B1NARYTUXED0

B1NARYTUXED0 posts about his hobbies and what he's creating.

[binarytuxedo]

Did a bit of level design last night and tweeted this. Level design is an interesting beast to tackle, especially when you can do whatever you want. Focusing my vision and level themes has really helped.

[binarytuxedo]

SIEGE Post Mortem

SIEGE Con was last weekend and it was great! It was the most fun I've had at SIEGE, mostly due to being more active during it. My focus for SIEGE was to meet as many people as I could and I accomplished that. Social anxiety issues can paralyze me when talking to new people, but I fought past it and was able to talk about video games with lots of interesting people, hear what they are working on, and talk about my own projects. I also got to speak with many people at the parties, and talked with Zoe Quinn about her new FMV game and tabletop RPGs.

The panels were great, aside from the keynotes I really enjoyed a Tripwire session on their gore system. Very interesting solutions to dismemberment and blood, and it sounded like a serial killer's manifesto as well. A panel by two member of the Elysian Shadows development team on Kickstarter was packed with information, and a panel by John Sharp on game design and how your game is perceived and affected through it's life cycle was some very high level thinking.

SIEGE always seems to exacerbate how critical I am on myself. Seeing so many people working on such interesting things makes me judge myself even harsher. But, moving past that I was able to use the experience to motivate me even more than I was on my game. I was also able to show GNAW to my friends which provided, well some great praise, and great feedback.

Also, I ordered a green tie from online and wore it all weekend. It was great because when people saw my business card they usually got the correlation. Of course, I forgot to actually take pictures of myself, but luckily one of my friends got a picture of me in the wild. I'm on the far right. 

[binarytuxedo]

Preparing and Programming

Doing some final preparation. Putting myself together and programming quick fixes for last minute issues for SIEGE con tomorrow!

[binarytuxedo]

New Website

My new website is currently in development. But fear not adventurers! I will begin being more active to get content on there, on here, and everywhere!

www.binarytuxedo.com

[binarytuxedo]

Been workin!

I've been making some good progress on GNAW. Got a prototyped HUD for the phone and a fair amount of combination powers. Once I've come up with some more powers and rounded out some other gameplay elements I can probably throw together a video to share!

[terrifyingjellyfish]

so i tried to make a fully physics-driven controllable character

[binarytuxedo]

Looks good, ship it!

[binarytuxedo]

Update on No Updates

Haven't updated anything relating to my game. I've got more planned for Character Bios, but the rest require much more work regarding design and art assets. I've got more Odd Elements ideas as well, but haven't felt inspired to type them up. So, now is the time I put my nose to the grindstone and work silently. Will update when I can.

[binarytuxedo]

Unity and References

Just went through a somewhat hair pulling moment. Apparently, Unity automatically passes by reference when dealing with Objects, string, and arrays. What this means is if you declare "array2 = array1" then any changes to either will change the other. Essentially, it does pointers. It does this to save memory as these variable types can be costly to pass... since you can already use "ref" to pass by reference I feel it might be better to push that as best practice, but I suppose they might have their reasons.

[binarytuxedo]

Animal Crossing: New Leaf

When I was younger I remember playing Animal Crossing on the Gamecube. I didn't like it too much because I didn't "get" it. I'm a hardcore gamer, and treated it like a hardcore game. Trying to play it for hours running errands for neighbors and get as many bells as I could. Suffice it to say I didn't find it the most enjoyable experience.

Animal Crossing is an interesting game. It's a game that requires you to enter a different mindset than other games. The mindset is an easy one though, as it's basically just relax and do what you want. Fish, catch bugs, talk to neighbors, stare into the sky. Make an obscene amount of bells (money) or don't make any.

New Leaf adds a milestone element. Being the mayor. You now get to decide what is built in your town. Not everything can be controlled, but just being able to build a bridge or two where you want is a great addition.

Animal Crossing is a game that shouldn't be played in binges, and that's exactly what allows you to play it longer than any other game. You don't get burned out, and that's a great change of pace.

[binarytuxedo]

Broken Age, Broken Budget, Positive Thoughts

It was recently announced that the original Double Fine Kickstarter has essentially gone over their budget of approx. 3m dollars (which was over their original budget of 400,000.) Along with taking longer than they had anticipated (or possibly wanted.) Some people are angry, some are disappointed, some are optimistic. I'm probably more optimistic to none of the above.

My reasoning? Scope creep is a major issue in game development no matter how big or little a project you're working on. Couple that with the increase in scope due to increased funds from Kickstarter, and the fact that they're breaking new ground on video game funding. It's not really too much of a surprise that it happened. Plus, Double Fine consistently puts out fun and interesting games. So long as Double Fine puts out a great game and learns from their mistakes, then I will be a happy camper.

It is a bit unfortunate that they also have their Massive Chalice Kickstarter recently (which I funded as well.) But, hopefully the experience their having now will make sure Massive Chalice doesn't have the same issues.

[axial-spec-deactivated20130917]

[axial-spec-deactivated20130917]

This was very helpful!

I have decided I would like to learn C# instead of Javascript. I can’t seem to find many resources to help me learn C# Unity scripting though, and that’s what’s holding me back. I’m sure with enough messing around and experimentation I could manage to design whatever graphics I like, I’m just limited in the fact that I don’t know how to code the stuff to make it do what I want.

[binarytuxedo]

Those are some helpful tips! I'll have to check some of them out. If you haven't, you should check out the Unity Script Reference ( http://docs.unity3d.com/Documentation/ScriptReference/index.html ). If your curious about what something does and an example of how to use it then look it up on there. The code examples default to JavaScript but in the upper right of any example it has a drop down for what language you want them to use. And you should go through all the Scripting overview items on the left column, shouldn't take that long and is really helpful for basic functions. Otherwise, I think your best bet is just looking up tutorials or downloading examples and scouring through those.

[binarytuxedo]

Odd Elements: Absence

Inspired by anti-matter. Absence spells would effectively remove specific areas from existence. A lower level spell might make a small hole in something, while master level spells eliminate entire beings or large areas. Could also be used to reduce armor or increase vulnerabilities. The power source could be anti-matter or it could be reversing the normal means of magic. Often times magic is pulled from another realm, so why not push something into that realm as well? Could be tied into Order, gaining strength by removing objects that aren't supposed to be.

Also, noting (mainly for myself) Odd elements might be rough or unpolished. It's basically supposed to be, as it's just trying to think differently.

[miyomo]

GOOD BYE JON I mean we’ll see ya on YOUR channel but yknow

WE’LL STILL MISS YOU

[krudman]

Good on you, Jon.  You could’ve stayed on an incredibly easy project and made a load of money off of it, but you left. That takes gusto!

[coelasquid]

(I kind of like Jon Jafari’s solo stuff a lot more than Game Grumps so this is exciting news to me…)

[binarytuxedo]

(I feel the same as you) To me, Game Grumps was fun when I found out, but that many videos got stale fairly quick. I really like every JonTron game review, since there's always some good jokes or weird segments to keep it interesting.

[axial-spec-deactivated20130917]

[binarytuxedo]

Interesting. I never used First Person Controller. I feared it may add an unwanted camera view, but that could be worked around. I’ll have to check it out.

[axial-spec-deactivated20130917]

It does, but you can turn off the camera inside the prefab.

Also, could you reccomend me any good C# for Unity tutorials, or even make a small one yourself/post some basic scripts (movement, making things appear/dissapear, basic stuff) for me to look at? It would be a giant, giant help.

[binarytuxedo]

I'll look for some good ones, and if I can't find any then I'll slap one together.

[axial-spec-deactivated20130917]

[axial-spec-deactivated20130917]

Oh, wait, I think I got something..

if you open up the First Person Controller prefab, and click on ‘graphics’, over in the inspector where it shows ‘Poly Surface 2 (Mesh Filter)’ it appears you can change it to a cube, a cylinder, a plane, etc. 

then, you can click on the First Person Controller object in hierarchy and resize it so that the cubes top and bottom face is equal to the bottom and top of the ‘elongated capsule’ that is the actual Character Controller.

I may be wrong, but it seems to be working for me right now.. 

[binarytuxedo]

Interesting. I never used First Person Controller. I feared it may add an unwanted camera view, but that could be worked around. I'll have to check it out.

[axial-spec-deactivated20130917]

I’m tempted to just scrap my project and start everything again, from scratch. the thing is, I don’t know enough about Unity or Javascript yet to go and make something using an idea I have.

I’d like to make a 2d sidescroller using my own art and textures, but

1) I have little or no idea how to…

[binarytuxedo]

1) Unity isn’t really built for 2D game making. It can be done easily, but there’s some stuff you need to ignore or make work arounds for. Some simple stuff is set your camera to orthographic view, lock your z movement, and only change z values on objects to change display order. Otherwise, 2D is easier than 3D in some ways once you get around the other issues.

2) I’ve had stretching issues. The problem is Unity isn’t built for pixel art either. It’s used to much bigger images. I manually create larger copies of my pixel art to use in Unity. So, GNAW is 24 x 24 regularly. But, his Unity copy is 240 x 240. Just increased the canvas and expanded the art. Though Unity will never be pixel perfect.

3) I use C# in Unity since my original code language was C++. Unity can use C#, Java, or Boo(?). So, maybe C# would work better for your skills? Also, you can look up scripts online or there’s a lot of tutorials for various scripting.

Also, sometimes starting over can be good! I’ve started a few projects over from scratch. Look up “Iterative Game Design”

[axial-spec-deactivated20130917]

Thanks for the help. Just a few questions, if you will:

When you said, ‘lock your Z movement, by that do you mean the Z movement of the character controller? Also, do you know how to change the shape of the character controller? By default it is this weird elongated capsule when viewed as an object and I don’t particularly like that.

And yeah, I have a bit of experience with C#, so that might be a better route to take.It’s just all the tutorials I’ve used so far have used Javascript.

Yeah, I see what you mean by Iterative game design. Seems like a good thing now..

[binarytuxedo]

Your welcome, and ask as many as ya like!

Lock Z: Yeah, z movement of character controller, and anything else really. There should be some checkbox on it, I believe. You might also want to lock rotation.

Capsule: You can't naturally change the capsule shape, but it's probably your best bet for movement. I'm actually looking into this since mine currently has issues because of this. (Landing on the edge of the square puts him through the square texture) If I come up with something then I'll tell ya.

[axial-spec-deactivated20130917]

I’m tempted to just scrap my project and start everything again, from scratch. the thing is, I don’t know enough about Unity or Javascript yet to go and make something using an idea I have.

I’d like to make a 2d sidescroller using my own art and textures, but

1) I have little or no idea how to...

[binarytuxedo]

1) Unity isn't really built for 2D game making. It can be done easily, but there's some stuff you need to ignore or make work arounds for. Some simple stuff is set your camera to orthographic view, lock your z movement, and only change z values on objects to change display order. Otherwise, 2D is easier than 3D in some ways once you get around the other issues.

2) I've had stretching issues. The problem is Unity isn't built for pixel art either. It's used to much bigger images. I manually create larger copies of my pixel art to use in Unity. So, GNAW is 24 x 24 regularly. But, his Unity copy is 240 x 240. Just increased the canvas and expanded the art. Though Unity will never be pixel perfect.

3) I use C# in Unity since my original code language was C++. Unity can use C#, Java, or Boo(?). So, maybe C# would work better for your skills? Also, you can look up scripts online or there's a lot of tutorials for various scripting.

Also, sometimes starting over can be good! I've started a few projects over from scratch. Look up "Iterative Game Design"