In my game there's a ball which rolls around the playfield. While SpriteKit is very cool with baked in physics and lighting, it's a 2D engine. So although it will rotate the 2D texture of the ball around the Z axis, that doesn't really convey the look of the ball rolling forward. My original idea was to go with a flat shaded sphere and let the normal map lighting give the ball a more 3D look. Unfortunately the result was less than satisfying. But then I had an idea. What if the ball was
I have this idea for a game, which I'm trying to program for iOS (using Swift). As this is a considerable step beyond my typical C & ASM skill set, it's been slow going. Swift itself is a post C object oriented / procedural language so isn't that difficult to understand, and I can certainly appreciate _not_ having to learn Objective C. No, the problem is the frameworks. Swift on it's own can do very little. It needs libraries like UIKit and SpriteKit. So unlike C where you can do a lo
Earlier this month the family and I spent a week camping at (nee Six Flags) Darien Lake - riding roller coasters & other rides plus roasting marshmallows & drinking beer. Every night DL has a laser & fireworks show set to music. (Unfortunately the same one every night.) The laser show part of the show in particular was particularly impressive and would have made Pink Floyd (from 40 years ago) green with envy - complex animated scenes in full color. (Probably restricted more by th
For those interested in Apple ][ copy protection (and cracking of it) I have found two troves of information. First is the 4am Apple ][ Library at https://archive.org/details/apple_ii_library_4am Attached to each archive is a text file where 4am describes his cracking process. In most cases he simply follows the boot process, analyzes the often obfuscated code to figure out how to capture the next step in the process, then determines the minimum change required to allow the disk to be easily
The other day I was browsing a warehouse sale which had a few 4K TVs (but no 3D, which I found interesting), and it got me to thinking about them. Not because I want one, but strictly on a why? basis. The local cable company is hyping their 4K TV offering, starting with local baseball and hockey games. But when I'm watching my 55" HDTV, I'm not thinking "boy, I'd pay big bucks to have more picture detail". Maybe if my TV filled the entire wall so HDTV looked like 320x200 VGA on a 21" mon
I saw SW VII last weekend so I could stop worrying about spoilers. While the Force Awakens is a great movie and a worthy and logical successor to Return of the Jedi, it is not without it's flaws. First is the Death Star Mark III, complete with last minute destruction (IV & VI) following an attack on the shield generator (VI), a short trench sequence (IV), and flying into the structure (VI). Even Han points this out when planning the attack; almost, but not quite, breaking the fourth wal
I'm temped to try to do something like https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2015/11/raspberry-pi-zero-hidden-in-an-xbox-controller/ The one tweak I would make is to solder the micro USB cable to the controller rather than splicing wires. But then I have to remind myself of the number of other projects I have in progress, the number of game systems I already have (not to mention a very nice 27" iMac which can also handle emulators), and that I'm mostly playing Minecraft anyway!
I am going to start a YouTube channel https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCxuqdYak8Q81EUkUeSDoUVg of my 2b2t experience. My plan is to kill myself so I start back at spawn, then work out from there. Hopefully passing along a few bits of wisdom for new players and a few laughs. I'm bringing home a headset from work tonight to see how that works out. QuickTime does a great job of recording the actual gameplay at 4K then converting it down to 720p for YouTube.
My second base was semi successful. While the mine bottomed out into lava, it still yielded a few diamonds and other ores; but no emeralds (not that I've seen a village, where emeralds are used for trading). I also found an abandoned mine shaft, complete with a cave spider spawner. Unfortunately, it's difficult to create a automated grinder for cave spiders. I constructed a Nether portal, but discovered it linked to an existing portal so I didn't return to my base. I now better understand
My first plan on my journey away from my book making base was to set up a fresh spawn point. So I column jumped up to cloud level and created a 7x7 small platform on which I put small pond, melons, wood blocks and my bed (which I slept in to reset my spawn point). The idea was if I died I would at least have enough food and wood to make a fresh start, and I could get down from the clouds by turning the pond into a waterfall. One item of interest I found on my journey was an Ocean Monument, c
I ended up playing a lot of Minecraft on 2b2t over the long weekend. Once you get away from the chaos of the spawn area (and turn off the chat) the server becomes remarkably peaceful. Maybe I'm just travelling a different direction than most, but I've seen very few large builds; although there is still occasional evidence I'm not the first player to pass this way. Although while wandering though the wilderness may be far better than fending off other players, I decided I wanted to settle do
I finally took the plunge and bought Minecraft for the PC (after playing many hours on the PS3). An article about 2B2T, an "anarchy" server with a world which is now five years old, intrigued me. The world is littered with stuff players have built up and others have torn down. The central spawn point is a wasteland of blocks floating far over bedrock. Simply not dying of falling or starvation when you start is difficult. And yet, in spite of it's reputation as a lawless environment, it's s
Why do I say fail? Simple: no standardized controller except for the small touchpad on the remote. Why not announce a standard controller app (similar to the Remote app) or declare the PS3 or PS4 controller a de-facto standard Bluetooth controller? (Although then they'd need to provide a USB input for pairing.) This would then allow developers to port games much more easily. Heck, with a controller app Apple could provide a way for the Apple TV game to push the controller layout down to
A while ago my son asked when I was going to fix the Tempest cabinet. The fire cleanup crew removed the PC I was using to the Tempest cabinet and insurance wrote it off (although I did get the hard drive back). So the first step is to obtain a PC. MAME is still primarily a single threaded app, so I used https://www.cpubenchmark.net/singleThread.htmlto judge different processors. I figured a Core 2 Duo was probably what I wanted. I started looking at the lists of refurbished computers at loc
The Acer Aspire One netbook we bought after the fire has turned out to be a decent computer (especially with a RAM & SSD upgrade). It came loaded with Windows 7 Starter Edition and (bonus) MS Office Starter Edition. The free upgrade to Windows 10 sounded like a good idea. Not only would I get all of the ongoing security updates etc., but it wouldn't have the 2GB limit of Win7SE. Unfortunately, I just ran the Win10 upgrade check and learned the Intel GMA 3600 graphics adapter isn't supp
Watched the second episode last night, which covered off the remaining 8 battles in the first round. Unfortunately, that made it a little rushed compared to the first episode which only covered 4 battles. It also meant that a bunch of the teams didn't get their 15 minutes of fame before getting knocked out. I'm now regretting deleting the first episode off my PVR, I want to go back and make notes about each of the battles. Maybe I can find it online somewhere. Highlight of this round was
The other day I decided I needed to set myself a goal to work on in Unity. A game project to help focus my self education.
What I settled on is a Battlezone style game. (Not a port - just the basic ideas.)
So one of the things I need is a tank to shoot at. Which means I need to create a model which Unity will then display. While I could download Blender (also free), that seems like overkill for something as simple as a Battlezone tank. What I wanted was something dead simple - an AS
For those who've never heard of it, Unity is a cross-platform game creation system: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unity_(game_engine)
You can use it to develop games for current systems including Windows, OSX, web, IOS and Android. Free to download & use and practically free if you ever decide to sell your creations.
Lurking on gamasutra, I've known about Unity for a while. But I'd never considered actually using it until they announced Unity 5 and I realized there was zero reason for
Back in the early 90s I got sucked into the Magic: the Gathering collectible card game craze. Little Alchemist is a "free to play" mobile version of a collectible card game. And while you can spend real money buying cards (just like I used to do with MtG), it is quite possible to have lots of fun playing without spending a dime.
In the basic battle the goal is to reduce your (computer) opponent's hit points to zero before they do the same to you. Each card has an attack & defense valu
My son managed to convince mom to install CoC on his iPhone. After watching a little bit, I put it on my HTC. It's pretty cool, although I wonder how Supercell is making any money given lack of IAP pressure and the TV advertising.
IAP - in app purchases, or the way "free-to-play" games make money. In the case of CoC, $$ buys you gems which can be used to:
Instantly complete anything which would otherwise take time to complete. (More time requires more gems.) But if you're willing to w
Additionally, creator Markus "Notch" Persson, partner Jakob Porser and CEO Carl Manneh will also be leaving Mojang. Even before the sale Markus has tried to move away from Minecraft, but felt that selling out was they only way to continue to be himself.
I do wonder how MS plans on recovering it's 2.5 billion dollar investment. (Especially since MS believes it will happen before June 2015!)
A couple of years ago my wife and I played an MMO called Glitch. IMHO Glitch was doomed from the start because it only charged real money for vanity items and it wasn't social enough or fun enough to play indefinitely. However, the stylized artwork was was very well done and one of the more enjoyable parts of the game.
When I first saw screenshots of "Road Not Taken" on gamasutra, I was struck by how much the characters reminded me of Glitch. Not surprising since the same artist, Brent Ko
I've been playing Half Life (1) on the new 27" iMac - bigger is better! I've gotten most of the way through chapter 11 - Surface Tension, but I've discovered I bypassed getting the Tau gun back in chapter 10 - Questionable Ethics. Sigh.... I even managed to get through the whole drain hatch / minefield section without killing the helicopter gunship.
I guess it's back to an earlier savegame.
It's still one of the the best games.
While working at IBM (1993-2008) I acquired several classic Model M keyboards. Unfortunately, they have PS/2 connectors which isn't supported even by many current desktops. I have bought one of the "blue cube" adapters so I can use one at work, but I'm thinking I'd rather "roll my own" - open up the keyboard and replace the 6805 based controller with something that will output USB.
This has been done before by others, so I'm not breaking new ground. I even have a keyboard which is missing
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