Yesterday marked the deadline for submissions to the international Ludum Dare game jam. Developers are challenged to create a game from scratch in 72 hours (for the jam) or 48 hours (for the compo) based on a given theme.
Our team of four created Ultimate Question 42 in just 72 hours. I took on the role of programmer and technical specialist (well, what else could I do? :)), Shevadzutskiy Alexander was our game designer, and Artem Khodas and Dojo handled the art.
On the morning of the first day, we learned the theme, brainstormed ideas, and dove straight into development. By midday, we had a rough concept of the game, and by the second day, we had a playable version.
We decided to build the game on my engine directly for the Web, as it allows immediate testing without installing anything on desktop or mobile devices. A native Linux version is available on the project site, and I can run the iOS version on my smartphone. In the future, we plan to release public versions for iOS, Android, Apple TV (tvOS), Android TV, and Facebook Instant Games.
Although I was completely exhausted by the evening of the third day – like a squeezed lemon – I was incredibly satisfied with our work. Our team functioned seamlessly; everyone clearly understood their responsibilities, and in the end, we delivered a great result.
You can find the official Ludum Dare page for the game here: Ultimate Question 42