My GMTK Game Jam Results and Postmortem

The GMTK Jam is now over and I'm really proud of the work I did, regardless of the overall score.

While getting #681/2,648 overall puts me at around top 25% in the jam, I'm more happy about my placement in the Originality criteria where I placed #162/2,648, putting me at around top 6%.

I made a strong effort to try and make a game that was different and I'm glad that people recognized this and responded positively.

Here are some of my favorite comments from people who tried my game:

Or even just:

The same guy from above even made a thread and shouted out my game as one of his favorites in the jam:

It wasn't all positive though. There were many people confused by the game (via r/playmygame post):

This guy even questioned his intelligence:

Due to the mixed feedback, I sought after advice and got lots of constructive criticism via https://itch.io/post/883987:

(TLDR: Don't make the damn game so cryptic :D)

In response to this feedback, I made many minor changes to my game and it is a much more fluid experience now.

Some of those changes include:

• Storing game clues in the saved message log, making it possible to re-read previous messages! This was critical to moving the storyline forward and not allowing people to get stuck
• Rewording various messages to better fit the game's context
• Using a .ogg audio file rather than a .wav file for the music, reducing the size of the game file from 44MB down to just 6MB!
• Making game resolution larger to make text more readable
• Adding typing sound effects (as suggested by CrustyJon)

• Adding windows and mac builds

This has been an awesome game jam and I learned so so much from the experience. This game jam crossed many firsts for me:

• first time entering a 48h ranked game jam
• first time using the Godot engine instead of Unity
• first time using graphic art instead of pixel art
• first time using Ableton to make music instead of Bosca Ceoil
• first time going back and improving the game after the game jam
• first time making a postmortem

Hope to continue making more games in the near future!

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If these kinds of learnings interest you, every month or so I am going to send out what I worked on, what I learned, and how I stayed motivated.

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