Arsecast Episode 3

By: Tim

On: October 11th, 2006

Practically the best indie game podcast right now, because the rest of the competition just closed shop and disappeared.

You’ll hate listening to the programme if you make crap games and throw a tantrum when receiving constructive feedback. Others will enjoy the honesty, something most indie game sites lack.

(Photo stolen blatantly from oddbob’s blog)

Posted in Community, Podcasts / Audio | Tags: GrahamGoring, TheArsecast

Shabadage

Well that’s wierd; in Lethal Judgement 3 there’s a BG (The cityscape) that I was going to use for the same purpose. It’s actually one of my favorite BG cityscape images I have.

Oh well. LJ3 is a fun game btw, a bit heavy in the DL size, but fun none the less.
NO!

We want a TIGSource Podcast!!1! Weeee
http://www.arsecast.com The Arsecast Host

If you do use it for the same purpose, I’ll rip the piss out of you as well. ;)

And I agree! TIGSource podcast! TIGSOURCE PODCAST!
Alan Gordon

I get bashed in here! To be fair, the points he makes are pretty valid, but some of us LIKE massive wars of attrition. Right? Right?
http://www.arsecast.com The Arsecast Host

Glad you took it better than some of the people last month, Alan. I sincerely believe there’s massive potential for a visceral zombie tactics game set in a city, but for me it’d have to have really tight level design and more strategy to it, like Laser Squad or X-Com. Oh man, imagine X-Com with zombies… *droooool*

Love the concept art, mind.
Alan Gordon

Just for the records, how dare you insult my awesum gaem I worked hard on it so i am better than you etc etc etc.
http://www.arsecast.com The Arsecast Host

Righty, that’s it! *removes gloves*

I think that attrition is fine in games as long as you don’t have to deal with fiddliness, too. Like if you could have some of the units automatically try and acquire ground and automatically replenish themselves if their clogs got popped, etc. It’s just your game almost feels like an RTS with the essential RT bit missing, which just adds fiddly tedium (for me, anyhoo). It’s kinda’ like it falls between the two stools of real-time and turn-based games.
Alan Gordon

Hmm….

How do you think it would affect the issues you address if you had the option to:
-Chart multi-turn paths for units, which they would follow automatically each turn until they reached the end?
-Set soldiers (and possibly other units) to ‘guard’ mode, where they stand still, automatically attacking the strongest adjacent zombie each turn?

I ask this because I am considering submitting this to the IGF Student Showcase Competition, and need to get it as good as I can before then.
http://www.arsecast.com The Arsecast Host

Hmm, I think the main problem with charting turns is that it’s reliant on knowing what the zombies are going to do which again would require them to have very predictable behaviour (not that that’s bad as long as there are multiple elements which create emergent situations) OR the units would still require a degree of autonomy like the auto-defending soldiers. What I think you need for your game if you want to have large crowds of units and single-hit kills is have the zombies move in a manner which makes sense. Have them reliant on line-of-sight (although they’d share information with any other zombies they could see), or smell (this could be simplified to a kind of radar if you’re within X units). I just think that at the moment your game is almost on the level of cellular automata rather than a game as everything is so simple in it’s patterns.
Ryan A

Neat podcast, but I had to rewind a few times because the Arsecast Host talks extremely fast and in a (British?) accent.

Awesome though, I went back and listened to previous episodes. Keep up the good work. :)
http://www.arsecast.com The Arsecast Host

Ta! I talk in a British accent?! I shall have to curb that disgraceful behaviour IM-MEDIATELY! ;)