Monday, March 31, 2008

Nervous Breakdown

Ok, so after several panic attacks and realizing I was finally out of time to come up with some super awesome idea, I had to give in to a less than stellar idea for my next game. I don't hate it, and I think that as I keep developing the game and working on it, it could become good, but I am just not super into it. Unfortunately I only have one week left to make it, and considering I have to be out of town this weekend to attend to some other commitments, I am feeling the pressure. I only hope I can pull something together. Right now the user plays as Death and has to collect souls. I feel like I could maybe introduce some interesting elements, but first I have to come up with some and then I would have to code them...so basically I have my fingers crossed but I am not hoping for too much. The game is grey scale which is what I had wanted to do all along, however, I had originally wanted a much different higher contrast look than what I have so far. We shall have to see where it goes. If I come out of the next three weeks (which=hell) AND I have a working game...well I really can't ask for more than that at this point. Right now...I need to get at least a little sleep so I can work hard on it tomorrow.

Monday, March 24, 2008

The Night of Bush Capturing: A Virtual Jihadi

Well first of all, how lame of the city to cite a code violation as an excuse to shut down the show. Did they think anyone would buy that? I mean, come on, really? I can see, however, how the game could seem threatening to some. I mean, lets be honest, there are definitely people out there who would think that the game was encouraging suicide bombings and assassination attempts on Bush, and should some people actually be moved to undertake such tasks, it certainly wouldn't be good. And technically, if something is viewed as presenting "clear and present danger" then according to some supreme court case I can't remember it isn't protected as free speech. That being said, it might be a hard case for the city to prove. Not to mention time and resource consuming, hence the cop out with the code violation. All in all this could be a bit of a sticky subject especially since it's already sensitive subject matter. If it's seen as trying to recruit suicide bombers to the cause of offing Bush than I think that the city has a right to shut it down, but since it is really trying to "bring attention to the vulnerability of Iraqi civilians to the travesties of the current war and racist generalizations and stereotypes as exhibited in games such as Quest for Saddam; along with vulnerability to recruitment by violent groups like Al Qaeda because of the U.S.'s failed strategy in securing Iraq," as well as shedding "light on groups that traffic in crass and hateful stereotypes of Arab culture with games like Quest for Saddam and other media" then it is really a shame that it was shut down. Again...sticky situation. That pretty much sums it up.

In other news, I can't think of a good game idea (big surprise, right? not really AT ALL!). I have one that involves a polar bear and ice chunks and rising water, but I don't know what level 2 would be, I am not totally in love with the idea, and I am not thrilled to try to animate a polar bear. SO basically I am still trying frantically to come up with something. Hopefully some random inspiration strikes me before 9:00 am tomorrow when I have class.

Tuesday, March 18, 2008

Project 2

Well, as usual inspiration escapes me and I have no idea what to do for my next game. Story of my life really. Whatever, I will update when I get some sort of fantastic idea or something.

Game swf file

Ok so here's my finished game, Banana Rescue. Save the bananas and have fun!






Monday, March 3, 2008

BANANA RESCUE

So I came across some random inspiration thanks to a chance encounter with a news article about bananas and a comment from a girl on my vb team. With my new idea I made progress and am really pleased with my graphics and overall game design (which was a fair amount of work considering I had to start from scratch), but I found that I still don't really know enough to code my own game from scratch. Therefore my game is extremely similar in function to the example. It took longer than I anticipated for me to sort through all the scripting and figure out what goes with what and how it all works, but I am proud to say that I managed to figure out almost all of it on my own and with some help from Tracy got my game up and running. Unfortunately I was unable to successfully add in a new element that would make the game harder and more interesting to play. I am planning on coming in early to ask for help because I know that I am just missing something small and I know which area the error is in, I just can't figure out how to fix it. I was hoping to form my game around the example from class and once I had it working to make adjustments and changes from there to make it my own. Due to time and a not working section of collision detection I haven't quite reached that goal yet. I also thought about adding more levels, but for only having 2 weeks to create full functional game from scratch that was kinda asking for too much. So as it stands I have one almost perfectly functioning level, a load screen, title page, instruction page, and credits page and I feel pretty good about my game. It's kinda silly, kinda educational, and sends an environmental message that isn't too blatantly obvious or in your face (at least I don't think so). Anyway, I am starting to ramble and it's late and I have to go catch a bus and get up early tomorrow so I guess that's it for now. YAY for Banana Rescue! (The name of my game)