I don’t think that the roguelike genre is particularly renowned for its storytelling. This isn’t to say that roguelikes are particularly crappy at this sort of thing, it’s just that designers tend to focus on other things which players usually appreciate more — providing games which are praised for their elegance, balance and depth in [...]
I think it would be nigh unforgivable to skip out on mentioning the recent IGF awards, even if such a mention is a little later than most. After finally getting a chance to sit down and watch some juicy bits of the awesome video, I decided to post a quick summary of the facts: The [...]
Our local homies at Luma Arcade (swell buncha folks) have recently been up at GDC along with everybody else in the industry, and Microsoft has just showcased one of their projects, The Harvest as part of anannouncement about XNA-based game made for … well, the new ASUS Windows Phone prototype. Needless to say, seeing a [...]
Look! More stuff comin’ from sunny SA. Bounty Arms is a side-scrolling platformer thingum, made with the recently released Unreal Development Kit, and has been under development for quite some time. But just today, the developers have just released a playable demo. It’s quite a hefty download, be warned, and the game is in no [...]
Look, here I am again, trying to get you to spend money. Don’t you just love me? No? Well you should, because it was just Vamlumtimes Day and that’s what you’re supposed to do, I’m told. Anyway, this is all beside the point, because there are a whole bunch of developers who do love us [...]
So I was poking around on Twitter today (Digsby, thank you for making the Internet tidy again!) when I saw mention of an IGF student entry called Continuity. Armed with a decent Internet connection and high spirits, I decided that now was the time to spread my wings and get into the habit of clicking [...]
I mentioned this a few days ago, when it was first announced, but had yet to personally give it a run through. Having now finally jumped through a few hoops to get it installed*, I’ve now given it a good look and stand by my original judgement that it appeared to be little more than [...]
After excessive coffee and pizza consumption, the Global Game Jam has finally come to an end. Developers dragged themselves home after a(mostly) sleepless weekend spent (almost) successfully tripling last year’s game tally. The theme was “deception”, and it was worth 931 games, 10 of them from sunny SA. Notable among that list are Press Tilda, [...]
When bandwidth permits it, I like strolling through threads like this to pick up on all the teensy little games that people make at events like the UK TIGJam. After seeing the announcement on IndieGames and checking on one or two of their recommendations, I decided to browse through some of the other games and [...]
Right, so as I’m typing up this post, making good use of all of Word’s fancy productivity features, Ribbon Hero‘s running in the background, scoring my performance. Or, rather, it would be if I had realised that an additional .NET 3.5 SP1 download was required to get it running, the requirement of which was, unfortunately, [...]
An often overlooked half of the IGF is the Student Showcase, where up and coming devs who are still learning the ropes compete for recognition. And it’s often quite naïve to disregard them, having successes like Narbacular Drop originating from academic sources like DigiPen. Anyway, the fellas over Think Services agree, and have included a [...]
The part that comes after the creation of a game is just as nebulous as the actual creation itself. So everyone knows they need to market, and everyone knows they want to sell eventually. But many questions arise, such as “how?” and, eventually, “how much?” Thankfully, Gamasutra answers the second question with this article, sharing [...]
Back in the late 80s and early 90s, there existed two platformers that were marvellous examples of the best gaming had to offer at the time, and each one was essentially made by a single person. The first of those went on to seed a massive franchise that runs to this day, extending as far [...]
I’m going to assume you know Wolfire; they’re a grand bunch of blokes who share interesting thoughts, occasionally drop games in our inbox, and make cute videos while occasionally dropping games in our inbox (no, I’m not biased, why would you say that?). Now, the guys over in Overgrowth dev-land have struck a deal with [...]
Until this handy little article on IndieGames came along, I never really understood the IGF. I mean, a whole lot of games go in, a few of them come out, everybody gets excited for a while and then trophies get handed out. But what makes a good IGF game and how do the judges make [...]
Sunshine. No, not that stuff that makes every Briton envious of us down in sunny SA. This Sunshine, the latest gamelet coming out of whatever home Kyle Gabler (one half of 2D Boy) currently calls his liar. It was entered – albeit slightly late – into Experimental Gameplay Project art game contest last month. And [...]
{ I find that the essence of great indie games comes from knowing their core rules. If all gameplay adheres to the core rules, then emergent... } – May 11, 9:11 PM
{ Insanely detailed, well written and an interesting read 
Being in the process of developing a game that has a web of interconnected rules and... } – May 11, 5:17 PM
{ Great article! Very informative. } – May 08, 9:51 AM
{ Nothing to beat a simple tutorial with Actual Screen shots. } – Apr 26, 9:44 PM
{ Thanks for the feedback Ben, max and cool math 
Glad you found it useful. } – Apr 23, 8:56 PM
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