Ludum Dare is perhaps the classic virtual game jam, and one in which I’ve previously partipated as part of small teams (LD29, LD31).
After the success of Signals, the latest Ludum Dare (LD51) was a great opportunity for my first totally solo entry: A Little Bit Of Everything.
The Idea
This time the theme was “Every 10 Seconds” which, to me, meant rapid minigames with ten second timers. This being heavily inspired by classics such as WarioWare and The Impossible Quiz.
Building the initial framework only took a few hours with the majority of time being spent brainstorming and building a variety of puzzles that involve finding, calculating, platforming, or just accurately reading simple instructions.
Two key elements emerged during this process:
- Balance increasing difficulty with randomisation by grouping puzzles by difficulty
- Mix positive (do X) and negative (don’t do X) puzzles to keep the player on their toes
Feedback
Initial feedback was really positive, and it was a nice surprise to see that people were finding the game fun to play.
This was reflected in the final rankings:
| Category | Rank | Score (out of 5) |
|---|---|---|
| Overall | 581 | 3.523 |
| Fun | 234 | 3.785 |
| Innovation | 724 | 3.168 |
| Theme | 262 | 3.991 |
| Graphics | 1034 | 2.687 |
| Humor | 301 | 3.382 |
| Mood | 728 | 3.291 |
Getting 581th overall isn’t too shabby, and I’m pretty pleased about getting 234th in the Fun category. The score for Graphics was fairly mediocre, but that’s to be expected when they essentially consist of bright green shapes. Something to be improved in the future!
Next steps
My plan now is to produce a small post-jam update that:
- Boosts randomisation in some levels
- Fixes some bugs
- Adds a couple more levels
You can play A Little Bit Of Everything now on itch.io.