I’ve been at GDC this week and haven’t really had time to work on a new game. I did get a chance to revise the rules for the Space 4X Co-op Card Game, though.
It’s probably a little incomprehensible without the actual cards in hand to refer to, but here the latest version:
This is really long; I apologize. What started as a write-up for the second game in the #GameAWeek challenge that I’m doing with awesome Ana Salter, Melissa Peterson, and Dennis Ramirez (and soon Nick Lalone!) has turned into a monster of a post as I try to cobble together my memory for this card game I’ve been developing off and on for about 9 months now (yes, I know I cheated!).
Anyway, go read their reflections about their second games! Ana’s chilling My Town, Melissa’s clever merging of the crafting genre with the one room genre Solution, and Dennis’s retro-adventure game Time Enough to Travel. They’re also much better at writing reflections on each others’ work, sorry.
Continue reading #GameAWeek Challenge Game Two: Space 4X Co-op Card Game
A little over a week ago, I saw and tweeted Adriel Wallick’s ( @MsMinotaur ) debrief post on IndieGames about how she did a game a week, she in turn inspired by Rami Ismail’s Gamasutra post. I just thought it was really cool and inspiring.
Ana Salter retweeted and mentioned that she’d love to give it a go. I replied “I’m in!” and she quickly invited others. So, right now we’ve got:
The others have already written reflections about their games, so go read about Ana’s Nowhere, Dennis’s Blackjack framework, and Melissa’s Weather Worker!
The game I made is The Unflappable Academic (and his hoverboard).
Continue reading A #gameaweek challenge! Game One: The Unflappable Academic (and his hoverboard)
I recently did an illustration for one of the cards in the *successfully kickstarted* Widget, a zany card game by Kristan Wheaton!
Yesterday was my last day at UW as a postdoc with the LIFE Center, the Institute for Science and Math Education, and the Center for Game Science.
I’ve decided to pursue a few research projects that I think would best be done while not distracted by a day job.
Namely, I’ll be reviewing an ass-ton of free game making tools, while also playing around with game interface design and some simple game design in the process. I’ve gathered a list of over 2 dozen free tools out there covering all sorts of game genres: adventure games, RPGs, platformers, interactive fiction, etc. My hope is to 1) get back into game design, practice art, try out some ideas, 2) produce a document/series of blog posts that is useful to a k16 educator who wants to incorporate game design into their existing courses (whether that’s English, social studies, math, or whatever) but doesn’t know which tool is appropriate for their needs, and 3) get ready to teach a course on game design in the spring at Pepperdine. What’s great about this teaching gig is that it’s primarily an online course (with face-to-face meetings bookendings), so I can stay in Seattle.
Anyway, I’m also hoping to play a ton of games, as I’ve accrued quite a backlog over the last few years. Look at my Steam profile. Most of those games I haven’t played yet.
First up: the remake/sequel to X-COM, named… XCOM!
Yes, that X-COM. The game that I used to wake up at 5 in the morning some days to play before classes while a senior at Reed College. The game that I used to stay up til the wee hours for. It was the only time in my life when I could be totally fine with 5 hours of sleep per night for weeks. The game that started my love affair with the turn-based squad-based tactics genre (Jagged Alliance capturing my heart in later years). What’s funny is that at the time, I felt like nobody knew what I was talking about when I described these games. I always wondered why the creators of the original X-COM moved onto smallish projects, thinking they were underdogs, not capturing people’s attention. (Anyone remember that email tactics game?) And now, sort of out of the blue, X-COM is getting a massive, big budget remake. Looking forward to it. I hope Julian Gollop is getting props.
Two weeks ago, my book came out on Amazon!
Leet Noobs: The Life and Death of an Expert Player Group in World of Warcraft
It’s been like 20 years since Rob Liefeld made a name with X-Force or whatever. I remember loving McFarlane’s Spider-man and wondering how Marvel could hire both McFarlane and Liefeld at the same time. Thank god Jim Lee was around, too. I remember hearing that Liefeld had taught himself how to draw and never took an anatomy class and thinking “well, no shit!” It’s completely inexplicable that he could get a prominent job in the comics industry.
Anyway, I found this blog post on Progressive Boink about the 40 Worst Rob Liefeld Drawings. It’s from 2007, but it’s new to me! Read this early on and decided to link to it here before reading the rest of the write-up:
The most important thing you need to know before reading about all the terrible things Rob Liefeld has drawn is that he has never seen or talked to a woman in his life and has no idea what they look like or how their bodies operate. If you asked Rob Liefeld to draw a diagram of the uterus he’d put on a pair of gauntlets and punch the shit out of your chalkboard. This is how the man operates, and though I know it sounds like a lot, you have to believe me. I don’t want you looking at the stuff he’s drawing and think he’s a conscious adult male with a creative job who can and has influenced the minds of young artists. The man is a pair of blue jeans with a face. He has on a backwards cap, and when he turns it around, it’s still backwards.
guess it’s not a daily posting of art, but I am trying to draw daily.
Here’s something from when I was waiting at the airport for Robin’s plane to land:
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| From mark's daily art |
Saturday – Riley
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| From mark’s daily art |
Sunday – from Beth’s xmas tree decorations party
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| From mark’s daily art |
Thursday – I have no idea.
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| From mark's daily art |
