Eufloria (originally named Dyson) made it into the IGF finalists in 2009. It’s a real-time strategy game, where you create space colonies using trees. Gareth Wilcock reviews the game.
Gazza_N
Nov 172009
Aug 032009
Heed is odd. From the moment you start the game up, you get the feeling that it’s definitely not your cookie-cutter point ‘n’ click adventure. Maybe it’s the surreal backgrounds and stylized art, or perhaps it’s the bizarre and moody background music (containing remixed samples from late-19th-century folk music). Either way, Heed feels quite surreal, [...]
Jun 192009
Return to Sector Nine, by Pug Fugly Games, is a collection of nine minigames revolving around a single premise: make stuff explode… IN SPACE! It’s a throwback to the old arcade shooters of yesterdecade – you, in one little ship, blasting the everloving snot out of hordes of enemies while dodging walls of projectiles and obstacles [...]
In this, the final part of the series, we’ll cover the long-awaited subject of 3D models, as well as highlighting some of the possible problems you may have as you attempt your own 3D games.
May 182009
When a competition comes around with the theme “Advancing Wall of Doom”, you know that the games produces are going to be something special. Well, that’s exactly what the Ludum Dare 48 hour game competition did, as we reported a few weeks ago, and the submitted games certainly lived up to the challenge. The overall winner, [...]
We’ve covered drawing basic meshes, and we’ve covered the all-important transformation functions. We’ve also covered lighting. Now that we have all these basics down, it’s time to start on some of the nifty tricks that you can pull using what we’ve learned.
In Part 1, we learned how to set up a basic camera, and draw the 3D primitives that Game Maker provides functions for. If you took my advice and messed around on your own a bit, you’ll have noticed a few limitations to included scripts. For instance, how do you go about rotating primitives? There [...]
This article originally appeared in Dev.Mag Issue 13, released in April 2007. Overseer Assault is a freak of nature. Now that statement may seem harsh, especially coming from the game’s creator, but it’s true – Overseer Assault is a game that shouldn’t work, but through some dark and twisted means just does. One need only [...]
It goes without saying that almost every game developer probably started out wanting to make games in 3D. After all, practically all of the AAA games that we played growing up were in 3D, so it comes as no surprise that we want to create our own 3D wonderworks. What you may or may not [...]
Apr 022009
This article originally appeared in Dev.Mag Issue 27, released in November 2008. Anybody who’s played Introversion’s seminal strategy/action game Darwinia will know the joys of having thousands of little flat men marching across the map in a long green column, leaving the glittering red digital souls of dead virii in their wake. It probably occurred [...]
Apr 012009
This article originally appeared in Dev.Mag Issue 28, released in January 2009 When one talks about the development of episodic games, there are normally two distinct advantages that get touted. The first is a steady cash flow. The other is the ability to iteratively improve on the game as each episode comes out and players [...]
Apr 012009
This article originally appeared in Dev.Mag Issue 24, released in August 2008. In most games, the opening cutscene generally consists of hints of a dark secret, a terrible evil that must be vanquished lest it destroy the world. This first episode of the Penny Arcade Adventures series of episodic games is no different. Suggestions of [...]
Mar 282009
This article originally appeared in Dev.Mag Issue 22, released in June 2008. Trilby: Art of Theft is a stealth-platform game created by Ben “Yahtzee” Croshaw using Adventure Game Studio. Yes, you read correctly – a platformer made in an engine designed for adventure games. As the title not-so-subtly suggests, Art of Theft stars Chzo Mythos [...]
