been going today, seemed like it could be genuinely plausible. But upon reading deeper into the topic of variables, I suddenly thought: "I could make the game I initially wanted to make in unity, but was too chicken to attempt."

So I dug out the old school notebook and pens and got to work.

I found my handscribbled gameloop I had made for the previous jam, and went about inputting this loop into Twine. I ended up with a simple game with a beginning that reset all your scores, an end that displayed your scores once you completed the game and, if you played your cards right, could be played infinitely.

In looking up different types of variable rules for this game prototype, I found you could balance player choices with luck probabilities. Using these types of variables would give more unique outcomes, which in turn could mean more replayability for the game. I had a brief discussion with my fiance about weighted probabilities, but this is definitely an area that could do with some more research (and at this time of night, probably tomorrow!).

So in summary:

- Berni woke up

- The theme was announced

- She answered the @daily question

- Berni brainstormed an extremely simple game

- She then read the documentation for Twine and SugarCube

- Berni was like fuck dis I can make ma game BIGGER and b e t t e r...

- She decided her two goals tomorrow would be:

1. implement CSS into her game

2. expand sections of text that could be randomised

[myfirstgamejam]

🌱 My First Game Jam: Summer 2022 is finished! 🌱

Go play some games!

Over 460 really awesome games (!! the most of any jam we've run before) have been submitted for this jam! It’s an incredible effort to learn something new and create a project under a two week deadline–especially for first time (and learning) game creators!

🌱 Play some games!

Your fellow jammers made some incredible games! Be sure to check them out and leave constructive comments. We’ve also created a playtesting thread if you would like some specific feedback!

🌱 Fill out the exit poll!

If you participated in the jam (even if you didn’t submit a game), remember to fill out our exit poll! This will help us improve the jam this winter! (And yes–you can still participate if you’ve done previous jams!)

🌱 Share your game!

If you get the chance, be sure to post your game to the #MyFirstGameJam, #ScreenshotSaturday and #gamedev tags!

🌱 Fix some bugs?

We’ve gotten this question a couple times: Yes, it’s perfectly okay to update your game post-jam! Feel free to continue working on your jam games.

🌱 Continuing a project or starting a new one?

It can be tough to keep up your productive momentum after a deadline. Check out these suggestions for wrapping up your game or continuing it in the future!

Check out these productivity tools!

Don’t forget to back up your work!

Learn version control!

Write a post-mortem!

Connect with other devs from the jam!

Check out upcoming jams happening on itch.io!

Great job everyone! See you this winter!

[hydralisk98]

Môsi is still technically a Bitsy alike engine, right?

Anyway, got some progress made upon the Servitor entry to the MyFirstGameJam Summer 2021 entry albeit I don't like the random generation very much but that shall suffice for the moment.

It's very modest but I got some code done for the collectables, written some basic text for the agents and planned a bit more upon the "what to do later on" for this kind of demoscene-y project. I kinda lack a actual storyline/intrigue so if you have suggestions let me know if you have suggestions. As for the assets and engine improvement ideas I got some in mind but not much that I can accomplish by the jam's end.

However, I am preparing some restrictions and aesthetic sprites ready to get implemented so stay tuned for it hopefully.