Not much time to write up a journal this week, so I'll just rattle off what got accomplished.... 1. Test Enemy Animations : I made animations for the "Fake Ice Thug" monster that causes trouble in the game's first level. Still have more to go, but the main ones are up and running. 2: Enemies in the Game : Bad guys will now pace back and forth and get hurt when the player smacks them. 3. Moving Environment Object: You'll note that the hanging garden beds in these...

Not much time to write up a journal this week, so I'll just rattle off what got accomplished.... 1. Test Enemy Animations : I made animations for the "Fake Ice Thug" monster that causes trouble in the game's first level. Still have more to go, but the main ones are up and running. 2: Enemies in the Game : Bad guys will now pace back and forth and get hurt when the player smacks them. 3. Moving Environment Object: You'll note that the hanging garden beds in these...

With August half way past and summer slowly drawing to a close, our deadlines for Dark Avatar are beginning to loom. Luckilly, we've kept at a steady pace the last few months, meaning much of our hard work is starting to really come together nicely. Here are some of the major features we're working on right now.... Race Logos on Ships That's right, this is MY ship. Jesse, the man behind the "rotating jewelry" solution (for those that don't know, 1.0 didn't allow you to...

Mid-project designing has always seemed a 'necessary evil' to me. Don't get me wrong, as an artist, it feels really good to be fighting for the best possible idea then finally stumble across something acceptable, or, if I'm lucky, marginaly impressive . But when the clock is ticking, it's hard to be as creative as you'd prefer. However, despite the constant nagging form my brain's 'left side' to settle with 'good enough', I plowed through this week and (In my opinion) whipped up som...

Mid-project designing has always seemed a 'necessary evil' to me. Don't get me wrong, as an artist, it feels really good to be fighting for the best possible idea then finally stumble across something acceptable, or, if I'm lucky, marginaly impressive . But when the clock is ticking, it's hard to be as creative as you'd prefer. However, despite the constant nagging form my brain's 'left side' to settle with 'good enough', I plowed through this week and (In my opinion) whipped up som...

As a natural procrastinator, game development has never beenan easy fit with me. There are deadlines to meet, multiple timelines to juggle,revisions to make, and, when it’s done, you have to ship a fun end product. There are hundreds of places to fumble, so a planmust be in place to keep the wheels running smoothly. The process of planning, as a procrastinator, blew my mind . I never realized whatgreat friends ‘Waiting ‘till the last minute’ and ‘gross under-estimation’ were. Before fal...

As a natural procrastinator, game development has never beenan easy fit with me. There are deadlines to meet, multiple timelines to juggle,revisions to make, and, when it’s done, you have to ship a fun end product. There are hundreds of places to fumble, so a planmust be in place to keep the wheels running smoothly. The process of planning, as a procrastinator, blew my mind . I never realized whatgreat friends ‘Waiting ‘till the last minute’ and ‘gross under-estimation’ were. Before fal...

With the Epic Generator coming in at #3 on the poll, I figure it's time to give the faithful an update on the progress. When I first tackled this project, I was under the false impression that the difficulties would lay in the writing. Turns out I was wrong... very wrong. In my last dev journal on the subject, I went though and determined what story events I thought were needed to develop an interesting and accurate story. You guys posted some comments on other events that should be lo...

The Art/Code Tightrope Art vs. Code: It's the ultimate match up, but after working on several games in various positions, I've determined that, to make a good game, the share is 50/50. You can't expect a player to invest time in a game that's visually unappealing, but you also can't expect satisfaction on graphics alone. To dust-off my Bennigian's roots.....'Graphics are the spice, code is the meat'. When you're working on a game by your lonesome, it tends to be difficult to walk ...

The Art/Code Tightrope Art vs. Code: It's the ultimate match up, but after working on several games in various positions, I've determined that, to make a good game, the share is 50/50. You can't expect a player to invest time in a game that's visually unappealing, but you also can't expect satisfaction on graphics alone. To dust-off my Bennigian's roots.....'Graphics are the spice, code is the meat'. When you're working on a game by your lonesome, it tends to be difficult to walk ...

This week I tried to diversify myself and get some hefty work done in various areas. Unfortunatly, my list was too long for a week that felt WAY too short. Here's what I shot for.... Elfington's three jumping stages: 'Pre-Jump', 'Jumping', and 'Falling'. 1.) Clean up the Code: The interactive walk cycle from last week had some TERRIBLE code, so I wanted to go in and clean it up. My goal was to create an Action Class for handling animation, a Game Object class to generalize the ch...

This week I tried to diversify myself and get some hefty work done in various areas. Unfortunatly, my list was too long for a week that felt WAY too short. Here's what I shot for.... Elfington's three jumping stages: 'Pre-Jump', 'Jumping', and 'Falling'. 1.) Clean up the Code: The interactive walk cycle from last week had some TERRIBLE code, so I wanted to go in and clean it up. My goal was to create an Action Class for handling animation, a Game Object class to generalize the ch...

Looks like fans of the Simpsons were in for a treat at this year's ComicCon - some very rough shots of the upcoming movie were shown to various attendees (and now comes to us by the miracles of YouTube and shoddy bootlegging). They seem to like it (their laughs seem genuine) - I seemed to like it (I chuckled a bit) - but, will YOU like it? If you havn't seen these already...Enjoy!

Alas, the first week of my 18 week Christmas project has come and gone, leaving me with 119 days remaining to complete the task. This week I started by taking baby steps and focusing on the "Walking" animation of our hero (edit: unintentional pun, I assure you). The other animations shouldn't take a week apiece, but will still need my attention in the following month. Here's my current "Animation To-Do" list for all characters that can be controlled by the player:. Elfington's "I...

Alas, the first week of my 18 week Christmas project has come and gone, leaving me with 119 days remaining to complete the task. This week I started by taking baby steps and focusing on the "Walking" animation of our hero (edit: unintentional pun, I assure you). The other animations shouldn't take a week apiece, but will still need my attention in the following month. Here's my current "Animation To-Do" list for all characters that can be controlled by the player:. Elfington's "I...