I finally did not make thesamegame4! Not that I will stop myself from doing that if I want to anyway. So, Format: A New Beginning (the title could be a reference to trying something new but it's not). I'm happy with what came out of it! But let's go a bit further back.
I was very interested in the theme, hoped to see way more Digimon games that there are, but it's ok as it is. First of all I think this is the first time I had like 2 other ideas for a game, all of them different. One of them was thesamegame4, where a virtual pet would suddenly appear on a chat between 2 people online. And then the pet health would be related to the relationship between those two people... you know how it goes. The other idea... well, hopefully soon (or someday at least) you'll see what it is referenced in a future text... but for now just let this be a placeholder of what's to come. It was a very different idea from the other 2 games.
So, how did I decide for Format: A New Beginning? Well, this was the last of the ideas that came into my mind. I wasn't too sure about the other 2 games: one was repeating myself, but worse (probably) and not adding anything to what I've already said, the other could be a nice test of what's to come, but I prefer to save it all for its due time. So, the Sunday I decided that I needed to format my laptop after a whole weekend of the computer going really really slow. It's been a lot of time since I knew that I would need to at least erase everything if not buying a new hard drive, but I kept pushing it away. At the beginning, I was thinking "ehh yeah, too many things from college that I may need, I'll do it when I finish my studies". Then I graduated, but was looking for a job so "ehh too many important documents here, I don't want to risk losing anything like that now, when I get a job". Then I got a job... and forgot to fix the laptop or was too lazy.
To be honest, I was already used to the laptop being really slow for a lot of time. When I turned it on I already expected a lot of minutes of waiting, so I went and did other stuff in the meanwhile, always had something to see on my phone in case a big update froze the computer for hours... It's really stupid seeing it from the outside, but it makes a lot of sense when you are "there". There is a saying in Spanish that I really hate that goes like "a known evil is better than an unknown good" (the first translation I found online). Like, that's probably the worst advice ever. It's not only being conservative, it's being conservative even knowing that you are on the bad side, fearing whatever good may come, I hate that.
So yeah, coming back to my laptop... I got my external drive that is like thrice the size of my hard drive and started looking for important stuff to copy, if no copying everything. As I began to look... I noticed there wasn't really that much to save. Most of the stuff I have can be easily downloaded from the internet, and my more personal stuff occupies very little size. So I quickly copied the few data that I really didn't want to lose, formatted the computer and... surprise! Everything works wonderfully now, who would know?
The thing is that this is nos JUST my fault. It seems very stupid that computers that can trade exclusive pngs for millions of dollars through the most complex killing forests process of the world would let a simple laptop get so bad without at least some help. It is not that stupid when you take a look into mobile phones and notice that an app like YouTube, for instance, now is like 10 times the size or more than 5 years ago only for it to work exactly the same if not worse. That's how you have a perfectly functional phone that cannot hold more than 1 app. Is that on purpose? If you can think bad about companies, think bad, but there may be more than that. Users and developers that update their phone every year or so probably won't notice how much space their apps are taking. So, if there are resources in what "everyone" (not everyone, not even the majority) has, then who cares, right?
So... coming back to the game a bit. I don't think this problem is exclusive to technology or anything, even if it's the point where I'm starting off I didn't want it to end there. If you allow me another even less important field where this happens too, take a look at videogames. Coincidentally, I recently played Horizon Zero Dawn because they gave it for free and I'm dumb. You see, in that game you have crafting, shooting, rpg elements, sidequests, decision making, a map with so many icons that you cannot see the actual map... a lot of crap built on top of each other. And this is no exception! It is just the way of "making a good game", a way that keeps adding more and more stuff without any reason at this point. That's why I'm not such a fun of playing with conventions or stuff like that nowadays. Like, yeah ok you can do cool stuff with conventions or even point out explicitly how wrong they are even if you are doing them, but then what? Keep finding workarounds in something that is fundamentally broken?
Well, away from computers and games, I think just everything "important" and "big" today is like that. Economy, politics... if the destroying forests art doesn't demonstrate that the complexities of such a big system lead to very dumb stuff I don't know. So... Mother 3. If you played that game you know what I took from there.
Since I was going to talk about a computer from within, the virtual pet seemed to fit as a... mmmm... helper? In two ways. First as an "assistant" that will take on the technological work of erasing everything. And second, as a friend to talk to and reflect upon. A more "cold" view of thinking, less passional, but more free, and still someone who wants the best for their friend. I also wanted the "human" to be there, more resistant, with a similar view at the end of the day, but harder to understand, because we are like that sometimes.
About how do you advance in the game, I'm not a fan of labyrinths and boring time wasters in general. I hope that the way to go is relatively easy enough to see on each screen. For the sprites and all of that, I went on the easy choice of keeping the bitsy cat and using the avatar for the human sprite. In the background, I wanted to add some noise (I guess it could be called like that). Just stuff that made everything dirtier at first, but added some computer components reminiscent sprites later too. I decided to stop at 8 sprites because 8 is a kind of magic number in videogames I think and because of laziness.
Recommended games from the jam!
As always, be sure to check other games of the jam for yourself in here!
A Sharks Day
Just a nice game about cleaning the environment for you and your nice aquatic friends!
some day my prince will come
Not gonna lie, I'm kind of fond to the really short comedy that can be presented in bitsy. Go play it, you'll see in just a few seconds.
Virtual Responsibility
I was very surprised that one of the games that I liked the most of the jam was not just a game that isn't in likeness with virtual pets, but a game that goes even a bit against them. Thoughts about what is relating to a virtual pet and, in a way, how does that relate too to the people around us, especially at young ages.