The blog MusEditions wrote a fascinating little piece about music in computer games, and Cubert and TGTTPOACS are mentioned therein. I tend to agree with the author in that a game’s music is truly a huge factor that increases my immersion therein; perhaps a big reason I really got into LucasArts adventure games in my pre-teens was precisely because they put such emphasis on music to convey atmosphere. I suppose this is why I’m so flattered that someone has said the same about my own games. Although I know I’ll never have the talent and specialized training of Michael Land, Peter McConnell, or even Jared Emerson-Johnson, I do try and make the best effort possible to recreate the same atmospheric effects through music that influenced me in the classic Lucas games. I’m hoping to do this even better in Chivalry; though the music samples are a bit shorter in order to facilitate continuous looping effects (and to save me some time and space), I’ve been playing with a variety of different styles that I think fit well with the fantasy atmosphere. Time will tell if I actually succeed, I suppose.

On another note, I’ve recently been made feature editor at the somewhat dormant yet soon to be revived Adventure Developers. My my, the writing gigs just keep piling up, now don’t they?

Today, my captive audience, you are all in for a real treat, for I have finished my first-ever one room game using the Lassie engine! It’s called “When We Were Kids”, and you play a little girl who’s just gotten her beloved handheld gaming system stolen by the school bully. It’s also my first real attempt at creating an adventure game puzzle with multiple solutions. And it’s completely playable from within your web browser. So, check it out already. It’ll only take a few minutes of your precious time, after all.

In other news, there’s a lovely little interview with yours truly at I Eat Games, in which I talk about Cubert, TGTTPOACS, and life. You should all definitely check that out as well.

This evening, I played Cubert Badbone after not having touched it for ages, or at least what seems like ages. I can’t believe it’s already been four years since I made that game, and at the same time, I can’t believe how much I’ve grown up since then.

Playing games you made a long time ago kind of feels like coming across a box of your old school stuff, and seeing the drawings and writings you made back when you were a kid. On one hand, you cringe a bit because of their relatively terrible quality compared to what you’re capable of making now. On the other hand, you feel all happy and fuzzy because they bring back so many happy, fuzzy memories of the time you made them.

But wait, there's more! »

You know what really gets on my nerves? When programmers use “foo” and “bar” as variable names in example code. I mean, yes, I know that “fubar” is a clever little acronym with a swear word in it, but if EVERY PROGRAMMER uses it for EVERY SINGLE PROGRAMMING EXAMPLE (which practically everyone does, I swear!), it’s no longer clever, but downright stupid and uncreative. And being uncreative perpetuates stereotypes of programmers being nothing more than automaton droids who tap away at their keyboards all day without a single ounce of emotion. And that just isn’t fair.

On a side note, someone wrote an Italian walkthrough for Cubert Badbone. If you actually care and stuff, it can be found on the downloads page.

Oh man, it’s been quite a busy week. For starters, beta testing on TGTTPOACS has begun, meaning I’ve got my hands rather full on that at the moment. One thing I can say for sure is that I’m glad I actually decided to have beta testing. I recall that with Cubert Badbone, I got so excited at the prospect of having finally finished it that I released it right away and announced it to various forums… only to be told that the download link was broken. And once I got that fixed, there were plenty more bugs found. It wasn’t pleasant.

Back when I was working in QA last year at a software company, I’d always get quite irate with the stupid mistakes that the programmers used to make (especially the spelling mistakes… ugh). Now, as the programmer, I realise that no matter how much of a nitpicky perfectionist you are, there will always be at least one little thing you missed. And as the project you’ve been working on increases in size and complexity, your propensity to making stupid mistakes also increases. Bottom line is: it always pays to have a fresh set of eyes look at your work. And if you happen to be that fresh set of eyes, don’t be too arrogant.

Anyway, what else have I been busy with this week? School, of course, as well as an interesting and exciting development in my life that I’ll announce on this blog once the details have been finalized. Until then, I’ll just leave you in the dark and guessing, because it’s fun that way.

Today, I had the unique opportunity to test the newest, not-yet-released version of the SLUDGE engine, which features anti-aliased characters. It looked so pretty that I decided to release an anti-aliased Cubert Badbone. Grab it toute suite! As an added bonus, this newest version has a few bugs fixed (the game crashed if you tried to save during the intro, apparently), and is back in fullscreen mode, by popular demand.

In other news, after what seems like an eternity, I’ve recently started posting on the AGS forums again. It all started when someone posted a comparison of AGS and the proposed feature list of SCRAMM, and everyone who was in the amateur adventure game scene back during the SCRAMM days chimed in and started reminiscing. Of course, I couldn’t resist popping in with a “hey, what’s up?” and adding my two cents.

But wait, there's more! »

Have you ever had those moments when you’ve looked over your puzzle designs from an eternity ago, and spontaneously decided that they made no sense, therefore provoking you to do a complete rewrite?

That just happened to me this weekend. I decided to cut out an entire section of TGTTPOACS involving diving under the sea to meet mermaids[1] as well as completely changing the puzzles of one of the four story paths to make it feel more like a detective game[2] .

The good news is, reinventing the wheel does a lot for me when it comes to being inspired. Now, if I can only find a way to effectively juggle game development between more midterms and other school-related work (eek!), all shall live happily ever after.