Kitsuni Created for Ludum Dare

<- Back to blog | Posted on 29 April 2014 by Adam Summerton

Yesterday we just finished our 6th Ludum Dare game, Kitsuni.  Our aims this time were to do something slightly different, so we set ourselves some goals:  interpret the theme in an off-beat way, no guns, no weapons, no health, no immediate dangers.  This led us towards a goal of trying to create something with a nice mood to it, something that would be a nice environment to explore.

The theme arrived ,and it was 'Beneath the Surface', which immediately made us think of mining games and underwater games.  I love underwater games, but felt that it didn't quite fit our goal of doing something different, as a lot of people would go down one of these 2 routes.  We settled on doing something sinister, meaning was something ominous beneath the surface (we also liked the idea of beneath the surface meaning inside someone's mind).  Somehow we arrived on a sinister forest, with a creature that could go under the surface of the other animals and take control of their minds.  This became a fox, for no particular reason, and the game world was born.  As for mechanics, we decided on all mouse controls and a set of puzzles to collect things.

It took us up to the last minute, but we just about managed it, and overall we are really pleased with the result.  we'll write a full post-mortem on the Ludum Dare blog soon.  The game is playable here on our website, and has a walkthrough (as the puzzles were a bit confusing).  You can find the LD submission page here.

PS: My wife has reminded me that the name Kitsuni was actually her idea, and politely suggested I give her a credit here on the blog, so here it is!  Incidentally, the name is not a spelling error - it is meant to be a combination of the words Kitsune and Origami.