Author Archive
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Spectrum Games Bible
18th Aug 20090
I was really excited to receive another couple of books in The Spectrum Games Bible series today. It’s a series of 6 books that present screen shots and mini community written reviews of 1,200 Sinclair Spectrum games released between 1982 and now. Editted and compiled by Paul Johns and Michael Fraser these are fascinating reads.
I love just picking a book and opening it on a random page to see what retro gaming delight (or howler!) will greet me. The games are presented by year and alphabetical order, with a neat index at the back of each should you wish to locate something specific.
Game reviews are often quite short, but for some span a page or two. Nearly all of them have screen shots which really help to jog the old grey matter. As the reviews are written by community members they vary in quality. Some are a little too introspective, focusing on the life story behind that particular game for the reviewer, rather than the game itself. But overall they are still a great read. I’d strongly recommend them to anyone who has an interest in retro gaming, or Flash game development today – as they are a gold mine of ideas and concepts.
The books vary in price as they are printed and delivered by lulu.com, so the higher the page count, the more it costs. The print quality is excellent and the colour covers a nice touch. Layout is clean and clear and I had no printing issues with any of them. If you are extremely flush with cash then you can buy full-colour editions, which have all screen shots in full colour internally. The cost of these editions ranges from between £40 and £70, with postage on-top! However the ones I (and I dare-say most people) own are the colour cover with black and white internal pages. They are a far more reasonable £9 to £10.
Visit the web site for more details: http://www.spectrumgamesbible.co.uk
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FlodPro v1.0 Release Now Available with new ProTracker replay interface
16th Aug 2009I’m pleased to announce that Christian Corti has now released v1.0 of the FlodPro Soundtracker replay package. FlodPro extends upon the work done with Flod and adds a bunch of new features, better support for the harder to replay mods, and a brand new ProTracker style replay interface. You get the full source to this awesome player including the flectrum, so you can now learn how to sync with beat events, use stereo separation, change the volume, loop through the samples and more.
Grab the v1.0 download of FlodPro from the Flod page.
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Proof of Concept – Evoflash 64k intro
9th Aug 2009
EvoFlash have released the first ever 64k intro for Flash Player 10 – “Proof of Concept”. It features some new to Flash effects such as a nice looking multi-ridged fractals voxel landscape and bezier curve tweened particles, with a lovely depth of field effect. This is supported by a thumping 36-voice soundtrack. Again remember it’s a 64KB SWF with no external media.
The intro is nicely put together, harking back to the yesteryear of demo style. It’s a bit “showing off” and self congratulatory, as if they are challenging other Flash demo crews to do better (which might be hard, because there virtually are none!). You are bombarded with the technical facts during the demo, rather than left to enjoy the aesthetics of it. But still, it’s great to see and a bit of a benchmark.
Watch it here: http://mediaerror.com/temp/proof_of_concept_by_evoflash/
Anthology of Flash Demo History Video
The coder behind this demo (Jalava) also gave a presentation at the recent Assembly Summer 2009 Convention entitled the “Anthology of Flash Demo History”. This is fascinating viewing and you can watch it online here. That link is to the h264 QuickTime MP4 file, which is just under 630MB. Don’t let that put you off as it’s well worth the download or stream if your connection can handle it 🙂
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My New Game “Bug Box”
7th Aug 2009A week ago while chatting on a forum RobotJam inspired me by something he said: About how everyone should try and create a “one day game” at least once in their developer lives. As in a proper game, that you then go and and try to sell. And he gave some successful examples of his own.
I thought this was a nice idea. So now, a week later, mine is finished 😉
It’s a simple puzzle game: Just get the butterfly out of the box. There are only 3 levels, easy, medium and hard. It is based on an old Japanese game played with wooden blocks called Hakoiri Shogi.
The core game was done in 3 hours, as you’ll see when you play it (it’s hardly cutting edge technology). Having done that I then set about on the graphics, which took me a lot longer. I bought some of the images from iStockPhoto and then built the scene-up the way I wanted it. The music is from SoundRangers.com mixed with some nature effects by myself. Also big thanks to Eric at Cavalcade Games for doing the great “Level Win” animation sequence for me.
Originally I only wanted the one puzzle (“Easy”). That’s all I had in place and I was pleased I had managed to create a nice little logic game so fast. But then I let my wife play it and she completed it instantly, so I figured it needed more! I added in two new puzzles, the leafy reveal sequence, the in-game buttons, etc. I just guess I couldn’t leave it alone, so I polished it until I felt it shined enough.
Having said that it’s still my absolute fastest game build ever: from concept to FGL in 5 days, working evenings only. Yes I am going to put it up for sponsorship, but I’m realistic and really don’t expect much. My hope is that I could make a few little sales that add-up. As long as I cover my $60 media costs I’m happy.
For now you can play the game only on FGL. My FGL “Friends” can see it right away, as can other devs of a certain level. At the time of writing it’s still pending approval for sponsor viewing. Obviously once it has been sold everyone can play it 🙂
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So who’s watching Assembly 2009 with me?
6th Aug 2009
The Assembly Summer 2009 Convention is now under way, and you can watch it live at Assembly TV.
The good stuff doesn’t really kick off for a few hours. But they show lots of cool demos, random interviews and lots of mobile phone adverts until then 😉 Plenty more info on the official site.
I’ve got it up and running on a spare monitor watching via the 1MB VLC stream.
There is some great stuff coming up on the schedule (the GameDev Compo tonight for example). But if you miss it, you miss it, until they re-publish the recordings later in the month. Join me on Twitter (when it isn’t being DDOSd!) to chat about it – @photonstorm 🙂
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