Planet Ludum http://www.ludumdare.com/planet The Ludum Dare Community outside Ludum Dare Mon, 01 Dec 2008 22:20:40 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.5.1 en Information Painting http://psysal.livejournal.com/58794.html http://psysal.livejournal.com/58794.html#comments Mon, 01 Dec 2008 22:20:40 +0000 PsySal http://psysal.livejournal.com/58794.html
What's not quite as clear, though, is how I'm to know when to turn it on or off. There is a system I already have in place called "events", which lets me lay certain events on certain tiles. So for instance, an UP event makes you go UP one level if you're underground, etc. This seemed the logical place to start for triggering the black and white wavy effect.

In fact, it is, but while thinking of it I started to think about something that I'll call Information Painting. Tagging, which we all must know and love, is the idea of attaching attributes to discrete objects. So for instance, you could have a tagging system for all sprites in your game, and then tag things that can fly with a "flies" tag, and all things that are red with a "red" tag; then you can create a special effect that lights everything that flies and is red on fire; and it's quite easy to "query" for these objects. So you get to implement a generic system (the tagging) that then can be used for specific purposes (e.g., finding everything that flies); lots of bang for the buck!

Information Painting is the same sort of idea, but spatially. So you attach tags spatially to surfaces or volumes. For instance, a piece of floor could be painted with the "bwwave" tag, and then later on you can quite easily check to see what tags apply to where the player is standing, and if the "bwwave" tag is there, turn on the special black and white, wavy effect. Similarly, you could tag things that are metal with "reflection" (not by hand; you'd set these tags up automatically as you create the metallic things) and then if a laser beam hits a surface, you could check to see what tags it was painted with.

It's not a huge variant on tagging, but an interesting concept. Another advantage to tagging across space, and not just discrete objects, is that you could integrate your tags at a "physics" level, physics being typically lower-level than your discrete gameplay objects. So the physical world could be information painted, allowing your physics routines to have custom exceptions and so forth (passthrough, stick-furry-things, and so forth) without adding much complexity; managing the tags would happen at the object level.

Just some ideas!]]>
What's not quite as clear, though, is how I'm to know when to turn it on or off. There is a system I already have in place called "events", which lets me lay certain events on certain tiles. So for instance, an UP event makes you go UP one level if you're underground, etc. This seemed the logical place to start for triggering the black and white wavy effect.

In fact, it is, but while thinking of it I started to think about something that I'll call Information Painting. Tagging, which we all must know and love, is the idea of attaching attributes to discrete objects. So for instance, you could have a tagging system for all sprites in your game, and then tag things that can fly with a "flies" tag, and all things that are red with a "red" tag; then you can create a special effect that lights everything that flies and is red on fire; and it's quite easy to "query" for these objects. So you get to implement a generic system (the tagging) that then can be used for specific purposes (e.g., finding everything that flies); lots of bang for the buck!

Information Painting is the same sort of idea, but spatially. So you attach tags spatially to surfaces or volumes. For instance, a piece of floor could be painted with the "bwwave" tag, and then later on you can quite easily check to see what tags apply to where the player is standing, and if the "bwwave" tag is there, turn on the special black and white, wavy effect. Similarly, you could tag things that are metal with "reflection" (not by hand; you'd set these tags up automatically as you create the metallic things) and then if a laser beam hits a surface, you could check to see what tags it was painted with.

It's not a huge variant on tagging, but an interesting concept. Another advantage to tagging across space, and not just discrete objects, is that you could integrate your tags at a "physics" level, physics being typically lower-level than your discrete gameplay objects. So the physical world could be information painted, allowing your physics routines to have custom exceptions and so forth (passthrough, stick-furry-things, and so forth) without adding much complexity; managing the tags would happen at the object level.

Just some ideas!]]> http://psysal.livejournal.com/58794.html/feed/ Lucky LD13! http://hamumu.com/journal.php?entry=1228161596 http://hamumu.com/journal.php?entry=1228161596#comments Mon, 01 Dec 2008 19:59:34 +0000 Mike Hommel http://hamumu.com/journal.php?entry=1228161596 on now. Don't miss it!]]> on now. Don't miss it!]]> http://hamumu.com/journal.php?entry=1228161596/feed/ backup tools - clonezilla http://renesd.blogspot.com/2008/12/backup-tools-clonezilla.html http://renesd.blogspot.com/2008/12/backup-tools-clonezilla.html#comments Mon, 01 Dec 2008 01:41:00 +0000 Illume tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10678074.post-6142514053169653895 http://renesd.blogspot.com/2008/12/backup-tools-clonezilla.html/feed/ Braid Review http://entardev.wordpress.com/2008/11/30/braid-review/ http://entardev.wordpress.com/2008/11/30/braid-review/#comments Sun, 30 Nov 2008 23:36:08 +0000 Entar tag:entardev.wordpress.com://f81b9791be1021a0a6303f1d74e46b90

I finished Braid for XBox Live Arcade a few days ago, and I’ve been letting it settle for a while.

Braid is a puzzle platformer in which the player must navigate strange levels to acquire and assemble puzzle pieces. The player may reverse time whenever he pleases (including when he has been killed). One of the first wonderful effects that I noticed about this fact is that there is no loading or saving or any of that, and there is no need for it. Players just rewind back to where they went wrong, and try again. As the game continues, more time-related quirks are introduced, which never fail to astound. I won’t spoil too much of it for you, but I will definitely say that the gameplay is more than adequate, and the puzzles are astonishingly clever. Upon completion of many of them, I was left with a appreciation of the brilliance of the author, as well as a sense of accomplishment at successfully solving them.

The graphics and style of Braid are very strange, but in a good way, I suppose. Each level is like playing inside a painting which constantly and subtly morphs. This adds to the artistic and metaphorical nature of the game, but it may not be to the likings of many people (but what ever is to everyone’s liking?). The storyline and gameplay have an interesting, indirect relationship, in that the storybooks seen in the game sometimes make subtle references to a certain gameplay mechanic. At least, that’s what I got from it.

There has been some talk about whether Braid is reasonably priced at 1200 Microsoft points, or $15. Compared to many of the commercial games for XBox 360, which often cost up to $60, it is well priced, and I think it money well spent, as far as games go. However, I can see where people are coming from, because Braid has only marginal replay value. Once you complete a puzzle, of course it’s not as much fun the next time. There are also other XBox Live Arcade games, which include multiplayer, some of which cost less money. This brings me to another idea: multiplayer Braid would be sweet. If Jonathan Blow releases an add-on or sequel to Braid, which I eagerly await, I’ll be expecting some awesome time-twisting multiplayer fun. Reversing time at the last second so that the chandelier you just dropped hits its intended moving target? Or maybe using time travel and levers to protect puzzle pieces while the opponent does the same to reach them? Knowing the genius already poured into Braid, I’m sure the possibilities are endless.

       ]]> http://entardev.wordpress.com/2008/11/30/braid-review/feed/ The Next Phase http://hamumu.com/journal.php?entry=1228072706 http://hamumu.com/journal.php?entry=1228072706#comments Sun, 30 Nov 2008 19:18:04 +0000 Mike Hommel http://hamumu.com/journal.php?entry=1228072706 Winter Pack is done! I have everything set up so you can purchase it and play it, I just haven't put it up on the website yet. And as I sit here writing this, I find myself wondering why not... No reason it can't be up there for people to early-bird buy, right? I'll put it up once I finish writing this. Then I will of course announce it tomorrow in the newsletter.

If you're wondering where I have been for quite some time, the answer is vacation! I've been at home, but with the wife off work for a week for Thanksgiving, we just hung out and didn't do much. We watched a whole lot of Buffy. In fact, we got through the first three seasons, and now we are in season 4 (interspersed with Angel season 1). We had to watch that stuff since Netflix couldn't keep up with our sitting in front of the TV all day. I moved my laptop into the living room for this entire week. WoW+TV. That's relaxation!

So that was vacation and the end of the development of Winter Pack, all in one. Next up, two more Costume Party expansions of indeterminate content. Feel free to post ideas on the forum for what kind of new and interesting tiles and monsters you might like to see! I've got the costumes covered, I think. And what else is next? Well, I plan to develop those expansions on the side for fun, while I work on a real project!

Disregarding my earlier ideas, I have now struck on the perfect small-scale super-cool project that will upset everyone whose name is a cut of meat. A turn-based strategy game! Like I mentioned Happy Pony Wars before, but I am thinking perhaps that it will be Loonyland Tactics instead, with you going around trying to conquer the various lands of Loonyland (and using an army that came from one of them). What will be cool about this idea is that it has the same business as Costume Party - you can make battlefields on which to fight, or single-player scenarios people can try - but it also has another online element: multiplayer battles! A whole new world to consider there, but it'll be done in 'play-by-email' type format. Not that email is actually involved, but you log in, make your moves, and whenever your opponent logs in and makes her move, you'll be able to move again. So not a direct head-to-head at the moment, but rather a leisurely game, like playing chess with some old guy in Russia by mail. Of course, if you are both online at the same time, you can just wait a few minutes and get your foe's move right then.

Still very much in basic design for that, but definitely planning to rip off Land Of Legends, and make sure there's some leveling up involved, and items to collect. I have some cool ideas for the Eyeball Tree army... and there should be a Happy Pony army too. Definitely going to take some designing before I do any real work. I spent hours looking around for my copy of Land Of Legends, and the design I wrote long ago for a rip-off of it, all to no avail. And I know there were some vital key ideas in there! Very annoying.]]> Winter Pack is done! I have everything set up so you can purchase it and play it, I just haven't put it up on the website yet. And as I sit here writing this, I find myself wondering why not... No reason it can't be up there for people to early-bird buy, right? I'll put it up once I finish writing this. Then I will of course announce it tomorrow in the newsletter.

If you're wondering where I have been for quite some time, the answer is vacation! I've been at home, but with the wife off work for a week for Thanksgiving, we just hung out and didn't do much. We watched a whole lot of Buffy. In fact, we got through the first three seasons, and now we are in season 4 (interspersed with Angel season 1). We had to watch that stuff since Netflix couldn't keep up with our sitting in front of the TV all day. I moved my laptop into the living room for this entire week. WoW+TV. That's relaxation!

So that was vacation and the end of the development of Winter Pack, all in one. Next up, two more Costume Party expansions of indeterminate content. Feel free to post ideas on the forum for what kind of new and interesting tiles and monsters you might like to see! I've got the costumes covered, I think. And what else is next? Well, I plan to develop those expansions on the side for fun, while I work on a real project!

Disregarding my earlier ideas, I have now struck on the perfect small-scale super-cool project that will upset everyone whose name is a cut of meat. A turn-based strategy game! Like I mentioned Happy Pony Wars before, but I am thinking perhaps that it will be Loonyland Tactics instead, with you going around trying to conquer the various lands of Loonyland (and using an army that came from one of them). What will be cool about this idea is that it has the same business as Costume Party - you can make battlefields on which to fight, or single-player scenarios people can try - but it also has another online element: multiplayer battles! A whole new world to consider there, but it'll be done in 'play-by-email' type format. Not that email is actually involved, but you log in, make your moves, and whenever your opponent logs in and makes her move, you'll be able to move again. So not a direct head-to-head at the moment, but rather a leisurely game, like playing chess with some old guy in Russia by mail. Of course, if you are both online at the same time, you can just wait a few minutes and get your foe's move right then.

Still very much in basic design for that, but definitely planning to rip off Land Of Legends, and make sure there's some leveling up involved, and items to collect. I have some cool ideas for the Eyeball Tree army... and there should be a Happy Pony army too. Definitely going to take some designing before I do any real work. I spent hours looking around for my copy of Land Of Legends, and the design I wrote long ago for a rip-off of it, all to no avail. And I know there were some vital key ideas in there! Very annoying.]]> http://hamumu.com/journal.php?entry=1228072706/feed/ Story to Fit http://psysal.livejournal.com/58611.html http://psysal.livejournal.com/58611.html#comments Fri, 28 Nov 2008 17:07:01 +0000 PsySal http://psysal.livejournal.com/58611.html
Recently I read Wuthering Heights. Really an amazing novel, incredibly "real" characters and situations that unfold both painfully and yet with a certain brutal logic that makes it seem all too inevitable. I think a novel like that must be either

i.) conceived in the author's mind, through repeated contemplation of it, so that it falls into place before written OR
ii.) structured carefully OR
iii.) allowed to flow organically from a set of initial conditions OR
iv.) something else

I really couldn't guess which! But for my case, there is a certain flexibility required for fitting a story into a game, and fitting a game around a story. Certainly, the initial "set up" for Texas has not changed much, but what happens is that as the game is implemented, my idea for what the story should be drifts from the original conception (which tends to be a bit fuzzy in the first place) and details need to be filled in to the existing conception which tend to change fundamentals as well.

So for instance, the initial set up involves an alternate reality Texas world. But the map layout ends up dictating somehow the real world through interlink of portals. This in turn gives a higher importance and nonlinearity to the real world, which changes the setup slightly. This change is solved through some natural-feeling inspiration (see i. above) and also to fit some of the structured gameplay elements (see ii.). This in turn introduces new plot holes which have to be filled in.

What this means is that the specifics of the story have to be worked around the reality of the game. This is similar to the use of setting in a novel; elements which exist in one part of the novel need to exist later on, or be accounted for. If we suddenly introduce church down the road for a scene at the end of the novel, then it would be conspicuously absent from the early part. There needs to be a sense of "reality" to a novel's setting. In a game, that reality is even more concrete.

I've said about a million times that I prefer the plot and story to follow the setting. Setting should at the very least "seem" to be bigger than the story or even the game itself. With Texas, this is what's happened, to be sure! What's interesting to me is how as the specifics of the story are constructed, the setting itself becomes that much more interesting and believable.]]>
Recently I read Wuthering Heights. Really an amazing novel, incredibly "real" characters and situations that unfold both painfully and yet with a certain brutal logic that makes it seem all too inevitable. I think a novel like that must be either

i.) conceived in the author's mind, through repeated contemplation of it, so that it falls into place before written OR
ii.) structured carefully OR
iii.) allowed to flow organically from a set of initial conditions OR
iv.) something else

I really couldn't guess which! But for my case, there is a certain flexibility required for fitting a story into a game, and fitting a game around a story. Certainly, the initial "set up" for Texas has not changed much, but what happens is that as the game is implemented, my idea for what the story should be drifts from the original conception (which tends to be a bit fuzzy in the first place) and details need to be filled in to the existing conception which tend to change fundamentals as well.

So for instance, the initial set up involves an alternate reality Texas world. But the map layout ends up dictating somehow the real world through interlink of portals. This in turn gives a higher importance and nonlinearity to the real world, which changes the setup slightly. This change is solved through some natural-feeling inspiration (see i. above) and also to fit some of the structured gameplay elements (see ii.). This in turn introduces new plot holes which have to be filled in.

What this means is that the specifics of the story have to be worked around the reality of the game. This is similar to the use of setting in a novel; elements which exist in one part of the novel need to exist later on, or be accounted for. If we suddenly introduce church down the road for a scene at the end of the novel, then it would be conspicuously absent from the early part. There needs to be a sense of "reality" to a novel's setting. In a game, that reality is even more concrete.

I've said about a million times that I prefer the plot and story to follow the setting. Setting should at the very least "seem" to be bigger than the story or even the game itself. With Texas, this is what's happened, to be sure! What's interesting to me is how as the specifics of the story are constructed, the setting itself becomes that much more interesting and believable.]]> http://psysal.livejournal.com/58611.html/feed/ Metronomy http://renesd.blogspot.com/2008/11/metronomy-play-electronic-pop-and-stuff.html http://renesd.blogspot.com/2008/11/metronomy-play-electronic-pop-and-stuff.html#comments Thu, 27 Nov 2008 22:33:00 +0000 Illume tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10678074.post-7722407316719907151 http://renesd.blogspot.com/2008/11/metronomy-play-electronic-pop-and-stuff.html/feed/ Stuff-n-maintenance-n-stuff stuff stuff .. http://www.philhassey.com/blog/2008/11/26/stuff-n-maintenance-n-stuff-stuff-stuff/ http://www.philhassey.com/blog/2008/11/26/stuff-n-maintenance-n-stuff-stuff-stuff/#comments Wed, 26 Nov 2008 08:48:09 +0000 philhassey http://www.philhassey.com/blog/?p=184 So this past week or so was pretty wild. I was doing all “behind the scenes” stuff mainly. Sometimes these sorts of things are kind of weird to do, because the main goal is to do them in such a way that nobody really notices that I did them (so the point of this blog post is to point out the invisible so I can FEEL like I accomplished something in the last two weeks) … Anyway, they (supposedly) had to get done so that everything can keep moving along without collapsing.

  • Fixing up the themes on galcon.com so that all the pages actually use the same header/footer and everything. I also restyled the whole site so that all the pages use the same style.css file. (Previously each part of galcon.com had its own stylesheet. Weirdness.)
  • Moved to using a real mailing list (it took me forever to decide!) But in the end yourmailinglistprovider.com seemed to be the ticket. This is a pretty big step. Previously I was running some script which took a very long time to send out the newsletter and made me very nervous.
  • Updated my game server with init.d scripts so that should my server get rebooted, the game servers will automagically restart. Previously, well, if the server got rebooted, no games would come up.
  • I also migrated www.imitationpickles.org/galcon/ to point to www.galcon.com .. So now all the “classic” Galcon customers get to see my new swell site. This is also good for search engine stuff, so galcon.com has a nice position now.
  • While I was at it, I set up google mail for galcon.com .. So now I can e-mail in style!
  • Upgraded the maze so that each user’s “save state” is a single database record. Previously I saved the full history of a user’s game, so a single user could have hundreds of records if they were wandering around. This table got to around 362,525 records and it was making those pages go pretty slow! With a single record per user, I’ve only got 1371 records in the table and things are nice and fast again. (BTW - Maze 2.0 is up, you can create your own separate adventure mazes now!)

On a more “in your face note” I did add in a games section to galcon.com. I’m sort of excited about this, because it makes it look like I’ve actually made more than one game ) More importantly, it makes it really easy for me to put up a quick page for small games. I’m always making new mini-games for game-dev compos or whatever that don’t necessarily deserve their own “special custom website” but I still want people to be able to get at them. This will make that possible. It also makes it easy for me to link to some of my game-dev friend’s games.

Laters!
-Phil

[Slashdot] [Digg] [Reddit] [del.icio.us] [Facebook] [Technorati] [Google] [StumbleUpon] ]]> http://www.philhassey.com/blog/2008/11/26/stuff-n-maintenance-n-stuff-stuff-stuff/feed/ Newsletter Update, Maze of MADNESS 2.0, and more! http://www.galcon.com/news/2008/11/26/newsletter-update-maze-of-madness-20-and-more/ http://www.galcon.com/news/2008/11/26/newsletter-update-maze-of-madness-20-and-more/#comments Wed, 26 Nov 2008 08:31:53 +0000 philhassey http://www.galcon.com/news/?p=66 Hey folks!  There’s an exciting update to the web-game I put together a couple weeks ago. “The Maze of MADNESS” is a “point-and-click text adventure game” .. Where you get to create the game! It must be seen to be believed.  You can even create your own new adventures! So far people have created over 400 rooms!  A few days ago I upgraded it to v2.0, meaning now you can start your OWN mazes!  There are already several new cool mazes being built.

While I’m at it, the holiday season is upon us!  So for the end of this week, I’m going to put Classic Desktop Galcon on Sale for 50% off regular price!  You can buy it at that price by using the promo code “TURKEY” when you checkout. (And remember — you save even more if you buy in BULK!)

Also, just to give you the heads up I’ve finally gotten myself onto a real mailing list service ) (The thing I was using before just wasn’t cutting it!) This is much more convenient, and I don’t have to sit around sweating hoping that all the e-mails are being sent properly anymore.  If you aren’t on the mailing list, now would be a prime time to join.  Just create a user account, select “Yes, send me e-mail updates” and confirm your account.  Or if you already have an account just click Edit Profile on the top right corner and then Newsletter Preferences.

Have fun!
-Phil

[Slashdot] [Digg] [Reddit] [del.icio.us] [Facebook] [Technorati] [Google] [StumbleUpon] ]]> http://www.galcon.com/news/2008/11/26/newsletter-update-maze-of-madness-20-and-more/feed/ Dino Vs Pirate ship http://renesd.blogspot.com/2008/11/dino-vs-pirate-ship.html http://renesd.blogspot.com/2008/11/dino-vs-pirate-ship.html#comments Sun, 23 Nov 2008 04:30:00 +0000 Illume tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10678074.post-8272741830515698194 http://renesd.blogspot.com/2008/11/dino-vs-pirate-ship.html/feed/