I Won't Forget To Sleep If I Blog

Title comes from something I mentioned in the Sinfully Delicious chatroom (I'm there a lot so if you fancy a chat with me or one of its several other frequenters feel free to come), where Rebecca (needs no introduction to anyone that's been reading this blog for a while) suggested I should sleep then blog when I wake up, to which I basically replied "I'll forget to blog if I sleep. I won't forget to sleep if I blog...".

Anyways, a few things have happened since the last entry, which was a week ago thanks to my severe laxness in writing stuff.

The most relevant one to the blog is that I released a new quickie game, created in 1-2 hours (it was within the space of two hours - 10pm to midnight, but I was chatting during that period so it wasn't all game work). The game name is Acid R[ai/eig]n - a play on the fact it contains acid rain, which ends up reigning. You prolong the life of your plains by growing a curly, branchy tree, which should cover as much horizontal ground as possible. There's more description given on its YYG page, which you can find here.

In other game making news, Ne Touchez Pas 4 on YYG is a downrating magnet. Many of these people are actually entrants into the competition. I'm not so much angry at the fact they're hurting NTP4's rating (temporarily - my YYG moderator friend is always on hand to tell me who did it, remove the downratings and punish as necessary) as I am disappointed the human race simply can't play fair.

Offshoot topic - about Competition 05. I maintain that I'm not in it to place. A "best of the rest" or whatever mention would be nice, but I'm not one for high hopes so if I don't make the list I'm not too concerned. But another thing I dislike - the cockiness of many entrants. I've seen so many people that seem to think their entry is definitely going to place. The vast majority of these are games that clearly aren't... even some of those that must've taken a lot of effort pale in comparison to some of the better entries. My personal favourite entrant is Blackfoot, though.

I've designed the cover for the second of Rebecca Clare Smith's Jocasta Lizzbeth Moonshadow novels. This is a rare instance of me doing something graphical - I keep what little design skill I have away from game making because the two always seem to clash horribly. You can find this piece of graphical design here. If you'd like to comment on it I'd recommend posting on that blog entry, not this one, as she's likely to reliably tell me about the comments. I'm forgetful and my brain is mushy. Of course, if you want to post it on both entries then a virtual cookie your way. Even a real one if you're willing to go out and purchase it yourself.

Wednesday = shopwork, and I spent most of the day, having had my iPod touch suffer from an odd problem that now means it won't accept any applications (bastard), playing Pokémon HeartGold on the Nintendo DS. My verdict of it so far is that it's average. Gold and Silver were so long ago I've forgotten all the bits and pieces from it, so the nostalgia factor is gone. All that's left is a passable Pokémon game. Come on Game Freak, I'm sick of all these half-assed games with only about 60% of the roster actually catchable in-game. Release one with all the areas, all the Pokémon and all the awesome you COULD get out of the franchise!

WrestleMania 26 was on Sunday, and despite most critics calling it average, I still loved it. Bar the odd slightly poor match (Bret Hart vs Vince McMahon, that freaking pathetic diva tag team match ft. Vickie Guerrero) it was stunning stuff, particularly the final match of the show. I'm also loving their NXT program, though I'd like to see four of the rookies get into the main WWE roster (Daniel Bryan, Wade Barrett, Justin Gabriel, Heath Slater). Mind you, that may still happen, despite them only saying one would.

Anyway, it's 12:30am. That's half an hour later than I'm normally awake, and the last thing I want is to return to my old stay-up-to-7am days. Feeling crappy thanks to sleeping fail - does not want. Gotta be up as early tomorrow to witness the failure emanating strongly from all the weak, predictable, boring April Fool's jokes on all the GM websites.

G'night all!

Allie

Pushing People Down Flights of Stairs... Repeatedly

11 days since my last blog? I'm returning to my lazy ways, goddamnit!

Anyway, this is a blog a little about me but mostly about an aspect of game making, similar to a blog entry I made several months ago, highlighting some ideas I have. If you want to provide feedback on any of them, feel free to - I'll be more motivated to make one/some of these if I know there will be fans, and conversely will be happy that I'm steering clear of making them if everybody would hate them. So, here goes:

Beelzebox

This is an idea I had which goes with my wanting to improve my 3D modelling skills (see below this segment). Basically, it'd be a first person lighting-powered shooter with a freaky red dude, Beelzebox. It'd include elements from bullet hells, with Beelzebox shooting fire from all orifices, with other FPS-like devices put into place. As well as furthering my modelling skills it'd be nice for it to also help my FPS-making grow. Both of these will be needed for when I start the coding aspect of Frosted Glass, basically a game in a novel, of which the novel and all of the design direction is provided by Rebecca Smith.

Bleed

This is one I came very, very close to making/starting today. This is bullet-hell-esque action in which numerous maroon-coloured patterns would fill the screen in a very pretty manner, their colours sticking to the screen with either surfaces or the old Don't Draw Background Colours trick. Collisions would not be measured in the standard way; instead, the colour of the pixel behind the player (who would likely just be a 1x1 pixel, PixHell style) would be found and if it was maroon, death. You could, of course, happily run over colours that aren't maroon, including slightly lighter or darker shades of it. It would be eye candy, yes, but I think it'd be kinda fun too given the potential for tens of different patterns (it wouldn't just be bullets, there could be lines, geometric shapes and even sprites getting in on the action).

Dreaming On N

Ugggh, I'm torn between making this and not making it. Dreaming On E basically split people down the middle - I was surprised there were some people that really liked it. But the idea of a sequel is that it would look better, incorporate new 3D skills I've accumulated in the last year, and perhaps even tie all or some of the scenarios together (the plan is to start the game with a revisit to Scenario 1 from DoE).

Remaddening

Or mMm2. I'm wanting to do this some day to, as with the first Innoquous, correct the wrongs. This would mean including more than one level, a procedural generation mode, other types of gameplay, and a far greater level of polish. I'm unhappy with quite a few aspects of madnessMADNESSmadness, but I really wasn't expecting it to take off quite so rapidly so I never bothered perfecting it.

Trivia Giants

This would be a cross between a boss rush and a trivia game. The idea is this - you're on a 5x5 grid. Somewhere either in this grid or out of it (more likely out of it) is the boss. The boss asks you a question, gives you a few seconds to think about the answer. Then, as you move about the grid, giant letters appear on it that spell out the answer. So, for example, if the question was "7+3", a vertical line of squares would turn red or whatever on the grid (1) then that would clear and the outer squares (0) would do the same. The idea is to either avoid, or get into, the lit squares. After each question or whatever you'd take an automatically-handled swing at the boss and, after a set number of questions, the boss would be replaced by a better one that asked more complicated questions.

So they're a few ideas I've had. Really not sure what to do about them - knowing me I'll come up with a new idea in a few days and make it in two hours! Here's some other stuff I may as well mention while I'm in the blogging spirit though.

I finished Ne Touchez Pas 4. It made some people very happy, others very sad. It contained no new levels and was generally seen as very uninnovative, but others (mainly those new to NTP, I think) really enjoyed it. It was mostly made for YYG Competition 05, in which you're allowed to use old stuff in your entries - perhaps I would have been better calling it 3.5 or something. Either way, though, it's not the worst self-cloning in the competition, I've seen at least one entry which is simply a downscaled port of a previously made game.

Another thing I've finished, but in a different way, is Shadows & Ghosts, the second instalment of the Jocasta Lizzbeth Moonshadow series written by somebody I've already mentioned in this entry, Rebecca Smith (this time I linked to her blog).

Now, to the blog title. I've been playing a lot of GTAIV recently. I've finished most of the game, though I've still got Brucie's secondaries to do (boring) and a lot of stunt jumps/pigeons to find. I'm having a ton of fun with it, partly thanks to its physics engine, which is pure brilliance. The guns are boring in the game when you can simply push somebody down a flight of stairs or off the kerb of the pavement (which shows how good the engine is - pedestrians' feet are two separate entities so if one slips off something they fall over sideways, or if you trip them up in the same way they may stumble or trip). You can also have fun throwing things at people, which does very little damage but does look funny. There's the art of going to the second island, where taxis are abundant, and hitting the taxis to annoy the drivers. They get out and start trying to attack you. If you do this multiple times without harming the drivers, then jump onto one, they start angrily hitting the car. Sometimes they miss, hit EACH OTHER, then start fighting. Childish, but fun to watch!

Then, my achievement on Monday - I ran around Alderney, the leftmost island, in its entirety. It took three real-life hours, during which I got a wanted level twice (was not caught on either occasion), didn't die (though had to divert to a hotdog vendor now and then), and never took a mode of transport other than Niko's own feet. You'd think it was tedious, but to be completely honest I enjoyed it due to the game's prettiness (my favourite experience of its prettiness is waiting until it's dark and very rainy, going to the GTA version of Times Square and seeing all the lights perfectly reflected in the wet roads).

Last subject - the wanting to get better at 3D modelling. As earlier mentioned I'm making a game with Rebecca Smith called Frosted Glass. This will require me to kit out a house, at minimum, in 3D with stuff like beds, sinks, sofas, chairs, chests of drawers etc. So, in an aim to prepare myself for this, I've started getting properly into the program Maya. I've not much else to say on the subject, so I'll end this blog entry on a different note: a picture of the bed I made in the program.

Until the next blog, goodbye!