Hi, since the Jam just ended I will talk a bit. I... don't feel very happy about the game I just published.

I joined the Jam before it started. At that time I had no idea of what I would make, but it would probably be in 2D (because I'm very lazy and it was unlikely that I would learn how to use a 3D engine).

But, after a few days, I had a clear vision of the last part of the game - from the moment John enter the last classroom to the end. There was no MacGuffin at that time, seeing what's in that room was enough for me to trigger the last part. The MacGuffin's story was added a few days ago because I needed a purpose to enter that classroom. But from the beginning the game was meant to be visually cut in two.

So I had a vision... and I did nothing with it. I procrastinated a lot. A few times I tried to draw an idea or code something but I couldn't put myself into the right mind to make a game. And almost a month passed, I had to kick myself to start coding, like, 2 days before the original end of the Jam! So I started to crunch.

Thankfully the Jam's end was delayed and the small demo I was trying to make became more like the full game I wanted to do.

Now... a part why I didn't make it earlier is also because I had no idea about the first part of the game. I had the 2nd half of the story, not the first. Also I had a problem with one of my characters because I couldn't translate something about them in French (because, since I'm French, I wanted to make the game in both English and French) - and it was not an important problem, but it annoyed me a lot.

In the end the Jam version of this game is about 90% complete - the story is finished, there are 5 endings like I planned (but I wanted to add CGs... right now it's just text), game is cut in two but the 2nd part is missing some animations and other flair thingies.

And until the very last 10mn before the end of the Jam, I had no idea on how to *name* this game. I still don't know, haha!

Now I will talk about what went wrong and what went better than expected, but it will be full of SPOILERS so be careful if you plan to play this game!

Soooo... Sweet to Sour. Immediately I thought of Hungry Lamu and Bonnie's Bakery, aka cute 2D games that turn into creepy 3D games. So I wanted to do something similar, but just in 2D.

Initially I wanted to make a very cute and childish sidecroll game (SS) with hand-drawn animations that turn into an almost realistic isometric game (iso).  The in-game explanation was that the main character, Johnathan, was drugged or something and he was seeing the world "in very bright colors"; and after seeing something shocking he would leave his state and see the world like it really is. That would have mean to make two games, but I had a full month to make it so I had plenty of time ahead. Of course it didn't happen as planned.

Also, since the beginning I wanted to add an easter egg in my game to thanks a certain youtuber, because I discovered itch.io thanks to him. It's unlikely that *he* will play my game, or even hear of it; but maybe the few people who will play my game will recognize the reference. I was originally planning to add him as a NPC, but after thinking a bit (and not finding something for that NPC to say) I gave up the idea and reduced my easter egg to his catch phrase when interacting with a certain kind of item. I also added a "secret" that literally say "thanks".

As the end line approached, I chose to forget all animations on the SS side, and tried to keep the hand-drawn to the iso side. But that, too, didn't happen. I tried until the end to keep time to draw the running and shooting animations of the main character, but there was always something else more important to do - and well the game can play despite the lack of animation but it's just not looking good. I will definitely fix that in a few days (I need to sleep first)

Then, the missing first half of the story. I already had the character Lulu in mind, who would be linked to the endings depending if we save them (I say them but I still don't know Lulu's gender... hence my problem with French because it's a binary language). Anyway, since the beginning, Lulu was seen by other as someone worthless, someone who don't deserve to be saved. And since the main character is... not in his right mind during the game, he may manage to save Lulu; and by doing that he would get the good ending.

And so, to put Lulu in danger, I added 2 old ladies living next to John and Lulu, and they would attempt to kill Lulu many times. I wanted to make 3 attempts but I had to reduce it to 1 because I didn't had enough content to fill the rest of the day. Those ladies became more important, and now they're the reason why John see the world like this. They pretend to be nice with him and feed him with their cooking filled with... stuff. They weren't meant to try to kill John until the last day of coding, but I thought something was missing with them being so nice. It's a horror game, afterward!

So I had enough to fill the part of the game *before the school*... but nothing when John is attending at school. That's why we jump from "take the bus" to the evening, because I literally have no idea on what to add! And that's why on the 3rd day we skip from the apartment building to the school, because nothing happens on the Street map that day.

And the school itself - I wanted to add more classrooms and allow the player to freely explore the whole school. But, again, not enough time :'( so the school is just a corridor with 2 mirrored classroom. There's a dead dude in one of them - with no head and a lot of blood (and I don't know if it's a suicide or a murder). Now since our character see the world in a colored way, I replaced the blood with white flowers. By seeing this scene, John has a bad reaction and the world switch to something more real (and the blood is now red, but very pixelated, even I can't see it clearly). The whole room should be... should have been in a complete mess, as if people were fighting there before the dead guy died. But again, that doesn't look like I wanted. Then, I had the idea that this "real" world (the isometric one) was still partly in Johnny's mind, but the dream turned into a nightmare.

So, the endings- since the beginning there was meant to have 5 endings - 2 if you let Lulu die, 3 if you help them survive. They are almost like I wanted, except they are just black screen - I wanted to add a comic-like screen explaining the ending. The thing I changed is that John leave in all endings, because his neighbors plan to kill him. Except that, they are quite similar; like planned, it's only when you help Lulu and don't kill them at the end that you will learn most events of the story. Else John is just confused and won't find that he was drugged by the two nice ladies living next to him. Also, in the endings where Lulu survive, Lulu steals the MacGuffin (maybe to visit the two ladies?) and that's why you can't find the weapon anymore.

What about the MacGuffin? Well, uh, I needed a reason for John to enter the dead dude's room. So someone ask him to go fetch something on the desk in that room - and the thing he find, is a gun. Initially I thought to make the MacGuffin some papers, and John would have confounded it with the gun; but since he may use said gun afterward on many ennemies, that weapon required an infinite amount of ammo. And so, that gun is now some sort of experimental/extraterrestrial/whatever gun that can shoot as much as we want. There's no explanation about this gun because it's indeed a MacGuffin, all I can say is that its design is inspired by the Gammacor from Warframe.

For the monsters, I wanted something creepy, scary, and glitchy. They... look cartoony. They are awfully not scary, but they are also the only thing animated! They should have been tall, with long arms and legs, a white face with big black eyes, and a very dark skin covered by a dirty grey shirt. From time to time they were meant to look directly to the camera in a creepy way (like in Harvest Festival 64) - but - everything I drew weren't working at all. What can be found in the game is actually a work-in-progress animation; I still have not added the arms. I don't know - that's the first time I animate something frame-by-frame, one one side I'm somehow proud and on the other side I'm disappointed.

Now, the sound. Until yesterday - the day before I posted the game - there was no sound at all. But that day, there were workers outside of my house; they were using chainsaw. So I thought, I will record that and put it into my game! So I put a mic outside of my window, and waited... and nothing I recorded was usable, except the love song of a bird (a... turtle dove, I think it's called in English?). And that song, I had the bad idea to stretch it for 10 times its length, and to add some reverb. Result: it's the most creepiest "music" I ever heard. I felt bad hearing it during all my tests on the last part of the game, and it was perfect, so I kept it. Enjoy my evilness :D

For the text voices, I had a previous record where I just say "wa" a lot of time. Cut that file in 19 "wa", make them play randomly when someone should speak, and tadaa! Easy. I recorded more "wa" this afternoon, they are used in the iso part of the game - I think you can tell that I'm quite tired.

Aaand then today, the very last day. I still had tons of work to do. I made about 10 iso tiles; I made the MacGuffin kill mobs (it doesn't shoot but automatically kill a monster on screen); I made the menus; I grabbed a happy music (for the 1st part of the game) from someone because I didn't have enough time to make my own; I made a credit screen to credit the dude who made the music; I made more sounds; I made checkpoints - there was no checkpoints until then - and checked that they would work under any condition and be correctly saved; and then I found that I completely forgot to write the endings! So, back to write them, and check they are correctly triggered, etc.

And when I was done it was 30mn before the end of the Jam. By the time I packed the game there was only 10mn left. During the last 2 minutes, my brain stopped to work as I didn't understand why itch.io wouldn't add my game to the Jam - it refused because it already added it a few minutes before when I made this game's page.

But... yeah, the end of the jam was quite stressful.

In the end I'm happy of this Jam even if my game is not as good as I wanted. I would probably do another Sweet to Sour if it happens again, but this time I'll take the whole length of the Jame to make a game.

And now I'm very, very tired - that's 6 days of crunch (my fault!), so I will rest a bit, and then fix my game. Sorry for my long rent, and thank you for reading.