South Wales gamedev meet

Tonight is the night and I'm kind of nervous. I'm also a little disappointed I'll be missing out on #IndieDevHour, but physically meeting some gamedevs might be better for me. 

There's two talks going on in Porter's in Cardiff, then a drink and talk afterwards. So I may be gone a while. ;) Can't be out -too- late, I have to get the train back home and get some sleep before ComX tomorrow.

S3 Mini Review

I don't get new hardware much, so I feel giving this phone a review is a good change from the usual game/software reviews.

There are 3 major reasons why I got this as opposed to a Moto G or other more up-to-date phone.

• Has a removable battery
• Has expandable storage
• Wasn't overly expensive

I use my phone as a social media device, email client, camera, music player and ebook reader: for the last two having expandable storage is essential. I transferred the 32GB microSD from my old ZTE Blade into my S3 and it's been fine.

I can also now do the magical and wonderful thing of playing games on my phone! I have Pixel Dungeon on there now (reviewed yesterday), sometime soon I will be putting on the Humble Bundle app so I can put on the Android games I have from bundles on this and try them out...finally. 

So that means more things to review in the end, which can only be good! 

On the general performance side of things, the dual-core means that 4.1 runs well and the UI is smooth. The only problems I get are usually with Baconreader (reddit app) but then it is loading a lot of data - text and images so I can forgive it.

Pixel Dungeon review

Since getting a new phone, I've started indulging and downloading various good Android games that I wasn't able to play on my old phone.

Pixel Dungeon was one of them. I love roguelikes, as you're all probably aware. Having one I can play anywhere is rather nice for me, as I do travel a lot. Even better, I can play it one handed while I make tea. (has been done successfully several times)

Pixel Dungeon is not easy. I struggle getting further than the second floor as a wizard, I can get to the third easily with a rogue or a warrior. But often I get ganged up on and die horribly. :(

Aside from my dire skill at roguelikes, it's a good game. The badges (achievements) are a nice addition - even if you die horribly you still managed a small lasting legacy. I've only picked up a few, like 100 gold and not killing anything on a floor, but it's still exciting to see "oo, I've done that!"

The controls are good - I have a tendency to miss enemies and walk off, but that's getting less of a problem as I play it more often. All in all, Pixel Dungeon is the first game I play if all I have on me is a phone and a few minutes to wait for a kettle to boil. Or I get an urge to explore and die and I can't be bothered to fire up DCSS.

Much recommended for the casual and experienced roguelike player alike.

Harvest Moon: A New Beginning review

As you probably would have seen on Twitter, I've been playing Harvest Moon: A New Beginning fairly obsessively.

Let me preface this with the fact that I have played quite a few Harvest Moon games: Friends of Mineral Town/More Friends of Mineral Town, A Wonderful Life, Island of Happiness, Sunshine Islands, Magical Melody, and the Rune Factory Frontier game. Rune Factory is a fantasy spin off, that combines dungeon crawling with farming - It's pretty well done.

But my point is that I've played a fair number of the series' titles, so anything I may say could be classed as bias for the "good old days" of Harvest Moon incarnations. But I'll do my best to be fair.

One objection I have to this incarnation is that it seems a bit more shallow than its predecessors. Versions like Mineral Town and Sunshine Isles have extensive mines that run for hundreds of levels. This one has 3 mining points you can access on entry to the Forest Mine. Similarly, Mineral Town had 7 levels to most tools, A New Beginning has 3 for the Hammer/Axe, 4 for Scythe/Watering Can/Hoe and 2 for the Clippers/Brush/Milker.

There are a lot of different things to do in this one though. It follows the restoration/buildup of the town thing that's been pretty common in recent Harvest Moons, but instead of gathering stones or notes to restore things, the farmer follows restoration plans. It's a lot more fun to slowly build the town back to a glorious state - quite literal on the building thing, instead of a carpenter getting hired to build stuff, the farmer does all the building with the help of blueprints!

The other thing is you get to customise the placement of everything on the farm and in the town. Even paths and roads can be changed around!

All in all, despite the "easier" factor, it's a lovely entry into the Harvest Moon roster. That will probably keep me entertained for quite a while.

On Past Reality and old ideas.

So I put this up last night - about my upcoming episodic cyberpunk-leaning interactive story.

It was an idea for a RPG, in the style of Secret of Mana. However, after I used Twine to make Split Beginnings, I decided to move development of Past Reality to Twine instead. 

It should work better - I think of it more as a story than a true roleplaying game, so it's more suited for the interactive story format.

The public domain novels I intend to use as settings are:

Pride and Prejudice

Frankenstein

The Three Musketeers

These are the definite, there may be the chance to add more.

There will be a lot of art to go with this - I'm drawing all the backgrounds, characters, items...It's going to be hard work, but I'm pretty psyched to make it all!

The first episode should be out sometime in mid-to-late May.

Patreon updates

It's been a busy 24 hours, I don't think I've been happier in a while.

But anyway, a few good bits of news from Patreon so far:

• Already hit my first 3 milestones: Funding DeviantArt Premium, SoundCloud Unlimited and my webserver payments
• Put up a sort of roadmap post of what's going to be happening over the next few months (thanks to Patreon and hopefully, game sales): post
• On top of that, posted an update this morning about my financial status and possible hiccups with bank transfers and whatnot: post

Big thank you to Mike Sheldon, Alex Haslam and James Ravenscroft, you three are brilliant people for supporting me. <3 

On Split Beginnings, I've already hit 40 views! Which is great, I am so pleased that it's got this attention. I hope that if you enjoy it, you'll contribute via itch.io, or share it with other people.

 

Patreon, itch.io, and the release of Split Beginnings

So, big day.

I've finally launched my Patreon page, my itch.io page and my genderjam game, Split Beginnings!

Everything's probably going to be a bit hiccup-y - I don't have my PayPal verified -yet- but that process is starting (and may be mildly manic while I'm trying to move my accounts as well)

So yeah, my timing could have been a bit better but oh well, it's out there now.

I'm also slowly setting up Stripe payments as an alternative to PayPal (which also requires verification!). Bear with me guys, it's a lot to get done in a short space of time...But it will get done.

Please, if you enjoy Split Beginnings, MiningRL, my art, my blog, my Pride and Prejudice series on SoundCloud or even just talking to me on Twitter - donate to me via Patreon or itch.io through my game(s).


Thank you all. <3

WINE compatibility

It is a truth, universally acknowledged, that a Linux user sometimes has a need to run one or many Windows-only applications and the solution can be found in using WINE.

Which is not an emulator per se, it's a compatibility layer. I've used it on and off for many years, mostly to try playing a Chinese F2P MMO called Perfect World International. I've recommended it to friends and even used a Linux build + WINE to try and curtail a friend's sister's gambling habit without compromising his ability to play Steam games.

I am considering installing it again to run tests on whether Twine works on WINE, so I can do most of my interactive story development on something with a non-dire keyboard. My Windows laptop is nearly 3 years old - it's been wreaked through gaming, working, travelling around the country, back and forth from uni...all sorts. I don't have the money at the moment to really replace it or put Windows on my tower on a separate drive.

If I can do some of my game development on Linux rather than Windows, I will be a happy Goggles. I honestly struggle to use Windows, it takes too much control away from me, it's a processor and memory intensive mess and there's no such thing as a proper terminal.

Slight rebranding plus musings

As you may have noticed, I'm making sure all my usernames are 8BitGoggles now, just to reinforce that the username is me. Which has unfortunately meant that my One Game a Month profile got wiped, but never mind, that's recoverable.

There will be some new pictures to go with the rebranding once I plan them out...keep your eyes open!

Also I've been thinking about writing a load more Twine games from my old RPG ideas. They're all easily convertible to interactive stories, which helps. To make conversion even easier, I'm thinking of making it all episodic (one episode == one mission, or thereabouts), with plenty of pretty still art depicting areas/characters etc. While it's in development, I'll probably go the "pay what you want" model.

When I actually finish the entire story, I'll bundle them together and offer it for a minimum price with a chance to pay extra. Seems like a reasonable pricing model to me...I could be wrong though - feel free to let me know if you think there's a better way to do it.

Oh, and when Split Beginnings gets released, it will also be going on the "pay what you want" model...for at least a little bit.

Breaktime + Split Beginnings update

I'm pretty achy and tired from yesterday's trip out, so I won't be doing much on anything except my farm on Harvest Moon today. I have a sheep now. :D

Also, I owe you guys a little update on Split Beginnings. Yes it's finished, no it's not up anywhere yet. Two reasons why it's not up: One, couldn't get itch.io to accept it. Two, after allowing my partner to play it, realised that yes, there are few bits that could require some polish before general release.

So I'll be working on that...not today, but hopefully tomorrow.

Temporary absence

Today, I won't be online much. 

I'm going into Cardiff to a thing called Judgement Day, where there are two back-to-back rubgy matches in one afternoon. I'm going to be spending about 5 hours in the Millennium Stadium with my parents, watching rugby for the first time in a fairly long time - I don't think I've been to the Millennium Stadium for about 6-7 years!

Also, afterwards, we're eating out. So who knows when I'll get home.

I thought I'd better explain my Twitter absence. But I will have fun away from my usual spot in front of my desk. Have a good Easter Sunday everyone!

Lego, Technic and Meccano.

I just watched this fabulous video of a massive Lego robotic contraption that transported balls around a circuit. It's a beautiful example of the complex amazing things that can be built with Lego.

It also reminded me that I still have all my Lego, Technic and Meccano up hidden in my cupboard, fairly untouched for a few years. I'm kind of inspired to start collecting Lego again, if just to make epic things again.

I think once I tidy my room up so I have some floor space again, I may have to try getting it all down and building stuff again. Of course, it will be shared if this happens.

I have the severely large urge to make something vaguely useful with Meccano. No idea what but I'm sure I can work something out...

Starfox 64 3DS review

Lylat Wars (or Starfox 64, depending on region) was one of my favourite N64 games as a child. It still has a hold over me now - I replay it every now and then on emulator.

So when I found a cheap copy of Starfox 64 3DS in Reading CEX, I though, "hell why not."

What surprised me was how much the graphics have improved. I felt a strong compulsion to go to every single area to see it all anew. Even hated places like Sector Z, Titania and Solar. It is a beautiful game. Many of my misgivings about the graphics in the original when it came to places like Aquas have now been corrected.

There are two different modes for control - Gyro and the original N64 controls. Gyro mode uses the gyroscope in the 3DS to control the ship. It's not practical for strong movements unfortunately - I'm too used to being able to zip around the screen.

The voices haven't changed much, but there are some additional phrases from your teammates when you shoot them accidentally and the Star Wolf guys when you evade them.

All in all, I recommend it whether you enjoyed the game on N64 or never played it before - it's short but the replayability factor is extremely high.

IndieDevHour

For those who do not know, #IndieDevHour is an hour between 7-8PM GMT on Wednesdays hosted by @LunaRose13 and @Sllayt3r. It's held on Twitter and gets used for a variety of things:

• To promote games in development or already out there
• To encourage more indie devs to connect and talk
• As a opening point for people to ask questions about common problems/tools/etc

I've used it for all three, the last point being the most useful. Last night I used #IndieDevHour to talk to people about some of my hangups on using tools like Construct 2/Twine/GameMaker Studio, when I feel like I should be making stuff by hand (a carry-over from meritocracy snobbery that tinged a lot of my interactions at university, which has affected me far more than I realised)

Hearing from other people that yes, using stuff like GameMaker is -not bad- is rather nice. After two years of meritocracy that ground me down, to suddenly hear that these tools are worth using is an absolute blessing.

So to everyone who takes part in #IndieDevHour - you guys are awesome. To every other indiedev, it's worth taking part in!

Split Beginnings

It's a working title, but one that may stick.

Currently I'm working on my interactive personal story for #genderjam. It's harrowing, it's interesting working out how to gamify it and it's a minefield trying to work out what can and cannot be said in the name of protecting certain people. 

A lot of details will probably be left out/modified/made fairly abstract, but it will be a fairly faithful telling of bits of my life that are relevant to the gamejam's theme.

It's good from two points - one, I'm spending time thinking about things that have already passed, getting a better idea of what happened and how to tell the story from a slightly different viewpoint. Two, it's getting me to think about what could have happened if my life had taken other turns. Which is interesting from an introspective look at myself, as well as from the "would it really affect what happened" view.

This is definitely a more "artistic" game than a "gameplay" game. I'm pretty okay with that.

On the subject of gamejams

I'm having serious trouble being inspired by generic words and themes like water and loops. Which leaves me in a bit of a quandary when it comes to One Game a Month themes.

Yet, through sheer accident, it seems I've found a bit more of a haven with Deviever's current #genderjam. Suddenly inspiration! Suddenly stories! Suddenly...I feel driven to tell stories, rather than gameplay for gameplay's sake. Which seems to be my most recent problem. I'm utterly struggling to make almost generic games in the name of technical exploration and skills, yet I can easily think of a story to tell and how to do it interactively.

I think I shall take the hint that my mind is giving me and settle into making interactive fiction. Better to do things I can make rather than struggling along in areas I'm less than confident in. As long as I keep my hand in with the normal programming for interesting/useful gamedev utilities, I should be perfectly fine.

DeviantArt Muro

It's a tool that's been on DeviantArt for a while, but I've only been able to use it properly recently (what with the whole "getting a graphics tablet" thing). 

Muro is a digital painting program that sits in your browser. It's tied to your DeviantArt/Sta.sh account, so you can save your work to Sta.sh and submit it to DeviantArt with no hassle.

Despite the fact it's in a browser, it's a pretty well-featured digital painting program. It's been a nice tool for getting used to my Wacom without being overwhelmed by the options that are available to me in Krita or other digital painting programs.

An added advantage is that on Muro you can load in your DeviantArt submissions/Sta.sh files as a new layer, or even pull them up to work on them as a file. Which is really good! I like the idea that work that's been made, that is already out there can be used again in this.

Krita

Krita is an open source digital painting program that used to be part of the KOffice package - now it's split off into a separate thing.

It's got a lot to it. It's trying (and succeeding) to be a professional painting program. It offers a lot in the way of brushes, provides templates for various things (comics, movie stills etc) and has more modes and options than you can shake a stick at.

I'm pretty in love with it. It's powerful, but not as intimidating as something like Photoshop. It's also theme-able, which I like. I put it to the darker mode, because it looks the nicest. The colour-selector is very powerful - as well as the colour-wheel, triangle shade-picker, there are gradient/contrast/hue bars underneath. Makes it so much easier to adjust the colours.

Unfortunately, I can't wax lyrical about it much more, as I don't -know- much more. I'm kind of limited in my experience from only doing one drawing in it. I'll post about more features as I find them.

Wacom Intuos

I received a Wacom Intuos Pen Small a few days ago as an early birthday present from my parents. This is the first graphics tablet I've ever owned, so it's all a bit new to me.

One of the main reasons I went with Wacom (aside from it being a popular brand) is that they support cross-platform usage - as well as the included drivers for Windows and Mac, Wacom give support to Linux driver developers. So with a little poking and building an older driver, I got my Intuos to work on my tower and my laptop.

It is a dream to use. Takes a little while to get used to, but after a day to adjust, flying around the screen(s) seem second nature to me. Using it on a dual screen setup was a bit bizarre at first, but now I'm pretty happy with it.

Jay Townsend's Trigger Warning

The game itself.

Jay Townsend is a gamedev I follow on Twitter. He's a pretty cool guy, says good things and is generally someone I enjoy interacting with. So when he put up a link to TW: Trigger Warning, I instantly clicked on it to check it out.

First and foremost, this is an artistic game. It's less about the game mechanics and more about the message that's being conveyed. Some people don't like that kind of game, so I guess avoid in that case.

For those who are more interested in the artistic applications of games, read on. Don't read on if you haven't played it and plan to, there are spoilers ahead!

It deals with depression through a game of Space Invaders. First the colours dim, then the shot speed goes down, then movement range decreases, until pretty much all you can do it await the slow approach of the wall of enemies.

All through, messages pop up. I really recommend playing it just to get an idea of what someone who suffers depression can feel like. 

As someone who has been there, I appreciate what Jay's made. It clicks with me, I'm glad he made it and I hope that other people get to play it as well.

April 1GAM ideas

I have a few, I'll lay them out.

1: Rainy setting for pretty much anything. April showers could be a theme or a puzzle-solving mechanic.

2: Water as a weapon. Water gun against sludge enemies or something.

3: The sea/a river as an environment. Boating,  flying over the water, something like that.

Those are the main few. I think I'll be writing it in PhaserJS, but I still need to look at the physics stuff properly. Maybe I'll change my mind, who knows.

MiningRL postmortem

I thought it best to get it done now rather than trying to think about it a few months later.

There were two main aims when making this. The first was to learn more JavaScript, which I have done. I'm also a lot more confident when debugging my js as well, so that's a major plus. 

The second aim was to learn different PCG methods - instead of just the usual dungeon generations I've done before, I now know about (and get terribly happy about) cell automata generation, for making caves and other organic structures.

I missed out on making some features like an online scoreboard and proper randomised cave-in/gemstone mining points, but I'm rather pleased that I got it finished and playable to count as my March 1GAM, despite two bouts of illness and a lot of travelling around for interviews and the like.

Overall - I'm rather pleased, could be better, let's see what I come up with for April! :D

Soundcloud

I've got a Soundcloud account now!

I'm not uploading music though, I'm making various noises that can be used for games - I have announcements and some spells up now, plus some example readings of Pride and Prejudice to attempt to show off my voice.

Though I'm having so much fun with the P&P readings that I may do the whole book and put it on YouTube or something. (SoundCloud only has room for 120 minutes of audio on a free account)

So anyway, here's my SoundCloud account, I hope y'all enjoy what I've put up! (maybe even use some of it)

DS Colors update

I've been working on various drawings, getting used to 1.11beta (last version of Colors I used was 1.06).

It's pretty good - despite the limitations. The size of the DS Lite screen is indeed a problem, though I might buy Colors on the 3DS store so I can use it on my 3DS XL.

I wouldn't use it as my -only- digital painting program, but it's a pretty decent stopgap until I get a graphics tablet. Hopefully I'll be able to transfer some of these skills to proper digital painting and I'll have a little less to learn.

Kittens in a Blender

Yes, you did read that right. Last weekend I got a card game called Kittens in a Blender (you may have noticed it on Twitter).

Despite, or because of, the questionable morality of playing a game where you save your kittens and try to blend your opponents, it is very very fun. I fully recommend people find it and play it.

If anyone's in the same country as me and I happen to meet them, I will play it with them to spread the weird joy of this game.

Evoland

Okay, I haven't got far beyond acquiring 3D mode, so this isn't an entirely complete review. I will make a follow up if I need to comment on the rest of the game.

As for the amount I have played, I really like it. After playing DLC quest, the idea of collecting gameplay features is not a new one, but still a somewhat novel idea of doing things. Even if it is just a Zelda/Final Fantasy mashup-parody thing, it's rather good at what it is.

Another good point is that Evoland is written in Haxe - a cross-platform language that I need to learn at some point. So automatically it can run on all three major systems (or it would, if there weren't a particular library issue with Linux)

Annoyingly, I don't see that it's something I'll be replaying anytime soon - it's nice but as a single experience only. I'm also quite glad I got it in the Humble Bundle - doubt I could have justified paying full-price. It's pretty fun, but I try to pay more for games that I'm likely to play more than once.

DS Colors

If you ever spent a few minutes in the DS homebrew community, you may know of one of the most popular homebrew applications - Colors.

In my current absence of a graphics tablet, I'm going to start some digital painting with Colors just to keep in practice. Plus, with Colors, I can doodle pretty much anywhere! 

The nice thing is, that all of the drawings I save will be put on the SD card and then I can simply transfer them to one of my PCs and upload them to DeviantArt. Nice and easy. \o/ A few are already up on DevArt, so feel free to check them out!

A personal challenge

Using sites like Seventh Sanctum and other generators has given me the idea of a little personal challenge I'm going to set myself.

I aim, at least once a week, to use a character or race generator and draw something from the description. I want to do it as a regular thing just so I'm always exercising the creative muscles on something new rather than being bogged down in the usual things (fantasy/cyberpunk/sci-fi/modern).

Who knows, maybe a usable race/character will come from it. 

Upcoming fanart.

I've been doing lots of Binding of Isaac fanart lately, but I need to change it up and do something different. I'm starting to backtrack through my old Pokemon savefiles and find my old teams.

In some cases, this means reaching back into my memories - because my Pokemon Silver cart doesn't have a working battery and my old save died. But the rest are on DS carts now, so much easier to recover.

As I haven't played Black and White, I'll be doing 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 6th gen. 6 should be fun, I'll also have to draw my trainer in all her customised glory.

As always with my art, it'll end up on DeviantArt.

Card art

I've been contemplating making a series of Tarot Cards for a while. Just because it would be an interesting project to do, that and to have a series of artwork seems like a nice thing for one's portfolio.

Not entirely sure what style I'll end up drawing them in. Tempted to go for a chibi-style. Comedic Tarot Cards kind of appeal as an idea to me. Whether it would to anyone else is another matter, but I'll just have to see.

As with all my art these days, it'll end up on DeviantArt.

Side note: this is past 12 in my timezone, so definitely nothing to do with April Fool's Day.