The University of Michigan hosts an annual game development challenge, in which small teams of students have just 48 hours to develop a video game. The event is run by the campus' game development club, Wolverine Soft.
Beware the Bears
This is my first time participating in the 48-Hour Contest, and I'm unsure of how it will go. Granted, I'm a computer science in engineering major at the University of Michigan, but my experience programming games amounts to only one project. That game was made over the summer, with much more forgiving time constraints than I'll see here.
I've decided to team up with my friend Adam. Although he has not participated in the 48-Hour Contest before either, he has done more game programming in a computer game design class.
Friday
6:30 p.m. Teams are announced and we now know that our third team member, Emeric, also has never been in the contest, nor has ever programmed a game. The three of us are all programmers, but none of us has any real graphics or music experience.
Since Adam and I have more programming experience, we decide it is best if Emeric does what he can on graphics and sounds, while we program the game. Adam and I both know how to use the DXFramework; thus our contest strategy is formed.
7:00 p.m. The contest theme is revealed to be "Honoring Stephen Colbert." Our sentiments are best described in the words of my team member Emeric: "Who is Stephen Colbert?"
None of us has any real knowledge of Stephen Colbert other than that he has a television show, The Colbert Report, and was the voice of some characters on Harvey Birdman Attorney at Law. Although we're displeased and confused that the theme is not more general, we begin brainstorming and researching.
8:30 p.m. After brainstorming we come up with a couple of ideas. One idea is to make a game in which a crazed Colbert fanatic tries to increase the ratings for The Colbert Report by setting all the televisions in electronics stores to the channel playing the show. The store employees will constantly try to turn the televisions back to their original stations and catch the hooligan who is making them do more work.
Another idea we have is based on Stephen Colbert's fear of bears, which we learned during a brief bit of web research. Colbert will be attacked by many different kinds of bears, and he must shoot and kill the bears chasing him. The animals used to be humans but were changed into bears due to some hand-waving biological weapon, and they want to turn Colbert into a bear as well. This game would be a top-down shooter with many levels and different kinds of guns.
Of our two ideas, the bear shooting game sounds like more fun. We get to work. As Colbert escapes the bear attacks, he will inch closer and closer to the White House. If he wins the final stage, he will become President of the United States. Surely giving Colbert the presidency constitutes "honoring" him.
10:30 p.m. Emeric leaves because he needs to catch a bus to get home for the night. Meanwhile, Adam and I have gotten a simple move-and-shoot game up and running. We might want to fix the shooting angle such that he shoots toward where we click on the screen, rather than some other angle based on where we click on the screen.
I start by making a generic bear that will chase and maul our beloved hero. Once I get this up and running, I can work on randomizing where the bear appears on the edge, and then start on the different types of bears. I really like the idea of having a ninja bear, a pirate bear, and a Secret Service bear. 
11:30 p.m. Our angle problem is fixed. Adam had to leave, so I'm the only person on my team who's still here, but my morale is high, and I'm not tired since I got a lot of sleep prior to the event. I create a "to do" list so that we know what functionality still needs to be implemented at each step.
