Posts by zaphod

  • devbump.com opens it's doors

    http://www.devbump.com is a site opened by mapcore member Zaphod which is taking aim to become a news and information resource for all game developers or persons interested in game devlopment. The site features a "digg-like" community moderated publishing system that allows stories to be constantly posted around the clock and makes it easy for everyone to become involved. Pay a visit and take part in the action!

  • Zaphod's new web project: devbump

    I have always been interested in internet communities, and in particular - community generated content. Hence the reason I was a part of mapcore, and hence the reason for a new project of mine and my brother, http://www.devbump.com

    devbump is a clone of the popular "digg" method of posting news, information, any any interesting things on the web in general. However, in contrast to digg, devbump is all about sharing articles of information that are of interest and use to us game developers.

    Here is the way it works;

    1. any tom dick or harry finds something neat and interesting on the web related to game development.

    2. tom dick or harry submits the story to devbump, the story shows up in the "qeued stories" http://gravatar.com/ for avatars, so just use the same email address for both and your avatar should show up, though it can take awhile for the gravatar people to rate your icon and the have it start showing up.

  • Multiverse MMO engine

    is a garage games type publishing model feasible for mmos? Or are mmo games simply to large to be done by a small indie team and be good enough to succeed. EVE did it with a larger scale team, a tale in the desert had only 2 developers I have heard.

    As MMO's get more and more mainstream with the help of bluckbuster titles, hopefully more mmo engines with publishing models that work like multiverse and torque on garage games will become available, although one could see the difficulties in producing any kind of easily moddable generic mmo engine since it's so complex by it's own nature.

    Ryzom, the game wacko mentioned is putting out it's engine as open source http://www.nevrax.org/tikiwiki/tiki-index.php , or at least that was the plan in 2003 when there were articles written about it.

    article -> http://www.linuxdevcenter.com/pub/a/lin ... 6/nel.html

  • Multiverse MMO engine

    this game really wouldn't be targeted towards hardcore people who live to pvp in mmo's. It would be more of a social/civ type game.

    From what I have seen so far of multiverse, they have a really interesting direction but the tech still has a little ways to go before it's ready for someone to just sit down and make a great looking game with it. That said, there really aren't many other options for an independant mmo engine.

    And wacko, I think you need to cut your daily monster drink intake down to a few cans a day! I'm thinking about your health here buddy

  • Why do you do this?

    I'm feeling a little nostalgic and reflective tonight, and wanted to share my thoughts. The longer I work in this industry, the more the stars fade from my eyes, the more times I start to ask myself what it is exactly I enjoy about this line of work and why it has obsessed me since I was a teenager and why I continue to do it today.

    well

    after a bit of thought I have concluded that the reason I love doing this is because I love engineering all the little pieces that fit together and are driven by other mechanisms to create a grand machine. A machine that started as nothing and ends up it's own little whirring, purring, spinning, creative and interactive display.

    It all starts with an idea (or to be more realistic, a delegated task) Make something that when anybody climbs into it, provides them with an experience where x does y while z happens and everything meshes together. It goes from some hairbrained producer's idea to a designed series of systems, each part of which is engineered, whittled, shaped, chamfered, embossed, and drop shadowed to be a spinning cog in this grand machine.

    It's up to me to figure out what the piece should look like, how it needs to be shaped to perfectly into the whole contraption. You try out one part, dosent fit. Try a different approach, install it in the machine - tweak it untill it works perfectly. Eventually you see that little piece working along with all the other hand crafted pieces all working together to become one whole seamless experience that is totally transparent to people that come along and play with it.

    it's a swiss fucking watch

    From out of nothing, this complex thing comes out of an idea and just sits there finished, fully working (sometimes) for people to jam on. And it took a team of people all having thier own little specialization each crafting thier little parts, working together for it to come to be.

    well thats about it in a nutshell, I think thats what gets me the most. It's more of a pep talk for myself, but I would invite everyone to post thier own motivation for doing this every day, wether professionally or as an independant passion.

    *edit* well what an appropriate 800th post.

  • inspired by hl2?

    Quote from sensee

    I still think it is very possible that a set designer or concept artist or whatever has played the game and put some references in the movie.You can't just say it's in the nature of dystopian movies/games to look like that.

    why not?