This jam is now over. It ran from 2021-11-25 20:00:00 to 2021-11-28 20:30:00. View results
Banner art is by AdmiralPiplup (Logo) and IcedLemon (Character)
This Jam has concluded! Our winners are:
By Category:
Best Gameplay - Ore from the Age of Gods
Best Concept - 广重36号 ~ Neo Super-Express
Best Visuals - Drunk As I Like - Gensokyo Chugging Contest
Best Story/Writing - Gensokyo Odyssey
Best Challenge - Where is that Bustling Marketplace?
Best Use of Theme - Reach for the Moon, Immortal Smoke!
Best Music - Gensokyo Odyssey
Overall:
5th Place - The Rabbit has landed
4th Place - Drunk As I Like - Gensokyo Chugging Contest
3rd Place - Reach for the Moon, Immortal Smoke!
2nd Place - Ore from the Age of Gods
And, our 1st Place Winner: Gensokyo Odyssey
Thank you everyone who participated in the event, please hang out with us on our Twitter or Discord server for information on future events.
This time 'round we're trying something new, using a participant submitted theme;
Need help picking a Touhou Song? We have a Generator to help you find interesting titles, as well as a Big ol' List
Performer Selection? Floating with the Tide? Bad Omen? How about Peaceful Romancer? There are literally hundreds of prompts to choose from and combine to find an interesting new gameplay or idea.
Touhou Project is a series of 2D bullet hell (or "danmaku") games from Japan that has become widely beloved due to series creator ZUN's loose policy on creating derivative works. Thanks to this, the fanbase has been able to create all sorts of interesting and high quality fanworks: including games, song covers, art, fics, and much more. We celebrate this by regularly hosting a game jam for Touhou fans to come together in friendly competition and create their own games based off the series.
We've hosted this game jam over five times before, in addition to our other community events, you can check out our past events: ( 1, 2, 3, 4, 5,6, (9)-Jam, PrideJam2, PrideJam3, Touhou Station, Touhou Station 2 )
If you'd like to participate (especially if you need a team), we recommend you join our Discord server: a Touhou-centric gamedev hub where you can discuss and show off Touhou fangames. The Discord has chat channels for the jam as well, including team-forming. You can also follow us on Twitter and Tumblr for more updates and to help spread the jam!
For those unfamiliar, a game jam is a contest where participants are given a "theme" to work off of and then given a brief period of time (usually a couple days) to create a game, from scratch, based around that theme. All skill levels and areas of expertise are welcome, and members can work either in teams or individually to submit a game by the deadline.
After the contest is done, anyone interested can play the submitted games and vote on what they think are the best entries. After a period of voting, a winner will be announced. Categories to vote for include: Best Overall (1st, 2nd, and 3rd), Best Gameplay, Best Concept, Best Visuals, Best Audio, Most Challenging (for FAIR challenge), Best Writing/Story, and Best Use of Theme.
Rules (READ THESE):
How to participate and submit a game:
FAQ
That's a pretty broad theme, where do I start? The goal of the theme is to get people thinking about the song titles many of us are already familiar with in a new context. Take a look at the list or generator, see what comes to mind! One prompt not good enough? Maybe pick a few to get your creativity going.
What kind of game can I make? Any kind you want! As long as it's a fan game of Touhou, the sky is the limit. You can make a game that's gameplay-oriented or story-oriented. You can go for simple art or complex visuals. Whatever floats your creative boat.
How does my game have to relate to Touhou? As a fan game, your game is expected to borrow from the intellectual property in the Touhou series, meaning you should be including characters, locations, lore, or anything else from the from the official Touhou universe in your game. But do not steal assets from the official Touhou games themselves. You're not restricted to only characters/locations/etc. from Touhou, but it must be included and generally be the focus of your game's setting and events. Your game does NOT need to be based off any gameplay from the Touhou games themselves. Making a bullet hell game is perfectly acceptable, but by no means mandatory. You can create whatever type of game you think would be fun to play or fun to make.
Do I have to make the whole thing myself? Nope! If you don't want to work alone you can form teams with anyone you please and take any job that suits your style. However, the game you submit must be made entirely by your team and within the jam period. I recommend picking a team with a similar timezone/sleep schedule so all of you are at least around at the same time.
Can I join multiple teams/games? I don't see why not. Voting will be on the game submissions and not the participants, so you'll technically increase your chance of being on a winning team if you offer your talents to multiple games. Just keep in mind that of course means extra work, and this is all just for fun anyway, so no need to overexert yourself.
I'm new to this. What can I use to make my game? You have lots of options for how to make a game. Even if you're a total beginner, game engines can make it super easy to make something playable and fun. Some of them don't even need you to write a line of code! Some popular engines include:
If you want to use an engine such as these, I recommend you look up some tutorials and get some practice in with them before the jam starts. Just enough so that you know the basics, and once the theme is announced you can jump right into it.
What's the theme going to be? Unlike most of our jams, we are experimenting with making the theme available ahead of time. The theme for this jam is Deaf to All but the Song, with the requirement to make a game based on one or more Touhou Song Titles. Good luck!
Does my game have to follow the theme? Your game doesn't exactly need to involve the theme to be eligible, but it's highly recommended for the sake of the sport. There will be a category during voting for best use of theme. Not only that, but the theme is often a diving board for brainstorming ideas at the start of the jam. Since there are so many ideas and so many things you can make in a game, it's nice to have an idea to start with. Restriction breeds creativity!
Just three days to make a game? Any advice on how to manage this? It may seem daunting, but if you manage your time and plans well enough you can make something super fun! Here's my take:
My most important bit of advice is not to rely on making a giant, comprehensive game. For a game jam, you should focus on what the core mechanic/point is of what you're trying to make, and make that as good as you can, expanding upon it once you're satisfied with it.
Don't worry about perfecting every little thing either. If you spend half the jam time polishing a single aspect of your game, you'll likely end up not being able to reach the full potential you imagined before the deadline. Also don't be afraid to change things up midway through. You may find out one of your game mechanics is way more fun than you thought, so why not focus on that instead? Just make sure you have the time remaining to change things up.
Losing out on some sleep is common in game jams, but know that it comes at a price. If you pull an all-nighter the night before the deadline, you could very easily run out of energy before your game is ready to be submitted, so be careful. Also take breaks if you're feeling out of it. If you don't take care of yourself, you'll likely have trouble taking care of your game and delivering for your team.
And most importantly: experiment, learn things, take it easy, and have fun!
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