Possible new behaviors for our "Cage" game (or also known as "Zomb--"...er...the "Common Cold")
Blue ball can only stay within this territory or zone on the map.
When red ball hits blue ball, blue ball changes to red, and has the same attributes (movement, etc.) as red ball.
When blue ball hits a specific wall (or object), blue ball dies, but red ball doesn't.
Red ball runs away from blue ball if it sees blue ball.
Reds will group together when they see each other.
Blue ball will run away from other blue balls, but chase down reds if seen.
Monday, February 9, 2009
Friday, February 6, 2009
Triachnid Review
In an internet full of random and silly games to play online, one of the few that stand out to me and make me want to play on and on is Triachnid!
Originally found on NewGrounds: www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/347467
Design and Programming - Florian Himsl
Graphics and Design - Edmund McMillen
Music - Tin Hat Trio
Sound Effects - Anders Gustafsson
Slight graphic violence.
The game starts out with a few simple, yet well produced images, showing a "family" of three-legged spider-like creatures (triachnids). A giant worm eats up the female-looking triachnid, who drops the egg-sac she's carrying. The male triachnid tries attacking, but in vain. The worm disappears, leaving the triachnid alone.
This is where you start: A heart-broken triachnid searching for "his" offspring, and seeking revenge for his murdered...wife?
The game play is a little shaky at first, you use the mouse to drag around his legs to make him move around. The best way to move is as if he is a pinwheel--legs flailing in a smooth circular circular motion.
You can also spin weblines; grab various things from your eggsac, enemies, and your weblines; hold your breath underwater; and hold things in your mouth (like your eggsac or eating enemies).
A good review of the instructions and playing around on the first level are recommended.
Good use of a web...while standing on the ground...
In essence, Triachnid is a sidescroller. Your objective is to get to the finish line of each level, and finding as many of your offspring as possible along the way. The levels progress in a way that you get used to different aspects of the game. New elements such as key-bugs used to unlock doors, swinging from your web, eating enemies for health, throwing items, moving efficiently underwater, saving your offspring, and using the environment are all combined on the last few levels when you travel inside the giant worm.
It is a short, but addictive game to play, and again (as Portal Flash) you want to start replaying it as soon as it is over. The soft and relaxing music adds a whole new layer to the game, and it makes me want to buy Tin Hat Trio's album. The triachnid also has a "vocabulary" that makes him easy to understand: Everything from a gruff growl when he grabs an enemy to an affectionate "purr" when he picks up his offspring.
Look, he's a pappa!
The graphics are very cartoony, but really uphold the atmosphere of the world of Triachnid. The background is blurred and what is closer is in more detail. Although, when you are travelling through the bowels of the worm, there are some arteries that are blurred to make it look like the screen is a few inches from them.
Overall, Triachnid is a very entertaining use of spare time. Also, the music is very soft and soothing, for those stressful days at work. The only thing of what I'd ask of in this game was an extended gameplay, so I can keep messing around with this character!
To the Creators:
Keep it up! I'm looking forward to number 2.
4.7/5!
Originally found on NewGrounds: www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/347467
Design and Programming - Florian Himsl
Graphics and Design - Edmund McMillen
Music - Tin Hat Trio
Sound Effects - Anders Gustafsson
Slight graphic violence.
The game starts out with a few simple, yet well produced images, showing a "family" of three-legged spider-like creatures (triachnids). A giant worm eats up the female-looking triachnid, who drops the egg-sac she's carrying. The male triachnid tries attacking, but in vain. The worm disappears, leaving the triachnid alone.
This is where you start: A heart-broken triachnid searching for "his" offspring, and seeking revenge for his murdered...wife?The game play is a little shaky at first, you use the mouse to drag around his legs to make him move around. The best way to move is as if he is a pinwheel--legs flailing in a smooth circular circular motion.
You can also spin weblines; grab various things from your eggsac, enemies, and your weblines; hold your breath underwater; and hold things in your mouth (like your eggsac or eating enemies).
A good review of the instructions and playing around on the first level are recommended.
Good use of a web...while standing on the ground...In essence, Triachnid is a sidescroller. Your objective is to get to the finish line of each level, and finding as many of your offspring as possible along the way. The levels progress in a way that you get used to different aspects of the game. New elements such as key-bugs used to unlock doors, swinging from your web, eating enemies for health, throwing items, moving efficiently underwater, saving your offspring, and using the environment are all combined on the last few levels when you travel inside the giant worm.
It is a short, but addictive game to play, and again (as Portal Flash) you want to start replaying it as soon as it is over. The soft and relaxing music adds a whole new layer to the game, and it makes me want to buy Tin Hat Trio's album. The triachnid also has a "vocabulary" that makes him easy to understand: Everything from a gruff growl when he grabs an enemy to an affectionate "purr" when he picks up his offspring.
Look, he's a pappa!
The graphics are very cartoony, but really uphold the atmosphere of the world of Triachnid. The background is blurred and what is closer is in more detail. Although, when you are travelling through the bowels of the worm, there are some arteries that are blurred to make it look like the screen is a few inches from them.
Overall, Triachnid is a very entertaining use of spare time. Also, the music is very soft and soothing, for those stressful days at work. The only thing of what I'd ask of in this game was an extended gameplay, so I can keep messing around with this character!
To the Creators:
Keep it up! I'm looking forward to number 2.
4.7/5!
Friday, January 30, 2009
Portal Review
Portal - The Flash Version
Available online, Adobe Flash required.
http://portal.wecreatestuff.com
This is a spin off based off of Valve's highly successful Portal game, available through The Orange Box for the XBox 360. Valve also created the Half-Life Saga.
Portal is all about getting from the entrance of a room, to the exit. Simple enough. Now add in portals, allowing teleporting from one place to another. Pretty sweet.
In the game, you use the portal gun that shoots yellow and blue portals. Once both colors are set up on walls, you can "walk" through yellow, and come out through blue; vice versa. Easy to use. Okay, now add in obstacles such as pits, moving platforms, un-portal-able walls, sentry bots, force fields of various types, cubes, buttons, switches, doors, electrified floors, and even Gravity. That's when it all gets complicated.
The game design is simple, almost sidescrolling--without the sidescroll. Its a concoction of platformer, advernture, and puzzle, and its "father" from the 360 also incorporated first person shooter to the list.
In the Flash version, everything from the 360 version is simplified into a nice package. Not too easy, not too difficult. Its easy to pick up online anytime you're on a computer. The levels progress at a good pace, slowly getting you adapted to the type of thinking that's used in solving the puzzles. Once you're ready, then it starts to escalate, quickly challenging even the most talented Portal-shooter.
Just like it's "father", the end of the game leaves you sputtering for more, so you go back and replay it again. The beauty of it, you can solve each room in a different way. If you're skilled enough, you can even use what is called "portal stepping."
I highly recommend this game, for newbies, as well as for experienced, 360-Portal veterans looking for a way to feed the Portal craving. This game is enjoyable even if you haven't played the "father", but I recommend playing both to get the full experience of the Portal idea. Join the cult.
Oh, and Portal: Still Alive for 360 is coming out soon.
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
DigiPen One
Game Development:
The Development Team of a game creates a game, and codes it so that it responds and looks the way they want it to. Development teams can have anywhere from 20-150 people all working on various aspects within a game, depending on the game's scope, game play, storyline, difficulty, and several other variables.
Each of these things will be run by different branches within the Development Family. Some of these are Directors, Game Designers, 2D/3D Artists, Game Testers, etc.
This huge industry has an ever-growing demand for all positions for creating a game. By 2009, it is projected that US employment for the gaming industry will grow from 145,000 to 250,000. Also, gaming technology is also leaking into other areas such as military and medicine.
The people that are coders are the driving force behind how a game reacts, how it feels, looks, and sounds. Everything from the game physics to the visuals for the background, is all because of coders. It is because of this branch that a 2D/3D character can go from standing there idly, to jumping into battle wielding an assault rifle with a chain-saw bayonet.
The Development Team of a game creates a game, and codes it so that it responds and looks the way they want it to. Development teams can have anywhere from 20-150 people all working on various aspects within a game, depending on the game's scope, game play, storyline, difficulty, and several other variables.
Each of these things will be run by different branches within the Development Family. Some of these are Directors, Game Designers, 2D/3D Artists, Game Testers, etc.
This huge industry has an ever-growing demand for all positions for creating a game. By 2009, it is projected that US employment for the gaming industry will grow from 145,000 to 250,000. Also, gaming technology is also leaking into other areas such as military and medicine.
The people that are coders are the driving force behind how a game reacts, how it feels, looks, and sounds. Everything from the game physics to the visuals for the background, is all because of coders. It is because of this branch that a 2D/3D character can go from standing there idly, to jumping into battle wielding an assault rifle with a chain-saw bayonet.
Tuesday, January 15, 2008
Temperature/WB, In Practice
This pic looks a smidgen too blue.
Was obtained from my teacher's blog:
http://itsaboutthelight.blogspot.com/
Now, the blue tint is gone, and it looks more natural. In the end, it all come down to individual preference to what looks better as a "balanced" picture.
Monday, January 14, 2008
White Balance 'n Temperature
White balance is a very widely used effect to get an even light color in photos. It used to be more complicated of a process, but now it can easily be adjusted on most digital cameras.
You can point a [digital] camera at a white or grey card so it fills the frame, then press the White Balance button or option. This card has to be reflecting the light produced in the room. This is how to manually set the WB on digital cameras, and it allows the camera to calculate what it needs to filter when it takes a picture in order to match the lighting.
Light has a temperature in photography; lower temperatures will be redder, higher temps will be bluer. The levels are around 17000K to 16000K (match light to full sunlight basically). Different lights like incandescent and "warmer", orange-er lights will do different things to the overall balance. Using orange and blue filters cancels out the different balances to make the overall photo a relatively "whiter".
You can point a [digital] camera at a white or grey card so it fills the frame, then press the White Balance button or option. This card has to be reflecting the light produced in the room. This is how to manually set the WB on digital cameras, and it allows the camera to calculate what it needs to filter when it takes a picture in order to match the lighting.
Light has a temperature in photography; lower temperatures will be redder, higher temps will be bluer. The levels are around 17000K to 16000K (match light to full sunlight basically). Different lights like incandescent and "warmer", orange-er lights will do different things to the overall balance. Using orange and blue filters cancels out the different balances to make the overall photo a relatively "whiter".
Wednesday, December 12, 2007
Photoshop CS2 Tutorials
Yesterday, I started using Photoshop to add a lightsaber into a picture I had taken during the weekend. Today, I'm looking for other tutorials online to do other effects.
This image is using photoshop to paint in colors and blur to create a lightsaber. Looking around today, I found it can be done easier than that. (See Mason's blog: )
This image is using this link as a tutorial: http://photoshopcs3tutorials.wordpress.com/2007/08/21/photoshop-cs2-tutorials-and-photoshop-cs3-tutorials-the-bourne-ultimatum-color-and-motion-blur-effect/
and makes a photo look like the Bourne Ultimatum posters.
It's using multiple layers, a different saturation, layer masking, motion blur, and noise.
Also,this one using the same techniques.
This image is using photoshop to paint in colors and blur to create a lightsaber. Looking around today, I found it can be done easier than that. (See Mason's blog: )
This image is using this link as a tutorial: http://photoshopcs3tutorials.wordpress.com/2007/08/21/photoshop-cs2-tutorials-and-photoshop-cs3-tutorials-the-bourne-ultimatum-color-and-motion-blur-effect/
and makes a photo look like the Bourne Ultimatum posters.
It's using multiple layers, a different saturation, layer masking, motion blur, and noise.
Also,this one using the same techniques.
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