Hey there you ones and ones of loyal readers! I just thought I’d post an update of what has been going on recently and what will be coming in the next 3 weeks or so as far as site updates.
Real life actions have taken a front seat to the site in the past 2 weeks or so and that is why there has been a lack of updates. But I think now they are sorted out enough that I can return some of my attention to my very fun hobby!
The 5 Games I’m Anticipating in 2010 list will be seeing updates and completion. I have a listing of about 8 games that are vying for those final 3 spots at the moment and I’ll be narrowing that down and getting the articles written asap.
Project Dooley will see some updates and “completion” as it hits version 1.0. I feel like the feature set I’ve taken on adding between 0.9 and 1.0 was a bit larger than I initially took it to be, but that it will result in a solid final project.
Project Albatross has been chosen as the next project. It will see some of its base features getting locked down and made into reality in pretty short order. Agile development and the iterative process will definitely be in play. I liked the results it yielded on Project Dooley.
The site will probably see an overhaul in the March-April time frame. The redesign will be kind of happening in the background until that time. I’ll be checking out existing themes and/or frameworks and then the actual process of making the changeover will probably happen in one fell swoop.
Aion is a game that I played for a bit during its beta period in late 2009. I never played it once it actually launched. But a friend who picked up the game talked me into starting during the double experience event that happened this past weekend. I played it and I have enjoyed it so far. There will definitely be some talking of that game going on. And hopefully it will continue to entertain me as much as already has.
So there’s a little rundown of what will be coming in the next 3 weeks or so. And now that I’ve posted it up on the site, I will feel compelled to stick to the plan, which is a positive thing.
This is part of a list of 5 Games I’m anticipating getting to play in 2010. They are numbered but are in no particular order.
The second game on the list is not so much a game as a platform.. XBox Live Game Room.
The concept behind the XBL Game Room is the same concept behind a real-life arcade. The service will have games available with 2 different means available to you to play the games.
There is a method of playing that is akin to how we already think of games on our console; you buy the game and then you’re able to play the game as much as you’d like. The step that intrigues me in this process is that, much like a real arcade, a person (in this case, limited to XBox Live friends) can walk up and watch you play the game! This is a concept that I absolutely love!! It is definitely one reason that I miss the college roommate days. I can recall many a day when I would not feel like playing a game so I would grab a sandwich and watch my roommate Blake play any game from Gradius to World of Warcraft.
But there is also another method of play XBL Game Room will allow. It will allow you to use Microsoft Points like quarters (or perhaps tokens is the better comparison). So you can play a game one time for 50 cents instead of buying the game outright. I’m less excited about this approach but I like the attempt to recreate the arcade feel.
I think this platform has some nice room for growth in the coming months and years as well. So far there is no online multiplayer component. To actually play multiplayer, the players will need to be sharing one console; hopefully that will change given time. And maybe the Microsoft engineers will devise a way to have the players with the highest scores in a given game be viewable by even people not on their friends’ list. It would be akin to the whole arcade gathering around to watch those two epic players compete in Tekken or Daytona USA.
The service should launch in Spring of 2010 with 30 classic games. From there, Microsoft is talking 7 new games per week! So the library of games should build up quickly. And just like XBox Live Arcade games, each game will give you a trial play so you can try before you buy (or waste 50 cents).
As a short aside from the games activity that goes on here, I thought I’d drop in a funny YouTube video from last year. It uses the new (still in beta) Google Wave, to “act” out a scene from Pulp Fiction.
I cracked up the first time I saw it and it still has me laughing everytime I go back and check it out again.. as with Pulp Fiction itself, this is probably NSFW (not safe for work (for the uninitiated)).
APB presents itself as a grand scale, multiplayer version of cops and robbers. The character customization videos that have been shown as some gaming/tech events is astonishing. When I watch the video, I think it goes so far that I lean to the side of this is TOO MUCH customization. I’m never gonna just be satisfied and get into the game…
Once through the epic character creation/customization phase, you presumably choose whether you want to play cop (enforcer as they call it) or robber (criminal). From there you exist in a persistent world (think MMO) playing a 3rd person action game. You choose the crew/gang of people that you befriend and strive to have the city run in your vision (rampant crime and graffiti for criminals or arrested criminals and keeping order for enforcers).
The gameplay sounds somewhat GTA-ish. There will be missions you can choose to undertake or you can simply move through the world distributing your form of justice as you see fit.
As it’ll be running on Unreal Engine 3, it will definitely have the capability of looking beautiful. It has a release date of Spring of 2010, but as it is MMO-ish in nature, I don’t really expect it to make a release date set so far in advance.. but I guess only time will tell.. and I’ll definitely be listening.
Project Dooley has reached a release version. I’ve termed it version 0.9. That is to say the game is fully functional and playable. And things should work smoothly and in reasonable amounts of time.
I’m giving it a 0.9 version instead of the full-fledged 1.0 because I want to add more content to the game. I’m going to get more images (puzzles) in the game and give the user the ability to select how many tiles to separate the puzzle into.
As I get those choices added and presented to the user, I will also be working on an XBox 360 port of the game. Hopefully that will be a pedestrian matter, but we’ll see, we. will. see.
Controls for the game are the arrow keys on the keyboard to slide tiles around and press the enter key to show or hide the numbers overlaying the tiles.
If you try the game, please don’t hesitate to leave me comments about its functioning and features.. I am open to working in some more features while I am adding the customizable aspects.
The Games section is your key to happiness (or access to download Project Dooley.. whichever happens).
