I liked this TED talk --- 1 month resolution.. do what you dread most for one month continuously.
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or 
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2 years ago
Flash Games Portal -2/?
Friday, July 8, 2011
The Progress so far on the portal is great. I am putting all of my free time into this stuff these days. And the idea still holds importance and meaning for me is a good sign. normally I loose the enthusiasm to other ideas. But I will get this working and implement this idea.
Never knew a flash games portal is an amazing concept. A lot goes behind the scenes. I have to research many things before I finally get down to coding which is really the simplest of the stuff to do. The biggest challenges and final reason of success and existence of so many portals are:
1) The type of games vary across all portals.
2) Audience profile(Geography,Age , Sex...) of these games vary across the websites.
3) Some Portals are good at some stuff and others are good at other. i.e. Multiplayer games are handled in a awesome way by OMGPOP. while addicting games is really nice place for single player games. newgrounds does an awesome job of connecting developers and users. so basically what I am saying is that it is a crazy scene out here.
Their will be hiccups in the middle due to some personal issues but I will complete this for sure.
Never knew a flash games portal is an amazing concept. A lot goes behind the scenes. I have to research many things before I finally get down to coding which is really the simplest of the stuff to do. The biggest challenges and final reason of success and existence of so many portals are:
1) The type of games vary across all portals.
2) Audience profile(Geography,Age , Sex...) of these games vary across the websites.
3) Some Portals are good at some stuff and others are good at other. i.e. Multiplayer games are handled in a awesome way by OMGPOP. while addicting games is really nice place for single player games. newgrounds does an awesome job of connecting developers and users. so basically what I am saying is that it is a crazy scene out here.
Their will be hiccups in the middle due to some personal issues but I will complete this for sure.
The facebook way
Thursday, June 30, 2011
A big Hahahahahaha...............My first review on google plus..... It is all going how Mark (facebook) wants it.... The tech world is on fire. Google is on big panic mode and from how they are changing the main page layout getting Larry Page again to the company..... and facebook topping the charts of most visited sites.... it's all clear.
Mark wanted the web to be connected ... to be social ... he said facebook is a social bus ... either you ride it or you are left behind.... hahahhaa........ google is trying to build a new bus........... Google get a life..... better strategy would be to collaborate with facebook and get into their bus.....
Browsers are being made around the idea of sharing... (RockMelt).... online dating websites have become viral due to facebook..... (Badoo).... game industry has already been shaken due to facebook.....(Zynga).. now movies are being promoted on facebook instead of making a website for them(delhibellythefilm.com) .....Hahaha....... I can't stop laughing.....
And still the brilliance of Mark is that everybody feels that they are doing their thing.....no people you are doing what mark wants you to do....
P.S : I am sorry this is off the topic of online games..... but I couldn't stop myself....
Flash Games Portal -1/?
Well I started working on a flash games portal after a healthy and long discussion with Chris , Ronak and Crash.
Meanwhile I found an amazing cloud based development environment on internet."Kodingen" I am totally blown away with the capabilities and the features of this IDE. You need to check this one out if you really want to see the power of cloud based applications. don't feel like writing too much right now. Will keep on posting as soon as possible.
Meanwhile I found an amazing cloud based development environment on internet."Kodingen" I am totally blown away with the capabilities and the features of this IDE. You need to check this one out if you really want to see the power of cloud based applications. don't feel like writing too much right now. Will keep on posting as soon as possible.
Flight Simulators
Friday, June 24, 2011
I have been researching for some time regarding flight simulators available. And suprised to find so many of great quality ones exist at current time. I managed to lay my hands on some of them.
1) FalconHas a dramatic history behind it. Was initially developed by micropose. Got diversified into free falcon and open falcon after source code leak in 2004.
Has a huge fan base. It is developed and maintained by fans. current version of freefalcon is 5.55.
Developer Forums are great and lively.
2) Flight Simulator X
is one of the best commercial solutions available. The delux retail version of the software comes with a developer sdk which provides tools to edit the complete game including scenery, terrain, aircrafts, create missions.
You can download the trial version here:
A website for Addons
A full fledged developer community exist behind this game.
The Addon commmunity for microsoft flight simulator is the largest.
Development on microsoft flight simulator has been stopped . so don't expect anything new from the developers now.
3) X-Plane : Another or rather the best flight simulator with most realistic flight simulation. Been in development since 15 years or so. available on ipad & iphone ,windows , mac.
Only simulator to have been awarded a accredition by FAA. and only flight simulator still in development
Games - How to make one?
Thursday, June 23, 2011
[I wrote this article for my college magazine (Entelechy, DA-IICT)]
. Seriously!! God created humans, the environment we live in, gave every creature a unique behaviour and the power to speak.We too have these powers while we are making games. We create a virtual world
in which every object acts the way we want them to act. The world looks the way we want it.
in which every object acts the way we want them to act. The world looks the way we want it.We all have been playing games since the Mario
and Contra
times. And even now in the Dragon Age
and Shank times. But won’t it be fun if can create them too!
and Contra times. And even now in the Dragon Age and Shank times. But won’t it be fun if can create them too!Sounds Cool! Right?
[To me games have always been interactive stories.]
So let’s see how you can go about making a 3D game.
1. What kinda game you wanna make?
As SEN(Software Engineering
) would have taught (or will teach) you first thing to do is to get your design document in place. The design document should have all the intricacies of how your game functions.
) would have taught (or will teach) you first thing to do is to get your design document in place. The design document should have all the intricacies of how your game functions.Google for a sample game design document
(GDD) to get the complete list of things your GDD should have.
(GDD) to get the complete list of things your GDD should have.Also the artists need to make concept art. Concept art
is actually 2d drawings or sketches of how your characters would look and how your game levels will be.
is actually 2d drawings or sketches of how your characters would look and how your game levels will be.Also figure out which platform you want your game to run on. The possible platforms are
• Browser , Facebook
• PC, Mac
Certain games are suitable for a certain platform. Like you can’t play a RTS (AOE types) game on a ipad comfortably. So make sure you read up and know about the platform(technical details as well) you want your game to run on.
2. Choosing a Game Engine
Well firstly what is a game Engine?
A game engine is a piece of software which has all the core functionalities of a game implemented such as displaying graphics, loading 3D content or making your code manipulate your art content. You don’t need to recode this stuff and can concentrate on game logic.
Some famous game engines in use these days are:
• UDK - The best one out there. It powers most of the games released so far. Can be downloaded for free at www.udk.com. Used by many AAA games.
• Unity3D – The most user friendly one and large community of friendly and helping developers. Free for use at www.unity3d.com. More used for casual games.
• Choose a game engine suiting your needs. www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_game_engines
3. Components of a game
Ok!! You know which engine to use. What next?
[I will give just a overview here. It would be overkill to describe everything in detail]
Firstly based on the concept art and the design document you have prepared you need to create 3D models for your characters and environment props.
Next get some animations ready for your models which will be played when some actions are triggered.
During this time the programming guy can prototype the functioning of the game using cubes. Your 11th, 12th physics and maths will be used in programming. Also if your game supports multiplayer mode then you need to do the network programming stuff too. And if it is MMO then you need to do the web based security too because most of the time people will be trying to hack into your game.
Finally it is time to integrate both art and programming work. Replace the cubes and everything with the real 3D models and images.
Next comes the audio and GUI stuff.
Finally it’s time to compile everything into a final product.
[google for 3D game pipeline]
4. Places to get you started
Computer Graphics and Game Design Courses are a great place to start if you want to do something in this direction.
If you want do something on your own you surely can.
Read up on computer graphics
first. Brush up your programming/art skills.
first. Brush up your programming/art skills.Unity3D is a great engine to start off with.
Download the tutorials, starter kits and other resources from its website. They will be immense help.
Use the documentation that comes with the game engine.
Unity forums is the best place you can go to for help
Unity’s IRC chat is really lively.
How to use above resources is listed here:
http://unity3d.com/support/community
5. How you can work on some games while you are in college?
The unity3D or UDK forums have collaboration topics wherein people from all over the world and diverse fields collaborate on interesting projects. You will surely find a project suited to your need and talent once you acquire a certain level of expertise in a specific area say programming or art.
Doesn’t everything sound so easy?
But wait!! It’s time for reality check.
Games are normally a team effort. [Go to Credits Screen of any game and you would see 100+ names].
It’s really....really difficult for you to build one on your own individually unless you are superman or something.
Also games require collaboration of people from diverse field. Art, Programming, Music, Managerial, Electronics. Finding and managing this diverse talent is a daunting task as all of these have a different way to work.
Also the effort and expertise required is much more than coding a website or an inventory management system.
But still games are any day better to work for because the final result of your efforts is so beautiful.
[I tried to make this article less geeky by putting in really less technical information. Still you will find pointers in here if you want to acquire the technical know how?]
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