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Blog Details for "Videogame Biscuit"
Videogame BiscuitVideogame BiscuitI'm an amateur game developer. I publish the progress of the games I'm working on, finished games, reviews of tools and books and anything game development related Articles
Naming conventions
2008-02-09 22:00:00 Without proper formatting and decent naming conventions, programming code can become incredibly confusing. And, of course, this is starting to happen to me all over again. A particularly annoying problem in Torque occurs when you use the same name for several things. It has happened a few times before that I used the same same ... More About: Conventions , Naming
Wasabi Defense update 07-02
2008-02-07 20:34:00 Despite all the trying-to-find-a-better-wordpress-theme crap the last few days, I have managed to do some more work on Wasabi Defense ! And I have done quite a bit of work. Here’s the result: As you probably see, there are a few new things. First of all, the new base element. It’s a drilling platform, wich drills for ... More About: Update , Sabi
Site overhaul, update
2008-02-05 23:00:00 For now, I’m gonna keep this theme. I have been searching for a good one for a few days now and I’m amazed about the flood of Wordpress themes that plain and simply suck like hell. What I simply don’t understand is why the hell 99% of all themes don’t show the category hierarchy. For ... More About: Site , Update
Site overhaul
2008-01-31 21:00:00 In the next few days, I’m gonna change the appearance of the website. Even though I think the current theme looks ok, there’s some functionality I don’t like. My main issue is that in the categories list, you don’t see any difference between main categories and subcategories. I have tried to change this but I’m ... More About: Site
Wasabi Defense update 30-01
2008-01-30 21:40:00 Another small milestone in the development cycle! I’ve finished this level, so it’s time for another screenshot. Some units in the base can be bombarded, and that’s what you see here! When it gets hit by a bomb, it starts burning. More hits intensify the fire and after three hits, kaboom! Critical units (the landing ... More About: Defense , Update , Wasabi , Sabi
Laser beams
2008-01-27 22:11:00 As promised, here is the tutorial about creating laser beams with Torque Game Builder. The laser beam effect I created is different from the type you commonly see in games or movies. Instead of a spear-like beam, the entire beam appears at once. The only time I had ever seen something similar in another game ... More About: Laser
Wasabi Defense update 01-24
2008-01-24 23:29:00 Here’s another Wasabi Defense update! I have created another enemy, a bomber this time. It drops large bombs on the base, and it can also destroy buildings! The bomber enters at the top of the screen, drops its payload and then pulls up again. You don’t have much time to shoot it, so you have to ... More About: Update , Sabi
Wasabi Defense update 01-18
2008-01-20 00:38:00 Yesterday I said I was working on some sort of laser beam effect, and here it is! It took me a while to figure out how to do it without using too much particles but it works perfectly, and I think it doesn’t look too bad! The effect you see actually consists of three particle effects. ... More About: Defense , Update , Wasabi , Sabi
Wasabi Defense update 01-17
2008-01-17 13:49:00 My computer is back! As I already suspected, one of the RAM chips was having issues. It’s replaced and everything works again as it should. This also means I’m going back to work on Wasabi Defense . The last few days, I designed a few new sprites on a borrowed laptop, and here’s the result (at ... More About: Update , Sabi
Tips for finishing a game
2008-01-15 21:00:00 Anyone who writes games, especially if it’s just as a hobby so you don’t have publishers breathing down your neck and pushing you to finish the game, is probably familiar with this problem. Of all the games you start working on, not too many ever get finished. Before I started this website I created games ... More About: Tips , Game , Game Design
AI Techniques for game programming
2008-01-14 21:19:00 Artificial intelligence. One of the most complicated aspects of game development, and one of the things that can ruin an otherwise excellent game. Nothing ruins a game like shooting a guard with a sniper rifle while the guy who is standing next to him acts as of nothing happened. Although I probably won’t be writing ... More About: Programming , Books , Game
Short break, update
2008-01-13 22:33:00 Okay, my computer still isn’t fixed. It’s not really clear what causes the crashes and the guys at the computer store are doing all sorts of tests to see wich component is the source of the problem. Good news, though, is that I borrowed a laptop so I can at least continue to work on ... More About: Break , Update , Short
A short break
2008-01-10 20:24:00 I’m having a bit of problems with my new computer. Ever since I got it, I’ve been getting BSOD’s, sometimes a few times per day. At first, I thought it might have something to do with bad drivers or the BIOS, but after several updates the problem still hasn’t been solved. My best guess is ... More About: Break , Short
Wintereenmas is coming!
2008-01-02 15:54:00 First of all, a very happy new year everybody. It’s been a kick ass year for me (I started this website and finally managed to put a game together and publish it, and I got a new computer!). No new year’s resolutions for me, though! Everyone makes the same stupid promises each year and forgets ...
Wasabi Defense update 29-12
2007-12-29 17:37:00 Here’s another update! I’ve created a rocket pod that fires small missiles. Unlike the plasma cannon, this doesn’t reload, so if you’re out of rockets you’re out of rockets. The advantage of this is that they have a proximity fuse, so a near miss will still be a hit. How I did this? Very simple: ... More About: Defense , Update , Wasabi , Sabi
New status display
2007-12-22 20:35:00 I’ve mentioned my problems with adapting the status display I built using Torque’s GUI builder to the display resolution before. I fixed the problem by abandoning the GUI builder and going for a sprite-based display. I created a new display background and numbers that look like those 7-segment LED displays. This display automatically adjusts to ... More About: Display , Status
Explosion with sparks
2007-12-14 13:17:00 A while ago, I wrote a tutorial on how to create an explosion. Now, we’re gonna add a nice shower of sparks to the fireball. The starting point is the basic explosion from the previous tutorial, wich had one particle emitter for the fireball. Now, we’re gonna add a second emitter for the sparks. Here ... More About: Explosion , Sparks
Wasabi Defense update 12-08
2007-12-08 16:28:00 Whew, I finally fixed the attack wave code! A few days ago I realized it had become a bunch of spaghetti code and a bug explosion waiting to happen. So I decided to just dump the code I had and start over again. First I took out my notebook (a paper notebook, not a laptop) ... More About: Defense , Update , Wasabi , Sabi
Game engines for indie developers
2007-12-06 21:30:00 Since most independent or hobby game developers can’t afford hi-tech engines like the Unreal engine, and writing one yourself - even a simple one - is a complicated and time consuming process, Nuclex has made a list of seven engines you should know. Here’s the short version: C4 Engine Ogre 3D Irrlicht Torque Crystal Space NeoEngine Unity 3D The author of the article ... More About: Indie , Game , Engines , Developers , Game Design
Wasabi Defense update 12-03
2007-12-03 21:50:00 Did some more work on Wasabi Defense ; here’s another screenshot! Another enemy, a bomber this time. It fires four bombs upwards in a fan-pattern, after wich they fall down. Unlike the purple fireballs of the first enemy, these bombs are able to destroy buildings. Except the landing platform and the launchpad for the hovergun, these are ... More About: Update , Sabi
Doom movie
2007-12-02 17:23:00 I rented the Doom movie from the local video shop this weekend. Most of the time, movies made from video games suck. So far, the only one I enjoyed was Resident Evil (probably because it had Milla Jovovich). Doom, however, was for the most part another disappointment. First of all, the story was different from ... More About: Movie
My latest headaches
2007-12-02 13:25:00 Okay, here’s the deal. Getting POV-Ray and Moray to work properly on Vista is a nightmare. Until now, things worked more or less, but not as good as on XP. Creating scenes and rendering them from Moray worked, but I had to close POV-Ray every time before rendering or everything would freeze. Annoying, but not ...
Wasabi Defense update 11-22
2007-11-22 22:15:00 Whew, here’s another screenshot at last! The first enemy is flying around and dropping… well, stuff on the player. They look like flashing balls of light, I haven’t come up with a cool name for them yet. The enemy flies in some sort of sideways spiral and drops its payload in three shot bursts. Most important ... More About: Defense , Update , Wasabi , Sabi
Wasabi Defense update 11-13
2007-11-13 22:45:00 Okay, things aren’t going as smoothly as I wanted them to go. The main problem is POV-Ray. I’m using this tool, together with Moray, for creating most of my sprites. I have tried Blender a few times but it’s difficult as hell, and simply overkill for creating pre-rendered sprites. POV-Ray doesn’t work as good as ... More About: Defense , Update , Wasabi , Sabi
Wasabi Defense update 11-03
2007-11-03 21:43:00 I did some behind-the-scenes work on Wasabi Defense . This includes stuff like: starting the game from a menu, handling lander crashes and landings, expanding the base, initializing the hovergun weapon, counting lives and resetting the game when the player is out of lives. And to avoid having to create it all when the game is ... More About: Update , Sabi
The dumbest thing in programming languages
2007-11-02 11:33:00 According to Game Producer, the worst invention ever when it comes to programming languages are “==” and “=”. The first one is used for comparing two values, the second one for assigning a value to a variable. This has already led to countless errors, when you accidentally mix the two up. Torque Game Builder also ... More About: Programming , Languages , Thing , Programming Languages , Ages
Creating a resolution independent status panel
2007-10-23 20:45:00 The status panel I created for Wasabi Defense required a bit of coding for making it resolution independent. The problem with Torque is that the level builder and GUI builder use different coördinate systems. The level builder uses world coördinates. These aren’t affected by the screen resolution and have, by default, the origin placed in ... More About: Creating , Panel , Status , Independent , Epen
Wasabi Defense update 10-21
2007-10-21 21:00:00 Okay, so here’s the new screenshot. This is the first screenshot made on my new computer, so it’s a Vista window, and it’s in widescreen format. The colors are a bit darker, because I had to adjust them for LCD displays. What you see is the hovergun weapon entering the game. Originally, I intended to make ... More About: Defense , Update , Wasabi , Sabi
Back on track once again!
2007-10-20 23:05:00 After the initial trouble with The Gimp, I’m back on track with Wasabi Defense. I couldn’t get the original Gimp to work, so I tried the portable version, wich is designed to run off removable media and doesn’t require installation. Not the most elegant solution, but it works. The first thing I had to do ... More About: Back , Track
A short setback?
More articles from this author:2007-10-16 18:05:00 I finally got my new compter, and there’s a small problem. I created all artwork so far with The Gimp, and I can’t get it to work on Windows Vista. The installer doesn’t even work, I get a very cryptic error message. This means that I either have to fix this problem, or find another ... More About: Short 1, 2, 3, 4 |
