Homebrew
Jason Kelk navigates the world of hobbyist retro gaming creations
August saw the latest iteration of the well-established Ludum Dare competition, where programmers all over the world are challenged to produce games in a very short period of time. The theme for this instalment was ‘running out of space’ and, as always, the developers were left to interpret that pretty much as they saw fit, producing over 3,000 games in the process. Since there’s so many entries, we can barely skim the surface here, but a few did grab our attention. Letterbox looks like a 16-bit platformer, except the black borders around the playfield move inwards over time and can be used to wall jump to otherwise inaccessible places. Similarly, the spaceship in Super Converger must constantly blast enemies to keep the walls from closing in.
Of course, there are quirky entries like Tale Of The Bagger: A Love Story where the player bags up items on a supermarket till and, hopefully, falls in love. We also enjoyed the parking simulator Parking Spaces where vehicles must be safely stowed away until the timer on them expires and they’re driven away. Finally, there’s Ludum Dare Simulator 2019 which tries to distil the experience of creating a Ludum Dare entry into a series of Warioware-like minigames. These and the other entries in the competition can be picked up behind the link at Kikstart.me.uk/ludum-dare-42.
Another competition that’s actually underway at the time of writing is being held at the English Amiga Board, so it probably won’t be much of a surprise that all of the entries are for the Commodore Amiga. There are currently 13 announced entries, including a version of the classic coin-op Rygar, the Audiosurf-inspired Modsurfer and Pumpkin Bros, a platformer which the developer says will bare a resemblance to Snow Bros. There isn’t much to actually see at the moment behind Kikstart.me.uk/eab-compo-2018 but that’s where the developers are essentially blogging as they work, so be sure to check it out once the competition heats up.
Finally, there are a selection of Game And Watch-style titles that your can play in your computer or mobile device’s web browser. A notable one of these is Bride, which sees the lady in question gathering flowers, avoiding love rivals and ultimately trying to capture the heart of her beloved. Punch in Kikstart.me.uk/bride-gw-web into your web browser to head over to the webbased versions of these games while the Atari Age thread behind Kikstart.eu/ gandw-thread has further information.