Garbage Collection Kombat
GC KOMBAT (Garbage Collector Kombat)
Fight chaos. Sort the heap.
You a are the garbage collector. Sort blocks into the correct color columns.
Built in Pure Code with Odin + Raylib for the Beginners Jam Summer 2026.
Submission Entry Constraint: 100% Assetless Engine. Zero AI-generated audio or visuals.
THE CORE FANTASY
You are a manual Garbage Collector thread coded in low-level architecture. Your system is being flooded by buggy, chaotic processes leaking data chunks. You must deploy legendary sorting algorithms to align the heap before the system triggers an Out-Of-Memory crash or absolute deadlock!
HOW TO PLAY (Read in 3 Seconds Flat)
- Match the Column Gradients: Use WASD or Arrow keys to move your flipper cursor. Press Space or Enter to manually swap blocks so they match the color guide blueprints running vertically beneath the grid.
- Purge the Heap: Align a full row, column, or diagonal to trigger a compilation clear, securing valuable score and system bandwidth.
- Defragment Hypermode: Fill your Bandwidth meter to 100% to overclock the system. During Hypermode, your abilities have zero cooldown, the music mutates, and you can spam sorting algorithm casts at lightning velocities.
- Watch for Red Locks: Attempting to swap a Red Mutex Lock hazard instantly triggers a SEGFAULT. If the heap reaches 20 active Red Locks, the system enters a hard deadlock and crashes.
THE PLAYER ALGORITHMS (Abilities)
When manual swapping gets overwhelmed, invoke automated memory manipulation scripts:
[1] Bubble Sort: Rearranges and pulls correct blocks matching the immediate 3x3 quadrant around your cursor.
[2] Quick Sort: Sweeps and aligns target blocks along your cursor's full vertical column.
[3] Merge Sort: Flashes a target grid container to align data chunks across your cursor's full horizontal row.
TECH STACK & ENGINE PURE JUICE
This jam entry features a custom, high-performance runtime loop optimized for WebGL2:
Procedural Synth Soundscapes: 100% assetless audio generated purely via mathematical wave synthesis at runtime. Features a real-time, low-pass filtered 82 BPM lofi hip-hop tracker complete with simulated vinyl hiss and dynamic 106 BPM acceleration overclocks.
Fullscreen Instability Shaders: Custom GLSL ES 300 fragment pipeline rendering dynamic CRT lens distortion, subtle chromatic aberration, and matrix glitch anomalies tracking the stability of your memory banks.
Adaptive Spawning Engine: Background resource generation dynamically scales to populate the board during hyper-fast player combo streaks.
Persistent HTML5 LocalStorage: High-fidelity retention saving your absolute best runs to an internal top-5 retro arcade ranking board featuring a classic 3-letter name-entry system.
CREDITS
Studio: LIKE A BOSS GAMES 2026
Development Engine: Odin Programming Language + Raylib
Category: A Beginner's Jam Summer 2026 Game
Development log
Comments
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I'm not sure a game made entirely with AI counts towards a beginner's jam.
Thanks for checking out the game! Just to clear up any confusion: the game definitely wasn't 'fully made by AI.' It’s custom-coded from scratch using the Odin programming language and Raylib.
I absolutely did use AI as an assistant to help debug loops, write math logic, and troubleshoot syntax—which fits squarely within the jam rules permitting AI coding assistance. However, all the engine architecture, state management, and grid systems were designed and engineered manually.
The 'procedural' audio and graphics I mentioned in the devlog aren't AI-generated assets either; they are real-time code formulas calculating sine waves and custom GLSL shaders at runtime to keep the game completely assetless. The irony of getting an automation comment on a game about human manual garbage collection is pretty spot on, though! Thanks for playing!
Oh and I am a beginner. I have never entered a game jam and completed a project yet. AI helped me do that.
I hate to say it but considering that the UI has the generic cybernetic style distinct to AI, and the fact that you wrote this very response with AI as well (because I can tell), I doubt that.
I liked the sounds and visuals, but honestly, I didn't understand anything. I just kept changing the same cell over and over again, pressing 1, 2, 3, and eventually won.
I'll try and figure out how to make the game more intuitive. You just sort the blocks into the colored columns, But you can clear blocks by row, column, or even diagonally if all the cell match in the corresponding blocks.
Thanks for trying my game! I appreciate the feedback.
Amazing concept, loved the graphics, and i cannot believe you did this only using a graphic library and odin. Absolutely enjoyed it
I'm not sure about how well it adheres to the theme, but im ranking you high on the others
Thanks for checking out my game!! I appreciate it.