Posted by Derek Yu
Mon, 05 May 2008 04:06:00 GMT
Jeff and I spent another day and a half hacking away at the The Indie Game Database. A lot of smallish changes, but they are significant:
Tags. Users can now add tags to games (e.g. abstract, music, dinosaurs, stealth, co-op). It’s mostly a novelty right now, but once filters are in place it will be a great way to search the database.
Note: tagging is still slightly buggy.
Site Layout. The site has been widened, which makes screenshots look much better, and also gives us more room to play with. A number of small cosmetic tweaks have been made to the layout as well.
Basic Browsing. Jeff has added support for browsing. Right now you can either flip through the pages of the master list of games, or flip through the same list sorted by rank.
The major additions to the site will come in another few weeks or so, when we add user reviews (yep!) and also filters, which, when added to what we’ve done this weekend, will let you browse games in a fairly advanced way.
In the meantime, I entreat you to rate games, add tags, and have fun perusing the site! Comments and suggestions are still very welcome.
Posted in Features, Community | 7 comments
Posted by Derek Yu
Sun, 04 May 2008 13:42:00 GMT
Procedural content generation has been applied to video games forever to create random content and to reduce the space requirements for games. Roguelikes are a genre that generally depend on procedural generation for level creation. And recently, Will Wright’s Spore has put this idea in the spotlight, since the game is mostly procedurally-generated.
But all in all, I think this is a concept that is still relatively unexplored, and it could be applied creatively to every part of a game to do some really neat stuff! The focus of this competition is to develop a 4-week game that uses PCG to create compelling, new content every time the player starts a game.
Posted in Features, Community, Developers, Competitions | 32 comments
Posted by Terry
Sat, 26 Apr 2008 19:08:00 GMT
For the last two months or so, Interactive Fiction veteran Emily Short has been running a cover art drive. The basic idea is that attaching something visual, like a cover, to various works of Interactive Fiction would make it easier for sites (like ours, I guess) to promote the brilliant and very overlooked interactive fiction scene to a wider audience. It’s gone pretty well – including alternates, there are currently 98 submitted covers in the photostream (some examples are included in the side image), but there are still quite a few games outstanding.
I know there are officially only a few days left, but after seeing all the artistic talent on display in tonight’s iScribble session I figured that there are probably quite a few people reading this that could help out with a final push! To take part, all you have to do is create a cover like the ones on the side for any interactive fiction game and send it to Emily. A good place to start would be this post on her blog which lists a few games which have requested cover art but haven’t gotten any yet. Even if you’re not familiar with those games (or any interactive fiction), I’m sure someone on the forums would be more than happy to give you a synopsis or describe a scene. Full details about the project (including detailed clarifications) are collected here. As of right now, here are the games still looking for cover art:
- A Dino’s Night Out, by Aris Katsaris
- Breath Pirates, by Mike Snyder (to replace existing art)
- Goldilocks is a FOX!, by J.J. Guest (to replace existing art)
- House of Dream of Moon, by IF Whispers
- Learning to Cross, by Mark J. Musante
- Legerdemain, by Nathan Jerpe
- Luminous Horizon, by Paul O’Brian
- Revenger, by Robb Sherwin (to replace existing art)
- Tales of the Traveling Swordsman, by Mike Snyder (to replace existing art)
- Waystation, by Stephen Granade
- Wearing the Claw, by Paul O’Brian
There are officially only three days left, so if you’re interested, get cracking! |  |
Posted in Interactive Fiction, Community | Tags EmilyShort | 9 comments
Posted by Terry
Sat, 26 Apr 2008 05:13:00 GMT
Tonight is Games Night. Come join us in #tigIRC around 8pm GMT! Game of the night: iScribble! We’ll also be playing Jet Set Willy Online, TrackMania, Zap, and anything else anybody might want to play. Check out BlademasterBobo’s thread on the forums for more info.
Be there or be a four equally sided shape with 90 degree angles.
Posted in Multiplayer, Community | Tags GAMENIGHT | 8 comments
Posted by Derek Yu
Wed, 23 Apr 2008 17:27:00 GMT
Tim W., editor of the almighty IndieGames.com blog, has compiled a list of his awesome indie developer interviews, including one with the notorious MDickie.
His latest interview, with Tommy Refenes (shown above), is not currently in the list, but must be read at all costs. Tommy’s multiplayer action/strategy game Goo! was an IGF finalist this year. A public PC demo of the game is available from his website.
P.S. Tim, I still want to do an interview with you. Please return my calls! :-*
Posted in Community, Videos, Interviews | Tags MDickie, PillowFort, TimW | 9 comments
Posted by Derek Yu
Tue, 22 Apr 2008 01:12:00 GMT
...comes a whole new experience that is guaranteed to change the face of electronic entertainment forever. During a private unveiling of the game in San Francisco this past weekend, reknowned movie critic Roger Ebert purportedly took his hands off the keyboard after just 10 seconds of play and said+, quietly and to no one in particular:
I’ve heard many arguments for why games are art. This is best one. I am convinced. My hat is off to you, Romeopie.
He then proceeded to cry real tears of joy which, he claimed, “had not touched my cheeks in over 75 years. Since the Great War.” It is not understood exactly which war to which Mr. Ebert was referring, or how he could have cried before he was born, in 1942. However, those in attendance were compelled to believe that he was being genuine with his emotions.
+ This is completely false.
Posted in Shoot-em-ups, Community, Windows, Freeware, IGF / GDC | Tags RomeopieSoftware | 28 comments
Posted by Derek Yu
Fri, 11 Apr 2008 16:57:00 GMT
Clysm, aka tapeworm, has written a nice retrospective on Shawn “Shawn64” Noel, a prolific and well-respected developer in the Game Maker community. Shawn was best known for his Jetz Rampage series of games, as well as Street Bike Fury, the last game he released before he tragically took his own life in 2006. He was 17 years old.
(Source: moshboy, via IndieGames.com)
Posted in Community | Tags Shawn64 | 69 comments
Posted by Derek Yu
Fri, 11 Apr 2008 05:50:00 GMT
Hmmm, this is most definitely intriguing. Ian McConville, who’s probably best known for his work on the webcomic Mac Hall, joined Three Rings (Puzzle Pirates) in 2006 as an artist. What he has been working on there was anyone’s guess until about a week ago, when he revealed Whirled to the world (via his new webcomic with Matt Boyd, called Three Panel Soul).
At first glance, Whirled appears to be your average game portal/social network, but it’s a bit more than that. Ian describes it on TPS as “a Flash-Based Object Oriented Multi-User Dungeon.” Three Rings calls it “a web-based social world fueled at every turn by player created content.”
Aside from playing games alone or with other players, you can create your own Flash games and hook them up to Whirled via a free multiplayer library supplied by Three Rings. Ian himself designed a simple brawler (see image) with it that’s pretty awesome.
In the games you can earn points which can be used to buy things, including assets (avatars, pets, etc.) created by other players. You can also create a personalized “room” from the ground up and then connect it to other players’ rooms. These rooms can be embedded into any website, where anyone, account or not, can access it (guests show up as little ghost avatars).
It’s obviously early in the beta, but I’m excited by the idea… it seems like the next logical step for social networks, game portals, and MMOG’s could be right here.
(Source: Transfer, via Sensible Erection [NSFW])
Posted in MMOG, Community, Developers | Tags ThreeRings | 26 comments
Posted by Derek Yu
Wed, 09 Apr 2008 19:06:00 GMT
The results are in! Voting for The VGNG Competition is now over, and our buddy Farbs caught 16% of the vote with his really-rather-brilliant ROM CHECK FAIL, followed close behind by Farmergnome’s excellent My First Skydiving Academy. All in all, the VGNG Compo was a huge success. It’s been said before, but all the entrants should be really proud of themselves for participating, and making some really good shit!
Regarding the next competition… keep your eyeballs peeled. You never know when or how it’s going to hit. But you can expect that it’s going to be a lot of fun!
Congratulations, Farbs, and all the entrants!
Posted in Features, Community, Developers, Competitions | Tags Farbs, Farmergnome | 42 comments
Posted by Derek Yu
Tue, 08 Apr 2008 02:20:00 GMT
Did you know Castle Crashers has a development blog? Now you know! I especially like these videos of artist Dan “Synj” Paladin making his magic in Flash. Lookin’ good!
...oh jeez, who am I kidding, this entire post (and perhaps this entire site) is just a reason to post this damn awesome BEAR who’s wielding a fish as a weapon (one of the 22 unlockable characters in CC).
Castle Crashers is still slated for a Summer release.
Posted in Fighters, Community, Previews | Tags TheBehemoth | 23 comments
