Gaming

EDIT: To see a clearer list of the 26 (read below) entries, click here. The Indie Games Summer Uprising list has been narrowed down from 70+ to just 25 this week. Starting Monday July 11th, developers will have the opportunity to select 8 picks to represent the platform in the Uprising. Voting closes on Sunday July 17th. Developers are to vote on a variety of factors including: Marketability, originality, appearance, entertainment, music, and gameplay. A 5 star rating system will be used, just as XBLIG tittles are rated on Live, and the 8 titles with the highest average score are selected in the promotion. A poll will be e-mailed to all XBLIG developers who have submitted candidates. Winners will be announced the following day, Monday July 18th on the IGSU home page. ...

We’ve finally launched the Indie Games Summer Uprising site! Josh Addison, Nathan Smith, and Chris Brousseau have all done an outstanding job with the web design, art work, and initial launch trailer. You can find more of their work at Blazing Forge Games and Game Production Studios. In addition to the site, we’ve released the initial launch trailer and press release to a number of outlets. Be sure to “Like” us on Facebook as well, where you will have the opportunity to vote for two additional titles that you would like to see as part of the uprising. Click through for the press release. ...

I’ve just finished creating a tutorial on programming pickups for vehicles in UDK. This covers both ammo and health. I noticed that it was something that I felt wasn’t covered in depth when I needed to learn how to do it for Death Sentence, so I figured I would save others the time. At the end of the tutorial you’ll find the .uc code for both items, and instructions on how to implement it into your game. What are you waiting for? Check it out! And be sure to let me know what you think of it as well.

See, I really do make games and not just write about them! Take a gander at the site I created for Death Sentence. It is still very It’s a great team so far, and I’ve been fortunate enough to hop on, although later in development to work as both an environment artist and web developer. It is a vahicular combat title in a similar vein to Twisted Metal. We’ve created it using the latest Unreal Engine, and it should have a release on the PC and perhaps iOS at some point after.

Flexing my creative talents, I’ve recently finished Conelle Construction’s website. They are a general contracting firm out of Manhattan, NY, who speciailizes in high-end residential and commercial renovations. I also work there as a field supervisor, and AV / IT tech. Check out some of our work in the photo galleries.

I’ll be attending my second GDC conference this year. I’ve recently received my press pass as a member of the Armless Octopus. I plan on staying the full week this time, most specifically for the UDK game track. I’m also scheduling an XNA meet up for XNA and Xbox indie developers, so if you’d like to join us, feel free to contact me.

I just finished putting together a feature geared towards indie developers on how to market their titles. I frequently find that many of the smaller, or even 1 man studios tend to have a difficult time promoting and marketing their work, so I felt it was time for me to share some of the best practices I’ve come across so far. I should have part 2 up some time later in the week. It originally appeared on Armless Octopus on April 16th, and you can access it through this link.

Here are some screens from the level layout I’ve been working on now that I’ve decided to go full speed with my project. I’ll add more as I finish more sets. I use SketchUp to layout the levels, in combination with Visio. It makes things much easier to have models for comparison before I actually build them in Unreal. You can find more of them on the Unreal Project page.

I’ll be attending Pax East 2011 with the rest of the Armless Ocotopus staff (minus the Canadian). We’ll be there interviewing XBLIG and XBLA developers, previewing the latest and greatest titles, and are considering another live podcast like we did last year. A video review may be in in order well. If you’re headed over as well, feel free to contact me so that we can meet up!

Who’s got two thumbs and is headed to PAX Prime 2011? This guy! If you’re going too, why not reach out to me before hand so that we can meet up while we’re there?