Game Maker

When I started using Game Maker, I was somewhat skeptical. This would not be the first time I had tried to adapt one of my visions to fit inside somebody else's box. Last time I tried to use a free ware engine I found to build a strategy game, it turned out to have more box and less fit.

On the other hand, Earth vs. Mars is shaping up gloriously.

You may remember I had this idea about a Solar civil war between Earth and the colonies.* It was going to be on a giant hex grid so I could use vectored motion a-la Triplanetary. After two weeks-ish of off-hand development, I have this so far:

A full on Newtonian movement system. With gravity implemented. A playing area that covers everything inside the jovian orbit. The ability to scale the display from 1:1 all the way to 1,000,000:1 - this is important when you're trying to navigate from Earth to Mars and you don't have radar.

It's a cool toy, but it's not a game yet. I still have some User Interface tweaks to make before I start adding bad guys.

MMmmmm. Saucers.




*Actually, after looking through the back blog, you may not. I may never have mentioned it here. But it's cool, trust me.

MMO Showdown

As I have a whole bunch of time to kill, I'm doing an MMO showdown. I'm playing World of Warcraft with Burning Crusade and Everquest II: Rise of Kunark.

Yes I'm really that busy. I have to say these games are fairly comparable on the graphics side. The WoW engine is still much smoother on Hank, given that it does less, but style is where Blizz still wins. But you've heard all that before.

It's really hard to get into a game that is so heavy into it's own mythology. Both of these games suffer from that, I think. It's hard for me to tell with WoW because I've been through it all. I was having a hard time connecting with EQII.

An open apology

For those of you who are used to my usual acquaintance, I want to apologize, in advance. At some indeterminate time in the near future, I will become completely unavailable for any and all social interaction. Blame Blizzard.

(Of course, being a Blizzard production you could have my undivided attention for at least he next two years while they develop it.)

Ten?

I've been quiet for a while. Let's just leave it at I've had nothing I wanted to comment about. Well nothing that lit a fire under me.

But 10? Two games have come out in the first half of this year that have attained this lofty number. The first is GTA:IV. The second is Metal Gear Solid 4. Neither of them is Bioshock. Tom Chick wrote a really great review of MGS4 for Crispy Gamer.

If you're a Metal Gear Solid fan, this review is not for you. Frankly, you don't need a review. Metal Gear Solid 4 is between you, Hideo Kojima and whatever bond the two of you have formed over the last 20 years of Metal Gear games. I might as well come to your house, root around in your shoebox of old love letters, and comment on their grammar, punctuation, imagery and literary merit.

Instead, this review is for everyone else. It's partly for those who, like me, dabbled in the previous games. It's mostly for those who might have had their interest piqued by the marketing or who fell for the "tactical espionage action" tagline on the box (only one of the three is true, and only occasionally). For you, I cannot stress enough that this is a terrible, terrible game.

Read it, and then understand why my vote is for more editorial reviews like this and "Zero Punctuation".

And for heavens sake, play Bioshock already. It's honestly almost a 10. Except for that shader 3 thing.