Jumpcoins (my Ludum Dare 44 game)

The theme for Ludum Dare 44 was "Your life is currency". I struggled with coming up with a good game idea here, since both the words "life" and "currency" offer very little wiggle room for interpretation.

I created an action platformer game for the compo—solo, from scratch, in 48 hours—where each double jump and walljump costs a coin, as does taking damage.

You can play Jumpcoins at https://jumpcoins.sartak.org or right here!

As with Pigheaded Pirate, I had an amazing time making this game.

I don't have much to say about Jumpcoins at this point except that I'm very proud of it. I spent a lot of time on polish: walljumping in particular feels really satisfying, as does the death animation. I think those contributed way more than I could give them credit for.

The art was serviceable even! (At least it wasn't a drag down on the rest of the game, in my opinion). I didn't have time (or really the ability) to make proper background art. Instead, the background is a particle system mimicking a bunch of colored floodlights. The novel thing here is these particles that react to you jumping and dying. I think that ended up being too subtle to notice though.

My favorite comments from players:

• "and suddenly… Celeste."
• "I dunno if there’s a name for this sticky platformer genre but I love it"
• "Almost felt like I was playing Super Meat Boy."
• "Lemme get 10 jumpcoins for $0.99"
• "Happy to see [double jump inertia] was a conscious choice, further contributes to how rather high-designed this unassuming game was."
• "What’s up with the music? Did you use a compilation of 'game over' songs? It’s sooo depressing!"

Here's a wordcloud of all the comments from players. Lots of positive sentiment :)

Here's a complete playthrough video I made:

Finally, here's how Jumpcoins scored in the compo:

I am thrilled with these results! I placed in the top 100 for Overall(!!), for Theme, and Audio. And well into the top 50 for Fun!