ThePhorse

Productivity at all time low...

2007-07-28T12:31:00.000-07:00

I think there's several things getting to me about progress right now.

Firstly, most of the clickbeat stuff I'm working on requires a decent MySQL server to run from. currently I'm on a "load balanced" site. This is not good - it's far too slow to support more than 1 user (and it struggles with just one user!)

Secondly, to get a dedicated server will cost a fair bit of cash per month and I'm not *quite* ready to spend it yet (just moved house etc, etc...)

Thirdly we've been told at the blitz forums that an official 3D module is nothing more than a hope...it's very unlikely. The main man (mr sibly) has decided that he wants to make game creation more accessable...sounds very much like click and play to me. In my opinion it is not the way to go - it actually detracts credability from the language. So I'm even thinking about using...XNA...omg! But that depresses me too :P

So most of my focus has been on my other project which has seen a lot more activity of late at www.chibitamakuchi.com

I am expecting to get a new server in the next couple of months and then no doubt things will move on, but for now I'm in limbo :(

Sorry to complain about it, but I just don't feel good about the game creation stuff right now...

Progress again

2007-04-16T02:05:00.000-07:00

Its always good to make progress.

This weekend I managed to get the secure password functions into clickbeat so user's passwords are protected as they're whizzing about the net. I also wrote some ground work for the user detail download. Its all very fast so we should have no problems with up to (I estimate) about 1000 users at the same time. Any more and we'll have to move to a dedicated server but unless we get HalfLife2 level attention I dont think we'll worry about it ;)

Im moving house personally soon so things might slow down in about a week, Im hoping to get a beta of all this out before then though - lets just wait and see :)

Clickbeat for all!

2007-04-12T01:23:00.000-07:00

Wow, clickbeat has taken off very well over the last few months, and we've made some significant improvements on it over that time also. There always seems like there is more to do, but its definitly going to be worth it in the end.

One thing that has always worried me about the game is the lastability - since once you've played a script a few times, the need to play it probably isnt there much afterwards. We've always wanted to give more incentive to play the scripts more and more, and our idea was always online high scores so people can play against each other (sort of)!

However this introduces a whole bundle of issues - if you're going to have online high scores, you need online accounts, and security and all the rest. Luckily this is what Ive been working on the last few days and its going pretty well - hopefully all nice and secure too! It should give people the opportunity to show off and discuss the game more, and hopefully lead to more scripts being made and played.

We're also looking at advertising and distribution possibilities. We really dont want to sell the game and have no plans to do so (unless bandwidth goes nuts), therefore we're looking at getting a decent advertising deal. These are not going to be displayed while script are running (obviously) but will probably feature in the highscore tables, both in game and on the site.

We're probably going to get some beta testers in while we get this sorted, and Im sure in game ads will not be the easiest thing to implement!

ThePhorse

2007-01-14T23:36:00.000-08:00

We officialy released Clickbeat the other day to the whole wide world.

Wow - not a bad response at all. We've had over 5000 downloads in a week. Thats not bad for an unkown game like ours!

I think we have the press release we created to thank for that! Although we were spurred on by a review at a big indie game review site which gave us the original burst of downloads!

Now we're thinking of ways to improve the game so we get people comming back all the time! Ive finished all my gaming for a while so I should have some time now, if I can get motivated :S But Im really glad that one of our games is popular at least, at the worst its "brand awareness" which I believe is quite important in the IndieGame world since you get a lot of repeat customers.

Wow, its been a long time!

2006-12-14T07:16:00.000-08:00

I must be the laziest Indie game dev in the world!

So what have I been working on lately?

No much! Ive been working hard at winning FF8 though!

Seriously, Ive been very lax lately, its mostly to do with my lack of time - and Ive also been working on a project for someone else - which I need to get finished asap! (Im a bit too late with that!)

I have managed to put a small demo of a game im planning to do next year together though. I really want to do something on a larger scale than last time - I mean, clickbeat and pushy are great and everything, but they're not very "involving" and thats the sort of game I want to be creating.

Its a remake of a game i *almost* finished last year but stumbled at the last couple of hurdles. This time however its going to work, I plan to get some artists to do some proper art for it and Im going to sell it at an amazingly cheap price for what it is - mainly becuase i want people to play it!

The worst part of not selling games isnt the money - its really not been a great expense for me - its the fact that not so many people are playing the games...

Which reminds me! Ive got to get pushy sorted out! I only found out recently that the download no longer works! Dont worry everyone, it'll be sorted sometime soon!

Pushy will also be back before the end of the year at a cheaper price and with slightly updated gfx/music!

Progress!

2006-09-12T04:55:00.000-07:00

Ok, so im pretty satisfied with my clickbeat script.

Its not graphically amazing, but it shows what clickbeat is capable of at least. Ive just got to finish off the actual interactive part of the game and then i can start thinking about basic marketing for it.

Since this is all stuff i can do in my lunchtime now though Ive been considering what to do next game wise.

I toyed about with a "match-3" idea which a friend of mine pointed out had been done before. This was a set back for a couple of days, but it didnt take me long to get back to my positive outlook.

Ive decided to totally outsource the artwork for my next project, since I am all too aware of the lack of my artistic abilities. People are even being quite brutally honest about it -which i have to admit is difficult to swallow sometimes! - however Ive tried to take it in my stride!

ThePhorse as a team is possibly going to be working on a space strategy game over the next few months. Its actually a project we've planned for many years and we now think we're at a stage to actually be able to do something about it...

Personally (since I dont have to concern myself with design nor artwork on that particullar project) am going to work on a space-action game instead. Ive already started buying media for it and am going to rope in steve to do gui work since he's turned out so good at it :P

I bought some space craft sprites from www.gamebeep.com - very good quality I highly reccomend them!

Selling Out?

2006-08-30T02:27:00.000-07:00

Blimey, I really am not a sell out, I swear!

However in the upcomming weeks you'll think I may be. Im going to start looking into affiliate programs and such to bring in a little more income for the site, which itself needs a redesign.

Im also going to look into more advertising solutions (nothing too obtrusive, i dont like flashy stuff!).

Basically it would be nice to get the site to pay for itself. I'm not aiming to make hundreds of dollars a month profit, just a few dollars to pay for the bandwidth (its almost time to pay again!)

Anyways, just dont hate me...'kay?

Beatclick is almost ready for general release

2006-08-21T06:01:00.000-07:00

Its awesome, its unique, its everything we wanted it to be!

The help has been updated, we have new artwork in there that wont get us sued, most of the bugs have been ironed out...

All we need now is more scripts! We're very excited about it all, we've got far and achieved much, but now we must press forward to produce the actual Meat which visitors will feed upon...uh, or somthing like that.

I have a couple of scripts in the pipeline, one is a skill based one and another is a story based one (that features my drawings *gulp*) and i know for a fact steve has a couple in the works, so we're still very busy with it. Hopefully we'll release the new version of clickbeat tonight though so everyone else is happy as we are with it :D

ThePhorse

2006-08-08T05:34:00.000-07:00

Argh, whats happenning to the site? Its so slow!

are we being attacked? Or are our servers just being rubbish today?

Ah well, im sure it wont last forever...

I think we're getting closer to a solid engine for clickbeat, its really starting to feel sturdy. So we've been discussing what to do next (in between updates and script writing for clickbeat of course) since steve and I are really keen to get our own game studio up and running one day.

Our biggest problem is 2D and 3D art. We dont know anyone who has the time to help! Steve is pretty damned good at the 2d interface type gfx, but when it comes to characters...well Ive not seen them and perhaps thats for the best, they can't be worse than mine though!

The point is we need to try and find something which we can achieve between the two of us. Im half keen on a Final Fantasy style game, that would be the best:D mainly since ive had a lot of script engine practice now and feel im up to it! The problem with that is the ammount of media required...

I was thinking of trying to convince steve to help me remake Pioneer in 2D since i have most of the dialog and plans for that still, just missing some of the old code which im going to totally re-write one day anyway.

So who knows, hopefully clickbeat will become famous at some point and we will have a community to support on clickbeat...if there's any justice in the world that is!

On ice...

2006-08-02T07:51:00.000-07:00

Ice Blast is on...Ice (thanks simon!)

To be quite honest I had a long hard think about what i was doing. I wasnt enjoying Ice Blast, neither the coding or playing of.

My plan now is to get beatclick up to a good standard then start a new project. Most likely the new version of Pioneer in blitzMax. I dont think this will take me too long, a few months maybe? But Im not totally decided.

Hopefully a new version of beatclick tonight. There are a few fixes/features that are needed yet so Im going to get that done first.

Static Energy

2006-07-14T00:58:00.000-07:00

The problem with not doing anything on a project for a couple of weeks means that it gets even harder after those two weeks!

Ice Blast has been pretty stagnent since i sent a beta out to a few friends. personally I blame this lack of progress on my Steve who convinced me that beatClick is the project i should be worrying about the most!

Actually Ive made some amazing progress considering i lost the original code a few months ago! Steve has also set up a website for beatclick and we're aiming for a release in a weeks time.

Wait a sec...A release??? omg

Another Set Back!

2006-06-15T03:01:00.000-07:00

NoooooO! Can you believe it? Yet another HDD crash! Thats 2 this year! and its unrecoverable again! So another HDD Wasted, Im not happy. Ive come to the conclusion that its a motherboard issue and have bought a new one so Im only going to be out of comission for a couple of days. I should have all of next week to work on stuff while im off work :D

The only good news was that it lasted long enough for me to backup ice blast and my other current blitz projects (dragon game is kept at work anyway).

I keep loosing emails godamnit!, so Im going to only use the web based interface from now on, that way its BT's problem.

*sigh* I was going to do the level scripting last night too! Its no good :(

Some decisions

2006-06-14T01:22:00.000-07:00

Well, the game wasnt...interesting (I think thats the right word). It's certainly fun enough, but when you play the same layout for each round it gets a bit *samey*.

Since Im planning to do the level layout scripting as my next task Im going to put in different level layouts for each stage. This should hopefully make levels longer and more varied/interesting.

Rolo/Pasty/Markus did some new gfx for the stage wording which appears before each stage starts which looks very cool indeed. I spent most of my time last night trying to sort out the level 2 music, the first 2 stages are fine but Im just not happy with stage 3, Ive even got the victory music sorted though!

So the list of jobs before the alpha release is now:
- GUI overhaul
- Scripting of level stages
- Level 2 music to be finished

In house testing!

2006-06-07T08:31:00.000-07:00

I had Jo play the game last night for about 15 mins. She seems to like it but lacks that "Wow" factor I reckon. She seemed to be in pain, but hopefully that was something to do with her tummy rather than my game!!

Its obviously missing the cool stuff which would actually make this more fun. I'm making a list of things to change to get to a better stage before releasing the alpha. I really want the testing team to go "woah, this is great" :)

I did put my whiteboard up though! This was an achievement in itself! Woot! Now I can feel bad about my progress all the time instead of just when i looked at my temporary to-do lists! Don't know if I'll get anything done tonight...

Time moves on...so quickly

2006-06-05T08:13:00.000-07:00

Arghh, how could this all take so long??! I was planning my alpha release last week and now I dont even know if i'll get it out for tonight!

Im sure pushy never took this long ^__^

Actually thats not true, it took plenty of time :) Anyway Ive done a few portraits (woo hooo!) at last and have put them in and they're not the my best work, but they're not my worst either. Tonight I plan to get level progression in (at last!) and then do a serious ammount of play testing. Im really concerned about the Fun-ability of the game. Personally I lvoe it, but I loved magnablock ;)

Im also going to put level 3 in tonight (if i ever get to that stage!) after the play testing incorporating anything i find while testing.

Its all good fun!

2006-06-01T02:30:00.000-07:00

Other projects have suddenly taken over a little. My previous incarnation as a composer may be resurrected on the side for a music orientated project.

However that doesnt mean progress has stopped on ice blast! The only thing i remember doing recently is putting boxes in which the puck bounces off. However, im almost certain ive done more which ive just not mentioned!

Ive been thinking of increasing the number of levels...not sure if its a good idea yet, but it shouldnt be too difficult to do. The main reason is that I want some bosses in there, ive been thinking on how they'd work and it sounds like fun :D

Ive also decided on having "slow" areas or glue on the ice which slows the puck down. Im also thinking of more obsticals to make some interesting levels. Its all turning out fairly arcadey which is pretty different for me ^_^

Not all done but close

2006-05-25T01:02:00.000-07:00

Pausing is in now which is pretty coolies i guess. When paused you can either continue, return to the level select screen or even exit the game completely.

F12 is now the exit at any point key.

So the only critical things left to allow me to make a demo version are:

- a return to main menu button from the level select screen
- level progression to be enabled via...
- end level screen finished including score and other stats

I'd also like to do a couple of tunes for it. Otherwise its comming along fine. I want to get a version out tomorrow but im gonna have to really push it to achieve that.

GOMU GOMU NO SECOND GEAR!

2006-05-24T03:03:00.001-07:00

Ok, I feel like Im haaving a second wind on Ice Blast now.

-Spawn points are in and working,
-Swots are in and have dying animations,
-Another music bug has been found and fixed!
-Some tutorial stuff in there, although missing the portraits which would

So I do actually have a working alpha now with most of the actual features i want in there minus some of the planned eye candy.

Tonight Im going to put in a pause/quit option into the main part of the game and also a quit to menu option from the level selection screen. Also the level progression must be sorted out and perhaps a basic pillar which gets destroyed...

Then i can give it to people to play with :D Im getting quite excited about it now :)

GOMU GOMU NO SECOND GEAR!

2006-05-24T03:03:00.000-07:00

Progress Makes Perfect

2006-05-22T01:59:00.000-07:00

Made some great progress on Ice Blast. Finished the Tutorial/Storyline Engine, except for the character portraits (thats gonna take a while...) The level select screen needs a few more things too. I need to finish some pictures of some pillars (which is what you're trying to destroy). I also need some real level music.

Its all looking good so far though. Hopefully I can send some new demos around at the end of this week.

As far as the dragon game is going I put a new build together the other day. We'll have the first level done by the end of the week i reckon. Im going to make a level editor in Excel today.

Powers!

2006-05-16T01:09:00.000-07:00

My drawing powers needed charging again! The dragon game takes up my lunchtimes and Ice blast takes up my evenings (that and fixing my dads pc lately anyway).

Been trying to draw the portraits for Isobel (the main character in Ice blast) which is mainly to give some storyline to the game, for those people who like it such as myself :D Ive got a huge list of artwork to do but luckily it hasnt bloated the size of the game all in all comming in at around 2mb so far (not including music). My aim is 6mb or smaller, but these days its not so important imo.

Been thinking of doing a web version of magnablock...not straight away, got enough on my plate as it is, but people are still downloading it (as much as pushy!) just not buying it. So at least more people would get enjoyment out of it.

Anyway things are going fairly smoothly :)

Team Effort

2006-05-11T05:39:00.000-07:00

Ok, looks like 100% of thePhorse team is in on the shooter game!

If Ive not mentioned it before its an entry to the shmup-dev.com dragon shooter compo. We're doing a side scrolling shootem up, just so we get a bit of coverage basically. I'm not aiming to win, just to complete a group project with the guys so we dont get too rusty ^_^

So far its looking pretty good. Mark has done some trees and clouds and Jon is working on the main character sprites. The engine works pretty well, ive managed to make things look a little better, but Bmax is still playing up on the vsync issue.

Ice blast had a bit of work done to it the other day. It now goes from the level select to the actual game (woot) so now im working on the intro level (1) where it tells you how to play (not too much help, but enough to get you started).

Trials and Tribulations!

2006-05-05T03:00:00.000-07:00

Blimey what a couple of days its been.

The car has gone in for some work and thats gonna cost me a bundle as it is. But you're here to know whats happening with the games....

Ice Blast has had a bit of a leap in that the sound engine now works for sure which involved me using the cut down version of bass instead of the fully blown version. Not that it makes much difference apart from it lets me set the position correctly! (woot!) So Im really happy now and can get on with the rest of the drawing.

The dragon shooter is causing me a headache right now...literally. There seems to be a blitting or v-syncing problem which causes a huge ammount of flickering on some of my faster moving graphics. Im sure this never happened before...Im hoping the creator sorts this out before the end of the compo!

so hopefully I'll be able to move forward on ice blast while im waiting for this prob to be sorted.

Change of tact

2006-05-03T01:35:00.000-07:00

Change of tact, in this case means, Im going to work on another project until i get my mojo back for Ice Blast. its not that Ive done nothing with it, I just dont feel focused on it.

Therfore me and the team are going to work on the dragon shoot em up compo. Im hoping it will only take us a few weeks. Im writing up the plan now. Then once this is done I can get back to Ice blast.

Im gonna chase my publisher for an update on the press release for pushy today too...he promised tuesday :( - closure on Pushy would really help too :P

Getting on with it.

2006-04-25T07:30:00.000-07:00

Yay things are getting up to speed again.

I coded the level data structure today, ie, how the levels are stored per user. This also helps on the world map (yay) for where the dot is that represents the level and also if its a bonus level or a regular level and so on.

I also did some more gfx orientated stuff. I played with graphics gale for the first time ever and now have an animated fish jumping out of one of the lakes and back in again. Also I did a "Start" button for whatever level you're on and there's smoke comming from one of the chimneys in the village.

Im aiming to get the level choosing screen to such a point that its almost finished (just in case anything else needs adding later) before I work on anything else. Should be by the weekend I hope. Then im planning on getting level 1 done and finished. Level 2 should be easier to implement. Then I have a game to show people! woot!

Its a little weird

2006-04-21T02:39:00.000-07:00

The graphics to pushy aint that bad are they? I mean...really?

Most people who actually Say something about them only have good things to say. The only bad comment Ive had was "its ugly", but thats not exactly helpfull. I need to know *why*. Is it the outlining? Are the colours too bold? Is the style itself too kiddish? that sort of thing. "Its Ugly" doesnt help.

Thats from someone who should know better too :P Or maybe not.

*Anyway* the point is, I noticed all the other games from my publisher have appeared on bigfish games except mine. Its a shame puzzle games have to rely on portals, since potential customers wont go further if they find a site like realarcade or bigfish or arcade town.

It really makes me feel quite low about it all.

However people have bought Pushy. Its not rubbish, its a damned good game. Its just not getting the coverage it needs.

pfffft

2006-04-20T06:09:00.000-07:00

Ive been working on the world map again now, filling in the gaps and making it look a little nicer and more complete. It looks a little busy around the edges right now which is something I ought to sort out, but i'll get there.

I think Im close to getting on with the actual meat of the game again soon, ive pretty much decided on objects so now Im going to be thinking about bonuses and powerups. I aready have a few ideas in my head but they need jotting down.

Im still really happy with the music theme I created for the intro/menu of the game. It's really moving and cute (I ditched the cheese!) and i think it really fits a snow-themed game. It still needs a few touches before its ready but Its really urging me to do the intro before I actually do anything else...must...resist...

Im still learning some great stuff in theGimp...for a free program it covers anything I would ever want in a gfx package! When i make some serious money from games i'll have to donate or somthing!

Im also restraining myself from saying something I might, in future, regret right now...just need to hold back a couple of days...

It all makes sense now...

2006-04-19T05:41:00.000-07:00

Ok, thats why I had a surge of net players of Pushy, because of the release of Protogem by Eikon. Looks good from the screenies, not had a chance to play it myself though yet...

However, if he gets a press release before me...well, it just wouldnt be the best situation for everyone to be in, thats all...

Web downloads and reasons

2006-04-19T02:10:00.000-07:00

Blimey! Loads of web plays of pushy yesterday! Kept me just above easter bonus! Thanks to whoever is playing!!

Anything you think would make it better let me know!

Ive also come up with some more reasons to buy my new game when its done...
- background features such as little fish swimming under the ice :D
- several Mini games throughout the adventure
- online highscores for adventure mode
- multiple user accounts (is this a good thing? not really sure...)

so im getting there. I'd really like 20 good reasons for people to buy the game, then I'll be feeling very motivated and organised about the whole experience.

Im also thinking of using the characters out of this project in a 2D rpg game, always wanted to make one of those...

Thanks again to the web players! Its mucho appreciated!

Reasons to be cheerfull

2006-04-17T03:18:00.000-07:00

Ok, not quite cheerfull, lately ive been consumed by the fact that people need very good reasons to buy games.

For instance, I bought Starscape this weekend and have been playing it a fair bit to see what makes it a successfull game. Its great fun, blasting loads of enemy space craft but its different to how i imagined. Its certainly easier than Pioneer was ever planned to be.

Anyway the point is i think I need something like 10 really good reasons for people to buy my latest game, so before I finalise my design Im going to list the existing ones and create new ones if necessary to make it up to 10.

Existing Reasons:
1 - New Gameplay Type
2 - Emotion tied in with main character through use of moving music and storyline
3 - Cutesy graphics
4 - 5 hours worth of gameplay
5 - Good click-per-reward ratio
6 - Dynamic in game music
7 - Survival Mode for instant no complications play

ok, thats even less than I'd hoped to come up with. I guess it highlights a few problems with my game design. Not enough reasons to buy! Ok lets think of some reasons I can add in there,

8 - Online highscore table for both modes so you can play against the rest of the world!
9 - Mini game between levels to raise score

Well there's 9 reasons anyway. I'll try and think of a 10th today...

More Artz 2

2006-04-13T00:57:00.000-07:00

Well, here's a rarity, I actually have a screenshot to show. To see it look Here

Just showing where I am with the level select screen (since it really doesnt give anything away about the gameplay Ive devised!)

Quite pleased with the look so far. It feels a lot neater than pushy and more mainstream cartoony.

Still learning! Lemme know what you think :D

More Artz

2006-04-12T01:12:00.000-07:00

Not really had that much time on the pc of late (apart from day job) so nothing very new.

However I did do some coolies sketches of the characters in the game which i might show off soon (going to use them as outlines for my gfx anyway).

Artz

2006-04-10T01:38:00.001-07:00

Artwork is by far my least favourite part of game development. The only thing worse is paying for it (I just dont have that sort of money to spend!!)

Im no master at it all yet but im getting there, my latest gfx are certainly a step better than pushy (not that much better but its an improvement!). It took me 7 years before I believed in my abilities as a programmer and 10 years for me to believe I was any good at music. Im going to stick this thing out!

After this project Im going to take a break from making something to sell and work on my non-profitable projects. My plan this year was to finish 2 sellable games which I will have achieved. The rest of the year is going to be spent practicing drawing but taking on the artwork of a friends project and to work on Pioneer.

If these projects finish nice and early I might try to write something again in time for Christmas.

As far as the project is going though, Ive been working on the level selection screen (the "world" map) which is looking fairly spiffy so far...Need to think how im going to do borders...

Artz

2006-04-10T01:38:00.000-07:00

Sound Player

2006-04-08T13:03:00.000-07:00

I spent all my time on the sound player today. Its a little bit complex because of the way Ive designed the Music to work in the game.

Some of you might know my history in the Mod music scene, so because of this I do all my music using MOD files (with the help of steve on the team of course, he does this for a living after all ;) )

So now, after much pain with the bass library (which is great dont get me wrong! BlitzMax should have it nativley thats all!) Ive managed to write the system so you can give it a level and a stage and it will goto the correct Order within the song and start from it no matter what you were playing before.

It works pretty well, but it wont shine until the rest of the game gets going...

Ice Blast - design

2006-04-06T01:19:00.000-07:00

Well, having completed my prototype to a particular point i thought - right, time to design the game now!

Pushy also had a prototype and i built the rest of the game ontop of it. It worked well then and its working well now. I knew how I wanted the actual playable part of the game from the start and what the boring side of the objectives would be, but thats not what makes a game fun.

Not to give too much away but you have to acheive a certain energy level before moving onto the next stage in a level. Thats pretty dull right? So I thought, "why? why do you actually need an energy level?" then the easy answer came to me...to blow something up!!

In my opinion thats the difference between a game and a puzzle. A game has an objective while a puzzle has a solution. Im not saying for a second that this determins success but I'm sure it leads to a greater Conversion rate.

Anyway, thats where I am at the moment. Protoype finished, design in progress...

Design the Future!

2006-04-05T05:33:00.000-07:00

Ive been thinking a lot about what I want to acheive this year compared to what I was able to achieve last year.

Although my "online" efforts were diminished last year I was still able to run a music competition for many months as well as program 70% of a game called Pioneer (which I unfortunately lost most of recently in a HDD crash). In Real Life I was able to get a new job as a programmer (rather than just an admin position) which Im extremely proud of, and im really doing well.

So now Im settled, what can I achieve this year?

Well, so far Ive managed to release a puzzle game (pushy) and I plan to release another in a couple of months. But shouldnt I be thinking Bigger and Better?

Planning is supposedly a wonderful thing, and its worked very well for me in short term projects but never for long term projects. However, this isnt because planning for long term is rubbish, its because my skills for planning long term are lacking. Therefore I keep altering my approach for long term projects. So far Ive started 3 long term projects and completed none. However the % completed for each has been slowly increasing!

My game called "Epic:whipsers of old" was my original blitz3D project which featured a Final fantasy style battle system. the fiorst 2 minutes are still playable, however i dont think i got further than 10% overall. No planning whatsoever!

My next big game called "Gunjack", which is something I want to revisit eventually, was a colaberation with my friend. We got to about 40% overall and there is a playable level! Very minimal planning!

Pioneer was planned a little better but not totaly. I spent about two weeks planning the project after I'd written the prototype. Result? 70% overall!

So now im planning to re-do Pioneer in BlitzMax using 2D and a whole load of new features. This time Im going to plan for a month before even writing any code!

Sound Design

2006-04-03T01:45:00.000-07:00

Ok,my sounds officially suxx0r...

So after a talk with my brother Ive settled on a new more "melodic" style of sound design for the game, so it basically plays a litttle tune (which I will try and alter each shot)

Im looking forward to doing this tonight :D I must think of some boring task i can do first though...(i always find doing a boring task before an interesting one is a good idea rather than saving the boring ones for later...)

Advert construction

2006-04-02T09:37:00.000-07:00

Ive not been happy with the advert I put onto Bytten so I spent all morning thinking up a new one.

Ive gone for something a lot simpler and more "in yer face" with a picture of Pushy from my latest Game and the slogan "Get pushy!" which i think is pretty clever :D well, i would...

Any comments are welcome on it, Im always trying the tweak-to-improve methodology...

The Missing Link

2006-04-02T04:28:00.000-07:00

Blimey, Having another look at my stats I realised that most sites havnt updated themselves from my pad file and are still using the old download link for pushy!

A quick forwarding thing in the website setup though and they're pointed in the right direction. Thank god for that, looks like ive lost a lot of downloads because of it though!

Anyway, apart from that Ive done some more work on IceBlast - there is a basic vesion of the survival mode working. Once ive got this all covered I can start working on the adventure mode.

The latest job to do is to put sounds in to give the game a more alive feel...

Always look at your web stats to see if there are many 404's being reported!

Main Menu done

2006-04-01T08:47:00.000-08:00

Im taking a slightly different approach in the order i write the game sections this time.

After completing a basic build of the gameplay engine Ive done the main menu.

Mainly because its an easy job and its always nice to have a part of the game finished (or very close to). Its pretty cool with snow falling in the background and some mountains...

So far Ive settled on the name "Ice Blast" since its the sort of name which people seem to be drawn to these days ^_^ Ive not scanned in any pictures this time, instead im trying to do everything on the computer. This leaves some nice clean space on my desk and makes me feel a bit cleaner...also the lining looks pretty good so far :D

My next job is to decide how the levels will pan out for the adventure mode of the game. Im not sure if I should go with a pushy similar aproach or go with something less "mappy"...or maybe more mappy. Ive really not decided yet :P

The Quest for Excellence

2006-03-30T23:58:00.000-08:00

Wow, with a title like that I feel like Im back in my old Civil service days!

The question Ive been thinking lately is how important "quality" is within a game these days.

Now, of course quality can mean so many different things, qualuty of graphics, quality of sound, quality of gameplay, etc...but when you're in a position like me, ie. no artist and no money, how can i acheive quality of graphics, for example? Is it essential that I do?

The answer is fairly simple I believe. Ive seen many very well done games which have a very minimal feel to the graphics but maximise on gameplay and sound. "Obvious!" I hear you say, but if it was so obvious how come we get so many badly done clones which seem to pull in the sales? Its becuase they've cloned the quality of the Gameplay above all else which is what attracts people to buy...

The point I amd trying to make is that quality is a balance of all elements in a game. If you're unsure, think about how someone might review your game. When beta testing "Pushy and the Magic Blocks" I asked everyone to give me an opinion on each aspect (although i was mostly worried about the graphics). One of the first reactions was about the sound! Ie, the blocks used to move with no sound, anytime you clicked on something there would be no sound. So I immediately added a library of sounds to the game to give it a better feel...

So, if you have pretty average graphics and no money, work on the gameplay and sound. Try to create emotion in the game, give it character, give it a soul. This will give it quality.

Game Tweaking

2006-03-30T05:13:00.000-08:00

Soon my publisher for Pushy is going to send out a press release which will hopefully do the game a load of good in the download stakes.

So far I've received an average conversion rate for Pushy, but it could be better. Conversion rate is the most usefull figure in the world of indie games since it tells you;

- If your game needs to be improved
- How many people need to download your game in order to reach your targets

I had no real expectations for Pushy, so any sale is a blessing :D but I can see that some improvements may be required. Also a heck of a lot more downloading needs to be done by everyone out there :P

Even if your conversion rate is at 10% (wow, that would be greato!) its always worth looking for ways to improve you existing products. Ive already thought of about 5 things i can do to make pushy a better product which Im going to implement asap.

Site tweaking

2006-03-30T02:18:00.000-08:00

Tweaking your site can really work for you.

I noticed that Grey Alien games is running paralell to myself right now on this aspect. We've both started blogs and both started to share links. Of course everything is geared around selling more copies of our games, but although thats the eventual goal, the first goal is to attract a larger visitor base to your site.

Regular updates and news (or a blog) can really do this, Ive noticed my site visitor rate double in 2 days because of this blog and other external links...

This is why Im adding to my blog all the time, adding content to the site which I hope people will find interesting (and eventually usefull) as I hope the readers are aspiring games creators just like myself :)

Progress and Advertising

2006-03-29T23:48:00.000-08:00

Paid for some advertising over at bytten, the banner aint the prettyest but we'll see how it runs there, it wasn't extortionate after all :)

I started some new gfx for the next project. survival mode will only take me a few more hours to write, and since it includes all final elements of the game i think it really is the best way to start. Im writing it so i can easily turn on/off the different aspects randomly and depending on how well you're doing...

I tried drawing the main character I invented for the game, some anime girl thing, but it went very wrong! I dont think i was in the mood really ^_^ I also tried drawing a map for the adventure mode, which isnt too bad but i think i can do much better.

Ive deceided to go with a ttf font this time around, drawing every letter in the alphabet (and punctuation marks) for pushy was time and soul consuming. Im going to have a good look round my fonts collection today.

Picking up!

2006-03-29T13:29:00.000-08:00

Things are picking up downloads and purchases for pushy had a lurch today! No idea how or why...It may have something to do with the fact I set up this blog, or shared some links, or put the "play online" link on the main page at last.

Whichever way things are on the up!

This makes me a lot more motivated for the next game! progress is about to explode! The first thing Im going to work on is the new games' survival mode which can serve as the prototype. Im also going to put an adventure mode in since a lot of people enjoy an overal goal with incremental difficulty. It also gives a reason for me to practice draing some characters for it...

Woot!

Jumping In...

2006-03-29T03:57:00.000-08:00

My other blogs failed...because they weren't easy to write about.

Computer Games? Now, thats something I can blog about. Especially about the one Im writing at the moment and the one I just finished!

Its great! Its fun! No one is buying it! grrrr

To be honest Im not too worried. I have my full time job right now and Im learning loads! Programming doesn't really come naturally to me, its just something I enjoy. Art comes even less naturally to me and i dont enjoy it.

This is why my games take so long to develop, I dont want to pay the incredibly high prices of artists these days (no one ever wants to work for a % and i dont blame them with my sales track records!)

Music does come naturally though (or at least it feels like it!) and together with my good friend Steve there's no issue!

Thats the 3 parts of creating games, but what about marketing? Selling myself? pah, Im suprised I ever get jobs at all the way I talk about myself and the things Ive acheived!

Luckily I have a publisher for my recently finished game (Pushy and the Magic Blocks) and Im hoping he'll be intrested in my latest project once i have a decent prototype done to show off.

So thats where I am, 3 finished (approx) games making me (currently) no money. If i could manage to create something which sold 10, 000 copies I'd be on the way to my goal of buying a new house outright...Its a plan, and a means to achieve the plan...must keep at it...