Jan

Ludum Dare Results

As previously mentioned in our development blog both of us (Jargon and CWolf) entered the Mini Ludum Dare #31 contest on this past weekend. We did a great job and both of us managed to finish our games! It was touch and go for us and we finished just minutes from the 48 hour deadline! The theme was ‘fear’ and you can decide for yourselves if we accomplished that. So, with that, Deadworld Studios are proud to present two free games for you to play!

Dark Choices – CWolf

“What is this place? The air is crisp and cool. I know this place but it is not the city. My city. Where am I?

I hear strange whispers tonight. This place is calling out to me. Where am I?”

Download | Ludum Dare Post

Catch 2122 – Jargon

It’s the zombie apocalypse and your apartment building is under attack. Are you able to fight your way through the hordes of the undead from the 10th floor and to safety?

You’ve also got a terrible hangover.

Quick fingers and plenty of pain killers will be required to ensure survival in this action-packed zombie shooter with a twist!

Download | Ludum Dare Post

January 30th, 2012 by CWolf | Type: Standard

Filed Under: News Tags: 48 hour development, Deadworld Studios, Games Development, Indie Games Company, Ludum Dare, Ludum Dare Mini, Mini Ludum Dare 31 No comments yet

Jan

Deadworld Gaming Night

We’ve decided to host a ‘Deadworld Gaming Night’ on Sunday the 29th of January. We think this is a good chance to enjoy shooting our community – what better way to relax right? The schedule is as follows…

1PM GMT / 2pm CET / 5am PST – The Hidden: Source (Halflife 2 Mod)
3PM GMT/ 4pm CET / 7am PST – Enter the 1000 player FPS world record attempt
After the World Record Attempt- Continue with The Hidden: Source (Halflife 2 Mod)

The gaming night is an open offer to anyone who would like to play with us. We will be gathering in our IRC channel #deadworld at irc.globalgamers.net. We hope to see you there!

January 27th, 2012 by CWolf | Type: Standard

Filed Under: News Tags: 1000 player fps, Community, Deadworld Studios, Gaming Night, The Hidden Source, world record attempt No comments yet

Jan

Jargon Dares Too!

So, I have decided to enter the Ludum Dare Mini along with my esteemed friend and colleague, Mr CWolf, which is happening this weekend (21st-22nd Jan). I wasn’t sure whether I would be doing it, even though I desperately wanted to, due to time issues. While working on Deadworld Studios, I’m also doing some web development on the side and all the coding is beginning to take it’s toll. That being said, I can’t let CWolf have all the fun and I have been meaning to do one of these since University (unofficially tried my hand at a 24 hour challenge, it didn’t turn out too good).

Anyway, as CWolf has mentioned, the theme is fear and while he is going for an ambient psychological approach, I have decided to go with a more of a technical approach (as I usually do). Mostly because I don’t think I can create the level of immersion a player would need to truly feel fear, although CWolf seems to have latched onto a good idea. I can’t say too much about my game because it is a bit of a one-trick pony and once you know what to expect, it will lose it’s power. I guess it will work on the principles of fear of the unknown.

There’s not much time for prep work and I’m still feeling a little wound tight due to our recent Mechadroids update and the web development work I’m doing, so there is a good possibility I’ll be taking the next few days off and winging the whole thing… what could go wrong!? 🙂

Oh, another thing. Myself and CWolf will be synchronising our start for the Ludum Dare Mini. We’ll be starting at 8pm (UTC + 1), 1 hour later than CWolf stated, on Friday 20th Jan, which is actually 6am Saturday for myself. Also, there’s a small chance of a dual stream going on, depending if we can work out how to do it.

January 17th, 2012 by Jargon | Type: Standard

Filed Under: Development No comments yet

Jan

Mechadroids Update 0.3.0

What madness is this? Two Mechadroid releases within half a year of each other and four weeks none the less?! That’s right! Here is Mechadroids release 0.3.0!

A few exciting things have happened in the past three weeks. Our community member Inveracity has been very busy creating us a Mechadroid launch video for the previous version 0.2.0 and a full length Mechadroids theme tune! Our community is growing and we’re making good progress.

So, what have we thrown together for this release? A few exciting things. Firstly we have tweaked the balance of the game so try it out and see how it has changed. We have also added a contact system for friends and foes. You can now add players as a friend or foe using a long click anywhere you see a player name. This allows you to track how well you’re doing against your friends and allow you to attack people anywhere you see a name! In addition to this the detailed battle has new messages that are unique to each weapon and shield. It gives you important information regarding your foe’s armour weak points. Next time you fight it might be worth checking them out to get the upper hand in a fight!

Here is the full changelog…

(more…)

January 16th, 2012 by Rogue Vector | Type: Standard

Filed Under: News Tags: Android, Development, Games Development, Java, Mechadroids No comments yet

Jan

Ludum Dare Mini (Jan 20th – 22nd 2012)

Last week I decided to enter the upcoming (and my first) Ludum Dare Mini! This is my first Ludum Dare event ever so I’m starting to get a little nervous with the lead up to it. For those of you who don’t know what a Ludum Dare event is here is an extract from their site…

“Ludum Dare is a regular accelerated game development Event. Participants develop games from scratch in a weekend, based on a theme suggested by community.”

So for the usual LD event it lasts over 48 hours and the next mini event is this coming weekend (21st – 22nd of Jan). The main difference between the LD minis and LD main event is this that the rules are a little more relaxed in regards to release of source code, timeframe and declaring tools/frameworks/reuse of code for minis. I think this will be ideal practice for the main LD event in April I intend to enter.

So… this LD mini’s theme is fear! I’ve decided to make more a psychological game based around fear – use of music and dark will be pretty important. I’m drawing pretty heavy inspiration from games in the Silent Hill series. I’ve decided to use Slick2D with my own framework built on top of it since it provides a nice graphical game support for the crucial visual experience of my idea.

Since the 48 hours is flexible I’ve decided I’m going to start mine at 7pm UTC+1 on the Friday 20th of Jan and finishing at 7pm UTC+1 on the Sunday 22nd of Jan. I will be live streaming the entire event (except when I’m sleeping) at my live stream site of http://twitch.tv/cwolfs so feel free to drop by and wish me luck! Also feel free to jump into our IRC channel at irc.globalgamers.net #deadworld to show support / ask questions. I’ll probably be more responsive there than on the live stream chat.

Why am I doing this? Practice to be a better programmer in some aspects, learn more, the experience, to be able to say I’ve done one and… why not? Wish me luck and I’ll see you on the stream (or IRC earlier!).

January 15th, 2012 by CWolf | Type: Standard

Filed Under: Development Tags: 48 hours, Development, Fear, Games Development, Java, Live Stream, Ludum Dare, Ludum Dare Mini, Programming, Slick2D, Twitch 1 comment

Ludum Dare Results

Deadworld Gaming Night

Jargon Dares Too!

Mechadroids Update 0.3.0

Ludum Dare Mini (Jan 20th – 22nd 2012)

Interfacing with UI #4 – Coherent UI