Sheep O' Faith

Sheep O Faith - Proof Of Concept

Fri, 16 Mar 2012 17:12:20 -0400

Sheep O Faith - Proof Of Concept

All is (not so) quiet on the sheep game front...

Fri, 16 Mar 2012 17:10:07 -0400

You thought I’d abandoned it, didn’t you?!

Don’t worry I’ll forgive you; after all, it’s been a very loooooong time since the last update. There’s a very good reason for the break however. Y’see, I halted development after hearing all the talk regarding Gamemaker Studio being released ‘very soon’.

Well, let’s just say those folk over at YoYo Games were a little optimistic about their release schedule and ‘very soon’ turned into ‘rather a while’. Anyhoo, they’re back on track; this evening I downloaded the beta, and started playing…

Gamemaker For Mac Update

Fri, 02 Sep 2011 16:30:18 -0400

I’ve just opened GM4Mac to a brand new update in which big graphical speed improvements are promised.

“Huh…”, I say dismissively, “we’ll see about that…”

The update installs and I immediately open a prior project that has, thus far, chugged along like a 19th Century steam locomotive that’s run out of water. Skeptical as always, I run the game in full-screen mode with all the particle options ramped to the max.

First three levels go by with their usual flair and up springs the fourth; it’s this stage I’m interested in. It’s this baby that can kill CPUs and tear any GPU in half! I launch my projectile and await the ‘less-than-stellar’ 3 fps firework display as always…

… However, much to my amazement and extreme pleasure, it kicks out a solid stream of graphical fun at a stable 30 fps with no slowdown! Whooah! Well done GM4Mac team!

As soon as I’m done with S’o’F, I’ll be revisiting that project for sure.

It's an update!

Sun, 28 Aug 2011 15:23:00 -0400

So - to recap - everything developmentwise came to a halt around the end of spring as my day job began picking up pace. The project has sat on the shelf until quite recently when I’ve started adding a few ‘bits n pieces’ including a new level and connecting sequences between the “worlds”.

‘Sheepy’ has a name (finally) iiiiiiiit’s …. Baabara

Now all I need is a surname for her and we’ll be away ;-)

The upgrade to Lion from Snow Leopard went okay, so I’m now on 10.7. Huzzah! Had nice moment during the summer where someone who’d seen an early build of the game suddenly asked me, “Whatever happened to that sheep game you were doing? That looked pretty cool at the time…”

Which brings us up to date.

Ohhhhh, sooooo goooood!

Fri, 29 Jul 2011 18:24:00 -0400

Ohhhhh, sooooo goooood!

No Development News...

Tue, 26 Jul 2011 16:32:32 -0400

…as I’m currently working flat-out on half a dozen other projects all at once. Fear not! I haven’t abandoned lil’ sheepy - she’s just taking the summer off to relax in the meadow.

The real reason for this post is to point out that the (surely now ‘world famous’?) Humble Indie Bundle is back for a third (well…technically fourth) time. Grab your PayPal and GoogleCheckout accounts and get donating and downloading DRM-free games!

No news is ... er... good news?

Mon, 28 Feb 2011 12:31:31 -0500

So a really quick little update.

Firstly, lots going on at the moment outside of S’o’F, so there’s not really been a lot of time for in-depth development. Secondly, I’ve been mainly focusing on collision detection; it’s definitely where most of the glitches seem to be located in the game. I think it’ll involve an awfully large level of tweaking over the coming weeks, so that’ll slow down progression somewhat.

In terms of levels; done a couple more, but I’m totally junking one and starting again - it’s just too lazy and doesn’t feel structured enough to warrant further development.

Until next time…

…PEACE OUT!

"I think indie games are important because there seems to be an increasing feeling of stagnation in..."

Sat, 26 Feb 2011 13:23:29 -0500

““I think indie games are important because there seems to be an increasing feeling of stagnation in mainstream games. Although I’m not convinced that the mainstream doesn’t innovate, I think indie games are a fruitful avenue for innovation. I also think indie games are important because they democratize development. Games are creations and the lower the barriers to making them the better. I couldn’t design and make cars, buildings or practially anything else tangible on my own even if I had the skill, but I can make games on a small budget.””

- -Peter Stock, Armadillo Run (via emersonsmithdesigns)

Apple - Mac OS X Lion Server

Sat, 26 Feb 2011 13:23:14 -0500

Apple - Mac OS X Lion Server:

minimalmac:

Lion Server is now part of Mac OS X Lion. It’s easy to set up your Mac as a server and take advantage of the many services Lion Server has to offer.

Ooh, I almost missed this little tidbit. So, Mac OS X Server will no longer be a standalone product. I wonder if that also means that unlimited licensing will be part of the package at the same cost. If so, it’s a brilliant move.

(via Patrick Lenz)

Pariah Dev: Alright then. What's goin' on.

Sun, 13 Feb 2011 14:15:37 -0500

Pariah Dev: Alright then. What's goin' on.:

pariahdev:

Getting arrested now works with the mouse controls and takes you to a police station where you sleep for the night.

You can actually get arrested if you’re seen dealing by the police. (previously only when a test button was pressed)

Mouse control now works in all aspects, including getting…

Looks sooo good already!

YAY! You can never have enough Minter! oddbob: :D RT @llamasoft_ox: http://bit.ly/hbxQMg

Sun, 13 Feb 2011 14:11:26 -0500

YAY! You can never have enough Minter!

oddbob:

:D RT @llamasoft_ox: http://bit.ly/hbxQMg

Strange Days

Thu, 03 Feb 2011 12:04:32 -0500

Hmm… I’m in a very strange place in terms of development. I’ve been trying to stay away from the ‘sheep’ project as much as I can for a few weeks to give myself a bit of space; since the last posting I’ve only added a couple of levels and, although they’re rather more fiendish than I expected them to be, creation progress has been fairly sluggish.

Today I erased the last build off my hard disk (thanks AppZapper) and played the game from start to finish. To my surprise, I actually enjoyed the playthru quite a lot. I’d forgotten a few of the nice tricks I’d added here and there, and one level that totally stumped me for a couple of minutes - I genuinely thought, “Did I really complete the design for this level, or just forget to finish it half way through?”

Needless to say, I’m feeling more excited by the project than I was this time last week. The moral of the story? Taking a break is sometimes more productive than trying in vein to plow through…

wiiandthekid: Richard Perrin on storytelling in video games....

Thu, 03 Feb 2011 11:53:45 -0500

wiiandthekid:

Richard Perrin on storytelling in video games. Taken from the World of Love Conference.

A really interesting argument. I do agree that storytelling is a very important part of videogaming, however, I don’t think that Richard’s ethos necessarily looks at the whole over-arcing ideology behind the concept of ‘story’ and ‘storytelling’.

A picture paints a thousand words (or a minimum of a couple of thousand if my academic history is anything to go by) - effective storytelling can be done with a single sprite or an iconic sound sample. Games don’t need strict narrative (in the same way that film or television does) to make sense or to tell a good story. In fact, some of the worst games I’ve played involved elongated cut-scenes, FMV and animated intros that force storytelling onto me in a linear style. By contrast, some of the best games I’ve played have told stories with their ‘interactive’ character, sound and level design - not traditional ‘passive’ clunky game play narratives.

For example, a game like fl0W doesn’t necessarily build into a great ‘story’ per se, but it does have a strong storyline, if you get what I mean?!

fuckyeahfamicom: Nintendo President interviews the original...

Thu, 03 Feb 2011 11:35:34 -0500

fuckyeahfamicom:

Nintendo President interviews the original creators of Super Mario.

Iwata Asks: Super Mario Bros. 25th Anniversary

Hitting the wall...

Mon, 10 Jan 2011 22:18:53 -0500

Well… it was bound to happen (although I thought it would have been next week in all honesty).

I’ve finally ‘hit the wall’.

It’s interesting to note that with each passing year (and each development project) my attention span and ability to get past inertia has improved. Certainly there have been times when I’ve wanted to pack it all in, but I’ve quickly learned that you soon get over it if you keep plugging away.

This week is only going to get busier for me, so I’m going to take my ‘time out’ over the next few days and come back refreshed for the penultimate stage. I generally think that this part of development is always the worst: you’re too far across the lake to swim back now, but the opposite shoreline seems too many miles away.

Penultimate Zone

Sat, 08 Jan 2011 14:33:16 -0500

Penultimate Zone

A quick break from development...

Sat, 08 Jan 2011 14:10:00 -0500

I thought today I’d take a few moments to comment on the launch of the ‘Mac App Store’. Nice and simple to install, launch and use; though why they couldn’t just incorporate it into iTunes I’ll never know…

The number of products on offer looked a little sparse compared to the iPhone/iPod/iPad store, but that’s hardly surprising considering the bajillion games they now have on offer. Nothing really stood out for me, although I did download the Twitter client - simple and robust; just how I like it.

I also downloaded a rather fun little Worms clone called Hedgewars

It’s still a little rough around the edges in terms of GUI and control mechanisms (although I have publicly complained about the XBLA version of WormsHD over Team17’s ridiculous key setup too), but it’s a lot of fun when it works and it’s FREE!

So I guess I’d better update you on the “Sheep O’ Faith” front…

Well, it’s been slightly slow going this week, but I have started the third zone with it’s ‘low gravity’ mechanic: Game Maker has made it incredibly easy to implement, so I’m mucho happy about that.

The fourth zone will, I feel, be the final zone to implement. I’m still a little unsure as to how many levels there’ll be in total: but my aim is somewhere between 35 and 50 for the initial release.

Right now I have about 12, but I hope to grow that figure to at least 15 by the end of the weekend. In a ‘speed run’ I can manage to complete the current crop of levels in about five minutes or so; take in mind, that’s without all the orbs and dying a few times. I had a really great moment when I totally forgot the timing on one particular level: took me about four attempts to get it right - D’oh!

Back to the grindstone…

Another Day, Another Dollar, Another Level, Another Update, Another Bug

Mon, 03 Jan 2011 13:16:44 -0500

Today was a ‘two steps forward, one step back’ kinda day. On the one hand, I created a few more levels for everyone to enjoy. On the other, the autosaving technique that’s taken me days to perfect has been unequivocally axed!

Why? It’s a little complex so try to keep up…

In a nutshell, Apple’s new “App Store for the Mac” requires a stringent set of permissions set on all .app files (for windows users, this is the equivalent of an .exe file). Therefore, in the latest build of GM4Mac, the read/write permission of all packages has been tightened meaning I can’t write the autosave file directly to the .app executable without creating a workaround that would violate the game’s permission structure.

For now, I’ve changed the write location to the directory “/Library/Application Support/Sheep O’ Faith” where most other apps write their semi-permanent data to. It’s annoying, but ultimately for the best.

Speaking of things being “annoying, but ultimately for the best”, the latest GM4Mac build definitely did something with the sound libraries, but I don’t know what. All music and sound disappeared for around 10 minutes of playtesting and building, then suddenly *POW* it’s back to normal again! Weird!

Wii and the Kid Gem Finder: "But That Was [Yesterday]" A beautiful trip into the power of memory.

Mon, 03 Jan 2011 12:57:40 -0500

Wii and the Kid Gem Finder: "But That Was [Yesterday]" A beautiful trip into the power of memory.:

wiiandthekid:

A really great game… just… great…

Okay, so there’s no development today. Boring...

Sat, 01 Jan 2011 15:52:28 -0500

Okay, so there’s no development today.

Boring administrative duties and New Year niceties have meant little time for Game Dev-ing. That said, I thought I’d post a little video to show you what things are looking like at the moment; features the tutorial and part of world one.