Joined 5 years ago
I don't do gamejams, I am gamejams
The 13th Kajam coincides nicely with the Dos Games June 2023 Jam, so maybe I'll make a DOS based entry. This might make any kind of networked realtime multiplayer quite complicated to implement, unless the game is hosted on a BBS or something. Maybe I'll create a 'play by mail' game where each player takes their turn and then emails the save to the next? Interested to hear what everyone else's ideas and plans are
I've been a bit disengaged from AKJ but I'm looking forward to participating in AKJ17, which will finally be the jam where GIANT ROBOTS is chosen as the theme
Lately I've been dabbling in NES assembly programming, so that's probably what I'll use. I've done a (not great) NES entry using C before, but I've honed my 6502 assembly in onehourgamejam to the point where I can definitely cause some trouble in a jam timeframe.
I'm starting an hour early because I'm a dirty cheater. Current plan is to do a Game Boy entry…
For the last few days I've been putting together a little cross platform game engine. It's not at all ready for use but a good JAM will make the problems with it pretty obvious real fast, so that's my plan for the weekend - write game in unfinished engine.
Also if the theme is boring I will make a GIANT ROBOTS game regardless, thanks.
My current plan is to use the haxe programming language to create my kajam entry. In theory I can write a single codebase that can be compiled down to a headless (no graphics) server to run in the cloud, while having that same code be able to produce the playable version of the game. In order to get multiplayer support in the browser, I'll also be using websockets.
But more importantly I want to be able to quickly iterate on my entry during my free time, so I've set out to automate as much of the build and deployment workflow as possible. Nothing fancy, just a makefile that builds the server, deploys it to the remote server and launches it. I can then launch the client on my local machine and see messages passing between the server and client, which seems like a pretty important precursor to a remote multiplayer game. Testing with a local server on your development machine is OK but bypasses a lot of the issues that can occur with a 'real' server out on the interweb.
The test was successful but revealed that terminating the server on the remote server left a zombie process sitting on port 8000, which means that attempting to run the server again would fail as the port was unavailable. This behaviour didn't occur when hosting the server locally, so there's some instant proof that it's worth testing on as realistic a setup as possible. Hooray.
Checking out the prison cells
Meeting a doggo in a tunnel
Might have made a mess here
Meeting the staff and students in the re-education centre
A very blocky train at the yard
Added directional sprite support to my raycaster today, so now you can see FRIENDLY WORLD INHABITANTS from multiple directions
Welcome to the 7th Kajam!
From the 1st of April until the 28th of April, everyone is invited to create a game! There are only a couple of rules, covered here.
Details of the theme are in the announcement video above! I encourage you to make a game that can be played on genuine hardware of the era, but that's completely optional! Interpret the theme however you like, just remember to have fun.
Some suggested resources for anyone interested in making a game for genuine 1996 hardware:
Gameboy development
PlayStation 1 development
Tapegro: write DOS games in javascript!
Nintendo 64 SDK
Sega Saturn Jo-Engine
A few people have asked how to actually DO alakajam recently, particularly wanting to know how to submit their game, so here's a basic guide:
READY TO RACE. Actually I might have to work that weekend but I'm pulling out all the stops and doing whatever it is you do with the nitro to get everything done in advance.
Haven't decided what technology I'm going to use but I'm hoping to put together some basecode so I can get off to a 'ROLLING START'
My only tip to everyone is to have your development environment set up in advance to avoid any stress or chaos during the jam.
Finally, I'm looking forward to a fair, sporting and above all, FRIENDLY competition between the entrants with lots of cooperation and constructive feedback