30/10/2008 by admin.

Hello folks,

  I’m posting a day early this week because I don’t think I’ll be able to post tomorrow.

Well it’s been a pretty busy week this week and I’ve been working solely on Lucky 7 this week.  Well I did spend a night helping someone with a possible graphical theme for their project and if it works, I’ll post links to it.

  Isaac has almost finished the new special attach (which we are currently calling the Ghost Block Attack) and will send me a build when to test it.  Basically, the game is a match 3 style of puzzle game (but different to any other game I have see) with a large character based theme to the game with a lot of unique features which would really make the game stand out.

  I was also really looking forward to the new Bejewelled game (Bejewelled Twist) to come out due to the fact that I really liked the original games and the huge build up that PopCap has been building up.

  Now I have only played the demo version of the game and I know that a lot of PopCap games do seem to get much better after the first hour (Book Worm Adventures is a LOT better after about 90 minutes), but I was starting to get board of the game after about half a hour of playing and it didn’t really improve after that.  The actual game mechanic just wasn’t original and the rotating game mechanic just seemed to pull me out of the game, I think this was due to it feeling more complex, having to work out the rotation pattern instead of just swapping blocks.  It felt like it was an extra step in my mind moving four blocks around instead of swapping just the two and that forced me to think a bit more, where as with the original game I could almost turn my brain off and relax.  There is a Zen mode which doesn’t have the bombs, but even then it didn’t feel as relaxing as the original.

  The presentation was also nice in that it supports really high screen resolutions and it really makes the graphics look really sharp and allows for plenty of detail.  I wasn’t very impressed by the cheap 3D in between effects, but I guess, it does it job.  I also liked the little touch of having a roulette spin mini game if you failed to defuse a bomb in time (think of the chance of getting an extra last life on a pinball machine).

  I guess the above sounds really negative, but it’s not really that bad, but I know I wouldn’t buy it from playing the demo, especially when they are charging 50% more then normal games and if I had the choice, I would go for Bejewelled 2 or wait for Lucky 7 (wink, wink).

Weekending 31/10/08

Lucky Seven:

  After playing the new Bejewelled Twist game, I’ve decided to increase the screen size of the game from 640 * 480 to 800 * 600, so what this will mean to the player is that the graphics will look a bit more sharper and have slightly more detail.  What it means for me is that I will have to redo all the graphics again for the game to match the new screen resolution, which shouldn’t be as bad as it sounds as there’s a lot of pre-rendered graphic assets that I can just re-render out again and clean up.

  I’ve knocked up a quick Halloween poster from one of the monster / character heads from Lucky 7 (really quick and dirty wall paper), but it will give you a hint for the graphics style for the game.

  To be fair, been English, we don’t really do Halloween, the British are more interested in November the 5^th (Guy Fawkes night (Bonfire night)) where we celebrate burning an old school terrorist to death on top of a bonfire for a failed attempt to blow up the Houses of Parliament (he wanted to kill the royal family at the time).  See there’s always been terrorism, but I guess its part of the English sense of humour, that we actually celebrate burning someone to death, (that and fart jokes) and just to rub it in, bonfire night was really the only time we got to see fireworks as a kid, which was more then what Mr Fawkers got to see.

 Well, I guess that’s it for now, but this post has almost been educational, but don’t worry, it will be back to normal next week.

Have a good week and a Happy Halloween,

Mike.

www.badbumble.com

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27/10/2008 by admin.

Hello folks,

  Sorry for not posting sooner, but I’ve been as sick as a dog the whole week (I was that bad I was even off work).

Saying that, I was able to work like a mad man the first weekend (I think I slept for about 8 hours in total over the 3 nights) and got a fair amount of work done on Lucky 7.

  Fable 2 came out on Friday in the UK so I must admit to spending the whole weekend playing it.  I loved the first game and the sequel is even better.  If you have never played this game, it’s an arcade style role playing game, kind of a cross between Diablo and Zelda.  It’s not as puzzle orientated as the Zelda games and I think the combat is slightly more simplistic.  The game looks really nice and the level design is also top notch.  It’s not perfect as they are a few technical bugs in the game that can really annoy you, but in the grand scheme of things it’s really nothing.  Once you complete the game you can actually carry on playing and completing the remaining quests you missed off and they are even new quests that are only available after you complete the game.

  The big new features are your dog side kick (used mainly to help you find hidden treasure and as a decoy during fights (some of the enemy will go after the dog instead of you, giving you a bit of a breather)) and you can actually have a family now, so you can have children running around the various towns, which is a really neat feature.  I bought the special edition version which also gives you the Master Chief costume (from Halo) to using during the game which is a nice touch and look pretty funny if you eat too much food as you start to get a bit of a beer gut.  So if you have an XBOX360 and you like arcade style role playing games, definitely give it a try (I must have played the game for a good 30-40 hours and there’s still lots to do in the game).

Weekending 24/10/08

Lucky Seven:

  I’ve done lots of little jobs on Lucky 7 this week.  Simple things like the animated score font and a better level / HUD layout for the game.  This has also led to lot’s of new ideas for the game, which should allow us to have lots of variations of the game for the player.

  The game is definitely taking a more character based feel to the game now I think, which I’m hoping will add a great feel to the overall atmosphere of the game and it’s already a lot more playable in it’s current basic form then some of the current casual games that are out there.  Once all the game mechanics are in and the various special attacks and completed and balanced out, it’s going to be a real corker of a game I think.

Shuffle Blocks:

  Not a lot to talk about I’m afraid on this project, except for having to change some of the sprite sheets so they will work on different video cards.

  Dave did send me the min menu current build and it looks really, really nice.  They are 3 different cloud layers in the background that slowly move and it looks dead smart.  I plan on doing a fair bit of work on this project this week.

I know there is more stuff that I’ve forgotten, but I can’t remember to be honest as I’m still feeling really rough =(

Have a good week,

Mike.

www.badbumble.com

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17/10/2008 by admin.

Hello everyone,

  Hope you are all well.

Well it’s been a fairly busy week this week and the project work is starting to pick up pace again, which is really good news.

Lucky 7 has really taken on a new lease of life since concentrating on the Arena mode of the game.  I spent over two hours last night on the latest build without even realising it which is a really great sign for the basic game mechanic, especially when you realise that about 70% of it is just place holder graphics, without and special effects and just a random audio track playing in the background.  This game is going to be fun.

I’ve finished the new GoGo model for Shuffle Blocks.  As you can tell, he’s changed a fair bit from the original model, but I’ve tried to keep the basic form and colour scheme the same and of course I had to make him a bit chubby (every real man has love handles (that’s what I keep telling my wife at any rate)).  There’s still a lot of addition work to be done on it (animated morph targets and rigging (I hate rigging)), but the base model is done.

Weekending 17/10/08

Lucky Seven:

  I’ve spent most of the week on this project and if I’m been honest, I’ve properly spent about half that time playing the game.  So far, I’ve created a new back ground for the Arena mode which has a more hand drawn look to it and various little gf/x’s for the game.

  The game really has taken a turn for the better since we started concentrating on the Arena mode.  It really is relaxing to sit down and play with and we have enough different variations of the game that we should be able to add lots of different levels for the player so that with any luck the player will find the perfect set up.

  The basic game mechanic has stayed the same, but the level structure has now totally changed and I think it will actually work out a lot better for the player as the player will get a lot more variety from the different levels and allow the player to miss out levels he may not like.  It should also allow us to add bonus content to the level structure as well which shows the player what’s needed to be done to unlock hat bonus content.  I guess it’s almost like a board game in itself for the level selection, but I’m getting a head of myself here, we need to build it and test it out to see how it plays out in real life, but I can’t think of anything major to effect it and Isaac is all for it.

  Isaac has just gone mad again and is sending me a new build almost every day, I’m sure he doesn’t sleep and he’s got way more energy then me.  I think it’s about time that I started to think about a Lucky 7 preview page for the game soon (I’m want to try something a bit better then just the normal pages and I may have to try to learn Dream Weaver and knock something really nice out when I’ve got some more graphical assets ready for the game).

Shuffle Blocks:

  I’ve finished modelling the new GoGo model for the game which you can see a screen grab straight from LightWave below.

  I’ve made GoGo a bit chubbier as I’m fed up of having muscle head hero’s and I wanted GoGo to be more of your average Joe style character.  I did make him a bit fatter, but he started to look to much like Hommer Simpson, so I had to scale him down a bit.  It’s actually pretty strange modelling a character as you have to make some strange decisions such as is his ass to big and should I make his crutch bigger / smaller?  It sounds daft, but its surprising how long you spent on changing these things until they look right.

  Dave has just sent me a new build of the game which I’m going to try out as soon as I have updated to XNA 3, but I’m also downloading the Apples iPhone SDK at the moment and it’s taking a while as my Internet connection is going really slow again at the moment.

GoGo Digger:

  We have been getting a bit of good feed back from a couple of players about GoGo Digger which is a real boost for us and I really should start to publicize the MAC version a lot more (and the PC as well to be honest), as it is a really nice game to play and it will be good publicity for when we release the other games.

No doubt I’ve forgotten some stuff this week, but I can add them in the next post, so thanks for reading and if you have any questions just ask.

Have a good week,

Mike.

www.badbumble.com

Posted in Shuffle Blocks, GoGo Digger, Current Game Development, Lucky 7 Development Diary, Blogroll | No Comments »

10/10/2008 by admin.

Hello everyone,
Well that’s another week over with and it’s finally the weekend (it’s been a long, long week for me due to the day job).

Well then, let’s try to remember what I’ve done this week game project wise (I told you it’s been a rough week at work for me, feel like my brain is half fried). I’ve been working a lot on Lucky 7 this week simply because I’ve left Isaac to work on it all by himself and that’s just not fair on him and I apologize to Isaac for that. At the moment, the plan is to concentrate more on the relaxed game mode of the game so we can get a better feel for the game play as we are a bit concerned that because we are working on a more arcade mode at the moment, we might end up alienating the more casual players, who just want to sit down with the game are relax (which to be honest, I’m finding myself doing this more and more myself), then once that has been finalised we can turn our attentions to the other modes. It just seems to make more sense to get the main mode of the game done first. Shuffle Blocks has taken a back seat this week, but it’s still been worked on.

Game wise, I’ve been playing a lot of iPhone games this week. It’s amazing how easy it is for the user to think that a game is only a couple of dollars (les then a price of a pint of beer) and can be as simple as a single mouse click to buy a game. I know I’ve spent a lot more on iPhone games because of this then I have on other mobile phones as you don’t really mind spending a couple of dollars on an unknown game and they are some really nice games on the iPhone. They are also a lot of poor games as well of curse, but you always get that.

Games I would recommend so far are:
Free Games:
=============

PapiJump: Very simple little platform game, but very playable.
iGolf: Use the iPhone to actually swing the golf club. Think Wii golf
Cube Runner: Nice, simple little 3D racing / dodging game which is played by tilting the phone.
Lightsaber: Make your iPhone sound like a light sabre by waving it around. O, I know it’s not really a game, but it’s great for showing off your iPhone and it’s the one thing that everyone that has seen it has wanted for there phone.

Paid for:
============
Field Runners: A tower defence game with nice gf/x and pretty fun to play. Currently has no sound, which for me personally isn’t a problem as I don’t want to annoy other people with noises coming from my phone.
Hidden Expedition: A hidden object game at only a dollar.
Stone of Destiny: Another hidden object game, again at only a dollar. I spent about two hours playing this to the very end, which isn’t bad value for a dollar.
PapiJump+: This is the full version of PapiJump (see above) with several different style of games. Well worth it personally, but I would try the free version first, just to see if you like it. It’s definitely a game play over presentation and it won’t impress any one, but it plays really well and I like it.
Moto Chaser: A nice little 3D driving game which looks like a Play Station 1 game from a gf/x point of view. It seems to play okay, but only look at it if you really like racing games as this game will not convert you.

Weekending 10/10/08
Lucky Seven:
I’ve done a nice simple Main Menu font for the game which should go really well with most gf/x styles. I’ve also been playing around with a web 2.0 style of graphics for the game, you know the shinny button type effect you seem to see all over the web now a days.
Isaac is starting on the main mode of the game as I’ve already said above and knowing Isaac, I’ll have something to play by the end of next week. The big news is also that Isaac has stopped smoking now for over a week.

Shuffle Blocks:
I’ve finished the font’s off now for the menu and I’ve done the sliding scrolling bar elements for the menu. Talking to Dave today, we may need to move some of the elements / options around on the main menu, but that’s something I need to look into.

I’ve done a bit more on the new GoGo model, but not been able have a good run at it, it’s been a case of 20 minutes here and there which is a real pain when you want to spend a full day at something.

Well, that’s it for this week, so have a good week and I hope to see you next week.

All the best,

Mike.
www.badbumble.com

Posted in Shuffle Blocks, Current Game Development, Lucky 7 Development Diary, Blogroll | No Comments »

03/10/2008 by admin.

Hello again,
Well that’s another month over with and it’s starting to get really cold now. It must be getting nearer to Christmas.
We I’ve finally got everything settled down again after the last couple of weeks of madness and it’s been nice to get back to doing something creative again, shame there’s not been that much spare time. It’s going to be a very short blog this week as I’ve a lot of things I need to do before I go to bed and I’m already half a sleep as I type this so sorry if there’s any spelling mistakes
Oh I’ve finally got my hands on iTorque, so I can start to look into doing some iPhone games as soon as I get some spare time as well. I’ve got a few simple ideas that I want to flesh out and I would like to convert GoGo Digger across to it as well, but all in good time.

Weekending 3/10/08
Shuffle Blocks:
I’ve been knocking out a couple of new fonts for Shuffle Blocks and improving the new GoGo model for the game and high resolution renders and I’m hoping to have that finished really soon so I can get on and do some other things.
I’ve also got a couple of things to do for the front menu for Dave (scrolling slides and the like), while Dave is converting the code across to XNA V3 as we are too late for the XNA competition.

Lucky Seven:
Not a lot has been happening on this at the moment, that’s mainly my fault. Isaac is waiting for feed back from me on the current build before progressing (sorry Isaac, I’ll sort that out this weekend for you).
I had a bit of a shock this week, as I though I saw a game with our game play mechanic in it, but it ended out to be a totally different style of game and seemed a lot more complex then our game, so that a good thing for us (I think), as I think a casual game should be able to be played straight away by the player and without been confused (but still hold plenty of secrets / strategize for the player to work out), but it’s also really nice to see how other people can have almost the same idea, but take it in a totally different direction.

Right, that’s it for now from me as I really am sleepy and I’ll show you a couple of renders of the new GoGo model as soon as I have finished it.

Have a good weekend,

Mike
www.badbumble.com

Posted in Shuffle Blocks, GoGo Digger, Current Game Development, Lucky 7 Development Diary, Blogroll | No Comments »