top of page
Luis Zeno Jr
Bear Dating Simulation //
This was during the Global Game Jam held in Brooklyn, NY. The game was developed by a team of five including me, 4d crow, FT Broadcasts, MichaelPoorun, and Poxiao5002. One team handled the artwork, one worked on game designing, the other two worked on dialogue, storytelling, and characters, and I worked on programming the game.
On day one, the team plotted about what kind of game we wanted to make. We only had 72 hours before we turned in the game so time was against us. One of the team members created a sample of what the screen should consist of. We had ideas of implementing a heart rating system, but we didn't have enough time to search for ways to program it nor have time to prototype
As we continue to plan out our game, our artist began sketching the characters that the player would encounter in the game. The first is the Brown Bear, a British Biker with a mean attitude yet a kind heart. The second is a Panda Bear. Although we didn't have time to include the Panda Bear, we are going to put the bear in future updates to the game. This bear's personality is a laid-back gamer with a love of special bamboos.
As time went down, the game started to come together. It was with one major issue and it came from me as a programmer. During the game jam, I struggled to find the proper coding that would transition from one scene to another. The first intention was to search for tutorials on how to make a visual novel game. It was good for education and step-by-step lessons, but not good for 3-day game development. It was late but I fatality remembered a class I had taken that helped me with scene management and transition. Although I worked on a few scenes, the upload felt off and thus we had a broken game.
Although we ended up with a broken, non-functional game, the team managed to compensate for the game by encouraging attendees to come and try out the game. Much like a game show, the team asks each person who steps over the question on the screen and has them answer by the choices provided to them. Nearly all the guests in attendance laughed at how silly and fun the game was and loved the artwork that our team and dialogue provided. One of our team members also did voice work commentary to entertain our guests. As we show them the game that could have been, we have made promises to not only fix the game but include more characters and audio work.
Global Game Jam helped me with trying to collaborate with other team members, something that I am doing my best to adjust to. It was a great experience and after feeling responsible for not doing a good job, I felt there was something new in terms of being a part of the game jam, managing with other team members and the direction of the game but also mentoring them on getting involved in game development. They also inspired me to keep on working on this game in my spare time, finally making sure the transition worked and tossing a link to said game to show off their work. There is still more to go before we can be fully satisfied with our work.
bottom of page