itch.io

Exploration Focus: Idle/Clicker Genre

Key Lesson(s):

• My most played game by significant margin & over an extended period of time—result of organic growth from itch.io genre chart placement.
• Identification of player response outliers requires releases of lower performing games. :)

Exploration Focus: Procedural Generation; Player Rule Making; Learn Through Play (Substitution Grammars); Non-Competitive "Cosy" Multiplayer (Max: 4)

Exploration Focus: Player-Driven Procedural Music Generation; 3D Low Poly Game Art

Development Status: Early stage playable proof-of-concept.

Exploration Focus: Multiplayer (Max: 64)

Development Status: Functional multiplayer proof-of-concept with game play elements.

Key Lesson:

• Indie multiplayer requires engaging solo experience to increase likelihood of concurrent players.

Exploration Focus: Learn Through Play (Regular Expression Pattern Matching)

Development Status: Early stage proof-of-concept. Some game play featuring weapons with hard-coded patterns.

Exploration Focus: Puzzles; Logic; Spatial Thinking

Development Status: Early stage proof-of-concept with some game play.

Exploration Focus: Player-Driven Procedural Music Generation

Development Status: Very early stage, music theory based, interactive proof-of-concept with piano. No game play.

Key Lessons:

• Generative music is non-trivial with current web exports (but still cool).
• Entering a jam with a specific Exploration Focus means even individual game project "failure" can be overall exploration "success".

Exploration Focus: Character Ability Combinations

Development Status: Playable level with game mechanic proof-of-concept.

Exploration Focus: Multiplayer (Max: 32); Emergent Social Behaviour Without Direct Communication; Player Avatar Cosmetics; Narrative

Development Status: Functional proof-of-concept multi-player. Some "game play".

Key Lessons:

• Free-form player generated communication has massive overhead from moderation/legal concerns.
• Leader-boards (asynchronous) are valued above concurrent play by devs/players.

Exploration Focus: Learn Through Play (Music Theory); Player-Driven Music Creation

Development Status: Very early stage, incomplete proof-of-concept. Musical notation symbols as game play elements. Player movement & limited environment interaction but little-to-no game play.

Key Lesson:

• Tools/technologies/standards reveal their current capability to deliver on their promise only through actual use.

Exploration Focus: Physics; 3D Game Art; Music Soundtrack

Development Status: Early stage playable proof-of-concept.

Exploration Focus: Personal Narrative; Strategy

Development Status: Early stage playable proof-of-concept.

Exploration Focus: Job Simulation Genre; Narrative; Text-To-Speech NPC Voice Over 

Development Status: Early stage playable proof-of-concept.

Exploration Focus: Player-Driven Music Creation

Development Status: Very early stage proof-of-concept.