June 23, 2008
Game Development, Gaming, Modding
1 Comment
I feel bad. I have a Wii, but barely use it. For the first few months of owning a Wii, I played Zelda: Twilight Princess, Wii Sports, and eventually Resident Evil 4 (which is better on the Wii than the PS2 or Gamecube, but that’s a different post). I tried to get into the Wii, I really did. I checked out the news and participated in polls, but with long stretches of time with no decent games coming out, I lost interest and took solace in my 360. Plus, the Wii doesn’t give achievements.
A few months ago, I saw that the Wii had been hacked, and the hackers had a video to prove it. Fast forward to today, where Wii homebrew is alive and well, with no mod-chipping required. The Wii homebrew community has matured to the point where tons of documentation is available and it appears very easy to get say, an NES emulator running on the Wii. In fact some crafty coders created something called the “Homebrew Channel” which makes running homebrew apps a piece of cake. After doing a bit of research, I decided to see how long it would take me to get some homebrew apps up and running on my Wii.
I’ll explain all the details in a bit. For now, here are the required supplies:
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May 31, 2008
Game Development
3 Comments
Some people love em’, some people couldn’t care less about em’. “Collectibles” are simply a finite amount of objects player can obtain in a game. These objects typically aren’t integral to the progression of the game, but are often added to give the game an extra layer of interaction. Some game designs take collectibles beyond just an extra set of objects you can get, while others stay rooted in traditional, old-school collectible design.
I find it interesting that collectibles are still around in many games today. Five years ago I wouldn’t have expected collectibles to show up in mainstream games like Call of Duty 4 or Halo 3. I thought gamers would have grown out collecting “things” by now. However, the part of me that used to collect stamps and coins when I was a child still finds enjoyment in obsessively hunting for virtual objects. It seems there are many others like me.
I’m going to dissect collectible design and analyze the good, the bad, and the ugly of various collectible systems. I’ll be projecting a lot of my own preferences here, so bare with me. I’ve divided collectible design into five major categories, which are:
Hunting Enjoyment: Are the collectibles fun to hunt down and find? Sometimes, the hunt can be more enjoyable than obtaining the item.
Collection Enjoyment: Is the act of acquiring the object enjoyable? Are there sweet sounds when you pick an object up? Is the art of the object really cool? Do crazy particles play when you touch the collectible?
Immersiveness: Does the object fit into the game world or does it remind you that you’re playing a video game?
Clue Factor: How hard is it to find the collectible without any sort of guide? Are there audio and visual cues which help you find the collectible? Are there any hints in game which help you organize finding the collectibles?
In Game Reward: Do you receive new weapons or abilities by collecting objects? Do the collectibles unlock game content?
Using these categories, lets take a look at some recent Xbox 360 games and see how they stack up. I’ll use a scale from 1 – 10 to rate each category.
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May 13, 2008
Game Development
2 Comments
I went to a Grilled Cheese competetion (no joke) a few weeks ago with my wife and her boss. On the way there, her boss asked me about my job and what I do. Once I opened my mouth, I could tell she was lost. Words like crunch, polish, milestones, even AI had no meaning. The same thing usually happens when I talk to my family about my job. They simply don’t care about the ins and outs of the game industry. They’re happy if I’m happy. I don’t really blame them, as I’m not up on the current trends in education or food service either.
Talking about crunch is usually the worst though. Explaining that you work longer hours and don’t get paid more for it seems exclusive to software type industries, especially games. Everyone thinks we’re crazy. They think we’re even crazier when we say that we play games, and even work on other games (modding) for free in our spare time.
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April 15, 2008
Game Development
1 Comment
I recently got into Dr. Who on BBC America. Wow, what a wacky and creative show.
So, where’s my Dr. Who point and click adventure? If there was ever a game to bring back SCUMM, Dr. Who would be a good reason for it. You remember SCUMM games right? Think games like Star Trek 25th Anniversary, Maniac Mansion, Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis, and Kings Quest. Great puzzles, adventure, humor, and unexpected events. Dr. Who would have been perfect for that style of game. To bad SCUMM went the way of the dinosaur. Pixel hunting drove those games to extinction.
Somebody, make that game and I’ll promise to buy it!
April 9, 2008
Game Development
2 Comments
I’m not talking about Ninja Gaiden or Tenchu Z. Nope, I’ve been seeing Ninja AI in many games I’ve been playing lately. Ninja AI are simply AI that move from one place to the next in a blink of an eye. That’s all good if you have some crazy robot that teleports itself around, or ghosts that phase from one place to the next, but it’s buggy and annoying when humanoid AI that are supposed to move around semi-realistically end up darting around, swapping from one animation to the next in a single frame.
The worst offender is when AI is in the middle of a run cycle and decides to do a 180 and run in the opposite direction. It’s 10 times worse when the AI is leaning forward. Why? Well, as shown above, the player has just undergone heavy fire, dispatched every bad guy in his vicinity and is now taken a second to line up his shot. His finger is on the trigger, ready to take down that last MFer. Now, if the AI is behaving semi-realistically and decides to turn around, he’ll transition into a stop pose, then blend into running the opposite direction. This gives the gamer a chance to anticipate the AI’s directional change, or at least take a pot shot and possibly still hit the target. Even if the player misses, he’ll have some idea of where the AI will end up, can line up his shot accordingly, fire, and take the guy down. What a great reward for playing the game with some skill.
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March 21, 2008
Game Development
1 Comment
This is pretty straight forward, but creating something for your game and bringing it to a finished, shippable state is the only way to go.
“But Jesse, we don’t have time to get it finished! We need to just get it working and move on!”
Bzzzzt. I’ve seen it time and time again. We’ll create some half-baked prototype feature, get an event “working,” put in a temp animation, or place a temp texture. Then, people on the team will start complaining about it, laughing about it, or whatever. Placeholders tend to stay in the game for way to long, and it starts demotivating people. It’s really hard for people, even those working on the game everyday, to see past temporary and placeholder assets. And that’s really bad for team morale. Above all, everyone on the team should believe in the game you’re working on, and placeholders won’t help with that.
Okay, not all placeholders are bad. I think in some cases, if they look really close to final, that’s an okay thing, especially if you’re placeholdering for memory concerns. I think this is especially true for sound and VO. However, really bad, or even mediocre placeholders will damage team morale, and I think hurt the overall quality of the game in the long run.
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