Des Moines Game Dev Meeting == Totally Cool. Dinowaurs play testing

Mike, Josh and I(Greg) scuttled down to Ankeny for a developer meetup that the DSMGG held at a local gaming place Cyber Ops Gaming Center. I got there a little late, but everyone's projects were really cool and the whole tone of the place was really exciting. I suppose anytime you get a bunch of passionate, smart people in closed quarters together we start feeding off each other.


Like I said, I got in a little late, but I was able to catch the last half of David Duke's presentation on his sweet trajectory shooter prototype, Mini-World Wars. It was super simple, but those can be the best prototypes. I keep seeing a bunch of these gravity-body mechanics coming out post Mario Galaxy, and it's really interesting to see the influence that's had. It's definitely a good thing. David's prototype was sweet because not only did it involve mass-based physics but also took into account the mass of the orbiting moon, which affected me in my trousers as well ;) We all want to play ASAP!


Later we were lucky enough to run a few play testing sessions with the guys that were able to stay longer. It was certainly an interesting experience, it being our first run through of the game with other people. I would say overall, while it wasn't what I hoped for, we uncovered a few new bugs, some UI issues, and a consensus amongst the room about the villagers. We've got a fair bit of work ahead of us, but that's good, we've built the stone now it's time to shave it down to a pretty marble dino. Hopefully the next time we play test we'll be to focus more on the fun and intricacies of the gameplay itself.


It was great to get some of that inspiration last night. Sometimes living in Iowa you feel a little isolated from the "happenings" of game development, and while there's TIGSource and RPS and so on, there's no substitute for real human interaction with developers. Just the slightest bit of someone else's project, or hearing about real development issues others are facing can help a great deal. We all left pretty wide-eyed and ready to plug in for another go 'round.

"Wild & Free: A True Story" or how we forgot about Professor Porpoise: Adjunct Faculty Advisor to the Apocalypse and learned to love the boto

Mike and I have been chipping away at a little weekend side project of ours for a month or so. He's got a prototype up and running, and while the swimming mechanic is similar to PP:AFAA, we've added some cool new stuff that I think will be pretty compelling gameplay wise. Basically it's a very simple deathworm-like, where you command the likes of a studious Boto (amazon river dolphin) and fight the evil river-polluting humans on their way to refineries and such. With the aid of schools of flesh-starved pirahnas, you summon the power of the riverbed to take on impossible odds.



I've mainly been working on the logo, (this is actually a school project, so the logo was our first assignment) but have started in on the rough art style to help me finish the logo. It's pretty close to done, hopefully we'll have an alpha posted up here pretty soon.

Inspired game idea: Stratastencil gameplay

A friend of Greg's just linked this to him: "My Paper Mind," an animation of paper stencil cut-outs, using a technique referred to as "Stratastencil." The interesting thing is that the stencils are layered on top of each other, and photographed and lit such that the previous frames are visible behind the current one, receding into space and shadow. The effect is mesmerizing. Visit Javan Ivey's My Paper Mind page to view the video.

Now obviously, if you're a game developer, you'll likely think "oo, I wanna make a game like that!" At least that's what I thought. The easiest thing design-wise would be to copy the same visual effect, where the game world is a stencil, with previous frames in the background. It might take some graphics trickery to do the lighting such that it looks realistic. Or you could just make a sheet for every possible combination of object locations. Heh.

But what if you made a game based on the abstract concept of this, instead of the literal visual effect? What if you could see your previous actions in the distance, and that affected your current choices? What if you could go back to those frames to alter the current one? How could you design interesting gameplay by showing the past and the present at the same time? One draws parallels to something like Braid, but let's think past that.

Imagine the space that exists from the front frame to the back frame. What happens if you collapse that space? What happens if you connect it, creating a 3-dimensional form from that space? How do you explore such a space?






I think exploring some of the later questions could lead to some interesting game ideas.

Glitch art, tiny taste of Dinowaurs

Hey, just wanted to post a piece of "glitch art" we stumbled upon during alpha. Enjoy!



Hopefully soon, we'll have some real screen-shots with updated art and less explosive diarrhea. ;)

Logo. Done. (mostly)

Celebrate.

Here is the high detail raster version of the logo.....that I wasn't supposed to make. It's mainly for the title screen and posters if we ever decide to make any. I felt that it was really important to work the logo more for those things. I'm really happy with it.

And yeah, I paid for that piñata picture. It was worth every penny.

GDC 2008 Day one: Podcast teaser and other hijinks

Hey reader, we're broadcasting deep within the bowels of the bay area. We made another podcast last night, hopefully we'll have time to edit it and maybe make another one. There's so much to talk about with the IGS, we tried to hold it in as best we could until we could talk about it "fresh" on the podcast. So in lieu of an edited podcast we give you this gem. Man, ever since I learned how to spell that, it's been open season on "lieu." It has surpassed "purview" and "ilk," at least in written form.

THE ALMIGHTY INTUITION DEVCAST WORLD PREMIERE

On the night of day 0, I decided to search out a mysterious beep that seemed to emanate from Ted's bag. Apparently Josh captured my safari on camera.


Turns out it wasn't the bag, or even in the room, but outside somewhere. Next day, we posed for our book-nook picture at IGS.


Later... lunch. Where we learned a crafty new way to make a cube out of 6 business cards unbeknownst to us that it would destroy them.


Then sushi and talk with Tyler Streeter, our mutual friend from the VRAC. He does research on A.I. specific to the human brain. He's the one in the 2nd picture on the left, blurried. He's brilliant. And married... sorry ladies!



Oh yea, bonus picture. We found a guy with a ghillie suit laptop mod/cover thing. Anyway... pretty cool. Hope you liked the podcast. We really tried to cut it down to a reasonable length, and well try to get out a real one soon.

Oh what a long strange trip it's been. GDC 2008: day 0

Well, today was a work day, even though it was the Sabbath we worked just like Mike said. User stories, a little Orbit Room cafe, and so on. But that, was but the beginning. Awhile later we met up with Ted and we fumbled around San Francisco, going to two predetermined restaurants that ended up being closed. Blah blah blah, long story short, Mike made this vs. screen mockup that's probably going to change the way we think about gaming.



Soon after Mike's out-of-body inspiration his eyes went blank and he ran into the Moscone center stripping off his clothes. We were able to recover his clothes after finding him dripping with cold sweat in a fetal ball. We clothed him as best we could and decided he'd just sleep there. He kept spouting gibberish about Warren and his mother, we're not sure, but hopefully we'll see him there in the morning. We may have lost Mike, but we've gained a vs. screen beyond imagination.