Just a quick note to my followers(yes, all 2 of you, see, you're so special!).
I've got a part time job now, which means money for me. Of course, this also means even less time to update the blog.
I do have days off however, and I certainly have not stopped gaming, or making games(the progress of the latter has slowed considerably more then the former due to lack of energy).
I simply have been a bit lacking on the time/energy(especally the latter) needed to write up proper content for this blog. Been a rough couple of first weeks.
Just thought I'd post something so you don't think I've abandoned Gawain Games. This is still going, and I will still be reviewing and playing games.
I probably won't have time to write/play till later this week, but I've recently bought Trackmania 2:Canyon, which is still in multiplayer beta mode. A full preview of what buying the rather steep entry earns you will be coming once I get the chance to properly plow through it all myself.
Off to bed for now, got more work tomorrow. Till then, this is Gawain signing off.
Saturday, September 3, 2011
Monday, August 15, 2011
UT2004 with Wacom mouse is the best.
Ok, I love my tablet...but...
I tried playing UT2004 with the tablet mouse wheel to switch weapons. The problem is that the tablet wheel doesn't act quite like a normal mouse for older games, since Wacom emulates the mouse wheel or something.
It makes for a hilarious handicap, because use of the mouse wheel on my tablet also makes my character stare at the floor or roof at a 90 degree angle. With random rotation.
Thankfully, the auto swap when out of ammo is pretty smart...so I can just use the first 6 numbers on the keyboard to swap to a gun and let the auto ammo system find a similar ammo on it's own. Assuming of course, that I last long enough in the arena to get those guns in the first place. But it seems a good compromise, right?
Except for the Link Gun. Normally, the right click on the link gun boosts the attack of a team member also using the link gun. So it's good to fire the right click at a team mate.
But the auto ammo swap for the next gun is the UT Rocket Launcher with triple fire. Oh, with instant fire on right click if let go.
Hilarity then happens as my allies, who were expecting support, get splattered all over the room instead the instant I run out of ammo.
Bah, allies are overrated anyway, right? I can take them all on myself with my rocket launcher randomly shooting around. Besides, if I swap to something else, I'll just more then likely blow up my legs again.
I'm debating if I need a proper mouse to play this game. See, on the one hand, it's very obvious I can't play this well in it's current state.
On the other hand, it's utterly hilarious to fail this much at such an easy to control game in an online environment where everyone is counting on me actually being decent enough to keep my own head on my body.
And entertaining for me to hear the wonderful Text to Speech (which is terrible) try to pronounce all the swear words and uses of stuff I won't repeat here that are tossed my way when I blew up 3 teammates along with myself using the rocket launcher while no more enemies were even in my view at the time.
The ultimate point of the game is to be entertaining, isn't it? So I guess, logically, that the game is doing it's job with or without the proper mouse to play it with.
Somehow I don't think I'm getting let into any UT leagues anytime soon though. For some reason, everyone seems to hate me now.
The game itself is awesome, moddable and customizable to hell and back, and makes for many long hours of LAN or internet play with random bot personalities to fill in empty slots for play. In other words, lots of features many of the modern games forget to put in that make it awesome even if you are playing by yourself. It's also only $10 for the Editors Choice Edition off GOG, which is about 20 cheaper then what UT3 will cost you on a good day. (For your info, UT3 is shiny but last I tried it during a free steam weekend, it was missing a LOT of options and modifications that UT2004 had. It really needs at least 1 good expansion pack before it's got enough content to warrant it's steep price.). Not that I'd shamelessly plug anything on here.
*makes a note to swap to a proper mouse next time he plays.*
I tried playing UT2004 with the tablet mouse wheel to switch weapons. The problem is that the tablet wheel doesn't act quite like a normal mouse for older games, since Wacom emulates the mouse wheel or something.
It makes for a hilarious handicap, because use of the mouse wheel on my tablet also makes my character stare at the floor or roof at a 90 degree angle. With random rotation.
Thankfully, the auto swap when out of ammo is pretty smart...so I can just use the first 6 numbers on the keyboard to swap to a gun and let the auto ammo system find a similar ammo on it's own. Assuming of course, that I last long enough in the arena to get those guns in the first place. But it seems a good compromise, right?
Except for the Link Gun. Normally, the right click on the link gun boosts the attack of a team member also using the link gun. So it's good to fire the right click at a team mate.
But the auto ammo swap for the next gun is the UT Rocket Launcher with triple fire. Oh, with instant fire on right click if let go.
Hilarity then happens as my allies, who were expecting support, get splattered all over the room instead the instant I run out of ammo.
Bah, allies are overrated anyway, right? I can take them all on myself with my rocket launcher randomly shooting around. Besides, if I swap to something else, I'll just more then likely blow up my legs again.
I'm debating if I need a proper mouse to play this game. See, on the one hand, it's very obvious I can't play this well in it's current state.
On the other hand, it's utterly hilarious to fail this much at such an easy to control game in an online environment where everyone is counting on me actually being decent enough to keep my own head on my body.
And entertaining for me to hear the wonderful Text to Speech (which is terrible) try to pronounce all the swear words and uses of stuff I won't repeat here that are tossed my way when I blew up 3 teammates along with myself using the rocket launcher while no more enemies were even in my view at the time.
The ultimate point of the game is to be entertaining, isn't it? So I guess, logically, that the game is doing it's job with or without the proper mouse to play it with.
Somehow I don't think I'm getting let into any UT leagues anytime soon though. For some reason, everyone seems to hate me now.
The game itself is awesome, moddable and customizable to hell and back, and makes for many long hours of LAN or internet play with random bot personalities to fill in empty slots for play. In other words, lots of features many of the modern games forget to put in that make it awesome even if you are playing by yourself. It's also only $10 for the Editors Choice Edition off GOG, which is about 20 cheaper then what UT3 will cost you on a good day. (For your info, UT3 is shiny but last I tried it during a free steam weekend, it was missing a LOT of options and modifications that UT2004 had. It really needs at least 1 good expansion pack before it's got enough content to warrant it's steep price.). Not that I'd shamelessly plug anything on here.
*makes a note to swap to a proper mouse next time he plays.*
Sunday, July 31, 2011
Vacation, Android Phones, and beta testing mysterious new technology
This week is vacation week, and I'm leaving Monday and Tuesday with the family. I probably will just take the whole week easy so I can regain my inspiration and sanity again.
On the development front, I am now beta testing a new plugin for MMF2. I don't think I signed an NDA(yet), but I'm not sure they want me spilling all the gritty details since they arn't finalized anyway. Basically, know that it outputs MMF2 apps to Android OS., through a code translator similar to the Flash MMF2 plugin. Like the flash plugin, the final files arn't the most efficiant use of space, but they can do everything MMF2's base engine can do plus access many exciting android phone/tablet specific features. It's very unstable right now and buggy(thus the beta testing, duh). But it's also exciting.
It also overwrites the normal MMF2 exe currently with a beta version. While it "should" be safe to work on my flash games so long as I don't touch any android stuff with them, Clickteam doesn't recommend it, and I'd have to agree with them. So my flash games are on hold while I help grind away all the bugs out of the android beta. Actually, that isn't entirely true, I can work on my games, I just need to reinstall the base MMF2 over the android beta. Due to the compiler references for C++, flash, android, ect. , it's not as simple as just installing two copies of MMF2. Sadly they will read each other's settings and explode, among other fun bugs, so it's one or the other.
The benifits of being a beta tester are, for now, a discount when the plugin launches(price of the plugin is still to be announced, as is release date). And of course the ability to learn all the nitty gritty details about things like the accelerometer device before the MMF2 plugin is even out, without needing to spend weeks studying and testing java or C++ code.
While I'm not being paid in any way as far as money goes, it's still a fun and useful experience. It's also pretty cool to be able to suggest feature changes/additions so that when the plugin does come out everyone buying it gets their money's worth. Plus, as an expert user of MMF2, I already know how to push the MMF2 engine to it's limits, and can dump those to the phone to watch it break down and cry. (Which it currently does about 50% of the time. Beta versions of creative development software that does lots of different things are fun!)
Till next time,
Gawain
On the development front, I am now beta testing a new plugin for MMF2. I don't think I signed an NDA(yet), but I'm not sure they want me spilling all the gritty details since they arn't finalized anyway. Basically, know that it outputs MMF2 apps to Android OS., through a code translator similar to the Flash MMF2 plugin. Like the flash plugin, the final files arn't the most efficiant use of space, but they can do everything MMF2's base engine can do plus access many exciting android phone/tablet specific features. It's very unstable right now and buggy(thus the beta testing, duh). But it's also exciting.
It also overwrites the normal MMF2 exe currently with a beta version. While it "should" be safe to work on my flash games so long as I don't touch any android stuff with them, Clickteam doesn't recommend it, and I'd have to agree with them. So my flash games are on hold while I help grind away all the bugs out of the android beta. Actually, that isn't entirely true, I can work on my games, I just need to reinstall the base MMF2 over the android beta. Due to the compiler references for C++, flash, android, ect. , it's not as simple as just installing two copies of MMF2. Sadly they will read each other's settings and explode, among other fun bugs, so it's one or the other.
The benifits of being a beta tester are, for now, a discount when the plugin launches(price of the plugin is still to be announced, as is release date). And of course the ability to learn all the nitty gritty details about things like the accelerometer device before the MMF2 plugin is even out, without needing to spend weeks studying and testing java or C++ code.
While I'm not being paid in any way as far as money goes, it's still a fun and useful experience. It's also pretty cool to be able to suggest feature changes/additions so that when the plugin does come out everyone buying it gets their money's worth. Plus, as an expert user of MMF2, I already know how to push the MMF2 engine to it's limits, and can dump those to the phone to watch it break down and cry. (Which it currently does about 50% of the time. Beta versions of creative development software that does lots of different things are fun!)
Till next time,
Gawain
Tuesday, July 26, 2011
Humble Bundle #3
You all know the drill by now right? 5 awesome indy games, all multiplatform(That means Mac, PC, and Linux), all for whatever price you name.
You can be cheap and pay $1, or supportive and pay however much you think the charity/developer deserves. Actually, if it's anything like Humble Bundle 2, some people were buying it for $0.01 USD, but that seems kind of mean.
It's split default between both charity and developer, but you can control exactly where every penny of your purchase goes yourself with handy sliders. PS: They support paypal, bank transfers, and lots of other methods of payment, so if you've got some change lying around in any of those accounts, go for it.)
Go grab a copy for yourself. There's really, quite literally, no reason not to. The games are a total value of $50 USD entertainment on their own outside of the bundle when bought seperately. Quite frankly, VVVVV and Hammerfight alone are well worth the ride. Crayon Physics is pretty cool too. And Yet It Moves and Cogs, maybe not so much, but still decent and worth the time at least playing a bit of. The only thing hard about this purchase is how much fun you think you'll get out of these games for the money you decide to put in.
Why are you still here? Oh, right, cause I forgot the url. Here ya go, now get out there and grab it:
http://www.humblebundle.com/
Gawain
You can be cheap and pay $1, or supportive and pay however much you think the charity/developer deserves. Actually, if it's anything like Humble Bundle 2, some people were buying it for $0.01 USD, but that seems kind of mean.
It's split default between both charity and developer, but you can control exactly where every penny of your purchase goes yourself with handy sliders. PS: They support paypal, bank transfers, and lots of other methods of payment, so if you've got some change lying around in any of those accounts, go for it.)
Go grab a copy for yourself. There's really, quite literally, no reason not to. The games are a total value of $50 USD entertainment on their own outside of the bundle when bought seperately. Quite frankly, VVVVV and Hammerfight alone are well worth the ride. Crayon Physics is pretty cool too. And Yet It Moves and Cogs, maybe not so much, but still decent and worth the time at least playing a bit of. The only thing hard about this purchase is how much fun you think you'll get out of these games for the money you decide to put in.
Why are you still here? Oh, right, cause I forgot the url. Here ya go, now get out there and grab it:
http://www.humblebundle.com/
Gawain
Wednesday, July 20, 2011
Not dead yet
The lack of updates here may seem like I'm not doing much. Actually, I've been doing a lot, just not gaming related.
In Real Life, I've been very busy job hunting.
In between job hunting, I've also been busy helping out some friends of mine with fixing up a house. It's sort of a "I learn construction from them, they get extra free labor from me" kind of deal. For now I'm helping when I can, but it's under the understanding that if I get a job that pays money, I'm doing that instead.
Shameless blog plug for their house project coming up:
http://notmuchnewaroundhere.blogspot.com/
Check it out if you want to see what a house looks like when it's been abandoned for 3 years straight. Eeek!
A lot of my game projects are still in conceptual form, much too early to release any shots or info. I know I've been saying that a lot, so I've tossed together a quick screenshot for you all to look at. You'll probably know right away what it is if you've played the other flash game. I've blurred out most of it because it's very much in conceptual state and not even close to what the final game will look like.
Yep, Smiley has walls that scroll by now...and yes, I am working on a Smiley Gems 2.
The game will have a much more polished, faster paced gameplay of the first game. I've taken into account a lot of your player feedback for the first game, as well as my own tester's feedback, and I think this new one will make for a much better time killer type of flash game.
Not satisfied with just releasing a refined version of the first Smiley Gems, I've also been working on a new gameplay mode...Volcano Raid. The screenshot is from this new mode, in case you are wondering why I have walls involved. The new mode is still very much loose ideas on paper, so I'll have more info to spill once the gameplay is more solidified. Scoring tables for both modes will be seperate, as the two scores are not comparable at all.
Oh, and the jem/mine spawnings are funny(in a kick someone down a manhole way) and not very fair at all right now. I got a lot of work formulating and implementing new spawning rules for the gameplay.
As time allows me, I'll continue working on my game projects, and keep you all posted.
I've also recently gotten an Android Phone (Motorola Blur), so I might post some game reviews/recommendations for that as well. There certainly is a lot of apps and not all of them are that great, so I think I'll post some info to help you all sort through the trash to find the treasures.
I'm also really excited to try developing for the Android if I ever get enough free time to invest in learning the SDK and the billions of tools out there.
Like someone at a crossroads with a broken signpost, I don't know where any of this will lead yet. But there's no sense standing here waiting, it's time to plow ahead and find out.
Till next time,
Gawain
In Real Life, I've been very busy job hunting.
In between job hunting, I've also been busy helping out some friends of mine with fixing up a house. It's sort of a "I learn construction from them, they get extra free labor from me" kind of deal. For now I'm helping when I can, but it's under the understanding that if I get a job that pays money, I'm doing that instead.
Shameless blog plug for their house project coming up:
http://notmuchnewaroundhere.blogspot.com/
Check it out if you want to see what a house looks like when it's been abandoned for 3 years straight. Eeek!
A lot of my game projects are still in conceptual form, much too early to release any shots or info. I know I've been saying that a lot, so I've tossed together a quick screenshot for you all to look at. You'll probably know right away what it is if you've played the other flash game. I've blurred out most of it because it's very much in conceptual state and not even close to what the final game will look like.
Yep, Smiley has walls that scroll by now...and yes, I am working on a Smiley Gems 2.
The game will have a much more polished, faster paced gameplay of the first game. I've taken into account a lot of your player feedback for the first game, as well as my own tester's feedback, and I think this new one will make for a much better time killer type of flash game.
Not satisfied with just releasing a refined version of the first Smiley Gems, I've also been working on a new gameplay mode...Volcano Raid. The screenshot is from this new mode, in case you are wondering why I have walls involved. The new mode is still very much loose ideas on paper, so I'll have more info to spill once the gameplay is more solidified. Scoring tables for both modes will be seperate, as the two scores are not comparable at all.
Oh, and the jem/mine spawnings are funny(in a kick someone down a manhole way) and not very fair at all right now. I got a lot of work formulating and implementing new spawning rules for the gameplay.
As time allows me, I'll continue working on my game projects, and keep you all posted.
I've also recently gotten an Android Phone (Motorola Blur), so I might post some game reviews/recommendations for that as well. There certainly is a lot of apps and not all of them are that great, so I think I'll post some info to help you all sort through the trash to find the treasures.
I'm also really excited to try developing for the Android if I ever get enough free time to invest in learning the SDK and the billions of tools out there.
Like someone at a crossroads with a broken signpost, I don't know where any of this will lead yet. But there's no sense standing here waiting, it's time to plow ahead and find out.
Till next time,
Gawain
Friday, June 24, 2011
Balloons
Spent the last few weeks making balloons, and floating them all into the sky. The balloons are free, but the time spent writing them took a lot out of me.
They all contained a bit of personal writing, each directed at the intended reciever, each with some explanation why I would be one of the best choices for their particular Hot Air Balloon Crew. Each was carefully written, edited, and rewritten again. Though some Hot Air Balloon Crew positions are very similar, so I may have recycled some of my writings.
Yet I still had to take the time to fill the balloons and launch them into the right breeze. The Air Tubes are a bit of a mess since they haven't standardized it, so it takes even more time investment to figure out how to send the message to each Hot Air Balloon Crew.
I've released them all into the world, hoping someone would read them and consider me for their own Hot Air Balloon Crew.
The thing with balloon messages is, the balloon only flies to the sender. There's no way for the reciever to reply unless they take their own time to make a balloon themselves. And these Hot Air Balloon Crews, they get a lot of balloons. They get so many, it's impossible to reply to anyone except the one person they selected for their Hot Air Balloon Crew.
I've sent so many, I've now run out of Hot Air Balloon Crews to send messages to. And, like most people applying for Hot Air Balloon Crews, I've heard nothing back.
But that's ok. Because once those crews take flight, the next fleet of Hot Air Balloon Crews will start building their own landing platforms and forming new crews. They'll need someone to send balloons so they can look through them all and decide who is making it on board the next flight.
So for now, I watch. I wait. And when the new crews show up, I start sending my balloon messages again.
Because that's another thing about balloon messages. If I don't ever send one, I'll never know where, to who, or when it might land. And somewhere out there, someone on a Hot Air Balloon Crew just might finally take the time to write me back.
They all contained a bit of personal writing, each directed at the intended reciever, each with some explanation why I would be one of the best choices for their particular Hot Air Balloon Crew. Each was carefully written, edited, and rewritten again. Though some Hot Air Balloon Crew positions are very similar, so I may have recycled some of my writings.
Yet I still had to take the time to fill the balloons and launch them into the right breeze. The Air Tubes are a bit of a mess since they haven't standardized it, so it takes even more time investment to figure out how to send the message to each Hot Air Balloon Crew.
I've released them all into the world, hoping someone would read them and consider me for their own Hot Air Balloon Crew.
The thing with balloon messages is, the balloon only flies to the sender. There's no way for the reciever to reply unless they take their own time to make a balloon themselves. And these Hot Air Balloon Crews, they get a lot of balloons. They get so many, it's impossible to reply to anyone except the one person they selected for their Hot Air Balloon Crew.
I've sent so many, I've now run out of Hot Air Balloon Crews to send messages to. And, like most people applying for Hot Air Balloon Crews, I've heard nothing back.
But that's ok. Because once those crews take flight, the next fleet of Hot Air Balloon Crews will start building their own landing platforms and forming new crews. They'll need someone to send balloons so they can look through them all and decide who is making it on board the next flight.
So for now, I watch. I wait. And when the new crews show up, I start sending my balloon messages again.
Because that's another thing about balloon messages. If I don't ever send one, I'll never know where, to who, or when it might land. And somewhere out there, someone on a Hot Air Balloon Crew just might finally take the time to write me back.
Wednesday, June 8, 2011
Look up there! Fancy tab buttons!
Not much of an update this time.
Basically just wanted to say I've got a page on this blog now where I will be listing games I finished and released. For those new to the blog, I don't think I've actually linked to Smiley Gems, my first released flash game. So go check it out.
As for game design, little to report. A lot has been done, but nothing publically shareable yet.
One major breakthrough is that I worked out some unity code to move a player relative to the direction the camera is facing, without moving them on anything but the XZ plane. In non-technical terms, this means the player can control themselves like in Zelda 64 or other 3d platformers, where the controls change based on where the camera is looking. The math to do this sort of split my head open, but it's working.
And in the world of other games, I'm still a hopeless Minecraft addict. On our local lan server, I've built an entire, independant, enemy immune fort complete with renewable wood, infinite water spring, animal spawning areas, wheat, sugarcane, storage for literally everything in the game, and cactus. All built over the last few weekends, starting with the outer wall. Now I've got a donation box set up for a potential roller coaster. I think it's safe to say I'm terribly addicted.
At least I don't play it when I'm supposed to be getting work done. Not yet anyway.
Basically just wanted to say I've got a page on this blog now where I will be listing games I finished and released. For those new to the blog, I don't think I've actually linked to Smiley Gems, my first released flash game. So go check it out.
As for game design, little to report. A lot has been done, but nothing publically shareable yet.
One major breakthrough is that I worked out some unity code to move a player relative to the direction the camera is facing, without moving them on anything but the XZ plane. In non-technical terms, this means the player can control themselves like in Zelda 64 or other 3d platformers, where the controls change based on where the camera is looking. The math to do this sort of split my head open, but it's working.
And in the world of other games, I'm still a hopeless Minecraft addict. On our local lan server, I've built an entire, independant, enemy immune fort complete with renewable wood, infinite water spring, animal spawning areas, wheat, sugarcane, storage for literally everything in the game, and cactus. All built over the last few weekends, starting with the outer wall. Now I've got a donation box set up for a potential roller coaster. I think it's safe to say I'm terribly addicted.
At least I don't play it when I'm supposed to be getting work done. Not yet anyway.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)