competition

Ludum Dare Jam 23

competition

Check out “Overpopulous”! Once again I was part of team Make a Game and we made this space colonization game where you are a team of astronauts from an overpopulated planet that needs to expand. Thing is, the rocket is upside down and the whole planet is propelled along for the ride!

Ludum Dare Jam is an online competition in which you are given a subject and have to make a game in 72 hours. The game is currently being judged along with all the other cool games and the results will be known in 19 days.

You can play it here.

Good job everyone!

House of Brass, Sinking and the newcomer Carousel

boardgame prototype, Carousel, competition, House of Brass, Multiuniversum, Sinking

“Fantastic Creations: House of Brass Collector’s Edition”, the game I’ve been working on for a year and eight months is now out! It is a light steampunk Hidden Object Adventure for Bigfish Games. The reviews are great and everyone seems to enjoy the fresh ideas we brought into it. It’s currently in second place of BigFish’s Top 10 PC downloads and you can check it out here.

I just closed the box with the “Sinking” prototype for testing in the Ludopolis contest. I really enjoyed the process of creating it so far. The players enjoyed it as well so I’m pitching the game to publishing companies that seem appropriate.

While I was translating its rules I had started taking notes of another idea, this time for a card game. I played around with some ideas for a couple of days until I got to something I believe to be original, accessible and fun. If it’s anything like “Sinking” I should to a playtest right away so can I take the broken parts out and focus on the good stuff. I quickly made the prototype you see in the photo above so I can test it this week. I’m calling it “Carousel” for now.

Arcádia Lusitana de Criadores de Boardgames

Arcádia, boardgame prototype, competition, Sinking

Recently, the “Arcádia Lusitana de Criadores de Boardgames” was created. The main goal is to share information, resources, provide playtesting and feedback for portuguese boardgame projects. Currently the main discussion platform is facebook, along with regular meetings. Seems there are quite a few more Lisbon-based designers than I thought!

In the first meeting Vital Lacerda tried out my game. He seemed to like it and suggested I switch the placement of the minimum bid silhouettes with the action effects to make it more intuitive. I don’t know how I didn’t think of that before. I laughed and wrote it down right away. This weekend I had the chance to test it and he was absolutely right – it does make it easier to teach and play.

The second meeting is coming up! It will be on the 20th of February and you can find all the details here.

Also, Last week I read Raph Koster’s “Theory of Fun”. If you’re interested in making games I advise you to check it out. The first half is about the human brain and how we define what’s fun for us. The second half points a possible path games should take for them to be seriously respected as an art form.

“alone I art” got 4th place!

alone I art, competition, Game Jam, Ludum Dare

“alone I art” got 4th place in Ludum Dare Jam 22, with gold medals for Humor and Coolness! This time there were even more games! 174 games in the Jam, opposed to the 90 in Ludum Dare 21. I’m really proud for the team and for being a part of it!

Here is the list of the top 25.  My favorite game in the competition – and I tested more than 90 – was number one. Midas has stylized graphics and almost no animation but the mechanics are sound. I can see this being a pretty popular game if they further iterate on it. /follow, the sweetest eye candy in the competition, came in third. It’s more of an interactive narrative than a game, but it looks and sounds gorgeous!

I recommend these game jams to anyone who wants to get involved with the industry. It’s trial by fire, and it is such a rush!

“alone I art” post mortem

alone I art, competition, Game Jam, Ludum Dare

Carlos Leituga wrote a great Post Mortem about “alone I art”, our second venture into the Ludum Dare Jam. It covers every part of the process of making this particular game in 72 hours. It has pictures, scribbles and good insights about the whole thing.

You can read it here.

I can’t wait for the results, which will be released in about 25 hours.

Ludum Dare Jam 22

alone I art, competition, Game Jam, Ludum Dare

Check out “alone I art”! Once again I was part of team Make a Game and we made this stealth game in which you’re an art lover that wants to spend valuable time with art. You have to steal all the masterpieces you can without getting caught by the guards.

Ludum Dare Jam is an online competition in which you are given a subject and have to make a game in 72 hours. The game is currently being judged along with all the other cool games and the results will be known in 11 days.

You can play it here.

Good job everyone!

New boards and new Ludum Dare!

boardgame prototype, competition, Sinking

Here’s a sneak peek of the new player boards! The action effect texts have been resumed into icons, the minimum action costs are clearer now and the colors are more colorblind-friendly. I can’t wait to test these out.

Ludum Dare Jam 22 starts in 6 hours! I’ll be part of Make A Game team once again, we’ll be making a computer game in the next 72 hours. There are more and more submissions every time, and we’ll do our best to stand out.

You can check out “Eggscape”, our game for the previous Ludum Dare Jam here.

Ludopolis

competition, Sinking

Ludopolis is a gaming event that will take place in Lisbon, June 2012. Other than the obvious usual reasons (meeting new people, playing new games) the big draw for me this time is the Boardgame Design contest because the winner gets his game published by Runadrake. Given all the big steps you have to climb to get such a game on the market, this seems like a pretty good opportunity.

Each designer can send three games for evaluation. “Sinking” is running out of design creases to iron out so I plan to apply along with another idea I’ve been sketching out.

Interested? You can check out the rules here.

Eggscape got 10th place!

boardgame prototype, competition, Eggscape, event, Game Jam, Ludum Dare, Overpopulous, Sinking

Eggscape got 10th place in Ludum Dare Jam 21, ranked the 5th most innovative game! As if that wasn’t enough, it got into PC World‘s “10 Free addictive games to play in your browser”  and Nerd Age‘s “Ludum Dare’s Favorite Games”! This is great motivation to finish everything that was missing and officially release it to the world as a complete game.

With all of the ties solved the boardgame is running pretty smooth! I’ll still keep on testing but seems like it’s complete – until I spot a splinter, which hasn’t happened in a while.

This week I contacted two portuguese boardgame designers with a respectable portfolio and they gave me some very good advice. Seems like odds are strongly against boardgame designers at this time. I reached the point where I have a fun game that people enjoy and that was the most important part of this project. Editing it would be another great step forward, but one that has to be carefully planned first.

I’ll be in Eurogamer Expo in London this next week. If you’re there too come and say “Hi!”, I’ll be the smiling guy with the tired eyes and the accent you can’t quite identify.