They Were Just Pixels – Post mortem

This was my first LD entry ever and I have mixed feelings about it. When the theme came out, the only thing I had in my mind was that I didn’t want to make a space game with aliens. Never. I have seen some people use the Connected Worlds theme really well without having a single alien or space ship in their game, but I wanted to try something that nobody else would. As this is a casual competition, I took it as an opportunity and made a game that I wouldn’t otherwise make. Just because the idea in it is so weird.

The result was They Were Just Pixels.

First of all I have to say that even though I think of myself as a competent coder, you won’t easily find a graphics and sound artist worse than me. I could have done something with pixel art, but instead I created my game with stickmen because I thought that would fit my theme better. The music was generated with an online tool, although I did modify the instruments in FL Studio. It took a few tries to get something good out of the music generator, but I’m pleased with the results.

But that theme… As I have mentioned, my game is a really odd one. I deliberately built it to look and feel like a stupid hack-em-up game, but the whole idea of the game is something totally else. I made a mechanic that was well hidden in the game, yet plain visible for anybody who wouldn’t close the window before the ending texts roll in. I uploaded my game with the hope that people would actually play the game to the end instead of leaving in the middle of it without any idea what it was all about. Many did play through it properly, a fact which positively surprises me, but some didn’t.

The first two comments I got represented this very well. The first guy was clearly annoyed and said that it was fun for a while but had no real content. The second person said that the idea of the game was brilliant, but didn’t say much else because he didn’t want to spoil it for others.

It will be interesting to see what my placement is. I can be anywhere on the list. Even though I have gotten a lot of positive comments, I have a slight fear that in the end this game was too different from the rest to be able to compete with the others. But by experimenting with this game, I also got a lot of valuable experience that I wouldn’t get anywhere else. I’ll definitely take part in the next LD and maybe come up with something a bit more appealing. But first I have to wait for the results of this one to come out. Only three days left and I’m super excited.

Tools: Java, LibGDX, Gimp, Audacity, FL Studio, procedural music generator