Thunderware Games

Dragon Quest V Diary: Part 6

2011-12-22T07:00:00.000-08:00

(Have you read Part 5? Or maybe you'd like to check out the rest Dragon Quest V Diary.)

Rubbing the crust out of my eyes from a deep slumber inside the comfy confines of a Reinhart hotel, I see a weapons shop across the way.

I load up on...I don't know, stuff? Whatever you use to kill people with. I gave my slime a Steel Fang, but only because it's self-cleaning, and his old teeth were...phew. Also, it does a lot of damage.

Inside the castle, Henry pulls me aside and tells me that I shouldn't mention his real identity to anyone, so we can stay on the down-low. I tell him that's a stupid idea, he doesn't respond because he's a videogame character.

There isn't much to find out, here in Reinhart, now that Henry's on the lam, so I decide to check out the bar/dining area. That's when I met this cheery bunch:

It seems these guys were part of the army that raided Santa Rosa. So, the king of Reinhart thought, after Henry was kidnapped, that my father, who died trying to save the little brat, was the kidnapper? So he pillaged our home town. Alright. It's gonna take a little more than a bouquet of flowers to fix this for me. Box of chocolates, at least.

No cherry-filled ones, either. Those things are nasty.

Henry mentions that we should look for a secret passageway into the throne room and what Henry wants, Henry gets, so lets go.

After (multiple) hours of searching, I found a boat docked outside the castle. After (half) an hour of more searching around the moat around the castle, I found a passageway underneath the bridge. Now, you've seen screenshots of this game, probably played a SNES JRPG or two hundred, you understand the perspective. "Underneath the bridge" looks like this:

See what I mean?

Well, it is pretty secret, I'll give it that.

Inside the passageway, there's a waterway that ends in an underground church-type affair that effectively communicates YES, YOU ARE INDEED ENTERING A DUNGEON.

...Which we'll explore next time.

END OF PART 6

Next Time: I just told you. Are you deaf? Or, blind, rather. Nah, know what? I'm not saying it again. Eff it.

Dragon Quest V Diary: Part 5

2011-11-30T07:00:00.000-08:00

(Have you read The Rest of Part 4? Or maybe you'd like to check out the entirety of the Dragon Quest V Diary.)

The trip to Reinhart goes swimmingly. With the fishes, that is.

After finishing up in Santa Rosa, I hear there's some kind of cool thing in that cave where I saved that one dude in the beginning of the game. I'll investigate that later. For now, I'm on my way to Reinhart!

Actually, first, I had to stock up on some things. Then Reinhart.

Starting out my journey, as if only to hinder, I ran across a sea dividing me and Reinhart. How did I get there before? I've been to Reinhart, how is it that it's unreachable now?

Oh, there's a bridge.

Approaching the bridge, I am halted by a rather lonely-looking guard who tells me that the bridge is only drawn when I have the correct papers. Of course, Henry uses his debutante status to get us through. Either that, or he bullied him, I can't remember.

As he lets us pass, the guard tells me he had bad experiences with Prince Henry, but he doesn't mind.

Just let us through, already, man.

Before we set out again, Brown has to make a brownie.

On the way there, a thing riding a slime attacked me. It wasn't tough, but, still, it creeped me out. Of course, it also asked if it could tag along, to which I replied yes, cause why not? I got room. And as soon as I'm out of room I'm just gonna kick it out of my wagon, anyway. Plus, his name was Pierre. This team needed a little class, and Pierre was just the Slime Knight to do it.

Pierre would bring along fine cheeses whenever he could, just to perk up the gang. Oh, sure, he wasn't the strongest guy on the team (he is, after all, a dude precariously placed on top of a slime), but morale went up gangbusters when he joined up.

Also along the way, ran into this crazy guy:

So, on to Reinhart. Oh, no, nevermind, we're there.

Walking into the town of Reinhart, I'm greeted by a nice old man with a few words of encouragement:

Well. Uh. I guess I'll...just keep walking, then? Or maybe I'll just get some shut-eye at the inn, 'kay?

[Not pictured: Lost screenshot of Inn Lady charging 40 gold for a one night stay.]

40 gold!? What're you running here, sister? Do you even match your price to competitors? I was just in the Santa Rosa Inn and they charged a song. You know what that means? No, I'm not being hyperbolic, I mean I literally played her a song and she gave me a room. What's that? Why does it matter how much money I have? Well...4,120, alright? So, yeah, I can afford it. Oh, whatever, gimme the key.

End of Part 5

Next Stop: Castle Reinhart! I still have no idea what I'm going there for, but Henry wants to go, I guess. Oh, well, this hotel actually turned out pretty nice. They got those pillow mints.

Skyrim is: "Wings at the Speed of Sound" (or Happy Thanksgiving, Let's Talking About Skyrim)

2011-11-24T03:55:00.000-08:00

Everytime I begin a new paragraph, I'll be talking about a different Elder Scrolls game in this order: Morrowind, Oblivion, Skyrim, etc. I'm not gonna ever mention Arena or Daggerfall because I'm computer-illitarate and can't get DOSBox going.

In this order, from best to worst (also in alphabetical order, coincidentally), is what I think of each Older Scrells games:

Morrowind.

Oblivion.

Skyrim.

I'm going to try and explain why I think the way I do through a few categories that I think sum up the entirety of the three games. (Disclaimer: Throughout this..."review", I treat Oblivion like some kind of unwanted step-child that isn't old enough to get a job and not young enough to find cute.)

Category #1: Openings
In the first half-hour-or-so (an hour if you're as undecisive as I am) of Morrowind, you can't kill the first few people you meet because you don't have a weapon. Then, after you are properly equipped, you may kill, steal, and (obviously the most egregious) sleep in the middle of the town square. At any moment throughout the game, no matter how game-breaking, you may kill anyone/everyone.

The opening of Oblivion is similar, only, after you get your weapons, there are select people who, when their health is depleted, rise from the dead again and again until you have deemed that this will not be the game you continue and load your last save. There are dozens of characters like this throughout the game.

Skyrim's beginning starts off with a Half-Life-style cart/Disney ride which takes you to the area where your character will move (all by himself, ain't he special) to the next area where you will run from dragons until the next area where you will equip swords (and maces and axes and battleaxes and 2 swords and 2 maces and 2 axes) which you will probably immediately use to try and decapitate your buddy-friend who will react in no way to your gliding swords across his back. You can't kill your buddy-dude, not even a scratch, until you leave the tutorial cavern (tutoriavern?). Why? So you don't mess up the game? He also does ALL the killing in the tutoriavern. I mean, you could kill a dude, I guess. If you get in front of him, that is. By the time you get to where the action is, he's already wiped off his blood-drenched swords with the dead rat carcasses. Or the dead rat carcasses with his blood-drenched swords, I can't remember which.

Also, a lot of people complain about the fact that kids are pretty much invincible (that must be a pretty crappy 18th birthday, "Jimmy the Snot-Nosed, I'm sorry, but you are no longer immune to any attacks, disease, fall damage, stealth kills, slipping down a flight of stairs, or sleeping on your carotid artery, slicing it ever-so-slightly) and kids are really the only ones that you feel compelled to kill. I mean, really, if you complain about it, that's kind of a strange that to complain about, but it does make a lot of sense. The point is: if there's no town where kids rule the roost and act like monster dicks to you at every given turn like Fallout 3's Little Lamplight, then kids shouldn't even be in the game. I mean, they add nothing but bounding boxes and literary context, which, in a game where you can have a fireball bomb cooking in one hand and a mace swinging in the other, maybe context isn't too important. And think of all the free room you'd have with all those kids out of your way. Oh boy, I sound like a serial killer, now, let's take a quick break:

[INTERMISSION]

The progression from Arena-to-Daggerfall-to-Morrowind-to-Oblivion-to-Skyrim is similar to the career of one of my personal favorite bands, Wings.

Starting out with their first album in 1971, Wild Life, to which everyone replied, "What the hell is this?" Then they followed up with a great album, Red Rose Speedway, my personal favorite album (which includes my personal favorite song, but that isn't very important). Not getting any commercial or critical success, but not being exactly shunned, the band then went on to Band On The Run, their most popular record.

After that, critical success, commercial success, you name it (...spiritual?), they were on top of it. So, what do they follow that up with? Venus and Mars. Not bad. Not Band On The Run, but not bad. Has some good numbers on there. Everyone knows 'Listen To What The Man Said', and some people know 'Letting Go'. Not bad. What next? Wings At the Speed of Sound? Hm. I...alright. It's not terrible. Half of the songs are listenable--enjoyable, even. But, come on...Cook of the House? (If you're keeping tabs: Arena = Wild Life, Daggerfall = Red Rose Speedway, Morrowind = Band on the Run, Oblivion = Venus and Mars, and Skyrim = Wings At the Speed of Sound) After all that, you have the somewhat-return-to-form London Town, which was a fine album, then Back to the Egg, which was...well, it was Back to the Egg. A very experimental album. What songs aren't pretty good (Getting Closer) are pretty god-awful (Arrow Through Me). All of this, of course, is only partially analogous because Paul McCartney had 5 more careers before and after Wings.

Bethesda, however, is not Paul McCartney (you can quote me on that).

[END OF INTERMISSION]

Section #2: Attitude Towards Player
One of an enemy's taunts in Skyrim is, "I've fought worse than you!" What? You're saying I'm not bad? How is that helping you? This isn't some high-class British royalty fencing match. It's a barbaric, to-the-death fisty cuffs that will end with me peeling off the underwear on your hairy ass to sell to someone (preferably someone who needs barbarian underwear). You should be trying a little harder to intimidate me, maybe?

In contrast, Morrowind's residents (not just the hostile ones) will greet you, at best, with casual racism, calling you things like "Outlander" and "Cyrodil", which I believe is racist, but I'm not sure. I mean, calling someone outlander is actually a pretty rough, if you think about it. You're basically putting it right out on front street that they're not welcome in the slightest. I had to retrieve some dude's ring before he would even humor me with responses to my dumb questions about something dumb.

I don't remember what people said in Oblivion. It was probably along the lines of, "This is for the gods!" or something. (No, I remember one: "This is the part where you fall down and BLEED TO DEATH!"...so, there's that one.)

This is how a citizen greets an orc: "Hello, Orc." Well, alright. I suppose I wouldn't like it if a dog came up to me and said, "Hello, human." Or maybe I would. I mean, how should he greet me? He could just say, "Hello." and that might go over better. Maybe he should just say, "Hey, man.", but say it in a very condescending manner. Where was I?

Part #3: Mission Structure
One of the first missions I got in my recent game of Morrowind began with me finding a dead body just outside of Seyda Neen, the starting town. On him was 200 gold, tax records of everyone in town, and some stupid-looking robe. I talked to some official dude in the census office (or whatever the beginning building was) and told him about the dead body. He asked if I found any money on his body, to which I replied, "Uh...nope, can't say I found any...what was it that you said? Money? No, none of that." He said, "Oh, alright, I guess. Nevermind. I was gonna offer you a reward, but..." Save file successfully loaded. "Did you find any money on his body?" "Why, yes! I did." "Oh, well, I'll take that." I poised my finger over the reload button. "If you can find the guy who killed him, I'll give the reward of 500 gold, more than double the money you returned!" Oh, alright. So I found him by searching the tax records, looking at the person with the highest tab. I confronted him, he confessed, even going so far as to say he'd do it again. Then he got pissed and started jabbing at me. So I killed him. I reported back to Official Guy and he gave me my reward. Then I thought...hey...if I killed that dude BEFORE I talked to Official Guy, I wouldn't have to give him the tax money AND I could get the reward. Okay, I didn't actually think that, I read it, but still. I mean, that isn't a quest line, it's more like what a tax collector would do, in that you have to figure out what outcome of events benefits you the most. It isn't some random series of events that at the end you get gold. You actually have to understand and be able to play with the rules of what is happening. I didn't even get into the part of the quest that involves a ring the tax collector had that his girlfriend wanted to remember him.

In Skyrim, there's a mission where you stab a guy in the face.

Actually, that's not fair, I've seen some Skyrim quests and their competent along the lines of story beats. But as far as what you do, it isn't very involved. (Even Oblivion had that great 'And Then There Were None'-style quest where you have to go to a large house filled with prospective winners of a fortune if they can spend the night in the house, but you had to kill them all, one-by-one, without anyone seeing you. That was pretty good.)

This isn't about Morrowind being about CHOICE, though. CHOICE is a ridiculous buzzword that has no real meaning by itself. But Morrowind was about...optimization? What I mean is that, at any given juncture, there are hundreds--thousands of things to do. Some of those things can be done in any order, but figuring out what order to do things can yield far greater results. Example: If I get hired to kill a guy who wants me to deliver a letter to someone, I should deliver his letter, get the reward, then kill him in his stupid, smug face.

Even in the RPG mechanics, it's about optimization. How can I raise my Acrobatics without spending any time on it? Hows about I jump everywhere I go?

Optimization may not sound like an inherently interesting theme for design, but in a world with Phoenix Wright, a game about lawyers (albeit sweaty, Japanese lawyers), I don't think that's a problem.

Now, to be sure, Morrowind's quests aren't all of the same quality. There are the broken Thieves Guild quests that are broken. Like, really, really broken. Like, how did they expect this to be done by a sane human? And without mods. And I could give you dozens of examples, but I haven't really played Morrowind past...I don't know, three towns? And I only kinda skimmed them for quests. All I know is that the purpose behind Morrowind is...purposeful? (Boy, this is falling apart fast). It wasn't bold to make an open world game with lots of quests, Fallout and Diablo had it beat long before. What was great about Morrowind was its sense of a world only a game could create. Oblivion and Skyrim would strive for worlds based on Lord of the Rings, and Morrowind's visual style is certainly copped from other stuff as well, but how many quests in Oblivion were about you finding a dead tax collector? (I think I might actually remember one, or at least a similar one.)

In Morrowind, when you are being directed somewhere, you are told through landmarks and directions, rather than arrows on the bottom. Skyrim's so afraid new players won't have any idea what to do that it insults them by never walking away and grabbing a sandwich. It's always behind you, pointing at where to go, like a nervous game developer at E3, scared to death that the press-man won't understand what they've been pouring the last 3 or so years into.

I think (to tie this into Thanksgiving) I'll say that we should be thankful for what we have this year, game-wise. For every new Assassin's Creed game, there's a Dark Souls. For every Modern Warfare 3/Battlefield 3/Uncharted 3/Gears of War 3/Just Dance 3(?), there's a Super Mario Land 3D. And for every Skyrim, there's a dentist appointment.

That was too harsh. Ah, screw it. Happy Thanksgiving.

Dragon Quest V Diary: The Rest of Part 4

2011-10-16T19:00:00.000-07:00

(Parts 1, 2, 3, and the beginning of 4 can be found here. The entire series will be collected under the Dragon Quest V Diary tag.)

I started out on my new journey as an adult by promptly beating a row of Slimes that attacked me as soon as I left town. After the battle, one of the Slimes (named Slalin) popped back up and asked if he could tag along. Of course, he's the weakest sort of monster in the game, but I decided that was a good jumping off point to get my Pokemon on in this game. Also, I didn't want to be rude.

After a little palling around with him (and having to revive him after every battle that didn't involve me killing all the enemies myself in one turn), another, stronger monster asked to join the party. Disturbingly named "Brown", he was a much better addition to the gang, though I hated to relegate Slalin to the wagon where all the unused monsters go (what I've cleverly deemed the 'Monster Wagon'), but he understood it was for the good of the team. Every once in a while, I can hear the faint sound of crying coming from the Monster Wagon, but it's usually drowned out by the battle music.

With a full party in tow, I felt like there needed to be something I was meant to do, now that I'm an adult. Bar? Been there. Lost $1000 on drinks. Casino? $2000. Strip joint? Oh, I can't even remember how much I lost there.

People told me of a town to the North, though. Which is odd, cause that's what people said in the last town. How far North am I going? "Is this the search for Santa?", I said to myself. No one heard. No matter, at least it's a direction. So I went there and, surprise, it's my old home town, Santa Rosa. I had no idea that last town was so close before. Guess I should've taken a moment or two to look around down there.

When I got there, the town looked exactly the same. Except, of course, for the fact that each building now had a great big chunk out of it, and bricks and cinder lay everywhere.

A man stands inside his house, talks about the terrible tragedy that has befallen the town.

"A terrible tragedy has befallen our town."

Oh, really? I hadn't noticed the fact that we are currently OUTSIDE.
As sobering a look at this town was, there wasn't too much to learn about or do. So further North, I traveled.

Oh, okay, that's a mountain range. [Not Pictured: The Mountain Range. Or, at least the Range of Mountains You Can't Cross. Sorry.] Alright, then, west!

West was my other old town, Alcapa. In Alcapa, I asked a bunch of people if they knew who Bianca (my short-lived childhood girlfriend) was, to which they scoffed, said "no", and told me to stay at the inn. So I did. Nothing better to do. In the middle of the night, Henry woke me up to talk about his old castle. What I WANTED to say was, "So, you don't think we've had enough problems, both of our fathers being killed, us becoming slaves for ten years, your younger brother whom everyone loved is now king, and now I learn everyone I know and love is now dead from some attack on the village, and you want to visit your castle because you're a little homesick?", but the game only has "Yes" or "No" answers, and they didn't even supply me with that choice, anyway, so we're going to Reinhart, I guess.

Other things that happened there: I bought an herb. I looked inside a jar somewhere and found a small medal, after which the game asked me if I wanted to send it to the "Medal King", to which I meant to reply "No! Medal King ain't gettin' none of my medals!", but then I accidentaly hit "Yes", so now I'm medal-less and the Medal King has one more medal, as if he needs them. Also, that woman in the bunny outfit who made fun of me as a kid? This is what she had to say:

I would like a yes, please.

END OF PART 4.
Next time: Getting ready for the trip to Reinhart, the trip to Reinhart, being at Reinhart, and Brown antics.

Devil's Advocate - Dating Simulations

2011-09-24T11:37:00.000-07:00

(Devil's Advocate is perhaps a new semi-regular feature on the Thunderware Games news feed (I will not call it a blog) that details how I think nothing is truly and purely without merit and that there is a redeeming quality to everything by taking concepts, characters, games, anything at all that people find almost unanimously negative and try to play devil's advocate to it. It's part of a new program my therapist has me on called "The Positive Side of Positivity". I'm not supposed to say anything negative. Along with negative thoughts comes immediate singing of "When Doves Cry", because I simply cannot stand that song.)

I've never played a dating sim, myself. At least, one of the non-X-rated variety. Unless there is something to the relationship in the game that you can't get out of a real relationship (and that usually means it's illegal), then it's hard to find a reason why you'd want to work at it. At least, from your perspective.

But while you're actually playing the game, it makes more sense. You are no longer you, you are your character. The player-named farmer from Harvest Moon, for instance. Oh, I forgot Harvest Moon was half-dating sim, okay, I have played a dating sim, then.

When you are Mr. Farmer, you want to tend a farm and raise a family. From a narrative perspective, the prospect of farms and families sounds interesting. How many games let you have kids? Well, a lot, I guess. The Sims. Oh, The Sims! That's also a dating sim. I've played more than I realize, I guess.

In The Sims, say you start off with a single, male father who is interested in the Automotive Industry. If you court your special lady and get married, you have clear cut benefits for having her around. Because in Video Game World, in place of REAL LOVE, you have VIDEOGAME BENEFITS. She can cook, she can clean, she can raise your kid, and, if she's feeling particularly 21st Century, she can get a job and pursue the Sports Industry, a line of work she's always wanted to go after.

In Harvest Moon, however, there aren't real game benefits to marriage. I mean, hey, maybe I'm just not an experienced enough player and there is actually some kind of upside to having a wife that wakes you up each morning talking about how country living is a new and

exciting life for her ever since you and her got married, except, before that, she worked on her mother's farm. Hold on, lemme check a wiki or something if there is.

[INTERMISSION]

[END OF INTERMISSION]

As far as I could suss out, amongst the in-depth, lengthy guides written by moon harvesters that are difficult for me, a casual moon harvester (I really only harvest small asteroids at this point) to figure out, there are none-to-barely-any-at-all benefits to marriage and dating-in-general in Harvest Moon.

When you look at dating from Persona's (3 and 4) perspective, relationships are a thing to be used as a leveling up device. And, in the context of a grind-heavy RPG (and a Japanese one, at that), that's perfectly okay. In fact, it's a pretty neat idea. Since numbers are rising up as you fight bad dudes anyway, and those numbers usually represent more abstract things like "health" and "damage", why not put a spin on those same concepts that adds a bit more depth to the game while also mixing a story in with it. To be sure, it's a completely obtuse way of sticking a story in a game, but, right now, games could take obtuse stories that still blend in over dense stories that sit like pudding skin on the game.

Of course, the main problem with all this being that this dating is handled with one thing alone: dialogue boxes. Sure, voice acting, as well, but that's no more interactive, nor no less exhausting. Although dialogue boxes are something to be handled on a later installment of Devil's Advocate. The Sims (and Harvest Moon, to a certain extent) handles it much more eloquently by putting you in charge of everything, right down to remembering to go pee before a date so you don't leak all over her new shoes. Unless she gets stung by a jellyfish, of course. That makes it all the more satisfying when you get married, and all the more upsetting when she dies of old age. In other words: you are attached to the character.

I'll tell you the worst implementation of dating sim-ing I've ever seen applied is the Mass Effect series. Or Knights of the Old Republic, I guess, but, for those games I'm more...hm...sentimental? I'm not sure if that's the right word. Does sentimental mean I like the way your character's head bobs up and down as you pick dialogue options? If so, then, yes, sentimental.

Mass Effect's way of interstellar fraternization (or Space Chatting) is by talking to them when you get back to your ship, inbetween missions, which wastes no resource, takes no effort, requires no thinking other then "what does my space-racist love interest want me to say about aliens?", and the options to the dialogue never feel quite clear anyway, so it feels like a guessing game, which I'll grant is generally realistic when it comes to dating. You never feel really attached to the characters, no matter how well they are written, and they are written fairly well.

Personally, though, I like the writing in Harvest Moon better. They tell you exactly what you need to know. Nothing more.

In Harvest Moon:

Girl: I like flowers.

Me: Here are flowers.

Girl: I would totally say "yes" to a proposal from you.

Me: Will you marry me?

Girl: Yes.

Done.

Mass Effect:

Ashley: I grew up in a part of Zeta filled with a plant called Milliards. Our town was right next to the largest field of it in the galaxy.

Me: Here are a hand full of Milliards.

Ashley: WHAT!? Milliards!? How dare you! Milliards are what caused the death of a billion people on my planet!

Me: Will you make sweet space love to me?

Ashley: Alright.

Regardless of how the actual "dating" is handled, from the perspective of your character, a little dating can make sense. Dating is, after all, a natural part of human existence, right? Songs focus on it, movies focus on it, literature, art. Hell, even the most artistically void of mediums can't ever take a break from it. Like cable television. And every medium I just listed shows a different aspect of it. Music expresses the moods, movies express the situations that arise during a date or afterwards, literature expresses the thought patterns of someone on a date, can't games express the machinations behind a date? Figuring out where to go on a first date, what to complement- her hair or her clothes-, what do I say when she tells me she was molested as a small child, there are millions of things that can arise from these situations, and even afterwards: balancing a relationship, deciding when to propose, buying a ring, PROPOSING, marriage life, kids, kids growing up, kids moving out, growing old. Why hasn't a game been made about this, yet? Other than The Sims, I guess.

They don't have to be just dialogue boxes. They can be any genre, just twist it a little. Got a platformer? Have your (ex)girlfriend represent the platforms that you jump on. Don't do that, it's too art-house-y, but it's a start. Go from there.

I say the verdict I've reached here is that dating sims aren't all bad. Dating is inherently a game on its own. To put it in simple terms, you can "win" a date, or you can "lose" a date. People might make fun of dating sims, saying they are things lonely people do. I suppose they say that because it deals with something people who play games are stereotypically not familiar with. Dating sims shouldn't be used as substitutes for real human relationships, but you could also say the same thing about socially-withdrawn people who watch romantic comedies and use that as their basis for relationships. It's all relative in the game of life. But everything related to life should be up-for-grabs in art. Your mind, your body, your enviroment, when you are an artist, everything you see is fodder.

I remember a quote from Chris Crawford. Well, I don't actually remember, but I'll paraphrase it, "All the time we see games that are about things, things, things, THINGS! Why aren't there more games about people?" And, maybe this is what he had in mind, maybe it isn't, but it'd be a step in the right direction.

- Nick

P.S. - May I just state for the record, at no point was I ever talking about the "Dating Sim" filth on Newgrounds or what-have-you-Flash-sites. I do believe those are as meritless as QTE's.

P.P.S. - Oh, man. Son of a...

"How can u just leave me standing?

Alone in a world that's so cold? (So cold)

Maybe I'm just too demanding

Maybe I'm just like my father too bold

Maybe you're just like my mother

She's never satisfied (She's never satisfied)

Why do we scream at each other

This is what it sounds like

When doves cry"

P.P.P.S. - Tip of the Day for Dating Sims: Always go Redhead, never go blonde. The blondes are always the crazy ones. And not the good crazy. Drama club-crazy.

P.P.P.P.S. - Next Time: "Devil's Advocate: Escort Missions".

Dragon Quest V Diary: Parts 1, 2, 3, and bits of 4

2011-08-16T14:40:00.002-07:00

Dragon Quest V: Hand of the Heavenly Bride
Designer: Yūji Horii
Release Date: September 17, 1992

I've recently gotten access to a proliferation of vidja games (mostly SNES ones) (What? What do you mean? What are ROMs?), most of which it is unrealistic to play with my schedule. Not that I'm working. I should be, but my time is mostly taken up with catching up on Louie and looking at Wikipedia to see what crappy Nickelodeon/Disney Channel celebrities were born in the months surrounding my birthday (apparently white supremacist ones). But, every once in a while, I like to play one of them there gamey-games. And, this week (or month) I felt like loading up an RPG. A SNES one. The SNES had a deep well of RPG's, so I didn't have to go with the obvious ones (Chrono Trigger, Final Fantasy VI...Sailor Moon RPG). I've heard good things about the Dragon Quest series and enjoyed Dragon Warrior (in theory), so I went with Dragon Quest V for the inaugural Backlog.

Now, this was about 2 weeks ago. I didn't think I'd be doing this stupid post about it, so I didn't make any screenshots or bother to remember any of the plot points, but, hey, why should that stop me from trying to recount them?

SPOILERS, obviously.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

- I get borned.

- Due to child birth complications, I guess, my mother gets dead.

- Jump forward 8-or-so years, father and I getting off a boat onto a harbor that is part of no town. Just a harbor.

- We slug it to town (Santa Rosa), everyone loves my father, of course. People treat me with little respect, as I am a child. Can't even get respect from a bar maid wearing a bunny outfit.

- But everyone does like me in that oh-look-at-the-small-child kind of way.

- While my old man talks to some other old men, a little girl (Bianca) invites me up to her room (Friendly Reminder: I am the same age, if not younger then her).

- Boring stuff, saved some dude in a cave, yawn.

- Old man, Bianca, and I go to other town called Alcapa and spend the night.

- Awoken in the night by Bianca, we go to rid a castle of ghosts to save a suspicious-looking "kitten" from two terrible twins.

- My fears about the "kitten" are justified when, after we save it, it joins the party as a modestly strong member of the team. Ain't no kitten casting fireball.

- Got back to Santa Rosa, found invisible fairy, teleported to fairy land via magical basement staircase, saved fairy land, blah blah blah. I'll get better at trimming the fat with these Diaries.

- Back at Santa Rosa, bedtime arrives and sleep keeps me from seeing my father's exodus from town to yet another town (Reinhart) for he was beckoned by the King.

- But, wait, no, nevermind, he was too busy praying.

- At Reinhart, King and old man talk, I meet King's son who is a spoiled, little brat. I mean that in the best possible way, m'lord.

- Turns out, dad gets hired to babysit Henry. He doesn't seem too upset by this from talking to him, but you can just tell he's a little disappointed.

- Prince Henry, in a very clever scene involving a trap door, is kidnapped and taken away to a dungeon by some thugs.

- Pops rushes off to save him, I have to spend about the next three hours trying to find where the dungeon is.

- Turns out, it was right behind the castle. Go figure.

- I hope you took heed of the SPOILER warning, cause this is a doozy: father dies trying to save Prince Henry, Prince Henry and I are taken away as slaves. What's this? Mother LIVES!?

- Skip ahead 10 years, I am pushing boulders. Prince Henry has turned into a slightly better human being, if only because he's older and less of a rich douche.

- New girl in slave camp gets pummeled by some thugs, I step in and save her, kinda. Well, I take a beating, too. Henry and I end up in slave jail, which just has to be the worst thing in the world to be a slave in slave jail, and the new girl and her brother (who's a guard) show up and, not only break us out, but also help us escape by shoving us in a barrel and throwing it down the river they use to send bodies into the sea.

- Barrel somehow floats right then up to a small monestary where Henry and I are given two hots and a cot. While there, nuns nurse me back to health, give me a handful of cash, and say things that make me suspect some of the members of whatever-church-this-is were playing "How Deep Of A Sleep Is This Guy-Who-Washed-Up-Near-Our-Monastery Right Now".

- I am bidded farewell by the members of the monastery, everyone makes a pretty big deal of me leaving, I get a little wierded out by their warnings of a "dangerous path", I scoff and throw the bird as I leave, and I barely make it to the nearest town with a dead prince in my party and 1 HP.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

That's that, so far. I'll continue to update on my journey as I experience it.
Next on the agenda: figuring out what the hell I'm supposed to be doing now. Then buy a sword.
- Nick

P.S. - Pay no attention to the name in the screenshots. My character's name is Nikeless. But everybody calls me Nike.

P.P.S. - The shots I neglected to get myself were grabbed off of shrines.rpgclassics.com/snes/dq5/walkthrough This "Chris" character will be my alternate-dimensional doppelganger for the remainder of my journey.
P.P.P.S. - Thank you, whoever made that walkthrough on that website. I assume your name is Chris. I hope that is not too presumptuous.

P.P.P.P.S. - You know what happens when you presume? You make a pre out of 'u' and 'me'.

Flicker

2011-06-13T14:27:00.000-07:00

A Shoot-Them-Up that teaches the skills of spatial memorization. Ew, that sounds terrible, let me write that again.

A ShootEmUp that takes your teeth and feeds them to it's invisible guard dogs. Too aggressive?

A Shmup that focuses on pattern memorization. As your score goes up, everything on the screen goes slowly invisible, forcing you to survive in the dark.

Note: No, the thing at the top is not cheese, it is the Sun.

You can download it here.

The Story of Sun

2011-05-31T21:01:00.001-07:00

Introducing Station

2011-05-06T19:40:00.000-07:00

This is something I meant to post WAAAYYY long ago, before we released Station to the world. I thought it might be interesting, cause we never talked about Station anywhere else.

Never introduced it or explained what it is. Just pooped it out and didn't talk about it. Which I guess requires a little explanation why.

Basically I came up with this game idea years ago and originally made it in DOS, using qBasic, but never really 'finished' it.

Through the years I would start it up again, get to the point where you could move ships around and technically play a game between two people. But never actually cracked the nut of AI. Which was kinda my whole point and what I really wanted to get to.

About the 8th time around I was learning XNA and I figured it would be interesting to see if I could get this game working. I did and actually got around to making the AI work.

I was pumped to say the least.

So we decided to enter it into a competition and were readying a special build with threaded loading but there was a bug somewhere and I couldn't find it. It would randomly crash and I had no idea why.

That coupled with the realization that XNA is really awesome if your making stuff for yourself, or you know it will only run on the xbox, but really is a horrible experience if you want it to run on other peoples machines; made me not pumped.

Thats when I made Cygnus.

Then After Cygnus, Nick and I had a conversation and decided to release the older version of Station that we knew worked.

But by that time I was tired and really sick of thinking about Station (and also ashamed of using XNA.) So I just uploaded it and called it a day. Then Slept.

So without any further ado, the Station explanation starts here uncut...

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

We have a few smaller games on that sidebar over there, labeled "Tony's and Nick's Games", but we've been working on something a bit more ambitious. Namely, 3-D.

It's called Station. It's a cross between chess and Advanced Wars. Oh, what a lovely combination that is.

On an 8x8 grid, you control a Fighter and a Station. The Station builds, the Fighter fights. It's a tiny bit more complicated than that, but the game prides itself on being a simplified, turn-based alternative to the more complicated and hectic games like Starcraft or Age of Empires.

There's a level editor, too, for those who are interested. Or Customater(tm), as we call it.

And remember, us being fans of custom maps, we want your submissions! We may release map packs from time to time. Thunderware-Made and Fan-Made.

Although it's our first foray into more ambitious projects, it's still free, so if you're not sure whether to pick this one up or not, I just made the decision for you.

History Lesson:
This has been a personal project of mine for a very long time. I've redone it about 8 times in different programming languages on differant operating systems, starting on DOS. The original was ASCII-based. And I mean REALLY ASCII-based. That got deleted somehow. In fact, something always happened when I would try to make this game. But not this time. This time, it's finished.

Please rate and comment!!

Download here.

Breadcrumbs 4: Super Mario Galaxy

2011-05-05T23:18:00.001-07:00

In Super Mario Galaxy there are planets floating around that Mario can walk all around. Some planets are spheres or odd shapes and have no up or down association, but other planets are coin shaped and have two sides to them.

First time you encounter a little planet with a flip side to it, they need to explain it visually to the player. Get the idea that theres a entire other side to the rock your standing on, probably with more stuff being on the other side.

But the player can't see it at all because it's on the other side and whatever the player doesn't see isn't there.

I'm sure you could explain it to someone all day using text on a sign post.

Well, maybe you could, but "walk off the side of the world!" Just looks kinda silly.

I think how they chose to do it is a little genius. They actually use two differant methods right next to eachother.

One part is a bridge that goes over the lip of the world and wraps around. This works really well as a visual queue to the player expressing where to walk.

The second other method, is the warp pipe that just warps to the other side directly below it. Probably redundancy in case the bridge doesn't coax someone, they'll travel down the pipe and get to there destination.

Breadcrumbs 3: Athena

2011-05-05T21:54:00.002-07:00

I've recently gotten access to a GameTap account. There are a lot of old interesting games that no one cares about anymore (but should).

I came upon a game called Athena. Never heard of it before, I don't know anything about it.

I recorded a video of me playing..

It does some interesting things in the beginning to explain a couple of ideas really simply.

After a short battle the player comes upon this lonely stump. After the player realizes theres a jump button and jumps over it (and takes care of that enemy), there confronted with this wall thats taller then there jump can take them.

After a short while it becomes apparent that if you whack it with an attack, it destroys bits of the wall letting you pass.

Another interesting little thing is that Athena can climb up and down vines.

With enemies spawning and power-ups making an appearance on top of this little hill, it becomes apparent that you should be able to get up there. Thats when you realize that you can climb a vine.

Then you see the vine going down and wonder; "If I can climb UP a vine, can I climb down?"

You do, to find out that theres a whole other level and that it goes up and down not just from left to right.

For the record I have no clue how to deal with the cupid enemy that shoots arrows at you. It seems absolutely unfair.

Also I'm skipping over how the very first thing that happens to the main character is that the wind blows her dress off. I'm going to take it as symbolism for Athena getting down to business.

Coin Crumbs 2

2011-05-04T14:06:00.000-07:00

Here is another instance of collectibles used as bread crumbs.

This time a sole Yoshi coin is used at the top of a hill.

The purpose being to entice the player to climb up, grab it, then learn that they can slide down to kill that Rex that's walking up the slope.

Coin Crumbs 1

2011-05-04T13:32:00.000-07:00

I was playing super mario world and I noticed they use coins a lot as bread crumbs to explain to the player where to go.

This is one of the earlier examples of it.

If your running when you come upon these coins and jump to grab them, your arch will carry mario up to the Yoshi coin and bring him down right onto the little shell enemy.

Showing you that you can collect those Yoshi coins and jumping on stuff kills it! All in one little coin arch.

Interplanetary Conquest (in Tetris Worlds)

2011-02-02T00:38:00.000-08:00

Picture, if you will, a proud race of Minos. Living out there lives, oblivious to their surroundings. Until, one day, they realize there sun is about to explode and everything becomes a mad dash to leave there solar system and find respite on other planets.

Six Tetrinauts are sent to six different planets deemed terraform-able and to "ready" the planet for the impending mass exodus of Minos.

When the Tetrinauts arrive on the lush, fertile planet of Deneb, they are greeted with this...

The kingdom of the apparently equally as proud Denebians. Of course, this doesn't phase the Tetriminos. The conquest must continue. Poor Denebians.

I think they plan on them being a food source.

Color Theory Part II: The Theory (or Color Design)

2010-11-16T13:15:00.001-08:00

A while back, I was going to talk about the design aspect of color a little more. Knowing how to get different colors is important, but knowing what colors your working towards is more important.

I'm going to relate everything in terms of my own game Cygnus, because I put a lot of effort into the color design. Well, the first level at least, which dictated the colors I would use in subsequent levels. The player ship for example...

...when it came time to decide the color for the player ship, I could have chosen any color in the world, obviously, but I knew I wanted the color to represent something; stand out and be unique. There have been a lot of games where the player's ship is of a boring color and I definitely didn't want that for Cygnus. Also, I wanted the player to be able to know where there ship was among all the other lines.

One day, Nick was playing Super Metroid for the first time and I noticed that the over all color of Samus's suit (bright yellow) was an 'almost' exact compliment of the color of the very first level, which was a cold blue.

(Check this out, there's an image of samus at the top left)

These two colors came together to really visually give the impression that this area was cold, old and Samus didn't belong and was trudging through, really upsetting the place. Also it was very visually stunning.

I knew from that, that the player's color in Cygnus should be a compliment to whatever the first level was. Since I knew the first level was going to be some sort of dirt-ish planet. I chose a light brown that I liked. Which actually ended up affecting the choice for every other color in the game; because I got the player compliment color from this, and each world had to be visually different. Since everything in the game is drawn with just lines, being different meant having a unique color. (And animation, but that's a differant post.)

So the "compliment" for the brown that I chose was a mute blue.

Also, since Gravitar was a big influence on the look and play of the game, I wanted to have the spawner be the same colors and animation as the spawner on Gravitar. So that blew the nice color compliment but it's okay cause it gives the first level a cohesive prop, which maybe the second screen doesn't have.

Since walls kill you, I really didn't feel the need for enemies, but, for things that move and animate around a lot, I colored red to let the player know that they are more dangerous than a wall.

- Tony

Top-Secret P.S. - I forgot to comment out a piece of code in Cygnus that let's you hit the 'F' key for brakes. It was a line I wrote very early on when I was testing the movement code. It also sets your fuel to exactly 10. So if your going for a high fuel score don't press it, cause' it will cause your fuel to reset.

color theory Part I : The tech

2010-09-14T11:11:00.000-07:00

The first time you look at something like this

255, 94, 0

your like whaa?? But once you figure out what it is and you use it a while you start seeing it more like this

Or at least hopefully you do. Those three numbers separated by comas, is the RGB that describes a color to the computer. The first one is red, followed by green then blue. You combine those three colors and you will get the color your looking for.

Natively.

Theres another way for the computer to use those numbers. instead of "RGB" the alternative way is "HSL". (well to be honest the computer can do ANYTHING it wants with those numbers. But I really want to talk about HSL cause its fun.)

-The 'H' stands for "hue", which basically defines the color.

-The 'S' stands for "saturation", which basically means all white or all hue. or anywhere in between.

-The 'L' stands for "lightness", which also basically means all black or all hue. or (again) anywhere in between.

This is cool because using RGB can be very difficult if you, say, want to take a color and just make it darker. or would like to cycle through colors to create one of those psychedelic Jeff Minter style things. if you had the color defined as HSL you could just change the H "hue", and you got a different color with the same brightness and saturation. This is how i did the rainbow level in Cygnus.

Now, I know what your saying, Tony!, this sounds AWESOME but how do I convert to and from RGB and HSL? Well I found this c# code online a while ago,

http://www.geekymonkey.com/Programming/CSharp/RGB2HSL_HSL2RGB.htm

And I converted it to c++ and using openFrameworks(OF is awesome!). This bit will take an RGB color and convert it to HSL...

// Given a Color (RGB Struct) in range of 0-255

// Return H,S,L in range of 0-1

static ofColor twRGB2HSL (ofColor rgb)

{

float r = rgb.r / 255.0f;

float g = rgb.g / 255.0f;

float b = rgb.b / 255.0f;

float v;

float m;

float vm;

float r2, g2, b2;

float h = 0; // default to black

float s = 0;

float l = 0;

v = max(r,g);

v = max(v,b);

m = min(r,g);

m = min(m,b);

l = (m + v) / 2.0;

if (l <= 0.0)

{

ofColor hsl;

hsl.r = h;

hsl.g = s;

hsl.b = l;

return hsl;

}

vm = v - m;

s = vm;

if (s > 0.0)

{

s /= (l <= 0.5) ? (v + m ) : (2.0 - v - m) ;

}

else

{

ofColor hsl;

hsl.r = h;

hsl.g = s;

hsl.b = l;

return hsl;

}

r2 = (v - r) / vm;

g2 = (v - g) / vm;

b2 = (v - b) / vm;

if (r == v)

{

h = (g == m ? 5.0 + b2 : 1.0 - g2);

}

else if (g == v)

{

h = (b == m ? 1.0 + r2 : 3.0 - b2);

}

else

{

h = (r == m ? 3.0 + g2 : 5.0 - r2);

}

h /= 6.0;

ofColor hsl;

hsl.r = h;

hsl.g = s;

hsl.b = l;

return hsl;

}

And this next bit will convert from HSL back to RGB...

// Given H,S,L in range of 0-1

// Returns a Color (RGB struct) in range of 0-255

static ofColor twHSL2RGB(float h, float sl, float l)

{

float v;

float r,g,b;

r = l; // default to gray

g = l;

b = l;

v = (l <= 0.5) ? (l * (1.0 + sl)) : (l + sl - l * sl);

if (v > 0)

{

float m;

float sv;

int sextant;

float fract, vsf, mid1, mid2;

m = l + l - v;

sv = (v - m ) / v;

h *= 6.0;

sextant = (int)h;

fract = h - sextant;

vsf = v * sv * fract;

mid1 = m + vsf;

mid2 = v - vsf;

switch (sextant)

{

case 0:

r = v;

g = mid1;

b = m;

break;

case 1:

r = mid2;

g = v;

b = m;

break;

case 2:

r = m;

g = v;

b = mid1;

break;

case 3:

r = m;

g = mid2;

b = v;

break;

case 4:

r = mid1;

g = m;

b = v;

break;

case 5:

r = v;

g = m;

b = mid2;

break;

}

ofColor rgb;

rgb.r = r * 255.0f;

rgb.g = g * 255.0f;

rgb.b = b * 255.0f;

return rgb;

}

The code isn't formatted very well here, but i'm lazy so I don't care.

Coming...(maybe)... color theory part II : The theory

Battle Stations

2010-08-12T11:38:00.000-07:00

"There comes a time in every man's life when he must kiss his wife and tell his family that he is leaving home and he will not be returning for he is going to war. "With what?", they may ask. And you'll tell them it is with one of the worst kinds of enemies, one that walks in the shadows, one that goes by no rules, one that preys on the innocent and weak. Your family may try to stop you. Mine did. That is why I killed them."

That was an excerpt from my recent novel "Stations Over Moonbase 94" for our new game 'Station'. What's that? Oh, right, I forgot, we have a new game!

Download: Station

Station can be summed up in six words: Space fights. Oh yeah. Space fights.

Some other descriptory words: It's a turn-based Strategy game on a 8x8 grid. If that sentence gets any kind of hot and/or bothered, please do download at GameJolt by means of the link above the paragraph above this paragraph.

Cygnus

2010-06-25T15:24:00.000-07:00

It's an adventure game with Gravitar or Asteroid type controls. I've wanted to do a game like this for a while.

And I just uploaded it...ok ok I uploaded it like an hour ago, I went to go eat a sandwhich before I wrote this post.

You can download it here.

Pie in space

2010-06-23T07:24:00.000-07:00

Intergalactic confections!

screenshot?

2010-06-20T09:11:00.000-07:00

from what? A new game?

maybe : ) Click on it to make it BIG!

This Post Suffers From The Following Side Effects: Loss of Direction, A Questionable Existence, and Anal Leakage

2010-05-27T11:27:00.000-07:00

Thought I'd update the blog and bump that Dio picture down. That things starting to creep me out.

So. How's everyone doin'? Let's see, what day is it today? Ah, yes, everyone geared up for Memorial Day? Uh, if you're in the US. I don't want to presuppose.

No news right now. Bad time to have a blog, really.

I'm thinking about doing some excersizing, perhaps some light aerobics. Sitting and eating isn't giving me the abs/buns/thighs/arms of steel I originally thought it would. I was thinking Cobb Salad, then push-ups, then coffee, then Krispy Kreme. No, wait, scratch that. I won't have any coffee.

Alright, I'll stop this while I'm behind.

2010-05-16T23:16:00.000-07:00

very special belated Mammy day!

2010-05-11T00:02:00.001-07:00

We spent Mother's day eve making this game for out mother.

Your probably not our mother but its a fun 10 minutes to play through anyway! Then again you probably are our mother.

heres the link mom.

Thunderware...one year old....

2010-04-15T04:00:00.000-07:00

Today is the birthday of the website. And to celebrate were watching xbox live die. Both on Giantbomb and playing halo 2.

But enough of that, we do have some happy news, in preparation for the thunder birthday, I spent a little time tweaking sticky situation, the game that started it all and I'm now re-releasing it under the apply named moniker, "Sticky Situation 1.2".

Basically I smoothed out enemy spawning and the rate at which they shoot. Hopefully any long time Sticky Situation fans out there will appreciate the change.

If not, complain on our forums, email your congressman and start an online petition and I'll change it back. I want at least 7 signatures on that bad boy though.

Here's it's happy new home. Good Thunder-Thursday!

10 ten

2010-03-26T09:19:00.001-07:00

here's a game I made in about a week. I didn't have any kind of image of what the game would look like in my head while I was working on it and I never got one, so it looks horrid. please excuse that.

here

The 'game' itself is based around the idea that you have ten seconds to do stuff and then it's the computers turn. I'll probably never get it passed this unfinished state but whatever and the game probably doesn't even deserve the amount of words I'm writing about it. pff

Check it out anyway!

~ Anthony R.

Station

2010-03-03T08:53:00.001-08:00

[EDIT: This game is postponed.]

We just posted a video from our new game that we are working on.

It's called Station and we've been working on it for quite a while. Put a lot of blood sweat and tears into it. Were extremely excited that it's really close to being done.

The Video is of two computer controlled players duking it out on a map we call Symmetry.

More to come.

1st Annual 2010 Golden Bass Awards

2010-02-18T10:24:00.000-08:00

Hello, Ladies and Gentlemen and welcome to the 1st Annual 2010 Thunderware Golden Bass Awards! As par for our usual proceedings, we are giving out the awards, tonight, judged by a game's capacity to simulate and emulate the real-world pasttime of Aquatic Life Hunting and Capture, or as it is known colloquially: Fishing!

We give and deduct points based on the:
- Realism
- Entertainment Value
- Cost of Bait and
- Number of Puzzles Involving Capturing A Fish Weighing 10 or More lbs.

Tonight's list is categorized as "All-Time Best Fishing Mini-Games". Tonight's winner will recieve a gold paint-sprayed Golden Bass Award and a check worth $15 (USD)! Second Place Winner gets a Nintendo Wii.

The Nominees for the 1st Annual 2010 Golden Bass Award are:
1.) The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time
2.) Harvest Moon
3.) Animal Crossing
4.) Super Backwoods Bass Fishing '99

Let's kick things off and get down to the Second Place Winner, shall we?
The Second Place Winner of the 1st Annual 2010 Golden Bass Awards is:

2.) The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time
Nintendo, your Wii is being shipped to you as we speak!

Now, let's move on to our final category:
The Winner(s) of the 1st 2010 Golden Bass Award, with no contest, is:

1.) People who don't play Fishing mini-games.
Everyone, your checks and Golden Bass awards are in the mail!

Alright, that concludes tonight's proceedings! Congratulations to our winner(s) and, to the losers, better luck next time!

Thank you, and good night!

Desktop Chess

2010-01-06T21:12:00.001-08:00

A long time ago I wanted to have a game of solitaire chess going that whenever I have a down-time point I could look at it and take a turn. There are many online java based chess games, but I wanted it to just be there and not have to have it open all the time.

My bro and I had just watched THIS...

...and the point where the character does some choice art with his desktop icons gave me an idea...

I give you desktop chess...i bet someone somewhere has thought of this, but whatever.

Just extract all the icons to your desktop, set the chess board as your wallpaper, use the "turn.ico" to help you remember which side's turn it is and remember...have fun.

HERE

Purple Rain Video

2009-12-09T16:10:00.000-08:00

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

2009-12-04T21:35:00.000-08:00

[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

2009-12-02T18:15:00.000-08:00

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

2009-10-26T16:02:00.000-07:00

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!

2009-10-09T21:21:00.000-07:00

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

Heres Lazy Ball

2009-09-26T21:42:00.000-07:00

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

2009-09-14T23:28:00.000-07:00

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'

2009-07-28T21:04:00.000-07:00

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

How to play my very popular game

2009-07-28T19:21:00.000-07:00

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

2009-07-23T00:48:00.000-07:00

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

2009-07-22T21:24:00.001-07:00

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.

2009-07-22T12:34:00.000-07:00

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!

2009-07-21T21:05:00.000-07:00

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

2009-07-07T00:59:00.000-07:00

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

2009-06-19T21:44:00.000-07:00

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.

2009-06-16T03:33:00.000-07:00

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.

...

2009-06-05T06:39:00.001-07:00

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

w.e

2009-06-05T04:27:00.000-07:00

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

ugh...part 2

2009-06-05T04:09:00.000-07:00

(Because you suck) Oh that makes sense.

ugh

2009-06-05T04:07:00.000-07:00

why am i having trouble beating this stupid casual bot?

progress party blah blah blah

2009-06-05T03:58:00.000-07:00

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

Party like it's 1999 progress

2009-06-05T03:45:00.000-07:00

350

Party Likes it's 1999: Progress

2009-06-03T00:19:00.000-07:00

275 / 1999

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

2009-05-20T20:43:00.000-07:00

"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.

2009-05-20T17:24:00.000-07:00

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

2009-05-17T19:48:00.000-07:00

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?

2009-05-16T21:59:00.000-07:00

(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!

2009-05-12T19:04:00.000-07:00

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.

2009-05-05T14:24:00.000-07:00

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

2009-05-01T15:15:00.000-07:00

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...

2009-04-30T06:26:00.000-07:00

...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

2009-04-22T13:46:00.001-07:00

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

2009-04-15T20:55:00.000-07:00

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

2009-04-15T20:32:00.000-07:00

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.

Thunderware Games

Dragon Quest V Diary: Part 6

Dragon Quest V Diary: Part 5

Skyrim is: "Wings at the Speed of Sound" (or Happy Thanksgiving, Let's Talking About Skyrim)

Dragon Quest V Diary: The Rest of Part 4

Devil's Advocate - Dating Simulations

Dragon Quest V Diary: Parts 1, 2, 3, and bits of 4

Flicker

The Story of Sun

Introducing Station

Breadcrumbs 4: Super Mario Galaxy

Breadcrumbs 3: Athena

Coin Crumbs 2

Coin Crumbs 1

Interplanetary Conquest (in Tetris Worlds)

Color Theory Part II: The Theory (or Color Design)

color theory Part I : The tech

Battle Stations

Cygnus

Pie in space

screenshot?

This Post Suffers From The Following Side Effects: Loss of Direction, A Questionable Existence, and Anal Leakage

very special belated Mammy day!

Thunderware...one year old....

10 ten

Station

1st Annual 2010 Golden Bass Awards

Desktop Chess

Purple Rain Video

Purple Rain Postmortem

H1N1-ey

Purple Rain

Master Chieftan!

Heres Lazy Ball

icons

Just Sayin'

How to play my *very popular* game

Sticky Situation

Half-Past Thunder-Con

I'm Just Not A Con-Man.

It's Comic-ON!

God Bless AmericaWare

ok sorry if you've been lost

im a slow programmer.

...

w.e

ugh...part 2

ugh

progress party blah blah blah

Party like it's 1999 progress

Party Likes it's 1999: Progress

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

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

Introducing: The ThunderWare Forums

ThunderWare's First Game?

Quarter not Quarterly!

A League Of It's Own

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

Cocoa Butter

DOS Chocobo World

The Other Guy at ThunderWare

How to play my very popular game