Chris: I'm planning to make this a regularly recurring event so there should be another in a couple of weeks.

hryx: Cool, it sounds like Paul and some others have a similar idea for SF area. I'd be interested in attending some of those in the future as well.

Hey, first off, TIGJam was awesome. In fact it was so awesome that I, like many others, want to do similar such events more often. And by more often I mean, as often as possible. That is why I'm hosting a micro jam at my place this weekend.

A micro jam is just like a regular jam, but shorter and with fewer people. Snacks and beverages will be provided, but feel free to add any requests or BYO. If it goes late I've got some extra room to crash too.

Also, though the title says "South Bay" it in no way excludes people from SF, Idaho, Delaware, etc. It's just to say that if you're already in the South Bay it will be convenient to get to.

Summary

What: South Bay Micro Game Jam
When: Saturday, Nov 6th 6:00 PM until ?
Where:
    330 N Mathilda Ave. #910
    Sunnyvale, CA 94085
Why: For Awesome

Sorry for the sudden notice, but planning ahead is boring. Reply if you're interested.

I was there. It was good. I made a platformer using an in-browser JavaScript IDE. Also, I have a facedealy.

I had an awesome time and look forward to the next jam or mini-jam.

Could you do one of Contrasaurus? It's about a dinosaur who travels through time to save America from Communists in 1984. The game is about 15 min long of machine gun and jetpack fueled mayhem. It's a browser based game so you'd need to run in Google Chrome for best results. Thanks if you do it, and even if not, the series is cool!

I do indeed have room for two. I even have a couch, an air mattress, and a carpeted floor.

I've still got a spot available if anyone is waiting until the last minute to figure out lodging. I live just a short drive away.

I fixed that Firefox sound bug that caused the machine gun to make the chomping sound. I also converted the background audio to a format that works with FF too. It should be much more playable, at least sound wise. The framerate is still pretty bad in FF so if you can try in Chrome.

I had really high hopes for this game judging by the screenshots, so my criticism might be a little harsh.

That said, the premise and graphics look decently awesome. And judging by the name of the game, I was expecting some sort of frenzied action packed run and gun where you played a decked out dinosaur fighting terrorists.

Unfortunately what I found was a music-less game featuring (very few) stock sounds (did you really have to use the chomping sound for the machine gun?), slow movement (some levels took FOREVER), droll gameplay (no variation, very boring), and little polish (because of all of the above). Once again, my harsh criticism might just be a result of my extraordinarily high expectations for this game.

Really, I feel like the great graphics were put to a big waste in this game. The gameplay literally consists of the character holding down the left mouse button and holding the right key. Once you get the jetpack you pretty much can't die. The level design is non-existant, as every level (that I've played so far) is just a flat surface with enemies being constantly spawned on it. Overall, I think that you need to work on this game a lot. Currently, I'd say that it's too boring, and few people will play it past the third level, which is a shame because you clearly put a lot of work into the graphics.

Hi necromian, thanks for your honest feedback. The gameplay experience is very linear and I agree that that is one of the biggest weaknesses of the game.

If you can, let me know what browser you tried the game in. Firefox has been known to be a bit laggy, and I haven't converted many of the sounds to be compatible yet. If you get a chance can you try it in Chrome and see if the experience improves?

Thanks again for the honest feedback, your detailed response gives me a lot of good information on what parts are most critical to improve.

[Plot]

Contrasaurus: Defender of the American Dream

Plot
You are a dinosaur. The year is 3,700 B.C. You are summoned into the future to save America from the dark Communist forces that are amassing in Nicaragua. After you complete your mission and become the most decorated top-secret military dinosaur in history, you discover a terrible truth. Finally you seek out those whom you depend on most, only to have them confirm your darkest suspicions.

Requirements
Contrasaurus is an HTML5 based browser game. Chrome is highly recommended. The game "works" in Firefox but has been know to get pretty laggy. In Chrome, on a good machine, there is nearly no lag.

Gameplay
Fight your way through six action packed levels with beautiful parallax backgrounds. Engage in five epic boss battles culminating in a final conflict so legendary it will blow your mind.







I hope you enjoy! Please comment with any thoughts, feedback, or criticisms!

I just finished this game for the "greatest fear" themed mini Ludum Dare competition. It's a simple browser based HTML5 game so it requires a browser that supports canvas.

It's a pretty short exploration game ~10 min or so.

Quest for Meaning

I'd love to hear any criticisms or comments you have about the game. I had a lot of fun making it and I hope you enjoy playing it.

[New release today!]

New release today!



I'm looking for feedback on the level design and game mechanic interactions. Also any bugs or confusing issues.

Recent Improvements
Better camera tracking
Better movement
Fleshing out level design

Known issues
Parasailing level still has no real controls...

Thanks everyone for your feedback and support!

Play the Demo! (Requires a browser that supports Canvas: FF, Chrome, IE9)

[Back on topic]

  Hey, sorry I seemed to have assisted in derailing this thread into a Flash Vs. HTML5... to make amends I'll attempt to re-rail it.

Back on topic

The graphics and tileset have a wonderfully cohesive feel. The gib effects spatter and fade out are also awesome.

I do enjoy atmosphere and feel of the game though the gameplay seems a little shallow, but it is a good demo for the framework.

The demo video of the level editor looks amazing! I especially like the UI for the triggered events with the lines connecting the targets to the triggers.

I really can't wait until the framework is released!

I've got room for 2-3. I live about 10min away by car, slightly longer by train. Accommodations include the ground and a leaky air mattress, also an omelette bar.

So is this going to kill flash?

God I hope so

[all about]

I'm all about HTML5 these days.

I 100% agree with the concern about the poor audio support, Chrome has trouble playing short audio files and playing too many (~12) audio files simultaneously crashes the whole browser. It appears these problems will be solved in time, but it is aggravating to have little control over it.

As for the JavaScript language, as others have said, it is actually very powerful and concise, though the quality of tutorials and documentation available is poor. It's a high level language, but in order to use it well it requires the extreme discipline of a low level language.

I think the openness of the HTML5 platform is one of it's greatest benefits. It is incredibly easy to integrate sound and pixel editing tools together over the web. This enables sharing and building on the work of others as well as effortless collaboration.

Also, as far as distribution goes, it's incredibly easy in HTML5. On the Pixie platform you can edit code directly in the browser and your game is available for anyone to demo and test the moment you hit save.

It also sounds like the web is about to explode with tons of new JavaScript game engines, frameworks, and platforms... I very much look forward to all the new goodies!

Disclosure: I'm the author of the Pixie platform, I don't mean to soapbox, but HTML5 games are an issue very near and dear to my heart. The site is currently in beta, and pretty unstable, just an illustration of what is possible. I'd love to hear everyone's feedback on what issues are the biggest blockers to developing HTML5 games so I can overcome them with the Pixie Platform and enable better game creation.

... the world's worst RPG/RSS Reader: RSS Quest!

This game is about an elf fighter that needs to get to a computer to read RSS feeds.



It's part of my "make a game for all my friends for Christmas" project.

Right now though, every time I play, when I get to (what I assume is) the fun part, it freezes up

Hmm, that's no good... Can you give me some information on what browser and OS you're using? Once I diagnose the issue I'll get an updated fix out.

New release, and update original post with better screenshot.

[New version is up!]

New version is up! Lots of little changes and some big UI changes, you can aim and control Contrasaurus's movement now!

Play the Demo! (Warning - Audio) (Requires a browser that supports Canvas: FF, Chrome, IE9)

I'm still looking for feedback on controls, and interaction. Please let me know what you think, the game's come a long way since the previous post and I hope I addressed the major issues.

Known issues:
The inventory/store mechanic is still bad and unbalanced.
Some levels are pretty barren.
No parasailing controls.

[Controls and Player Agency]

First off, thanks everyone for the feedback so far! The specific and constructive feedback you all gave will be of great help to me in fixing and updating the game.

Sorry about the wall of text, just wanted to reply to everyone in one place.

Controls and Player Agency

The overall consensus is that players appreciate a feeling of agency. I'll update the thread when the next release is rolled out and look forward to your additional thoughts.

I'm not sure what I'm in control of to begin with.
I can sorta move back and forth and do flips, but I don't know how I'm shooting or avoiding or what. I didn't even know the game had started initially.
Cool name and guns though.

I had no idea of what the controls were, much less the plot.

After 10 seconds or so I worked out that I could turn left and right. I didn't work out how to flip or to control the guns. I got to the level with the dinosaur flying over the sea on some kind of parachute, but I could no longer control him to go left or right, so I gave up.

I am also a little bit confused as to what I am in control of.

I can turn left and right but since the screen is alway scrolling it seems that like no matter what I do it has no real effect on the outcome of the game. The main character is HUGE compared to the rest of the screen.  This is understandable because he is a dinosaur... but I think it makes it really hard to play if part of the game play is meant to involve dodging meteors.

I would consider trying to zoom out a bit and giving the player a bigger look at what is going on in a level, it will give them time to react to incoming obstacles.

Our main goal is to capture the joy of being an out of control, weapon covered dinosaur. Maybe if Contrasaurus laughs when getting hit by a meteor it will remind the player that they are powerful and nearly indestructible, and that they shouldn't worry about getting hit by stuff too much. Though his "sad eye" animation currently reminds players that getting hit by meteors hurts and makes them feel bad that their best friend Contrasurus got hurt. Reconciling controlling an uncontrollable force of nature is our primary gameplay difficulty.

I am a little confused about the inventory of weapons, it is not immediately obvious what they did.  I just ended up clicking all of them as much as possible because it made a bunch of bullets on the screen.  Are there hotkeys on the keyboard for activating these? It might be a good idea to include those and also give a visual cue on the HUD to show what hotkey will activate each weapon.

The weapon inventory system really does need some work, it's main purpose right now is debugging and testing different weapons, but that's not really useful to the players of the game, so any follow up feedback on how to make it more fun and interactive is greatly appreciated.

Language/Platform

Javascript?  I am curious as to why you chose to build this in Javascript?  Are you planning on releasing this as a game for the Palm Pre, or trying to make it playable on an iPhone in a web browser?  It is always impressive and cool to see people using a javascript canvas to build games so kudos to you.  

But you may want to consider trying out something like Flixel or FlashPunk and doing this in Actionscript with a nice games library.  It will give you lots of nice things that add polish to a game.  If your major goal is to make a nice looking video game that is playable on the web, I would reccomend looking at these libraries.  However if your major goal is to learn javascript and learn how to build some basic game engines in javascript  from the ground up then keep going, things are looking good.

We are planning to release the game for mobile devices, like iPhone and Palm Pre, but we also want to have it work on the largest number of machines without any porting. Pretty much every smart phone, laptop, desktop, iPad, refirgerator, etc. has a browser with JavaScript (or will within a year). We therefore chose the browser as a platform and specifically *not* Flash. I'm not sure if this is the best decision for everyone, but it's the gamble we're making on this game.

As far as game libraries in JavaScript go, the field is still pretty limited, but growing. I'm watching Akihabara and GameQuery and look forward to advancements in the area. As of right now Contrasaurus is built on our own custom, shoddily constructed, CSaurEngine^TM. There are some salvageable components of it that are being released open source. Matrix.js so far and some more to come later. Even though as a developer I feel that platforms are cool, players generally don't know or care about them, so I need to keep myself in check and only make what is absolutely necessary to enable the next awesome gameplay interaction (like throwing a battle ax at a paratrooper and having it explode).

Plot

i thought it was hilarious

Uh, plot? Is there some kind of time travel involved?

Yes!

The STORY:  Haha I have no idea exactly what is happening.  A dinosaur covered in weapons will save the earth.  This is all I really need to know and I am pretty excited about that.

My hope is that anyone who has ever played with dinosaurs and army men will feel the same way.

Bugs

[...] pressing left and right scrolls the whole window as well as changing the dinosaur's direction, which was pretty distracting.

I'll fix this today.