Postmortem prototyping Julimbit

Main idea
When it became known that the main theme of the jam was ritual, we started coming up with ideas. At first, we planned to build a game based on the theme of the wedding rituals. For example, the groom ran away from the bride, which is trying to catch him for the purpose of getting married. There was an option to add elements that would emphasize the local flavor of Ukraine, it would give us additional points in the competition: for example, wreaths that are floating down the creek, called "rushnik", which help young girls to find future husband. During the development of the game we adhere to the idea that the gameplay is designed for two players - for fun. But we did not realize that it can bring into play a large number of communication between the players and the cooperative process. Then we decided to change the story by using the William Shakespeare , and instantly the groom turned into Romeo and the bride became Juliet. We attempted to make a sequel of "Romeo and Juliet" in our game, Romeo will rescue the Juliet after her death , and William will help him. We thought that William would also like a happy ending to their story.
Juliet lies on the altar and she isn't playable character , players can see her in every stage of the game and it gives players to understand that all events which happen to them at levels are connected with her rescuing.

Game Mechanics
It is known that suicides go to hell. And we decided that heroes need to go through all the circles of hell for Juliet's rescuing. We wanted to create nine circles(levels) of hell as described by Dante. The main mechanics of the game are cooperative actions of players, i.e. the game can be completed only if the players will help each other. It was decided that each level will have it's own game mechanics. Thus the player gets emotional pleasure while changing game levels. So we started to make the first sketches levels. There is no interactive menu In the game - the gameplay is based on player's intuition. Both players must go to the altar .In the first level, we make it clear that the game is designed for two players.
The first level of the game shows that the game requires a certain interactions between the players to move on. The idea was in simultaneously pressing of buttons. Two identical buttons appear in different parts of the map . The players must simultaneously press the buttons, at the same time, rolling fire balls will hinder to do it. After that, the programmer and designer started to assemble levels. And the rest of the team members developed mechanic of other game levels. Then appears the level of labyrinth. Where one player should open the door for the second player. Doors were stray souls.
Another good level was where the players must catch harlots. One of the players have to go to the harlot and say a prayer, and the harlot which is located within the area freezes, and the second player of the team carries her to the altar to sacrifice.
Some levels have been made on paper, but there were no time to realize them . For example, we wanted to feed the angry dogs, catch enemies to the traps. But the main priority of our project was the completion of the story.
To create the intrigue in the game we made an unexpected twist in the plot. On the penultimate level the players know that there is only one place on the boat from the hell . Accordingly, only one player will get with Juliet, and the second one will stay in hell (It's Shakespeare's tragicomedy ).
So the last game level gameplay turns into a competition. The players became greedy . The winner of the level will be that player which could faster collect the coins.
The end of the game depends on who wins. The coins of winner will receive the death in exchange for Juliet's life. The winner and
Place blocks on level 4. (Cooperative Maze)
Juliet are leaving the hell. And the loser's character is staying in
the hell.

Technologies
The learning of new technologies during the game development leads to failure. At least one of the team members has to be familiar with it. We had two team members who were already in possession on the Unity technology. And there were no question in the selection of the game engine. We used models from the free package of asset store - Mikes Mini. Through the Blender modeling package we were changing and adding new models.

In the plan of the main priorities of the code there were:
- characters controller, input processing;
- the core logic architecture (wins, losses, rounds, spawn points and exit points);

Also we refined:
- Enemy controller (danger)
- the main hero abilities (freezing / transfer / collection)
- The lives deposit

The only templates we had done before were:
- Vertex animation code (background lava)
- scenes transfering Code
- game Localization (the game has 2 languages: Russian and English)

When we realized that only developers know how to play, we have implemented the dialog system that appears in a window UI. Heroes told to each other about the game goals, mocking each other.

Result.
The result was magical. We were the single team, who has a complete game story. Our game has the beginning and the end. We were giving to play for everyone who asked. Our players understood the jokes, called their friends, and made compliments to us. It's amazing that a small team can make the product in 48 hours, and this product would be more perspective than if we create it for a few years.