GMTK Game Jam 2025
If you ask anyone in the programming field (or any field, really), they would all certainly say that applying what you've learned in a project is the most important part of the learning process. It's with that believe that I created this website when I was learning React.js, and with this belief that I also seek out chances to participate in community challenges, Such as this year's GMTK 2025 Game Jam.
This blog post will act as an outpost that I can return to again in 2026 before that year's jam (fingers crossed).
Previous Jam
Okay, so first, we have to go over my previous jam experience, GMTK 2022 Game Jam. That year the theme was "roll of the dice". My ideation process was much weaker back then; I didn't really have a proper structured brainstorming session, I just raw-dogged a few hours of thinking. I eventually decided on making a puzzle game where you roll around, and you only get to roll around the number of tiles you have on your top face. While it might have been a decent starting idea, my execution of it led to most players resorting to trial and error until something worked. And while I had some unique mechanics later on in the game to make the gameplay more interesting, it was far enough that most people left the game before they reached it. Generally speaking, I think I had the vibes down, but the gameplay I was so reliant on ended up being boring.
2022 Advice
If 2022 me were to leave current me some advice, it would probably boil down to:
- If you decide to make a puzzle game, then keep in mind you'll need more play-testing by others.
- In gameplay-based games, a level selector or skip mechanic is very important.
- Cameras should not be an afterthought; they're how your player interacts with the game world.
- Having a level builder is great for accelerating development later on
- Banner graphics and the game page are a very important part of the game's success.
2025 Jam
After that I went through a busy school year which stopped me from being able to participate in both the 2023 and 2024 jams, but in 2025, I was finally ready, it was time for my return. This year I had a friend whom I pushed into participating as well. We would encourage each other to practice before the jam, and we pushed each other forward throughout the jam. I was coming back to game dev after a long break, so I practiced first by remaking pong.
Brainstorming
We then awaited the start of the jam and immediately got to forming ideas. This year's theme was "Loop". Unlike my last jam, this time we started by spit-balling ideas on our own for 30 minutes before returning to discuss them. We had to narrow down our lists to 2 ideas, one for me and one for them. Here are some of my top contenders:
Hooliducks:
You're a duck, and your only aim is destruction, you waddle around public areas and find creative ways to follow the rules, but only "technically", you're a natural at finding loopholes everywhere you go. some examples of rules you can break like: covering a sign out of view so you can do its opposite and taking symbols too literally
Tying Knots:
Working on a ship is not easy! part of your job is making sure the ship is always stabilized and anchored at the end of the night, where you have to tie together different ends of the rope each night to make sure you don't end up drifting away, but there are way too many dangers and distractions in the way, even worse, a single extra second could lead to you getting lost at sea! will you be able to tie the knot?
Slingshot Planet:
In the futuristic year of ____ civilization has finally mastered space travel, most humans now live in settlements around the orbit of different planets, your job is to control the deployment of these settlements, using super advanced space slingshots, and the gravity of different planets, stars, black holes and their orbits to guide your way!
I eventually landed on Tying Knots. part of my thinking process was that I wanted to challenge myself to something less familiar, since last jam I made a 3d mechanics-based game, this time I'm going to be making a 2d narrative game.
after giving the idea more thought I thought of the phrase "Tying The Knot" as in "to get married" and pondered "What if our knot-tying friend is doing all this to finally "tie the knot" and get married?" and that was the basis I built the story of the game on.
Development
For the most part, development went how you'd expect. I'm going to say though, with game dev in particular it's important to get your toolbox ready first before you try using it. What I mean is; before I began writing story or making levels, I made sure I had an easy way to create new levels, add sprites, add dialogue, and such.
For levels, I was able to generate a curved line that the player had to follow with their mouse using a spline tool that lets me draw in the editor itself. I also had toggles for the different "game events" that can happen during a level like the boat swaying and the seagulls that appear.
For story levels, I created a text bubble and would change its position to match the person speaking. I stored my dialogue in a JSON file with position, speaker, and text so that I could change the color and voice based on the speaker while having the flexibility to move them around scene to scene.
While I don't draw much, I liked the challenge of creating the sprites for my game. I settled on pixel art because that was what I was most comfortable with. Pixel art is the easiest to be "calculated" if that makes sense...
The big day
On the last day of the jam, I added some finishing touches and rushed out some audio effects then got to uploading the game. Having previous experience, I knew that waiting until the last second was a VERY BAD idea. and alas, just like last year, the sheer volume of uploads let to another itch.io blackout... I was safe though! having submitted a few hours before. phew!
Post Jam
After the Jam me and the same friend could finally relax, for the next few days we'd sit together playing and rating other game jam submissions, during that time I found wonderful works by wonderful people. Some I got in contact with, and some I followed, but overall the jam participants were very friendly.
2025 Advice
- Make an effort to meet more people.
- It might be wise to assign each aspect its own period of time so I don't get stuck rushing audio.
Interacting with the game dev community once again was a lot of fun, and I hope to get the chance to participate in more jams, hackathons, or competitions in the future. See you in a year, 2026 me!