Jane's Pumpkin Patch Postmortem

So, it all started when I collabed with 53xy83457 to make a small game for the 2024 Halloween Spooktacular called “Jane’s Spooky Skeletons”

https://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/954246

This game was pretty small in terms of gameplay but I was proud of how it turned out. Then, Tom announced the Flash Forward Jam in 2025! I started conceptualising ideas for the game. I planned for another Jane game where Jane would attack crows and defend her pumpkin patch. Pretty simple but it would get the job done. After I started programming, I realised that the game would be kind of hard to make with Adobe Animate. I knew that I had to use a game engine to make my game. First, I tried Godot. Sorry to you Godot diehards but I cannot understand the engine. The node system was unlike any game engine I tried before and it was so niche and there weren’t really many sources to go to when I needed help. Then, I discovered a game engine called GameMaker. I followed the official tutorials from the website and I got a bit of a grasp for it. I realised GameMaker was used for making games like Mindwave, Dead Estate and UNDERTALE, so I knew it was pretty versatile. There was also visual scripting and code so that’s cool. When I want something as simple as, “I want this character to go here when I press this button.” I can make the code in as little as less than 2 minutes.

When I started to work on the game, I realised it would be a bit empty if I had just worked on the game on my own. I wanted to collaborate with other people so that I and other people could combine our skills to make something fulfilling and awesome. I collabed with oquanaut for the art, Aalasteir for the sound design and thefakealki with the thumbnail art and the project was turning out pretty good! But I experienced some difficulty. I always debated on changing the game engine. First, I tried Scratch, but its animations would play out very slowly. Then, I tried Godot but I didn’t understand its node system. Then, I tried out GDevelop but that engine is basically just “The 2D Platformer engine”. I decided to settle for GameMaker. But, I experienced some more difficulty. I struggled with the cloning aspects of the crows and their movement. That was the hardest 

part of the game for me. I tried searching many resources but it didn’t work. Game development is a series of trial and error. But, eventually, I decided to ask for help from the NG Game Portal Discord server. Eventually, I decided to see how the code would look like in Scratch and used sources to see what the equivalent code would be in GML code. Eventually, it managed to work! I was so glad. 

Something I have to also talk about are tutorials! Something I learnt from a few YouTube videos is that you need to make simple games to learn the game engine rather than to learn the game engine to make a game. If you’re thinking about using GameMaker, I recommend doing GameMaker’s starter tutorials on the website to get a feel for the engine. While making this game, I would have learnt a lot more from trying rather than watching a bunch of tutorials. So, that’s something to keep an eye out for.

Game Development is something that I’ve always been dreaming about ever since I’ve played the very first Mario Maker game. The idea of making something and having other people play it and enjoy it really is something amazing. 

Oh yeah, I should probably talk about Jane. Okay, Jane! Everybody’s favourite green girl. One time, I was designing some random people and Jane was one of them. Once Tom announced the Halloween Spooktacular, I kind of wanted to create a game for it. I decided that she needed a name and thus, I christened her “Jane” and I gave her a personality of, “A paranoid girl who always gets into mishaps.” If it wasn’t obvious, it was inspired by Luigi’s Mansion. C’mon, green person, scared of the supernatural, Halloween setting? I have many more plans of what I want to do with Jane next, but for now, I’ll probably just stick to arcade styled games. I tried to design her in a style similar to parody animators I like such as Spicevipe, Cas Van De Pol and TerminalMontage.

I should also talk about my inspirations! Back then, I used to like simple arcade style games like roguelikes and platformers. My favourite platformers were Mario and Kirby games! But my main inspiration was Goodgis’s Ducky’s Cosy Kitchen game. This game and Goodgis’s game have very similar elements in terms of gameplay. Games I also liked playing were party games, most notably Mario Party 9 and Ultimate Chicken Horse! I know many people don’t really like Mario Party 9 but I find it nostalgic and fun. For the first Jane game, I was heavily inspired by Castle Crashers, the game just reminds me so much of old flash animations and the fact that a game made with flash made it onto Steam is just impressive. One pretty underrated game that I liked was “Kirby and the Rainbow Curse” . The game was just so colourful and vibrant and the gameplay was unlike any game that I’ve ever played before. In fact, I pretty much like every single game that came out on the Wii U. The Wii U is the best Nintendo console. Unfortunately, a game genre I don’t really like are Metroidvanias, I do like the action elements but exploring is kind of a chore. Most of the time, I would end up walking in circles and accomplishing nothing. When I played Super Metroid, I legit could not beat the game without a guide or some sort of finished map.

I know that the game I’ve made may not look that impressive but it was a labour of love and I’m getting better and better at game dev each and every time I make a game. By the time of making this, I don’t know if it’ll get a good rating but eh, at least I can say I tried. And all those years ago, I was surprised by what some Newgrounders managed to make and maybe, someday, I can surprise some other Newgrounders.

And thanks to all of the people that helped me out with the game. Without them, this game would be nothing more but a thought in my head that never came into fruition.

@oquanaut, @Aalasteir, @thefakealki, @ConnorGrail

And uhhh, that’s pretty much it! Sorry if this was a bit rambly. Below is a random image I found on Discord whilst sober.