Posted by dessgeega
Tue, 25 Jul 2006 23:12:00 GMT
my friend andrew gray recently had the chance to talk to introversion about defcon, their upcoming nuclear holocaust simulator. the result is a four-page spread in pc power play magazine.
“I think the stylized graphics of our games has become one of our trademarks,” chris delay told andy. “Making games with unique art styles like Darwinia and DEFCON also has a big advantage: your game instantly stands out from the crowd and can be recognized from a single screenshot….Some companies spend millions of dollars trying to get that exact effect by making their games extremely realistic – but there’s only so far you can go with that.”
speaking of darwinia, they spoke about darwinia: ”...the second demo took us four months to create – all for just one level with about an hour’s gameplay!” defcon will be closer to uplink in that it won’t rely on stage-based gameplay and scripted events. in fact, it won’t have a single-player mode at all, though ai opponents will be available.
the game sounds pretty swell – installations reveal themselves when they fire on enemy installations, after which point you can expect retaliatory fire to obliterate you. everybody loses, “you just have to make sure you lose the least!”
there’s more, including more info about the game’s unit types than you need to know before the game is released, and you can read it yourself in the september issue of pc power play, currently on newstands – in australia and new zealand.
Posted in Strategy, Previews | Tags Introversion | 14 comments
Posted by Tim
Sat, 22 Jul 2006 11:29:00 GMT
Does look like Invader, doesn’t it? Though both are charming in their own ways.
Poyo is a platformer consisting of fifty levels, which was created by Lazrael in under one month using Game Maker. Consider this: the only actions available to the titular character are walking, jumping and warping. Yet it will still stump a few players especially in later stages.
Warping is an essential skill to master, and most of the puzzles involve pulling off a succession of moves correctly.
Cave Story. Within a Deep Forest. Eternal Daughter. Poyo comes pretty close to joining this elite circle. Perhaps the author’s next attempt?
Other works include Pozzo – Jello Crusade and Flapper.
Posted in Highly Recommended, Freeware, Platformers, Windows | Tags Lazrael | 11 comments
Posted by Derek Yu
Fri, 21 Jul 2006 03:40:00 GMT
“Welcome to the Galloping Ghost Productions website. Check out our two explosive one-on-one fighting games that are currently in production! We are working hard to make them video games experiences that will be innovative and packed with fast-paced fighting action! We always want to hear from gamers around the world so feel free to contact us.”
Prediction: Best Games of 2006 (2007?). A bold statement, I know. But I’ve never been more sure of anything in my life.
(Source: Insert Credit forums… and Satan)
Posted in Previews, Fighters | 11 comments
Posted by Derek Yu
Thu, 20 Jul 2006 15:30:00 GMT
Behemoth, the company that made Alien Hominid (and was founded by Newgrounds creator Tom Fulp), has put up an official site for Castle Crashers, their second game. It’s a 4-player sidescrolling beat-em-up in a medieval setting. You could say that as Alien Hominid was to Metal Slug, Castle Crashers is to Knights of the Round. Or maybe Capcom’s D&D arcade games.
I had a chance to play the game briefly last year at San Diego Comicon and it was pretty fun (although buggy as hell at the time). I’m looking forward to playing it again at SDCC this year to see how things have progressed.
What do you guys think of the graphics? I’ve always like Dan Paladin’s work with Flash, but I was hoping that his console stuff would be a little more “polished.” To me, this still looks like a Flash game, albeit a very, VERY nice one.
EDIT: As far as I know, the game has been confirmed for XBox Live Arcade in 2007 but nowhere else right now.
Posted in Previews, Xbox 360, Action / Arcade | Tags TheBehemoth | 12 comments
Posted by Tim
Wed, 19 Jul 2006 13:49:00 GMT
Certain indie game developers enjoy a challenge, for example limiting themselves in terms of development time (e.g. LudumDare) or working with a single theme (Monthly AGS Contest). They are then often critized for attempting incomplete, unplayable or buggy entries.
So it’s not surprising that games like Invisible Vision or Illegal Communication will be ignored by most. And only because they don’t look appealing at all from the screenshots. Style don’t get you points like they used to, back when the early video game consoles were popular.
This particular experiment from cactus is a love hate relationship, as evident from the following forum topic. I assume that most people will not enjoy playing it as well, which is a shame since the reward will only be revealed near the end. No instructions were provided, leaving you to discover or solve puzzles by trial and error.
Try it for yourself. If you dislike it, then there are always other quality indie games. Though there’s not many like Illegal Communication, that’s for sure. Except for CyberSpace Assault, perhaps.
Proceed with a clean mouse. What else can I say, a brilliant but misunderstood game.
Posted in Puzzle, Windows, Freeware, Platformers, Action / Arcade | Tags cactus | 28 comments
Posted by Brien
Tue, 18 Jul 2006 19:00:00 GMT
The Blob is a game about painting a city with a rolling, growing ball of paint. It reminds me of (here it comes) Katamari Damacy and to a lesser extent of Mario Sunshine. I can’t believe I just wrote that. You must be sick of inane Katamari comparisons. Every single game with a rolling or growing character, someone’s gotta mention KD.
Right, so now that’s out of the way. I have a lot of good things to say about The Blob. The physics are handled by ODE, graphics by Ogre; both are employed beautifully. Every corner of the game is pretty and sparkling with polish. I really like the pixel shader work as the buildings are repainted. The jiggling paint ball feels right and is intuitively controlled with just the mouse. What else? Oh yes, it’s fun.
My main problem with it is that it weighs in at a prohibitive 97 MB. There’s also only one level and little reward for completing it but they explain themselves:
“The game was a school project for an outside client. The station area of the city of Utrecht in The Netherlands is getting a thorough face-lift, as the station and many buildings around it are being rebuilt. Our task was to make a game that plays in the station area as it will be ten years from now, so that while playing, the audience is informed about what is going to happen. The game was to be played in a centre with information about the changes, but also be downloadable for players at home. This means the main target audience will walk by, play for a few minutes, and then walk on, but it should also be fun for people who download the game.”
I say it’s worth it. So download (97 MB) it. Or go to their project page on gamedev.net to read more, to download the Dutch version, and leave the team feedback.
Posted in Action / Arcade, Windows, Freeware | 9 comments
Posted by Derek Yu
Tue, 18 Jul 2006 02:07:00 GMT
“An experimental shoot-em-up. An experimental shooter with minimal art assets. Use your different weapons to destroy the waves of ships. The longer you last, the harder it gets. 20 stages in total, each 1 minute long. If you die you lose your score and retreat one stage. Enemy ship configurations are partially random.”
From the creator of Fleafall comes this lil’ mini-shooter. Although at first glance it seems quite simple, you’ll soon realize that you can’t just hold down the fire button(s). Enemies can set up shields to block your shots and sometimes won’t put down their guard unless you ease up on the firepower. I still don’t think I’ve quite figured out what’s going on exactly.
Negatives: the controls feel a bit floaty to me, and it can get quite annoying trying to get past those damn shields after a while.
Posted in Freeware, Shoot-em-ups, Windows | 1 comment
Posted by Derek Yu
Fri, 14 Jul 2006 03:26:00 GMT
The Texas Independent Games Conference is coming up. Keynote speakers are Greg “Costik” Costikyan (reminds me to go check up on Manifesto Games) and Warren “The Spectre” Spector.
I’ll be honest, by way of topics for the conference, nothing aside from “how to secure funding for my ideas” sounds particularly appealing to me. Check it out:
“Where is the industry heading?”
“What’s the future of casual games?”
Is there really any use in analyzing these useless market trends? I don’t know, it seems like better time could be spent being creative. “Oh shit, all signs are pointing to space shooters not being popular next year… I’d better switch gears and do a Chip’s Challenge clone.” Shite.
Here’s a good one:
“Where are the best opportunities?”
My answer: the best opportunities are where no one else is looking, and that’s probably far, far away from these types of gatherings.
Sorry. I really do appreciate the effort to get indie developer’s together and talking, but between examining the future of the industry and pointing fingers at the mainstream industry we’re not leaving much time for actually making some cool games.
Posted in Community | 7 comments
Posted by Derek Yu
Fri, 14 Jul 2006 03:14:00 GMT
Bug-crushing, polishing, what’s next, and a really cool video of some of the special effects from the “ghost-hacking” portion of Mr. Robot. All this and more in the latest development diary from our friends at Moonpod!
Posted in Platformers, Previews | Tags Moonpod | 1 comment
Posted by Albert Lai
Tue, 11 Jul 2006 10:29:00 GMT
Now, we’ve seen a few gems these past few days. To quote Derek:
Cortex Command is what I would call a … “gem.”;
Some of you might ask yourself, “What is left? How can I complete my line of
two begging to be destroyed in a fashion that Popcap games has cloned more times
than Hitler?"
Well,
ask no more! Lyle in
Cube Sector is a nifty game that should follow up nicely for fans of Metroid
and Cave Story. Lyle, you see, is an average boy of dark skin with neon green
hair, and has lost his kitten. To retrieve it, he has to go through all sort
of hijinks, throwing blocks, kicking blocks, jumping by throwing blocks while
in mid-air, and so on. All in the name of finding his cat again.
What a nice
boy.
Posted in Windows, Freeware, Platformers, Highly Recommended | 16 comments
