I don't plug other indie games nearly enough. There are a lot of gems out there that deserve to be played.
My first quick plug of the evening is Worminator 3.
This platformer is definately a great throwback to Duke Nukem, Commander Keen, and Worms. It's one of the many indie games that consume a bit of valuable work time here at K.G.H.Q.
Check it out: http://worminator.classicgaming.gamespy.com/
My second plug is, of course, for David Karlgren's Cyberpunk-RPG Project.
His first game Action Cyborg was really fun (still is!) and his latest project is looking just as promising.
Have a look: http://www.terrorpunksyndicate.org/cyberpunk-rpg/
I also wanted to plug a great series of videos on YouTube by GyroVorbis. It's called Adventures in Game Development. They show how human and easy going the indie game development process really is.
Subscribe!: http://www.youtube.com/GyroVorbis
If you would like to have your game plugged in the next plug-a-thon, send me an email to: kevlargames (AT) hotmail (DOT) com
I'll write up a one or two sentence description of your game or game related web-stuff and post a link. If it really impresses me (like John Karlgren's ongoing project), I'll post the link in the "Links" section.
Well, I'm off to bed!
Cheers!
Monday, September 29, 2008
Saturday, September 6, 2008
Updates, etc...
Hey folks! Been a while since the last real update and I think those of you who actually read this blog deserve a new post :)
Cybertronic Armageddon...
Since my last post, a lot the rendering had to be re-written for the sole purpose of speed. We had it running on multiple machines and achieved 32 fps on my main rig. Pretty good, eh? Well, it dropped to a sluggish 5-6 fps on one of our designer's rig. (At his request, his name will not be mentioned)
So I cleaned up a lot of the code and cut out a lot of unnecessary gunk. Then it ran at around 26 fps on his machine and remained at around 32 on mine.
Currently, I'm writing a pretty hefty bit of code that takes all of our resources and packs them into a WAD/Pak-like format. (If you're not familiar, the WAD format was used in Doom-Quake 1 and the Pak format has been used in many many games in the past decade)
As for any sort of release, we're gonna go with "When it's done!" for right now.
SWORDS...
Ah yes, SWORDS. My own project.
Since my last post, I've gotten tons and tons of work done on SWORDS.
For starters, it's actually playable! It's no longer a glorified scrolling-engine! Whoo! For now, the enemies are just poorly drawn tanks and little unanimated stick man who explode into many little chunkies :) Good use for my particle system, yeah?
I'd love to talk to you about new technical things in SWORDS, but it's mostly just been pretty simple functions going in here in there. And yes, I'll admit, I've been playing the game more than working on it. But's only because I'm having so much fun with this game now that it's actually playable! And really, when you play your game more than work on it, that's a very good sign that other people will enjoy too.
Another cool thing I've been working on for SWORDS is the music element. My vision is to have some pretty heavy riffage going on at a lower volume during the normal gameplay and when things get really hairy, up the volume a bit and really unleash the fury (in the words of Yngwie Malmsteen).
I'm also setting a "When it's done!" date for SWORDS. As you know, I'm awful at giving release dates for my projects and I'd hate to promise anything.
A quick word about the projects on the backburner before I sign off and get back to work...
As of right now, they're not being worked on much at all and as much as I'd love to be able to do work on those games too, I just dont have time between working on Cybertronic Armageddon and SWORDS. So the official word is that they will remain mostly untouched until my other projects are finished and out the door.
Thanks for reading and stay tuned!
Cybertronic Armageddon...
Since my last post, a lot the rendering had to be re-written for the sole purpose of speed. We had it running on multiple machines and achieved 32 fps on my main rig. Pretty good, eh? Well, it dropped to a sluggish 5-6 fps on one of our designer's rig. (At his request, his name will not be mentioned)
So I cleaned up a lot of the code and cut out a lot of unnecessary gunk. Then it ran at around 26 fps on his machine and remained at around 32 on mine.
Currently, I'm writing a pretty hefty bit of code that takes all of our resources and packs them into a WAD/Pak-like format. (If you're not familiar, the WAD format was used in Doom-Quake 1 and the Pak format has been used in many many games in the past decade)
As for any sort of release, we're gonna go with "When it's done!" for right now.
SWORDS...
Ah yes, SWORDS. My own project.
Since my last post, I've gotten tons and tons of work done on SWORDS.
For starters, it's actually playable! It's no longer a glorified scrolling-engine! Whoo! For now, the enemies are just poorly drawn tanks and little unanimated stick man who explode into many little chunkies :) Good use for my particle system, yeah?
I'd love to talk to you about new technical things in SWORDS, but it's mostly just been pretty simple functions going in here in there. And yes, I'll admit, I've been playing the game more than working on it. But's only because I'm having so much fun with this game now that it's actually playable! And really, when you play your game more than work on it, that's a very good sign that other people will enjoy too.
Another cool thing I've been working on for SWORDS is the music element. My vision is to have some pretty heavy riffage going on at a lower volume during the normal gameplay and when things get really hairy, up the volume a bit and really unleash the fury (in the words of Yngwie Malmsteen).
I'm also setting a "When it's done!" date for SWORDS. As you know, I'm awful at giving release dates for my projects and I'd hate to promise anything.
A quick word about the projects on the backburner before I sign off and get back to work...
As of right now, they're not being worked on much at all and as much as I'd love to be able to do work on those games too, I just dont have time between working on Cybertronic Armageddon and SWORDS. So the official word is that they will remain mostly untouched until my other projects are finished and out the door.
Thanks for reading and stay tuned!
Thursday, August 21, 2008
The Day That Never Comes
I was completely taken by storm! Metallica has successfully done something for me no other song since Enter Sandman has done - Make my hair stand up on end!
Lars Ulrich (drummer) said in a past interview that the album was "the missing link between ...And Justice for All and Metallica (Black Album)"
Based on what I've heard from audio clips and the new single, the album is going to be better!
Check it out!: mms://wm.elektra.com/metallica/metallica_com/2008/de/Track04.asf
Lars Ulrich (drummer) said in a past interview that the album was "the missing link between ...And Justice for All and Metallica (Black Album)"
Based on what I've heard from audio clips and the new single, the album is going to be better!
Check it out!: mms://wm.elektra.com/metallica/metallica_com/2008/de/Track04.asf
1h and 14m Left!
"'Til what?," you may ask...
Metallica's first single from their latest album: Death Magnetic
I'm so pumped for this that I felt like I had to post about it before it even happened. I will, of course, be posting about it afterwards too! :)
\m/
Metallica's first single from their latest album: Death Magnetic
I'm so pumped for this that I felt like I had to post about it before it even happened. I will, of course, be posting about it afterwards too! :)
\m/
Thursday, July 3, 2008
Cybertronic Armageddon and More
Now that the RPG project is in full swing, everybody has agreed on a name for this creation of ours:
Cybertronic Armageddon
We all agreed that it would be best if the title revealed the overall theme of the game. We also agreed that the game will be released as freeware as opposed to the original plan to have a shareware-esque system.
Unfortunately, a bit of the engine was lost in the crash. So I guess I'll be spending the next week or so rewriting it.
Well, that's the update for today, folks.
Happy 4th!
Cybertronic Armageddon
We all agreed that it would be best if the title revealed the overall theme of the game. We also agreed that the game will be released as freeware as opposed to the original plan to have a shareware-esque system.
Unfortunately, a bit of the engine was lost in the crash. So I guess I'll be spending the next week or so rewriting it.
Well, that's the update for today, folks.
Happy 4th!
Monday, June 30, 2008
Until the Next Post...
... This should tide you over.
I'm still getting everything setup on the newly restored computer. When I get back to work, I'll update you.
I'm still getting everything setup on the newly restored computer. When I get back to work, I'll update you.
Wednesday, June 18, 2008
Not Dead...
Don't pack up your bags and move on to the next blog just yet! I'm actually not dead. I've just been having a few computer problems.
It started with the infamous UNMOUNTABLE_BOOT_VOLUME message accompanied by everbodys' favorite Blue Screen of Death. After swapping out hard drives countless times, I got every file backed up. How well they all survived remains to be seen.
After jacking around with all of that, I attempted a system restore:
"System restore has failed because a mass storage device was not detected."
It turns out that I had the wrong restore disc. I own a Gateway and apparently the restore disc was for Dell computers only. Gee, do you think it might have been helpful if the label would have said that? So anyway, I called Gateway and asked about their restore disc. They were going to charge me $20 and shipping. I had to explain that the disc wasn't packaged with the computer (like they should be.) After about an hour of telling them exactly what happened, they finally told me they would send it out for free but I would still need to pay shipping. That's fine. I'll gladly pay shipping. But I wasn't going to pay for a disc that was supposed to come for free.
So I get the disc in the mail and go through the whole bit. Now I'm here writing this. Nothing is wrong so far. We'll see how this goes.
It started with the infamous UNMOUNTABLE_BOOT_VOLUME message accompanied by everbodys' favorite Blue Screen of Death. After swapping out hard drives countless times, I got every file backed up. How well they all survived remains to be seen.
After jacking around with all of that, I attempted a system restore:
"System restore has failed because a mass storage device was not detected."
It turns out that I had the wrong restore disc. I own a Gateway and apparently the restore disc was for Dell computers only. Gee, do you think it might have been helpful if the label would have said that? So anyway, I called Gateway and asked about their restore disc. They were going to charge me $20 and shipping. I had to explain that the disc wasn't packaged with the computer (like they should be.) After about an hour of telling them exactly what happened, they finally told me they would send it out for free but I would still need to pay shipping. That's fine. I'll gladly pay shipping. But I wasn't going to pay for a disc that was supposed to come for free.
So I get the disc in the mail and go through the whole bit. Now I'm here writing this. Nothing is wrong so far. We'll see how this goes.
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