I like the theme because it *is* so non-obvious. I still don’t know what I’ll do, which is refreshing. In other jams I’d had ideas that could be tweaked to fit almost any kind of donuts, castles, etc., kind of themes.
This one is challenging! 
Jay
there are uncountable ways you could use “virtue” in a sentence - some of which could involve donuts and/or castles 
What like " he got fat by virtue of eating so many doughnuts" ?
If the theme is so tenuously linked like that then there isn’t really a theme and it’s just a fee-for-all.
Go over here and get some ideas: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtue Just in the ‘Roman Virtues’ section alone there are a billion (approximate) directions to choose from.
Here are some ideas worth what you paid for them…
Shmup – While you can shoot the enemies, dodging them makes your score go up, shooting makes it go down. Make it through a level with the fewest kills.
Word Game – Make words while looking for the letters to fill the V I R T U E spaces. Each time you do, your score multiplier increases. Add a timer aspect so player has to choose; finish a word or use that letter to try and increase the multiplier.
Text Adventure – Go old school with a text-based game (but use buttons for possible player actions to get around needing to code a parser) where the storyline relies on a person being virtuous in order to win. (Hardest simply because story takes so long to create.)
Anybody else want to throw something into the pot?
Jay
I’ve started a new Twitter account @corona_blitz to share news, all of your progress and final submissions.
https://twitter.com/corona_blitz
Don’t forget to include #CoronaBlitz2017 in your tweets so I can share it on Corona Blitz account.
I have to agree with this… This theme is far too abstract for me and kind of killed my inspiration straight away. :( Just coming up with an idea would take my more than 4 hours. Good luck to the rest of you who’ll be jamming!
@bgmadclown would have to confirm, but I don’t think your “thinking time to come up with an idea” should count against your four hours.
Rob
@Markus, coming up with an idea / design / testing does NOT count against your 4 hours. It is just for the coding period.
I’ll try to make it more clear in the rules section.
I know the theme is a bit unconventional but as Jay pointed out, there are endless ways to interpret the theme. For example, you can take “Platonic Virtue” from Wikipedia(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtue#Platonic_virtue) and make a game about courage or justice. It still counts.
Thinking time should not be included as this is 4 hours in 7 days… but surely testing is part of coding?
As we all know success its at most 30% coding and 70% testing!
That’s why I limited it to “gameplay testing” in the rules. I guess it would be better to allow a final look and feel to the overall gameplay at the end.
Trying to test and push out a big update this week so not sure I’ll have time for this… will try end of week if possible
Hi! It’s not that I thought it would be against the rules to work on the game idea for a few hours. The problem is that I don’t want to be doing that. I understand the meaning of virtue about moral goodness and everything, but it still doesn’t translate into more than some vague, abstract game ideas for me. I want to feel inspired and have cool, distinct ideas pop up in my head, or else there’s no point in participating in my opinion.
Don’t take this the wrong way. I still think it’s great that you’re hosting this event! But I’m also hoping that if there’s a next time, maybe the theme will be a little more straight-forward…
Actually, I thought people would like a theme that is a little bit different than other game jams and could be interpreted heavily. I see that this is not what everyone wants. I like jamming to whatever theme I face because, most of the time, I end up with really interesting ideas so I don’t think it’s the right way to go but it might be a good idea to introduce at least two different themes for special events like this in the future but we’ll see how this turns out.
That’s great feedback from both you and Todd. If I host another jam, I’ll keep that in mind and figure something out. Thank you.
Personally, I like the challenging theme. I think part of the fun will be to see what each of us comes up with as a straight out virtue or a creative workaround.
@adrianm - I think “he became fat by virtue of eating too many doughnuts” is brilliant! That’s what I call a creative workaround and a good laugh. I hope to see more surprises like that from the whole crew.
I put in 90 minutes today but if play-testing doesn’t count, I get 30 back - yay!
Like sharp100 said, you are free to find workarounds to the current theme and that’s one of the reasons that makes this jam fun.
I’m in 35 minutes and still designing the game as I progress. Also, thinking about a second idea if I can find time to implement.
@sharp100, If you got something to show, don’t forget to share it via Twitter ( #CoronaBlitz2017 ) or on itch.io community forums.
I like the theme, although I still have not really an idea.
I am not sure if I understood one thing right, the game needs to be published afterwards? I read something about provisioning profiles.
I thought I will have to upload an .exe file at the end. (This is actually part of my motivation, as I never made a desktop app until now…)
Edit:
I figured it out. The provisioning stuff would be necessary for the macOS version, right?
You have to upload something that people can download and play. Windows .exe, Mac desktop or APK will give you the widest range of devices to cover.
Rob
Yeah, now I understand.
And iOS is not an option as it is not possible to distribute iOS apps outside of the Appstore in an easy way…
*** I’m posting this to the itch.io community forum as well but as there isn’t any other activity there yet I though I’d post in both places for now***
Since the jam is limited to 4 hours, I thought it would be good to showcase the boosts in speed and efficiency that Corona Marketplace plugins can lend to a project.
Thus, I spent my first hour loading in plugins, libraries, and assets and coaxing them to play nice together (45 minutes of loading / 1 hour coding)
Plugins
Dynamic Shader, Terrain, SSK Pro, Gesture, TweenTrain, EasySound, EasyToast
Libraries (My libraries)
momath, sound(2D sound), groups, text, movement (applying force to physics objects, distance and angle measures, a bunch of trig)
Assets (from the Marketplace)
Explosion Animation Library, Textures and sounds from the marketplace
Art
My own art libraries with additional normal map files for the Dynamic Shader
Images below
1. First hour of coding - a whole mess of plugins “working” together rather randomly
2. I picked my variation of the Virtue theme - “Cleanliness is a Virtue” and refined the look of the game
3. I tried to integrate two new features (unpublished) of the Dynamic Shader. Beam lighting and vignette shadows for the landscape.
4. a. Beam lighting = failure but Vignette lighting = success.
b. Started integration with Gesture plugin for object control (gesture plugin plus my movement library will drive physics motion)
c. Tried to integrate SSK camera features (used many times before) however I’ve got a glitch in my code or logic somewhere that is making the camera crash. I’ll give it another 10 minutes of coding but then I’ll have to drop it.
Only 2 hours of coding left but many hours of planning and testing await.
- Jonathan
The _ Virtue _ of temperance seems apt as I’ve given up beer for Lent…
so here’s the baddies of the piece - demon drink…
