Well here we are - Devtober begins! We’re starting off spicy too since today also marks the start of Ludum Dare 49! We’ve got a fun month in store.

I had a long day of classes, work, and grocery shopping so I didn’t get too much time in before nightfall, so after writing this post it’s back to typing up scripts!

Anyways, this Ludum Dare’s theme is “unstable.” After some initial brainstorming I came up with an idea about a unicorn trying to save other horses from their stables in an attempt to “un-stable” them, but an interesting gameplay concept didn’t click with me. I got back to thinking, and then my current idea hit me: a game about a city that’s unstable in more ways than 1!

That’s when I threw together the above concept art! The pitch is that you’re the mayor of a rowdy town, and your job is to make everything run smoothly. You’ve got make sure your citizens are happy with the buildings you’re constructing, while also making sure that you don’t tip the balance of the island off with the weight of the buildings as to have it fall. There’s a lot of fun concepts to work with here, and I think it’s very doable for a game jam. I’ve still got to work out the core mechanics, but I think this is a great start to a rough and tough game jam. Hopefully by tomorrow I’ll have much cooler updates to share with the game actually functional!

I’ve got a long night ahead of me starting up the development, but I’m super excited to really get into the weeds and throw this weird concept together!
-Robert