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[VisceralBowl]

How was Mik fixing it, for future reference?

Mik was using a render target and applying the result to the emissive of the material.

I did basically the same thing which is using a cube render target and then applying the result to a sphere reflection capture.

 

[Mario]

TL;DR: In a nutshell, I'd suggest that you trust what players do, not what they say.

Yep. In our usability lab in the studio we have a video camera on each of the the players face, hands, and the game screen/feed, as well as having the audio feed of them "thinking aloud". Incredibly important when running or reviewing a test to be what is actually happening in terms of their emotions and body language versus their verbal account. What test subjects say and what they say they are doing or feeling is often in direct conflict.

 

[Mik2121]

How was Mik fixing it, for future reference?

If possible, you might wanna go with his mode as mine still has a texture call (the cubemap) but it has to be set per-material. That is, assuming you have very reflective materials that need to reflect everything around them and you don't have the option to bake lights and having a weird black fade looks too bad (or as in Visceral's case, some weird unlit "white" reflection).

 

[missile]

Yep. In our usability lab in the studio we have a video camera on each of the the players face, hands, and the game screen/feed, as well as having the audio feed of them "thinking aloud". Incredibly important when running or reviewing a test to be what is actually happening in terms of their emotions and body language versus their verbal account. What test subjects say and what they say they are doing or feeling is often in direct conflict.

Given the all the mobile devices with camera and mic it would be cool to
record next to all the inputs also the video and sound of the player while
testing the game on mobil. Hmm. Interesting.

 

[JulianImp]

Yep. In our usability lab in the studio we have a video camera on each of the the players face, hands, and the game screen/feed, as well as having the audio feed of them "thinking aloud". Incredibly important when running or reviewing a test to be what is actually happening in terms of their emotions and body language versus their verbal account. What test subjects say and what they say they are doing or feeling is often in direct conflict.

Hmm... guess you could bring all those costs down to around $0 if you:

1. Look at the screen as the player plays through the game
2. Contrast actions taken with what you thought the average player would do
3. After the player's done, write your conclussions down
4. At the end of the day/showcase/event look at your notes and see if there's anything that'd need fixing based on any discrepancies between the gameplay experience you had expected in theory and how playtesters played it out in practice

To elaborate, my point was that players often don't really know what's at work under the hood in a game. They might say "X enemy felt really cheap", but that's probably something you didn't even need to ask since you probably saw them struggle with the enemy, and you as a designer (if you are a designer, that is) could probably pinpoint the root of the problem better than they did. Was it that attack animations had too little anticipation? Were enemy stats or attack patterns too strong for the skill and gear level the player was expected to possess at that time in the game? Did the enemy's strongest attack look and animate exactly the same as a weaker move? Did the enemy's state-machine decide to use a stunning attack repeatedly because the AI logic allowed transitions to the same state instead of banning the previously used move to avoid that kind of repetition? All that kind of stuff are things your players probably won't be aware of, which is were you come in. Even if they don't tell you something in particular, there're times where you might realize things such as how players took a while to navigate the inventory/gear menu to equip a new item and decide to find a way to streamline that action in later iterations as a result.

 

[oxrock]

Spent all day yesterday working on art (yuck), so at the end of the day I threw in a day/night transition cycle into my game to get the taste of art out of my mouth. I put together a gif to showcase it to everyone and then realized that gifs really suck at showcasing smooth color blending via color lerping and it simply looked smoother in video(255 color pallets suck ><). If anyone'd like to see it properly in action, feel free to take a peek over here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5WWnjEfpP3k

I was just kidding about hating art btw, I just need a break from doing something I'm not good at for so long. Uggggh, the gif came out horrible, watch the video instead ;p

 

[OricWindstar]

Retro style cartridge boxart for Rex, based on the old Konami style (but horizontal like the Famicom, instead of the US vertical boxes).

(Larger image)

Art by my partner in crime.

That looks great! Ridiculously accurate looking.

 

[timetokill]

Had an unusually productive weekend. Need to make it the norm.

Managed to get some work done on an eye shader for my characters that allows them to look around and blink a la Wind Waker. Still just the foundations of it but it's been fun to do.

Spent all day yesterday working on art (yuck), so at the end of the day I threw in a day/night transition cycle into my game to get the taste of art out of my mouth. I put together a gif to showcase it to everyone and then realized that gifs really suck at showcasing smooth color blending via color lerping and it simply looked smoother in video(255 color pallets suck ><). If anyone'd like to see it properly in action, feel free to take a peek over here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5WWnjEfpP3k

I was just kidding about hating art btw, I just need a break from doing something I'm not good at for so long. Uggggh, the gif came out horrible, watch the video instead ;p

Cool Also nice to see somebody else doing voxel characters!

 

[missile]

Spent all day yesterday working on art (yuck), so at the end of the day I threw in a day/night transition cycle into my game to get the taste of art out of my mouth. I put together a gif to showcase it to everyone and then realized that gifs really suck at showcasing smooth color blending via color lerping and it simply looked smoother in video(255 color pallets suck ><). If anyone'd like to see it properly in action, feel free to take a peek over here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5WWnjEfpP3k

I was just kidding about hating art btw, I just need a break from doing something I'm not good at for so long. Uggggh, the gif came out horrible, watch the video instead ;p

Oh, it's not so much the 256 color palettes, it's more an issue with almost
all gif tools in terms of color quantisation. To circumvent you better
quantize and dither your image slightly beforehand (in-game). This lessens the
burden for most of the color quantisation algorithms in such gif tools. I did
this with gifcam. If I want to have better gifs out of gifcam, I pre-quantize
in-engine and let gifcam just slightly touch the data which eliminated almost
all problems using gifcam in terms of color. What tool did you actually used
anyways?

 

[missile]

...

... left real time, right baked ...

Out of curiosity, how long did the baking took for this size/resolution?

 

[Mario]

Given the all the mobile devices with camera and mic it would be cool to
record next to all the inputs also the video and sound of the player while
testing the game on mobil. Hmm. Interesting.

Hmm... guess you could bring all those costs down to around $0 if you:

1. Look at the screen as the player plays through the game
2. Contrast actions taken with what you thought the average player would do
3. After the player's done, write your conclussions down
4. At the end of the day/showcase/event look at your notes and see if there's anything that'd need fixing based on any discrepancies between the gameplay experience you had expected in theory and how playtesters played it out in practice

We managed to set everything up originally pretty cheap, with cheap web and IP cameras plus duct tape. Indeed, our camera setup hasn't really progressed much past that as it does the job.

In terms of how we run the formal tests, we generally test a given build of a game on 5 or 6 subjects, skewed towards people of the target demographic and but also a couple of people outside that. That's all you generally need to identify the top, most pressing usability issues in your game. If 3+ users had a problem with something, that's indicative of a widespread issue and should be approached as a priority. If only 1 out of the group has an issue, then that suggests there is room to improve something for others of their level of experience, skill, and/or genre knowledge.

Individual tests have a facilitator and 1 subject at a time usually. The facilitator stands and observes from behind, outside of the subjects gaze, asking the subject to "think aloud" about what they are doing, thinking, and feeling. A test will be kicked off giving the player a high level goal and letting the player go from there. The facilitator generally only steps back in to either remind people to think aloud, or to prompt them how to move forward if they are stuck for a while (at that point you've identified an issue and should move the test forward).

With tests being recorded, the development team can review the video at any time which is really useful to get a deeper understanding of the issue. We also stream tests in real time to intranet, so the dev team can sit in front of a large display or projector as a group and discuss what is going on live (at a suitable distance from the test).

We never run a test with someone that has played the game before as that corrupts their "purity" as a test subject.

Most formal tests across a group will result in a report with about 10-20 issues of varying impact, with our facilitator experts writing up potential solutions or otherwise providing some guidance. Most issues can actually generally be fixed pretty easily. Over time, the problems that come up will be less and less of an issue as you generally make things better and solve issues.

On subsequent tests, we make sure to verify our improvements and fixes have had the desired positive impact on previously identified issues.

You can do a lot of the above with just a notebook, either in formal tests or informally at events. Even a basic approach can yield meaningful improvements to just about any game.

 

[oxrock]

Oh, it's not so much the 256 color palettes, it's more an issue with almost
all gif tools in terms of color quantisation. To circumvent you better
quantize and dither your image slightly beforehand (in-game). This lessens the
burden for most of the color quantisation algorithms in such gif tools. I did
this with gifcam. If I want to have better gifs out of gifcam, I pre-quantize
in-engine and let gifcam just slightly touch the data which eliminated almost
all problems using gifcam in terms of color. What tool did you actually used
anyways?

Captured game play footage via Open Broadcast Software, then used GIMP's gap(gimp animation package) addon to convert mp4 frames into image layers. Then used GIMP to create an "optimized indexed color pallet" with dithering. Then I simply resized and exported as gif.

I would say that approach was an abysmal failure.

 

[Chronospherics]

...

TL;DR: In a nutshell, I'd suggest that you trust what players do, not what they say.

I wouldn't go that far. I think verbal feedback is incredibly valuable in illuminating their understanding of various elements of the game. However it's important to have that placed in context with behavioural observation - the actual gameplay.

The issue often is that players don't understand, what they don't understand. So they'll tell you they're perfectly happy with using the inventory system, but they didn't use it, or only used auto-equip.

In other instances however, the players feedback can be immensely valuable, particularly in understanding areas of the game where they say they had issues, or didn't understand what was happening. It would be unusual for a player to admit to not understanding something that showed a clear understanding of, and in general this still signals something has gone wrong with the manner the game communicates itself.

The questions are important too, asking players things like 'What did you have to do in the game?' is an incredibly valuable tool in accessing their core understanding. 'Is there anything you found confusing, or had difficulty understanding?'. This non-leading leading line of questioning (as in, you're never asking them things like 'did you find the inventory system confusing?') can help highlight issues the player felt they were experiencing, and assess their understanding.

In a full interview you can pursue that style questioning throughout the entire game, asking them about each component, and referencing that against their gameplay experience to highlight issues they might not have mentioned, and contextualise the issues they faced.

 

[missile]

We managed ...

Thx for the info!

Captured game play footage via Open Broadcast Software, then used GIMP's gap(gimp animation package) addon to convert mp4 frames into image layers. Then used GIMP to create an "optimized indexed color pallet" with dithering. Then I simply resized and exported as gif.

I would say that approach was an abysmal failure.

Why not capture with gifcam straight away or do you need the mp4 (video +
sound) file for something else? Problem is, recording in mp4 introduced some
further artifacts (compression blocks, depends) into the image making it even
harder for any gif tool.

 

[Mik2121]

Out of curiosity, how long did the baking took for this size/resolution?

Hard to remember but... like two minutes in total (compute, *think*, load and apply the maps, etc..)? It was pretty fast, since the quality wasn't Production.
I was doing it during a break at work so I left it rendering while I was grabbing some water and by the time I was back it was ready.

 

[missile]

^ Compute time, I mean. But couldn't be that long.

 

[NipplesAndToes23]

Another scene from the game, this time of the main character Jules watching TV in the living room.

Hahaha, Im glad it looks Seinfeld like, becuase that was our intention. The soundtrack is also going to be very seifeld like.

If I can I will upload the first mock ups with did of the game that actually used seinfeld characters I drew for an anime parody of the series (and thats one of the inspirations to make this game).

Why this shit look like Scott Pilgrim? Did the developers of that game release an engine?

 

[SeanNoonan]

So that's my game (Jack B. Nimble) up on Steam Greenlight!
I'd super appreciate any votes, spreading the word: http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=877705287

It seems crazy that I've just launched the iOS version and I'm onto the next one without any down time, but I feel like momentum is good with these types of things. I am actually quite happy with the greenlight page too, I might even mimic it in the website I build for release.

 

[JulianImp]

*snip*

Huh, I sort of wonder why you'd even spend so much time writing that post just to antagonize mine without adding anything to the conversation.

Chronospherics argued back that words do hold meaning, and that you've got to find the right type of non-leading questions, which was far more interesting to read than your "hurr durr oh yes, we use mind-reading devices for that!" posts meant just to patronize me.

 

[oxrock]

Thx for the info!



Why not capture with gifcam straight away or do you need the mp4 (video +
sound) file for something else? Problem is, recording in mp4 introduced some
further artifacts (compression blocks, depends) into the image making it even
harder for any gif tool.

I simply was unfamiliar with gifcam so I made it work with tools I knew about and had available. Looks like I'll be researching gifcam for future gif usage!

 

[missile]

^ Not that I want to advertise gifcam, for it comes with its own issues, but
it's simple enough and worth giving a try.

 

[Makai]

https://screentogif.codeplex.com

Best gif recorder I've used

 

[Darkstorne]

So that's my game (Jack B. Nimble) up on Steam Greenlight!
I'd super appreciate any votes, spreading the word: http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=877705287

It seems crazy that I've just launched the iOS version and I'm onto the next one without any down time, but I feel like momentum is good with these types of things. I am actually quite happy with the greenlight page too, I might even mimic it in the website I build for release.

Good luck =D Got my vote.

 

[NipplesAndToes23]

So just reading online tutorials and YouTube isn't working for me. I need some people to work with. I tried doing the online thing here before, but it didn't work out. Where are some places where I can find a lot of people around our age? I've been to colleges the past week, but they're about to be out of school and I need to get shit done throughout this month.

 

[electroflame]

Unity posted an update about the Unity forums hack: https://blogs.unity3d.com/2017/05/01/unity-forum-hack-update/

Sounds like no user passwords or emails were compromised. Might still be a good idea to change your Unity ID's password, though, especially if you used Collaborate or Cloud Build (just to make sure your projects are safe).

I'm thinking that Unity hadn't updated their Xenforo install in a while, and the "hackers" used one of the documented vulnerabilities that Xenforo regularly patches. The good news is that Xenforo uses pretty decent password hashing (PHPass) so passwords are likely still secure.

If anyone got any emails regarding the hack (some users received emails from the hackers) it looks like those were sent via the forum's mass-emailer, so it's a reasonable assumption that your email addresses are also secure (as they had to use the mass-emailer, and not send emails direct to your email address).

Overall, it looks like this was relatively harmless as far as forum hacks go. You should be safe, but it's never a bad idea to change your password and keep an eye on your account for a few weeks.

 

[oxrock]

So just reading online tutorials and YouTube isn't working for me. I need some people to work with. I tried doing the online thing here before, but it didn't work out. Where are some places where I can find a lot of people around our age? I've been to colleges the past week, but they're about to be out of school and I need to get shit done throughout this month.

What are you trying to get done exactly and why are you limiting yourself to people "our age"? Are you trying to learn stuff? If so, what?

 

[Minamu]

I saw that Unity has a video player asset you can place on objects, has anyone tried that? Is it new?

 

[JeffG]

I saw that Unity has a video player asset you can place on objects, has anyone tried that? Is it new?

They had a version before (for sure in ver 4), but back in the day it was only for the pro version. IIRC though it did go through a big update in one of the 5.x upgrades

 

[NipplesAndToes23]

What are you trying to get done exactly and why are you limiting yourself to people "our age"? Are you trying to learn stuff? If so, what?

Those are the most likely candidates who'd be interested in working with me. I've been going to these meetings all the time with people that are 50+ and none of them have interest in games and some are against it. I'm hoping I can learn with other people and eventually get a game made. If working alone isn't working then I need to work with other people.

 

[oxrock]

Those are the most likely candidates who'd be interested in working with me. I've been going to these meetings all the time with people that are 50+ and none of them have interest in games and some are against it. I'm hoping I can learn with other people and eventually get a game made. If working alone isn't working then I need to work with other people.

Have an engine in mind? Any relevant skills? Why not take one of the udemy courses that teaches you step by step? They have one of their $10 sales every few months and their courses can be pretty thorough. This thread had a lot of relevant udemy course picks: http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=1351720

Also, lookup gamejams in your area. That's something where game devs of all ability levels get together, team up and make something functional in a short period of time. Ludam Dare is taking place right now (biggest game jam) and a lot of the entries are open source. You can go play a game, if you like it and want to know how they did what they did, actually go and look at their project files and see for yourself.

 

[NipplesAndToes23]

Have an engine in mind? Any relevant skills? Why not take one of the udemy courses that teaches you step by step? They have one of their $10 sales every few months and their courses can be pretty thorough.

Also, lookup gamejams in your area. That's something where game devs of all ability levels get together, team up and make something functional in a short period of time. Ludam Dare is taking place right now (biggest game jam) and a lot of the entries are open source. You can go play a game, if you like it and want to know how they did what they did, actually go and look at their project files and see for yourself.

Well a while ago someone on here suggested I try Pico-8, so that's what I've been trying to learn lately. I've never been good at programming and I think Pico-8 technically doesn't use programming, but scripting languages are boring as fuck to me too. The only thing I feel I'm good at is writing and I mean writing narrative. I write stories and I know how to write game design documents, it's just that it seems next to impossible to get a job in it, so if I want to get the game dev experience I have to do it on my own.

I'll look up this gamejam thing you mentioned and udemy courses since they're so cheap. I was out earlier today and someone told me of a barcade in the next city so I'll have to go there, the only issue is I don't have a car so it'll be hard for me to travel at night considering the bus that takes me back to my town stops running at 5PM.

 

[shysaursoft]

Well a while ago someone on here suggested I try Pico-8

Have you tried things like Construct2 or Stencyl? Or even online offerings like Flowlab?

What kind of games are you trying to make? My recommendation is to start small, literally try making a Bricks/Arkanoid, or a Sokoban/Box Pushing, anything small and simple.

There are also alternatives like visual novel games that don't require any programming, they're made by basically writing scripts, like Ren'Py, so perhaps that'd be more up your alley?

Saying you want to 'make a game' is kinda like saying you 'want to be an artist', which is very vague, and encompasses such a massively broad field and subject, it doesn't really give anyone much to go on.

 

[NipplesAndToes23]

Have you tried things like Construct2 or Stencyl? Or even online offerings like Flowlab?

What kind of games are you trying to make? My recommendation is to start small, literally try making a Bricks/Arkanoid, or a Sokoban/Box Pushing, anything small and simple.

There are also alternatives like visual novel games that don't require any programming, they're made by basically writing scripts, like Ren'Py, so perhaps that'd be more up your alley?

Saying you want to 'make a game' is kinda like saying you 'want to be an artist', which is very vague, and encompasses such a massively broad field and subject, it doesn't really give anyone much to go on.

Ugh actually I have not tried Construct2 or Stencyl. I have tried Ren'py and Twine before, but yeah that little scripting language that still reminds me of programming is so damn boring to me. I have to force myself to do anything and that's not fun for me.

I was thinking about making a platformer on Pico-8.

 

[shysaursoft]

Ugh actually I have not tried Construct2 or Stencyl. I have tried Ren'py and Twine before, but yeah that little scripting language that still reminds me of programming is so damn boring to me. I have to force myself to do anything and that's not fun for me.

I was thinking about making a platformer on Pico-8.

I have no love for programming either, but Construct 2 is very simple I felt. I wanted to make a platformer with it, and I managed it somehow - there's more than enough help on the Scirra forums for getting the basics cobbled together.

Though to be honest, if you want to get into making games, you're going to have to at least learn some programming fundamentals. It doesn't matter if you find it boring, it's the kind of knowledge you should have, especially if you're interested in the narrative side because it'll help you communicate better with whoever has to do the programming in the end.

In a perfect world, no matter what part of game development you want to do, the best thing is to soak up as much knowledge as you can about *all* aspects of game development, even if it's just a very shallow understanding. It really does help in the long run.

It's the same way a movie director, does have a basic understanding of photography, audio design, special effects, even things like advertising and staffing. The good directors, anyway.

Beyond that, if you're only interested in narrative, what kind of narrative are you talking about? Just the game's plot? You say you know how to write game design, but that doesn't really say much - anyone can write what they think a game should be, but without an understanding of how a game is made, or what goes into programming one, it's not all that useful. I've got a friend who's written hundreds of game design documents over the last 10 years, and hasn't made a single game. That's because thinking up stuff to make is easy. Making it is harder, because that's where you have to make it real. There's no shortcut to that. Sure, you could get a pet programmer and pet artist and get them to make your dream a reality, but there's no shortage of people with game ideas. But if you can make a basic prototype to demonstrate your ideas and designs, even if the prototype isn't very good, then you're already leagues ahead of people who only have ideas.

I don't mean to sound like I'm coming down on your or anything. If something isn't fun, then yeah, it's not as much fun to do - you're left with a choice then, either power through it and hope something comes of it, or change direction and try to figure out what to do within your abilities. But you never know what you're capable of, until you actually try. I think a lot of people give up too easily, too early.

Sometimes you just gotta do it, if you want it to happen.

 

[missile]

... Beyond that, if you're only interested in narrative, what kind of narrative are you talking about? Just the game's plot? You say you know how to write game design, but that doesn't really say much - anyone can write what they think a game should be, but without an understanding of how a game is made, or what goes into programming one, it's not all that useful. I've got a friend who's written hundreds of game design documents over the last 10 years, and hasn't made a single game. That's because thinking up stuff to make is easy. Making it is harder, because that's where you have to make it real. There's no shortcut to that. Sure, you could get a pet programmer and pet artist and get them to make your dream a reality, but there's no shortage of people with game ideas. But if you can make a basic prototype to demonstrate your ideas and designs, even if the prototype isn't very good, then you're already leagues ahead of people who only have ideas. ...

Well said. People with ideas about games should go visit a doctor! xD

But yeah, I would also be interest what kind of narrative BP is talking about.

 

[fresquito]

Hi, I'm in the prototype stages for a game I'm doing on my own. It's my first game and I'd be interested in knowing what resources (free if possible) I have for sound fx. I'd be interested both in sound pools and easy enough programs to create/edit them. Thanks.

 

[missile]

Speaking of which, I'm also looking for someone who wants to work on a story
about a racing universe/sub-culture starting out with a little company
developing high-speed technology to transcend people's mind while racing fast
to experience that other side of yourself. I want to spawn a racing universe
out of it, but I'm currently undecided how to frame it in terms of a theme,
setting etc. and how to evolve a culture around it. I still have the idea of
the whole thing starting out being outlawish against the rules of a controlled
dystopian culture (drawing from cyberpunk elements) where you wanna just make
the day your way while racing with your friends having a thrilling ride through
the remains of what they call a city. This racing sub-culture should later get
promoted by the society as the culture evolves.

Speed up!

 

[Bollocks]

I want to procedurally generate a maze with UE4. Does UE4 optimize the rendering or do I need a 3rd party plugin like simplygon?

 

[VisceralBowl]

I want to procedurally generate a maze with UE4. Does UE4 optimize the rendering or do I need a 3rd party plugin like simplygon?

I mean that's pretty vague but as long as you optimize the pieces you use to construct it then I don't think you'd need that.

 

[MimiMe]

Speaking of which, I'm also looking for someone who wants to work on a story
about a racing universe/sub-culture starting out with a little company
developing high-speed technology to transcend people's mind while racing fast
to experience that other side of yourself. I want to spawn a racing universe
out of it, but I'm currently undecided how to frame it in terms of a theme,
setting etc. and how to evolve a culture around it. I still have the idea of
the whole thing starting out being outlawish against the rules of a controlled
dystopian culture (drawing from cyberpunk elements) where you wanna just make
the day your way while racing with your friends having a thrilling ride through
the remains of what they call a city. This racing sub-culture should later get
promoted by the society as the culture evolves.

Speed up!

I LOVE speedball2 on the Amiga500. Maybe you are racing for that kind of joy?
ice cream, ice cream

 

[oxrock]

Well a while ago someone on here suggested I try Pico-8, so that's what I've been trying to learn lately. I've never been good at programming and I think Pico-8 technically doesn't use programming, but scripting languages are boring as fuck to me too. The only thing I feel I'm good at is writing and I mean writing narrative. I write stories and I know how to write game design documents, it's just that it seems next to impossible to get a job in it, so if I want to get the game dev experience I have to do it on my own.

I'll look up this gamejam thing you mentioned and udemy courses since they're so cheap. I was out earlier today and someone told me of a barcade in the next city so I'll have to go there, the only issue is I don't have a car so it'll be hard for me to travel at night considering the bus that takes me back to my town stops running at 5PM.

I think it's unlikely in a very small team to JUST be working on narrative. But if you picked up pixel art skills, 3d modeling/animation, you'd have programmers tracking you down to work with you and perhaps you'd find that less boring to learn.

 

[missile]

I LOVE speedball2 on the Amiga500. Maybe you are racing for that kind of joy?
ice cream, ice cream

Hey thx for bringing that up! Loved that game to death back in the days but
have forgotten about it (kinda). Yeah, that kind of joy sorta. I also love the
graphics/art style. I can imagine drawing some cockpits that way.

 

[Mario]

Huh, I sort of wonder why you'd even spend so much time writing that post just to antagonize mine without adding anything to the conversation.

Huh? I wrote that post to expand on how we do usability testing for those that might be interested so they can improve their own approach where they see the opportunity, not to slight your post in any way.

Chronospherics argued back that words do hold meaning, and that you've got to find the right type of non-leading questions, which was far more interesting to read than your "hurr durr oh yes, we use mind-reading devices for that!" posts meant just to patronize me.

Think you need to read my post again without making the very incorrect assumption that I was trying to patronize you.


Edit: bonus talk I did on getting started with usability testing in 2012 for your viewing pleasure https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o0MMbrYkfU4

 

[SpacePirate Ridley]

Why this shit look like Scott Pilgrim? Did the developers of that game release an engine?

Is Unity. No we are not using the engine of scott pilgrim (I think they didnt use unity)
Our pixel artist always thinks he will never be as good as Paul Robertson so its good knowing that people are actually thinking it could have been done by him lol.
He worked before on Gods Will be Watching.

So that's my game (Jack B. Nimble) up on Steam Greenlight!
I'd super appreciate any votes, spreading the word: http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=877705287

It seems crazy that I've just launched the iOS version and I'm onto the next one without any down time, but I feel like momentum is good with these types of things. I am actually quite happy with the greenlight page too, I might even mimic it in the website I build for release.

And voted!
Its a pity that no matter how good your runner is (and its freaking good) you are going to get a lot of downvotes becuase its a runner coming from mobile (it happened to our first game).
But hope you can get it fast into greenlight, good luck!

Speaking of which, I'm also looking for someone who wants to work on a story
about a racing universe/sub-culture starting out with a little company
developing high-speed technology to transcend people's mind while racing fast
to experience that other side of yourself. I want to spawn a racing universe
out of it, but I'm currently undecided how to frame it in terms of a theme,
setting etc. and how to evolve a culture around it. I still have the idea of
the whole thing starting out being outlawish against the rules of a controlled
dystopian culture (drawing from cyberpunk elements) where you wanna just make
the day your way while racing with your friends having a thrilling ride through
the remains of what they call a city. This racing sub-culture should later get
promoted by the society as the culture evolves.

Speed up!

Looking good missile!

 

[shysaursoft]

Hi, I'm in the prototype stages for a game I'm doing on my own. It's my first game and I'd be interested in knowing what resources (free if possible) I have for sound fx. I'd be interested both in sound pools and easy enough programs to create/edit them. Thanks.

For editing sound files, Audacity is free and pretty solid.

Depending on what kind of game you're making, Bfxr is a great website for making retro-style sounds using waveforms.

If you're looking for royalty free sound effects, there's https://gamesounds.xyz/ which includes the massive GDC audio bundles and Game Audio Monthly bundles. It is an insanely huge, and professional collection of sfx.

 

[fresquito]

For editing sound files, Audacity is free and pretty solid.

Depending on what kind of game you're making, Bfxr is a great website for making retro-style sounds using waveforms.

If you're looking for royalty free sound effects, there's https://gamesounds.xyz/ which includes the massive GDC audio bundles and Game Audio Monthly bundles. It is an insanely huge, and professional collection of sfx.

Thank you!

 

[HandsomeCharles]

Hey folks!

So, I've been a bit absent for a while (I'm sure you all noticed... ) so I want to check-in and let you know what's been happening!

In short, I've been looking for a new job since the start of the year. This took up a lot of my time and added a load of stress, so my game got popped on the back-burner. (Where it will stay for a little while longer.) The good news is, I managed to land a new gig! I'm going to be moving into the exciting world of AAA!

Just out of my own policy, I won't publicly say exactly where I'm going (Though if anyone is interested feel free to ask privately.) but seeing as I have now finished an absolutely amazing job at my old studio, I though you guys might like to know a bit about that and the projects I worked on!

So, for the past 4 years I had been working an Ninja Kiwi Europe, working as a Generalist Coder on various games for iOS and Android! The games I worked on (in chronological order of when I personally started on them) were:

• SAS Zombie Assault 4
• Bloons: Monkey City
• Bloons Super Monkey 2
• Bloons TD 5
• Bloons TD Battles

I had a real blast working on these. It let me get involved in a whole range of aspects of game dev. There was some AI, gameplay programming, back-end, networking and then platform specific stuff dealing with storefronts and account systems. There have been some real challenges and struggles but at the end of it all it has left me with some great memories and projects that I can really be proud of!

Obviously, I'm still bound by NDAs and such, but if anyone has any general questions about my experiences in the industry, Mobile dev, or just about things that I did on any of these projects then feel free to give me a shout

As for my own game, I'm hoping to get back up and running with that once I've settled into the new place. Maybe in a month or two.

Keep up the good work everyone

 

[LordRaptor]

I've poured a shockingly unhealthy amount of time into Bloons TD5 across Kongregate and Android

 

[HandsomeCharles]

I've poured a shockingly unhealthy amount of time into Bloons TD5 across Kongregate and Android

Thank you for keeping me employed

 

[Kyuur]

For all of those folks out there bad at art like me, have any of you used character creators and the like to get a general image of what you have in your head "on paper", either from other games or professional software types? Or do you generally just build up reference images, descriptions before passing off to an artist-type for rendition? Or maybe just worked on getting a serviceable sketch of some sort despite your lack of artistic capabilities. Would love to hear how others approach this problem!

Hey folks!

Didn't know the guys who made the Bloons games jumped to mobile! That's awesome, really enjoyed those games back in the day.