Purple Rain Video

Should have done this a while back, don't know why I didn't. Here is a video, it's a little choppy, Fraps runs really slow on my machine.

Watch it over and over until your eyes bleed. Then post a comment!!! It will help the swelling..

Purple Rain Postmortem

[EDIT]: I changed a butt load of typos in this post, and changed the ending...just being honest.

Purple Rain was an idea my brother and I had awhile back about a game with tiered enemies. When you would land a hit on an enemy, they would go down a tier and change to an A.I. pattern that was based on the current tier.

So I worked it up really quick (a week actually). My original post announcing and releasing it is here. It's popular to do a postmortem now, so figured I could go over what I like and don't like about this game and maybe see where I could improve my game making process.

where to begin...

I thought it turned out good, the game is okay to look at. The controls are kinda fun, once you figure out that your gonna die if you don't use the rotation lock thing.

I was going for a strategic point with the tier system. As an enemy is brought down through the tiers you'd have to deal with the new tier. The problem is it kinda happens too fast, and the enemy is destroyed before it can ever do anything with it's new behavior. This doesn't detract from the fun at all, but it kinda misses the original point just a little.

There are a few instances where you do have to take into account what the enemy will be doing after you attack it though, if you hit an '8' with only a few bullets before diverting your attention to something else it will probably land on a tier that shoots and moves toward you. Meaning your gonna get hit.

Another thing, there's no pause button. I hard-coded the timers for everything to match with the computer's internal clock, instead of using how much game time has elapsed. This means that if I paused, the game would keep going. It was a dumb noob mistake.

I didn't realize this until late in the project when Nick said to me "Tony, pause the game and come look at this awesome picture I just drew!!", and I realized o noes I can't!! But by that time it was to late.

That ordeal has led me to writing a manager that handles timers and time. It's really simple, and manages everything for you. If I ever get around to making it presentable I'll post it.

Another thing I was pleased about in PR was the way the wave based levels turned out. When I first started I figured the game's difficulty would start easy and randomly things would get harder, but as I was working on that idea, I found that it wasn't really working the way I wanted. I would start off really sloooow and easy, then spin up and get ridiculously hard.

So I worked up a really simple way that I could specify which enemies spawned and how often on each level. This not only let me specify the exact difficulty curve I wanted, but it also allowed me to play around and have levels with some more character, such as the "purple rain wave" itself. That just started out as a "how many enemies can I draw on screen at one time" stress test. (it turns out a lot) and it soon became apparent that it's actually a healing level. Since all the enemies are tier 1, if you play it correctly, you can fully heal before the next wave rolls around. And I usually take advantage of that...ie. right before I introduce the 10's.

Of course I left out a proper tutorial. I don't know why I forgot it, when I did Sticky Situation I figured it was important to explain some finer points before dumping a player into the game. Didn't get around to doing that for Purple Rain though...

...with all it's flaws, I think it turned out to be an okay game.

Thats about it, if you haven't played it yet, please do. And then tell me what you think.

Tony.

H1N1-ey

I've just been recovering from a bug these past few days, so I broke out my Dr. Katz DVD's and watched this all week -


It was either that or stare at my bucket full spew all week.

Now, it may or may not have been the Swine Flu or H1N1 or whatever you want to call it.
I don't know, does the Swine Flu make you repeat lines of the Satanic Bible in your sleep?

Yes? No?

Well, here are some pointers for when you get this dreaded disease:
- Make sure you have a loved one to mop up the mess when your gag reflex is tested on a regular basis with medicine that would make me vomit regardless of the state of my Immune System.
- Watch something static. (Ex: Dr. Katz, the wall)
- Eat a lot of hummus and cheese.
- Not too much.
- If someone comes over to hang out, make sure not to tell them you're sick so they think you just smoked a lot of pot and maybe ate nothing but jalepenos for breakfast.

Anyway, even though I was busy regurgitating all week, I did have some free time to fix up the 'Crap Temp Header' you may have seen on the Thunderware blog throughout the entire month of November, and the Message Boards now have a really cheap and quick header as well. Also, I fixed the News Fader on the forums so it's not so mind-meltingly slow.

In closing, I've been to three funerals this month, and I gotta tell yah...I'm just not a mourning person.

- Nick R.

Purple Rain

Video Here

Purple Rain is my first submission for the Experimental Gameplay Project.

Following the guidelines, it was made in less than a week, by myself, and follows this month's theme- "Numbers".

Basically, it's a Shoot-'Em-Up (or "Shmup", as the cool kids call it) where the enemies are floating numbers, and when you shoot them the number goes down 1. Their are ten ranks total, and each rank has their own strategy and movements. For example, '1' will just go from the top of the screen to the bottom, ignoring you completely, just be careful you don't run into it or you'll take damage. A '2' will appear all around the game space and slowly move towards you. A '3' will move in sparatic movements towards you. A '4' will drop down like '1', but will shoot at you, in the process. An enemy is destroyed when it gets to zero.

Movement is controlled with the mouse. Left-click to lock your direction to get better aim.

If you're having trouble, all I can say is to use the Lock-Direction a lot.

Master Chieftan!

[EDIT]: I just realized I misspelled chieftain about a month later.

Heres Lazy Ball

This concept I came up with when my bro and I were playing a little catch(indoors, we don't go out) you play a lazy kid that just sorta pats the ball back and forth, trying to keep it up in the air.

It's really tough, but play it for a couple of minutes and it will grow on you. You use the two control keys like a pinball game.

Enjoy...

icons

ok...

holy smoke...

i am really sick of the crappy icons indies keep creating for there games. They spend countless hours crafting an awesome, fun thing, and then they make an icon thats 5x5 and looks like pixel vomit.

(But don't worry)

Big uncle tony is here to save the day. Please people open up photoshop, gimp or w/e and make a nice 256x256 image and convert it using this application(it's free). it will make your games look a little snazzier. the program is really straight forward. and an awesome feature is that it will keep the alpha data in the image.

It took me a long time, scouring the webs, to find it. But, if anyone knows or comes across a better utility(or writes a better one) please let me know.

possible improvements:

-doesn't need to be installed. (i hate having to install little tiny programs, it's a pet peave of mine.

-thats about all i can think of.

-oh! or if there is an easier way to convert bitmaps to icons.

-solutions must be free.

this post looks grumpy, but im going to leave it like that because i'm lazy.

Just Sayin'

(Tony's highest score 'Sticky Situation' is 250. Mine is 404. Just sayin'.)

How to play my *very popular* game

A couple of days ago, I said I would throw up some tidbits on how to not get a thousand sticky darts stuck to your butt. I was lazy and didn't get around to it, so sue me!

Just in case ya'll havn't downloaded it yet, It's free! Which is the best cost of em' all, I think.

If you havn't downloaded it yet, YOUR A DARN FOOL!, its probably the greatest game of all time in my honest opinion. It is kinda hard though. That constant stream of pink sticky darts, can be very intimidating. The thing to remember is that you WILL get shot, and you will get shot ALOT. shot alot. The trick is picking when you get hit.

The "Scrub a dart off of you" shift button, works on a timer. When you hit the shift key, your ship does some magic flubermagoo and a sticky dart mysticly falls off. After that you'll have about half a second until your able to shake another one off of you. You don't have to hold down the shift key.

Use that fact to your advantage and don't hold it down. Just tap it every half second or so, and you'll have a steady stream of falling darts, while still being able to move around.

Which leads me to my next topic: " Moving around "
Every enemy will shoot there pink stickies directly at you. Not above you, below you, infront or ahead a little in the direction your moving.

Use this fact also, slowly move down and quickly study the stream of darts that flow towards your last position, there should be a pattern, and in that pattern will be a lul of stickies. As soon as you see it, reverse your direction and jump through it. Rinse and repeat...

I'm going to leave it like that, have fun playing Sticky Situation! : )

Sticky Situation

I got a situation for-ya
A game where you are a helicopter type thing, shooting sticky things, at alien dudes, to try to weigh them down and crash into the ground.

Be sure to let the tutorial play out, it isn't much, but you'll know more about it than you do now.

Be sure to leave a comment if you have one, good or bad.

Tomorrow, I will jot down some good little hints i've discovered during my time with the game.

-T. (anthonylromano@gmail.com)

Half-Past Thunder-Con

In the moon of the Thunder-Con's Twilight, I shall actually begin to celebrate Thunder-Con with
the release of a long-awaited sequel to a critically-criticized, fully-acknowledged franchise of BUN-E.

BUN-E II: THE JOURNEY TO ROBOT PARADISE

- N.

P.S. - If you have Small Basic, by Microsoft Dev Labs, installed, you can search through the code and get a sort of delevoper's commentary. Decide for yourself, if you go through with it, if it was worth it. Same goes for the entire game, too.

P.P.S. - Spotlight #7 - Dave: The Man

I'm Just Not A Con-Man.

What? Did you think something important was supposed to happen this day,
July 22nd, the Day of Thunder-Con?
No, it was just an excuse to have Thunder-Cake.

You haven't truly lived until you've had Thunder-Cake.

- N.

It's Comic-ON!

Some pretty cool stuff happened this year.

Anyway, 34th annual Thunder-Con is coming up, and we're heating up the bunsen burner.
It's been cool all winter-long.
Cause it's been off.

Thunder-Con is a convention that takes place in PA, somewhere in someones basement.
Actually, it's not fair to call it annual, because it happens everyday.
When Timmy opens up his Christmas present.
When Dorothy gets that new kidney.
When your next-door neighbour gets ONE night of your dogs sweet silence.
It's all around us.
Thuhder-Con cannot be stopped, no matter how much I misspell it.
It's the little noise inside our hearts that tells us we're happy.
Or hungry.

It's the beat that our drum goes to.
Even if you play a different instrument, if you know what I'm saying.
What am I saying?
I don't know.
I don't care.
You should.
Let me stop and tell you why you should care about July 22nd, or Thunder-Con.

- It's Thunder-y
- It's Con-nie
- It celebrates that which brought you such
reveared and revolting titles such as:

[Edited to include more recent titles.]
-PURPLE RAIN
-STICKY SITUATION
-BUN-E: THE RETALIATING ROBOT
-BUN-E II: THE JOURNEY TO ROBOT PARADISE
-LAZY BA-...uh...I mean BUN-E III.

That isn't just a list of games we've scrapped up in our pasttime and named in all caps.
It's a list of games we scrapped up in our pasttime and named in all caps for THUNDERWARE.

If not for ThunderWhere, ware would you be?
Woops, sorry-
If not for ThunderWare, where would you be?

Get ready.
Get set-itized.

Thunder-Con is go.

- N.

God Bless AmericaWare

I'm not gonna lie, I've been too busy to update this thing for the 4th. Big family reunion.

Lotta cake. Looked like the American flag. It was good.

Graduation season is over. Tired of going to graduations. They're fun, but my camera has so many graduation speeches on it, I'm gonna have to have a home movies marathon. Which, I have every week, but a different kind of Home Movies -

Alright, Happy 4th, and Happy Graduation Season.

ok sorry if you've been lost

For anyone that was confused, all the partying and the whole mess is me trying to get a gears of war 2 acheivement.

im a slow programmer.

Wow, I look at the guy who's writing Minecraft, and reading his blog. I sometimes find myself wondering if I even belong doing this and do I really have anything to add? That's probly them there demons just trying to get me down. I guess when I start to think that, I know I just have to work harder.

...

Ok im stopping now, im going to get some work done. I think I got to like 365.

w.e

Ive given up that tactic, Nick and I are going to try and get some KI77s on execution "public"

ugh...part 2

(Because you suck) Oh that makes sense.

ugh

why am i having trouble beating this stupid casual bot?

progress party blah blah blah

355 a lone bot, set on casual downed me...

Party like it's 1999 progress

350

Party Likes it's 1999: Progress

275 / 1999

We've reached the point of no return!!!

"Hey doc', what does that mean?"
"O that? Once we get past that point, it's to late to turn back!!"

I don't think it's quite that dramatic, I like to pretend that it is. Cause the third Back to the Future movie was totaly kick-ash.

But. Alas. We ourselves have reached an important milestone!

I have finished (at least to the point where it is usable) a little tool in which it will be possible for Nick to work on our levels. I don't want to call it a level editor cause it's worse then that.

here's a pic of me debugging it in Visual Studio...

Now Nick can install it and start telling me what he doesn't like about it.

You're Spoiled, but That's Why We Love You.

What!? You've been refreshing the page ever since we announced our 'First' game? But, it's not really our first game! More of a side-project, you silly ragamuffin!

Well, refresh-no longer, Thunder-lings!

BUN-E

Bob and Jim: The Dead Prince

Yeah, I finished two games in the time I said I'd make one, but can you really complain about it?
The games are made in a game making tool called RPG Maker, a program I have enjoyed for years for its easy-to-use text system. I enjoy writing and story-telling, so this is a good program for that.

Anyway, stop listening to me pontificate and START PLAYING that which I have created.

Introducing: The ThunderWare Forums

I understand your love for ThunderWare has grown to almost an unhealthy level. After all, there's no outlet for such an obsession. You spend your nights tossing and turning, aching for ThunderWare news.

Good news, ThunderWare-ers! The ThunderWare Forums be erected in thy honor!

HERE

Post as much as you see fit! Don't do anything to upset the flow or smoothness for the other ThunderWare-ers. No racial, sexual, religious, or body odor remarks. I will find you. I will watch you while you sleep. I WILL shave off your eyebrows. I will email your friends and family photos of your eyebrows, or lack thereof. And I will continue to do this for the rest of your life.

Now, I know what you're gonna say, "Does he have it in him to shave off the eyebrows of everyone who crosses for the rest of his life?" Well, you're just going to have to ask yourself one question. Are you prepared to take that risk? You owe it to your eyebrows that much, right?

ThunderWare's First Game?

(UPDATE: This post has been deemed irrelevant. (Update payed for by the Association to Update Old Posts For Some Reason (AUOPFSR)))

That's right, QUESTION MARK, baby. I know, we've already posted two games. But this one is the most recent. And, no, it's not our main game. Not even close. Just a little game I made on the side. Er...making. I'm not done.

In a few days, a "Game I'm Making On the Side" will be squeezed out of my game-making hands, ready for you - Joe Public. Pretty exciting, eh? Especially in contrast to our other games. Man, so exciting.

The name? (Name has been deleted in post update. Makes it mysterious, doesn't it?)
Wordy. Cheesy. Exciting. Family-Friendly. What else can you ask for?

- N. R. (A.K.A. The Guy With No Qualms, at theblogwithnoqualms.blogspot.com )

Quarter not Quarterly!

The Gamer's Quarter just put out a new issue! It has a really well written article about Ghosts n' Goblins and how addictive it is. A MUST read. Also a must read, an article about the greatest game of all time, and what made it so awesome. (Greatest game of all time is my own personal opinion.)

Heres a link to website.

What's going on? I don't understand. The "no Qualms" blog sent us a memo saying they were going to have a cinco de mayo "Special". Where is this 'special' they promised? Maybe there asleep or maybe they can't log into blogger for some reason. W/e the reason is, im sure there really hard at work on there new post...that is really funny.

A League Of It's Own

As none of you know, Thunderware is a video game company. Meaning, we make video games. Right here, you'd expect a trailer or something for our game, but, no, no, no. Hah, we're not aywhere close to trailer-ready. BUT! I will force you to watch this - http://kotaku.com/5235320/could-brutal-legend-look-any-better
Can't wait for Rocktober? Neither can I. Neither. Can. I.

I Felt It Was Time For An Update, So...

...So, I thought I'd update. There.

But more importantly, I haven't shaved in over a week. You want to know what I look like? Well, too bad, I'm not posting pictures of myself online until I become the famous Adult Film Actor I've always wanted to be. No, no, what I'm going to show you is this -

Cocoa Butter

I've never smelled cocoa butter before, now I know why woman love it so much. They can be covered in chocolate and it's socially acceptable.

DOS Chocobo World

Tony:

I played final fantasy 8 on the pc a long time ago, and it had this little external program where you played a chocobo and you basicly did nothing.

U sat there and watched him run around, but I loved the music. And for some reason it intrigued me way more then ff8 ever actually did. So i m8de my 0wn verzion.

Here it is.

It was the first "complete" game I ever made. It's in dos, cause thats all i knew exzisted then. it’s all original code lol
the .EXE to run is CHOC.EXE thats where you play and save your chocobo thats you have sat there and watched grow. IF you and a friend both have a chocobo and you want to see who’s is stronger, run the VS.EXE and load them both in and they’ll both fight.
if for some weird reason you want to see who’s is faster, you can run RACE.EXE and they’ll race on a little coarse i made them. If there next to eachother in a race they’ll attack to slow eachother down.

The Other Guy at ThunderWare

Hello, I'm Nick, the other, better half of ThunderWare Productions. The first half, Anthony, is the Programmer/Maestro/Co-Level Designer/Co-Art Designer/Gameplay Designer/Co-Writer. I know, we're a bit under-developed as of yet. I, on the other hand, am the Lead Artist/Lead Level Designer/Lead Writer/Chef. Specificaly, a chef in the field of burgers and burger-ing.

We don't have any completed games as of yet, but we're working on it. Our current project is...pretty awesome. Oops! That's a spoiler! Un-read that. Just go back in time and un-read it.

Done? Alright.

Before we release (Hah! Release! I make it sound like we'll make money off of this.) any game, however, I throw out some games I've made in my pasttime. Sit back and be annoyed by my past!

First off, I've already established that I'm not the coder. That's Anthony. No, no, I'm the writer, mostly. What happens when a writer codes? This -



There it is. The first among a series of crappy text adventures by me.

Well, that's it. Thanks for reading, I hope you come back and stay updated about our game. Although I know you won't, it helps to think you will. So don't dissapoint me. I know where you live.