Posts by Hourences

  • Management within games industry

    Quote from WesleyTack

    It's not extreme, it's reality. I quit my job almost 2 years ago partly because of this. And quite frankly I'm scared to consider another company just because of these politics (which is why after 2 years I'm still unemployed). Games are being made by a small group of people who have to work twice or even triple as hard to get half of what they imagined ingame because of the friction caused by other people slowing down the development (not just management). You end up with a lot of overtime which you don't get paid for and burned out to the bone (this is what you get for caring about the stuff you actually work on).

    I agree 100%. I can tell you so many fuck-up stories, many of them just beyond imagination.

  • The Ball - Indie FPS Action/Puzzle Game

    Not much rest to be had, teaching Unreal 3 days a week in Stockholm, got to prepare the release, and I want to write two books and videos on the development of the game

    Pre orders start the 18th. Pre order The Ball and get an exclusive Killing Floor character!

    [Blocked Image: http://www.theballthegame.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/KFDLC.jpg]

    “We are really happy to see The Ball get a full commercial launch. It is the first UDK-based game to get into stores and the previews show just how much a group of talented developers can achieve with the toolset,” said Mark Rein, Vice President of Epic Games. “Like previous success stories from the Make Something Unreal contest, such as Red Orchestra, it is a highly-polished standalone product – and a great fun game, too! This is a great example of why we put the effort into supporting the community with the UDK and the MSU contest.”

    The game will be available on Steam and in stores from 26th October 2010 for $19.99.

  • Minecraft

    I dont like that either, I must have placed over 700 torches by now. I am going to have to walk around relitting them all? Common? That is a full time job.

    No micro management please.

  • The Ball - Indie FPS Action/Puzzle Game

    Loads has happened in the mean time, too much to do a recap but most important bits are:

    To be released October 26 on Steam, and retail North America, and Russia

    To be released retail in Scandinavia, on October 27

    To be released on Gamersgate, Impulse, and our own site November 2

    To be released retail in Europe November 5.

    Iceberg Interactive takes care of Europe, Wendros of Scandinavia, Akella of Russia, and North America and Steam are being handled by Tripwire. So we got everything covered pretty much, world wide retail, and all digital shops.

    Our Mystery Monday contest has come to an end, and the contest page is now up! Since its release last night 5 people have won, but we still got 21 The Ball/Killing Floor bundles we intend to give away (that is 42 games)! Still plenty of opportunity to win!

    http://www.theballthegame.com/contest/

    The goal of Mystery Monday is to find the 11 hidden words that we have hidden in our backstory. We have given away the solution to the first one to get people started (http://www.theballthegame.com/?p=720)!

    The words can be hidden in numbers, photos, texts, and so on. The words we are looking for are single words or names. They do not contain spaces or non standard characters, nor any numbers.

    Start looking now and win a copy of The Ball and Killing Floor!

  • Valve creates micro-transaction steam support

    I think it makes sense from a business pov, tho 17 euro for a hat is a bit steep. People like to show off though, especially in competitive multiplayer games. I am sure some people will pay that much to be "special", in the same way some do so in real life too. What Defrag says is also true, if you ask too little people will regard the items as worthless and they won't buy it.

    Problem I have is that it can unbalance a MP game, after a while it may become an unwritten requirement to first go buy these and these items worth 50 Euro in total before you can even think of trying to compete with the other players. A MP game should be accessible and fair towards new players, otherwise they'll quit playing and your game eventually bleeds to death.

    And $ = Euro is much less weird than you may think. There is up to 25% sales tax in Europe, and none in the US on Steam. That money has to come from somewhere. Digital <> Retail is also a much more complicated problem than "omg they charge more for the digital product than the physical one, the lamers!". As the retail sector feels the heat of the digital distribution networks like Steam they will try to win over and retain customers by lowering their price. If Steam would lower their price in return you'd get a price war that would eventually devaluate our products and no one wins from that in the long run. Also a lot of smaller developers, like us, nowadays focus on digital distribution. You start out by saying "Ok we will release it online for lets say 10 Euro", however as time goes by you get in touch with retail publishers who wish to get your game out in the shops. Naturally they will want to compete with what the game costs online, so they will charge exactly the same for the physical copy. You can't really ask them "Can you perhaps make your copy 5 Euro more expensive than the ones we sell?". They are investing money into it, they will want to be sure they'll have a fair chance at getting a return for that investment.

  • Minecraft

    My tower is done. You can tell my game went gold and I got time to spare

    So I dig a massive pit semi into the sea (and the sea was really deep there so it was great fun), drained the water out of it, and then went all the way to the very bottom of the world. I am 3 rows of blocks away from litterally falling out of the world. The top of the tower reaches the maximum allowed heigth. I still got over 4000 blocks of stone left now that I don't know what to spend on. I will probably build a big extension on one side and then a massive underground bunker or something.

    I got lava spawning at the roof, and it falls all the way down to the bottom of the tower illuminating everything at night.

    [Blocked Image: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/2300830/minecraft.jpg]

  • Minecraft

    Yeah it is hardcore, it does not explain what to do, and it takes half an hour of work to collect enough resources to make a decent start at actually playing the game. And you can get lost in no time.

    And yet people play it like crazy.

    Nuts.

    I am building a big tower, pics coming up later, I worked on it from 23.00 until 4.30 am yesterday:P

  • Minecraft

    You need to find caves for lava and iron and all that. I have whole truckloads of iron in my castle. Some caves are really really deep and long, those are the ones you want to find, lots of stuff in those.

    For lava you can also just go straigth down into the ground and keep digging. At one point you'll hit the bottom of the world. If you still havent found lava then, just start tunneling around on the bottom of the world and you'll bump into it. Be careful though, it might suddenly flood your whole tunnel

  • Minecraft

    It is really relaxing to just stroll around and build stuff. Explore things, try to find big caves and then see where they lead to. And then build a bunker on top of a mountain or so, and create some waterfalls around it and all. It is so simple that it is fun. Especially if you are a level designer

  • Games with lasting emotional impact

    Morrowind!

    Unreal too, but Morrowind, especially because of its sheer size and art style just sucked you in and kept you in its world for months.

    It was the first real RPG I played and I had no clue what to do at all, which only increased its appeal to me. I had no idea what quests were, so the first thing I did was I dumped the tiny little piece of paper you get at the start of the game (main quest item) somewhere in the middle of nowhere, and I started walking. I walked all the way to the other side of the island, and then all the way around the volcano in the center which was a super huge distance especially considering you walk super slow as level 1. It took me 2 weeks of playing to do just that, and by the time I got back to my starting point I was level 30 or so

    I then found out that there is a Main Quest and that you apperantly needed that piece of paper, so I went back to where I thought I had dumped the paper, and it was still there. Awesome game.

  • The Ball - Indie FPS Action/Puzzle Game

    We are proud to announce Mystery Monday, and its accompanying contest! Mystery Monday is all about the story behind The Ball. Where does this adventure take place? When did it take place? Who is the player?

    What happened to him after he discovered this mysterious hidden world? How did the world react to his discovery? Is history as we know it truly what happened, or is there more to it? Who really built the pyramids of Giza? How come the Maya had such an accurate calendar? And how does the Ball tie into all of this? We will be revealing a tiny piece of the puzzle every Monday from today all the way to the release of the game!

    Tied into Mystery Monday is a contest. In every piece of the puzzle a word has been hidden. Be the first to find all the hidden words to win! We are giving away an Ipad, and copies of The Ball, Killing Floor, Red Orchestra: Ostfront 41-45, and Red Orchestra: Heroes of Stalingrad (when it is released)!

    [Blocked Image: http://theballthegame.com/mysterymonday/contestsmall.png]

    The first piece of the puzzle is a scan of a local newspaper.

    [Blocked Image: http://theballthegame.com/mysterymonday/newspapersmall.jpg]

    The rules and more information can be found here

    Join our Official Game Group on Steam, or follow us on Facebook!