Hello World... Slow Down a Bit!

  Happy Anniversary

  It's been one year since starting this game development blog.  Well, more like 3 months of game development and 9 months of playing other people's games.  They're just so fun though.  I've started, scrapped and restarted several projects, read several books and saved many scripts and graphics.  I definitely have all the tools of making a game here, just not the time. 

  Time will be in even shorter supply soon.  There's lots of good games coming out soon (Not Skyrim) and I have a backlog to complete.  I keep writing down notes for my games;  I'll see a wall or a series of enemies and think how or why it would be good there or in my own game.

  For the most part, I plan on slowing the blog down.  Weekly updates were ok when I was working every week, but since so much of my game work is theory and planning now there's no point on bringing people up to date on that.  Secondly, no one needs to read about my weekly gaming habits since I often obsess over single games... playing them non-stop for entire weeks.  Also:  Seeing other peoples projects is discouraging for me.  While it's not hard to guess what sort of code they are using (I'm really good at that), the fact that they finished is hurting me.  Some quote:  There's never enough time to get things done perfectly, but there's virtually unlimited time to fix things.  I need to produce... anything;  And then fix it.

  So, for now I'm just going to slow down.  Bi-Monthly updates for start.  I still need a spriter to help me with work, but I finally have general character designs and style.

Project Summary

  For the most part, here are the games I'm still working on:

1.  Jargon Quest:  Name Pending: I've dumped most of my resources in to this.  I wanted to make the definitive Zelda 2:  Adventure of Link homage game.  Downward thrust has been sorely neglected.  Add a few lasers, bombs and destructible terrain and you really got something.  Imagine if during the random battles you could play a field mini-game after you win if you wanted to.

2.  RPS:  Rock, Paper, Scissors:  The Adventure Game.  This is my action platformer.  I use basically the same physics as my big projects, but level design is linear instead of world based, no permanent items, stage clearing and so on. 

3.  Cytomight:  My gooey colour matching adventure.  Was originally put on hold because I couldn't get a good wiggle / wobble effect working.  The artwork for Cytomight and the Cytoplasmas became the artwork for the "pl0x" in my big project.  Some of the organic artwork (which was based on Breath of Fire 2) was also copied over.

4.  Monsters Game:  Name Pending:  This is my oldest project, and the one I MOST should get done.  This was a turn based strategy game where you place AI tiles to control your monsters who work under fixed plans and assumptions.  A "goblin" for example, might have the AI to only move 1 step forward, turn and attack when adjacent to an enemy, and keep walking.  You would summon creatures, spells and field effects to win the fights.  Walls and arrow tiles can be placed to control the flow of monsters.  Virtually no physics... it's all math and graphics.

5. Other:  I don't remember any of my other projects exactly.  Maybe I should read my own blog and regain focus.


Gaming Summary

  Steam backlog, Wii backlog, Minecraft, Terraria update coming soon, La-Mulana Wii coming soon, CounterStrike: Global Offensive coming soon-ish, GeneForge collection and maybe some NetHack on the side.  It could take 6 months of power gaming to finish my full collection... and that's assuming I don't replay some NES / SNES classics at the time.

Other Summary

  Still on prescription topical pain relievers (Voltaren).  It's like the Chinese Food of medicine, very satisfying for a while, but you're only gonna hurt in like an hour.

  The next post should be the Saturday of the first week of December, where I'll start the bi-monthly format.  I want to avoid these terrible "non-updates".

  Bug me on the forums some time.  I need focus, inspiration, and resolution.

Year + 1, Lok

Non-Update

  Some minor script writing and set piece ideas, but not a lot of work.  Also, man this week went by fast... I didn't even notice.

  Disappointing to potential readers, I'm sure, but I'm gaining focus.

Current Projects

  A few minor doodles and a wad of puns.  Ideas are starting to really link together now into a proper visual narrative.  Now to only CODE SOMETHING!!!!

Gaming

  Team building for Dragon Quest Monsters Joker 2.  I'm obsessive, and over the wrong things.

Other

  Minor unimportant health problems.  Also Stargate SG-1 and Buffy: The Vampire Slayer marathon.

Time, Lok

Non-Update

  Is it Saturday already?  It feels like I just took a nap or something and it's a week later.

  No work done due to mysterious time loss, possible alien abduction although the odds of that are nil.

Projects

  Concept design for enemies, but not much.  I feel like this week lasted only 1 day and I don't know how that happened

Gaming

  I might have played some Dungeon Defenders, but I'm not sure.


Other

  Twilight zone me, bro!

Sleeeeep, Lok

Doodle Doodle Doodle

  Still no scripting this week.  Everything was art related.

  I want to describe what I'm working on more, but the little scripting I did do was not in engine, it was done on paper.

Current Projects

  Took about 3/4 of my resources from RPS and am making a more unified story in the form of "Jargon Quest", a hopefully humourous deconstruction of MMO concepts.  Took a lot of my monsters from my monsters game and the combat engine from Cytomight.  100% artwork related stuff

Other Projects

  Still hopeless as far as music is concerned.

Gaming

  Wall to wall Dragon Quest Monsters Joker 2.  I'm done all the post-game content so I'm basically just my 5 tournament fights a day and that's it.  I'm also in the "B's" in my backlog, so we're getting there.


Other

  I've been suffering a painful legs injury all week and my back aches...  pizza made it feel better for some reason.

Pl0x, Lok

Amendment:   I'm not going to lie.  My biggest problem with this project is my lack of good work ethic... 

Regular Small Time Stuff

  Mostly artwork still.  I'm getting more images in my head about what I want, what kind of style I need and so on.  I'm still not clocking as many hours as I'd like to though... In fact, I only clocked about 1 hour this week when a year ago I was doing 8 hours a day.

  It's not that I'm not motivated, I'm just incorrectly motivated.  When I get the mojo going I end up doing something with a higher skill cap than scripting... 

Current Projects

Mostly art for everything.  I still need help converting paper art into computer art... I lack good tutorials, help, school, friends, or anything really.  I got everything from people to snails to birds to rocks to trees.  I've really developed a style I can use.

Other Projects

Same as above


Gaming

  A fair bit of League of Legends.  Really liking Cassiopeia.  Also unwrapped Wii Fit, which I've had for like a year.  The games on there are pretty fun actually.

  Mostly Dragon Quest Monsters Joker 2.  This is what Pokemon should be... well, the first area "Treepidation" at least.  The later areas become more and more zone clearing over the inter-monster relations you see at the beginning.  It was fun seeing sabrecubs chasing slimes, in turn being chased by headhunters... with the Wormonger chasing everyone.

Other

  Everyone else here has a cold so it's only a matter of time before it hits me.  Also, my leg REALLY hurts in the morning.  Also hurts all day, but mostly in the morning.  Doctor says it's not arthritis and prescribed me some Voltaren... IT DOES NOTHING.

  I've also reached my half-way weight benchmark.  I lost 40LB's since starting this blog.

Scribble, Lok

Birthday Post

  Non-stop drawing all day.  Lots of chump work got finished too, so yay.

Also non-stop McDonalds... I'm gonna be sick tomorrow!

Small Work, Small Time

  Did a few minor room changes, but really... almost nothing.

  Just been very busy... playing other peoples games!

Current Projects

Minor engine changes.  I still mostly need sprites, but  I'm taking the art in a new direction.

Other Projects

Nothing

Gaming

Dragon Quest Monsters Joker 2, The Binding of Isaac and Mount & Blade: Warband.  Also Xotic.  They're all pretty good, but they sucked all my time away like a big time vampire conglomerate.

Other

I don't like animals, but somehow I got tricked into going to a dog show today.... blah

It's also my birthday in 2 days, I think I'll gift myself some development time and just work work work work

Work, Lok.