I’ve been following Danc’s posts at lostgarden.com for a while now, and I’ve been itching to work on one of the prototype challenges.

Last week I finally took the plunge and started taking my notebook with me to work every single day just so I can work on FishingGirl during the commute. It’s fun working with “little stuff” and spending hours tweaking small details.

The last  addition to the prototype was a physics-modeled fishing line with verlet integration and constraint relaxation.

The protype source code is available and hosted at GitHub. You can see a sample here.

From Psychochild’s post. Hrm, True Neutral does suit me, though I’m mostly Good ™. Elf Bard/Wizard is just perfect.

I Am A: True Neutral Elf Bard/Wizard (2nd/2nd Level)

Ability Scores:
Strength-9
Dexterity-12
Constitution-10
Intelligence-15
Wisdom-12
Charisma-12

Alignment:
True Neutral A true neutral character does what seems to be a good idea. He doesn’t feel strongly one way or the other when it comes to good vs. evil or law vs. chaos. Most true neutral characters exhibit a lack of conviction or bias rather than a commitment to neutrality. Such a character thinks of good as better than evil after all, he would rather have good neighbors and rulers than evil ones. Still, he’s not personally committed to upholding good in any abstract or universal way. Some true neutral characters, on the other hand, commit themselves philosophically to neutrality. They see good, evil, law, and chaos as prejudices and dangerous extremes. They advocate the middle way of neutrality as the best, most balanced road in the long run. True neutral is the best alignment you can be because it means you act naturally, without prejudice or compulsion. However, true neutral can be a dangerous alignment because it represents apathy, indifference, and a lack of conviction.

Race:
Elves are known for their poetry, song, and magical arts, but when danger threatens they show great skill with weapons and strategy. Elves can live to be over 700 years old and, by human standards, are slow to make friends and enemies, and even slower to forget them. Elves are slim and stand 4.5 to 5.5 feet tall. They have no facial or body hair, prefer comfortable clothes, and possess unearthly grace. Many others races find them hauntingly beautiful.

Primary Class:
Bards often serve as negotiators, messengers, scouts, and spies. They love to accompany heroes (and villains) to witness heroic (or villainous) deeds firsthand, since a bard who can tell a story from personal experience earns renown among his fellows. A bard casts arcane spells without any advance preparation, much like a sorcerer. Bards also share some specialized skills with rogues, and their knowledge of item lore is nearly unmatched. A high Charisma score allows a bard to cast high-level spells.

Secondary Class:
Wizards are arcane spellcasters who depend on intensive study to create their magic. To wizards, magic is not a talent but a difficult, rewarding art. When they are prepared for battle, wizards can use their spells to devastating effect. When caught by surprise, they are vulnerable. The wizard’s strength is her spells, everything else is secondary. She learns new spells as she experiments and grows in experience, and she can also learn them from other wizards. In addition, over time a wizard learns to manipulate her spells so they go farther, work better, or are improved in some other way. A wizard can call a familiar- a small, magical, animal companion that serves her. With a high Intelligence, wizards are capable of casting very high levels of spells.

Find out What Kind of Dungeons and Dragons Character Would You Be?, courtesy of Easydamus (e-mail).

(more…)

Okay. As I suspected, I was newbing out regarding Ninja Gaiden Sigma. Forget I said anything.

Actually, don’t. Don’t forget. Let’s talk about this a bit further. It’s a hard game, granted — and it’s got a gazillion combos and stuff, great. And many weapons (cool), with choice of advancement (nice) and secrets (awesome) and stuff (oh yeah). Oh — and it’s fun. It really is. It’s lots of fun…

…once you get the hang of it. Ay, there’s the rub! It’s a matter of practice, really. Studying the combo list (which should be more readily acessible, methinks — and particularly, should not “forget” where we were once we leave the menu and return) — and slashing and kicking away. As a friend pointed out, this game seriously lacks a “practice arena” of some sort — we had to New Game it repeatedly to catch the curve.

(more…)

Relive, retry, repose. The three reasons for saving.

Once games became larger than a normal human’s reasonable play time frame (and I said normal. People who can finish Resident Evil in Insane mode three times in a row just with the pistol need not apply), the save feature became a must — mostly because it wasn’t feasible to wrap the game up in a single seating.

That is repose. That’s when you save the game because it’s time to go. Because you’re tired. Because you’re bored, even, but just in case you want to try some more… This is the rationale behind games like Legend of Zelda or Nethack – games where saving is merely a method to ensure you can continue some other time.

(more…)

I hope they fix up the PS3 interface soon. A simple “grab ” action, maybe activated by pressing R1, would be more than enough. It’s ridiculous that I have to traverse all the games and demos I’ve downloaded to reach some older (yet more frequently played) game. And no, the sorting function is certainly not enough. Not to mention that ordering downloads is a must. I currently have use “pause all” and the judicious use of “resume” to try to prioritize downloads, but come on, that’s just plain wrong.

Let’s see what happens once Home comes out. I just hope they’re not wasting spending all their man-hours on it instead of having someone do nice fixes to the menu system.

We didn’t always have savegames. In times gone by, there was no such thing as keeping context between play sessions. Galaga, Asteroids, Space Invaders (hmm, lots os space games back then), River Raid, and even Pitfall — a game that required exploring many levels collecting precious stuff, and therefore naturally prone to saving — did not require or provide the means to save more than your highscores, if that. Technology was more limited and, anyway, games were simpler as far as videogames were concerned.

Computer games, of course, were far quicker to break this barrier. Even the Infocom adventure games would let you save your progress. Text-based interfaces allowed people to make far more complex games — requiring way more play time — and saving was easy anyway, once you had a hard disk or even a floppy ready.

(more…)

It *is* about learning. Danc has an interesting essay on the subject, available on GamaSutra, which I happened to read a while ago. As it goes, your brain rewards you with pleasure every time you test a hypothesis and you were right. So when you figure, “hmm, if I press this button, the plumber jumps. My head hits that platform. I wonder what happens if I jump at it from the side…”, that’s your brain trying to find a way to reward you with preciousssss chemicalssss. Yeah, baby, yeah.

I guess that’s what I find off-putting about Ninja Gaiden Sigma’s bosses.

(more…)

Psychochild has a post up about Knytt Stories (PC), the sucessor of the wonderful Knytt (PC). The latter is an exploration game where you’re required to travel a maze of caves and hills finding pieces for a broken spaceship — but wait, wait, that’s not the point. The music is beautiful, the gameplay is simple and fun, and the whole design is very interesing. The former is a whole game engine including a level editor and friendly installation procedure — anyone can design their own stories and share them online. Very cool stuff.

I love games with a strong exploration side. Myst (PC), Shadow of the Colossus (PS2) and even Freelancer (PC) were great in that aspect — one could dally as much as one wanted, travelling about, seeing sights and listening to the birds and the wind (well, not in Freelancer, of course — in space no one can hear you… never mind). I remember playing Starcraft II (Amiga) in the old days and marvelling at the number of planets and things I could find. Oblivion (PC) shows that nowadays we can still have exploration gameplay as when we played Drakken (Amiga).

(more…)

Warhawk (PS3) is frantic fun. At least once I can get on the game servers. It’s not as tactics-oriented as Battlefield 2142 (PC), but it’s lots of fun. I keep springing for the “Spotted” command, however, which just isn’t there — enemies show up on the map once they fire, not once they’ve been spotted by friendlis (or at least so I gather this far). Mostly one is competing against one’s teammates to score more frags. Many times we found ourselves shouting, “finish him off, finish him off! Someone else is going to get the kill, you did all that damage…!”. Whereas in Battlefield it goes more like, “thank the HEAVENS he killed those 2 soldiers and the walker. Let’s move!”.

But even so, it still sends a jolt when, everyonce in a while, you manage to coordinate something with your teammates. Even without the quick voice commands, the voice chat (I don’t have a headset available for it right now, and most people online don’t seem to either), or the squads, every now and then we’re able to pull off a pincer attack instinctively. Or we save one of our teammates from an enemy plane just behind them. It’s a nice rush.

(more…)

Asteroids had it right — wrapping is the way to go. And Super Stardust’s (PS3) take on it is the best. Their excuse for wrapping is perfect — no more disappearing off the screen to show up on the other side. No more Euclidean mishaps. It’s all about the orbit, and it’s all about the sphere. It is of such geniality that one can easily forgive the perspective and size issues.

Wrapping means action won’t be hampered by such trivial things as borders. No abrupt stops, no screeching to a halt. It’s all swerving, all the time, all around — and the only obstacles are, well, everything in sight. But no rigid, unmoving lines.

It’s interesting to contrast this characteristic with the Geometry Wars (X360)  field. The borders create a two-fold sense of security (”this is MY corner — MY CORNER!”) combined with an acute claustrophobia (”oh no, that’s the wall! Nowhere left to run!”). The limited field works well there, but it’s a different kind of thing. Stardust seems to me to be more oriented towards drive-by players, what with the boost capabilities and all.

Or maybe that’s just my personal playing style — I’m watching the automatic demo as I type and I see pro players moving in very little increments.

After trying the demo of Medal of Honor: Airborne (PC) a couple of times, I can already tell it’s not what I’d want it to be.

It does seem like fun. I love the freedom to land wherever I want — be it the top of a church tower, where one can snipe the opposition, the safe area, where you can get supplies and lead troops, or a dark alley, from where you can assault a flank or rear in close range. I like the way I can pick the order in which I want to complete my objectives. I like choosing my weapon set and getting unlocks due to shooting skill. That’s all good.

But it’s still not what I’m waiting for. Confrontations are only simulated within your reach; enemy soldiers holed in a cellar don’t come out unless provoked; and worst of all, at least in the demo, primary objectives require the player’s direct interference.

(more…)

“It’s a haaaard life,” singed Freddy Mercury. Hard games are good. It’s part of what makes it fun — the challenge, the difficulty, the stuff that makes people watching you play go “oh my god how did he do that that truck was coming at him full speed and he dodged the two cars while slamming into the third he’s psychic”. Be it bullet-speed reflexes at work dodging 8 lanes of traffic coming your way, frame-counting prowess so you start the combo counter at the precise moment your opponent starts raising his katana, or being so used to the square grid and movement rates that your monk reaches both enemy archers for a spin attack without ever getting hit, we find it lots of fun when we are able — nay, required — to hone our skills to a point we didn’t think ourselves capable of. It’s just way cool, and it’s what we do — we’re hardcore gamers.

But people sometimes seem to lose sight of the fact that there’s hard, and there’s dumb. Ninja Gaiden is hard. No problem there. It takes work and lots of replays to beat the toughest bosses (and frankly, some of the easier minions as well). Ikaruga is hard. Having to switch colors with lighting speed to avoid getting popped by a single shot in the middle of a sea of enemy fire? That’s cool.

Ghosts’n'Goblins (PSP), however, presents what I think is a dumb kind of difficulty. Don’t get me wrong — I think it’s a great game, well done and lots of fun. But the fixed-length jumping just doesn’t make sense. It never did, and it doesn’t now. It’s not a hard game per se — it just has a bad and outdated control scheme. The PSP version inherited the jumping style from the original arcade et al, versions, and it just sucks way too much. For those who are not familiarized with it, jumping involves choosing a direction (left, right, or straight) and pressing the button. That’s it. No air control, no shortening your jump, no nothing. Once you started the jump, you’re committed to it.

This, of course, creates an arbitrary difficulty decision. I’m not talking about dodging bullets mid-air — one wouldn’t be able to do that in real life, either. But it’s hard to get your jumps right. If you just want to climb the step in front of you, you have to step back and jump on top of it. Jumping across lava stones becomes a frustrating affair — where in real life (well, ok, not many of us jump over stones on lava streams, but anyway) one could mentally measure the distance and jump accurately without even thinking about it, in G’n'G one has to step onto a precise spot so the jump will come out right.

Some people argue, “that’s good. That’s what makes the game hard”. I disagree — that’s what makes it have a bad control scheme. It loses playability.

You want to make a game hard? Make it more complex. Throw in more enemies. Make things go faster. Make the opponents smarter. All of the above! But don’t hurt our ability to play… please.

(cross-posted from Handling Framerates on J2MEForums)

I’ve recently had the opportunity to play a high-budget game of quite some fame on two phones: a Moto V550, about 800k heap, and an SE W810i, more than 2Mb heap.

The game is based on building placement. So you have a beautifully rendered isometric map screen and a cursor. Click the cursor on a spot, and the whole screen changes to a piece-selection menu that shows one building at a time as you press left and right. After you choose the building, you click the button again and it goes back to the map screen, this time with the building placed.

Bear in mind this is all 176×2** isometric, map screen and selection screen alike.

Ok. Here’s the catch — in the SE W810i everything fits on memory. So you see the map screen, you choose the piece, and you go back to the menu (almost) instantly. It gets a bit clunky because of the “maximized” selection menu with a black background — no overlay — but it works.

The peril lies in the way it’s done on the Moto V550. The pieces for the map screen barely fit the memory — which is understandable, I’ve done isometric for that Moto and it’s a lot of trouble — which means that everytime you want to select a new building the game:

1) Unloads everything;
2) Loads a single building;
3) Unloads the single building and loads the next one as you press the arrows;
4) Reloads the whole map screen (with its tiles) when you select the building.

Can you spot the problem? Every load is a createImage(). In a Moto. Yeah, right, THAT’S going to work well.

So here we have it — an absolutely unplayable game (trust me, I tried, I really wanted to play it, I love the genre) that is being sold as “Moto Vxxx compatible”. Hah. And meanwhile, since the implementation is the same, the SE version suffers with a clunky interface.

GAH. I *hate* fragmentation issues.