So, I’ve taken part in the 2016 Adventure Jam, with a game created in two weeks as a result. The Adventure of Mr. It was a collaboration between three people, and my part was to make the music.

The other people involved were Osama Alsalman, who made everything but the audio, and Kathleen Lopez, who is listed in the credits as sound designer. That means that she made the sound effects, but from my point of view more importantly, she also mixed the music that I recorded. If I ever make another game, I absolutely should involve a sound engineer. The end result is much better thanks to Kathleen.

14 days was the time any participant in the jam had to make a game from start to finish, so that meant two week-ends for me to make the music (and those four days also included a band rehearsal and helping by brother put the mast on his sail boat). Not a lot of time to make and record four songs amounting to about 18 minutes (five songs, if we include the alternate version I made for the ending song, that was never used). So there absolutely were things that I would have wanted to change, but I am quite happy with the end result. Kathleen did a great job of fixing up what I’d done. Thanks to her, my music sounds better than it has any right to.

Unless we count a coding-focused thing I took part in back in 2001 that wasn’t expected to make good games (I’m surprised to find that that’s still online), this was my first game jam. (I did want to be a part of last year’s adventure jam too, but nobody wanted my music that year. 24 out of the 86 games preferred to have no music.) This was fun.

Does this mean that I’d like to make another game? Absolutely. But despite that it is currently not likely that my game musical will get anywhere. Maybe I should try and find someone who wants my music in their game instead, to focus on one aspect of the game making instead of biting off more than I can chew.

Go ahead and try the game! And as always, if you have any feedback for me it is always welcome.