pawlakt blog

So… I noticed that the App Store lacks one of my favorites genres… the RTS game! For those of you who don’t know, an RTS game is a real time strategy game where you create a city, manage materials, and build an army. Is is surprising to me since the App Store is HUGE!!! They have something like a million billion apps… and there’s not a single RTS game! There is one game that comes close… Lost Empires clams to be an RTS game… and for the most part, it is You command a small army which you move around the map and destroy all the orcs! While there are some city building and material managing elements, they are not used nearly enough! Each mission is pretty short, so you never have the time to build that massive army that you were dreaming of! Before you start calling me out for just complaining about very small things that vary from game to game… let me explain the biggest upset. There is no skirmish mode!!! Yes, you read right! No skirmish mode… one of the things that defines a true RTS! There is no option to just start a battle with limited materials and build up a grand city and army to destroy your enemies. If there were a RTS in the App Store that had a skirmish mode, I would pay a few bucks for it! When I was younger, I used to ignore the campaign and only do skirmishes… so this would be welcome! I know that Command & Conquer is in the App Store… but that’s turn based, but I’m not really into that… see below for info on this edit

Now, I’m not only bashing Lost Empires… It’s a really good game! Beautiful 2D graphics and good controls considering its on the IPod! It’s fun and I’ve wasted away a good amount of time playing it! It is defiantly worth the $1.99

EDIT!!!!!
I feel really stupid! when I saw Command & Conquer… I was actually thinking of Civilization… I downloaded c&c and am about to play it (its even in 3D :)) sorry c&c :/

So for Christmas, I received an ipod touch… and for the first 12 hrs of having it, I didn’t sync a single song over to it! I got on the App store and downloaded away! So I give you my top Apps!

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Skies of Glory / F.A.S.T.

Both Apps are basically the same thing, just one of them is set in WWII, and the other in modern times. The controls for these games are incredible. They are the best use of the accelerometer that I’ve experienced so far! It’s fun just to ignore your mission and just fly around! The only problem I’ve had with these is that, for some reason, FAST wouldn’t work for me the first time I downloaded it… so I just deleted it and tried again The graphics on these games are top notch. It almost looks like they used bump maps in Skies of Glory, but the closer I looked, I think they just baked the lighting into the texture :/

SCORE 4.5/5

Unblock Me

This game is surprisingly addictive as you shift the blocks to make a passage for the red block! This is one of those games that you just get hook on and you can’t stop playing. The touch controls are precise and work well for this game

SCORE 4/5

Need for Speed Shift

Pushing the 3D graphics to the limit, NFS is a great looking game! The cars look absolutely amazing and the track is surprisingly detailed! The controls are what you’d expect of an iphone racing game. The game gives you different options for the difficulty of driving though. On the easiest difficulty, you only have to steer. You also have the option of using the brake and using the gas.

SCORE 4.5/5

N.O.V.A.

… if you enjoy a good fps… and you don’t have this game… you’re just stupid! This is by far the best fps out there for iphone! Controls are standard with the virtual joystick for moving and dragging on the screen for pivoting. This game is also amazing to look at! I would go as far to say that it destroys N64 games and rivals Playstation games on graphics. The guns are fun to shoot too. They come in a wide range from your standard pistol to a plasma gun. This is one of the best games for iphone! The only downside that I have found is that you cant drive the vehicles… that will be a nice feature for N.O.V.A. 2… maybe

SCORE 5/5

Domino

Although I only have the light version on my ipod, this app is great! It is so simple and so addicting! It’s very nice to be able to create and destroy a line of dominos… in half the time it would take to set one up by hand!

SCORE 4/5

Sandstorm

Basically NOVA meets Modern Warfare… sounds pretty good… it is

SCORE 4/5

Bouncedown

From the makers of RuneScape… we get bouncedown. Not nearly as complex as the online RPG, bouncedown is a simple flash like game that is a lot like falldown… but you can’t hit the bottom either :/

SCORE 4/5

Online Version... not the Iphone version (basically the same but wider)

OMG Pirates!

This game is my new obsession on my Ipod! I’m a big fan of online flash games… and this game just looks and feels like one! It’s cell shaded, hand drawn animation is wonderful to watch and play. It has a similar look as a game by the Behemoth… for example Castle Crashers. Using a simple button scheme, this classic beat um up is easy to pick up and play… and die… did I mention that this game is hard? Well it is! luckily you have unlimited retries, cause I for one really need them! The greatest advice I can give you is to keep jumping! You can’t get hit while jumping, so its a good thing to do! This game is WELL worth the $1.99!!!

SCORE 5/5

Now this is my personal list… of course I’m leaving out several apps that I know you all have… (Tap Tap, Pandora, Facebook, Paper Toss) because I don’t feel like recommending things that you already have… and if you don’t have one of those… why?

So today, I found an amazing website that allows you to compose, share, save, and export… its awesome!

http://www.noteflight.com/

below is my short arrangement of “A Mighty Fortress.” We had to harmonize this song for three parts in my music theory class… enjoy and check out this site!

I know! I wasn’t sure at first either, but apparently this short clip can pull it off! This video allows you to choose from a number of different 3D viewing type. Since I don’t own a pair of 3D glasses… and I don’t feel like buying one, I picked the cross-eyed version. I wasn’t really sure if it would work, but it actually does. After a second or two, your eyes adjust to the video and you see it in 3D!!!

While this may be completely awesome, there are a few downsides. In this view, you end up actually seeing 3 videos (one to the left, one to right, and the center one which is the one that you’re supposed to look at) This is a little odd, but it really isn’t that big of deal. It actually reminds me of the racing arcade game with multiple screens. Another downside is the strain it puts on your eyes. For this small clip, it’s okay… but I’m not sure I really want to watch a full length film like this.

So in the end, It is sweet, but is limited.

Here’s an example of this kinda stuff.
Cross your eyes until you see 3 equally sized images. Hold it for a second to let your eyes adjust. You should be able to look at the center (3D) image as if it were any normal image. It works a lot like the magic eye pictures.

Do you hate it when you’re on a forum and the people there just don’t know how to use Google? They ask simple questions that can easily be solved by just a few clicks of the mouse. Now you can show them how with this:

http://lmgtfy.com/?q=

All you have to do is fill in what you want them to search in the url

example:
someone was looking for a simple actionscript 2 physics engine… obviously there’s a ton out there, you just gotta do a search.
So you just give them this link:

http://lmgtfy.com/?q=as2+physics+engine

simple… I know! This website gives them step by step instructions on how to search!

have fun!

Well… I needed a place to store my pic for the “Faces of Newgrounds” Collab… but SpamTheWeb has stopped letting you upload pictures, so I just decided to make a post about it. The point of the collab is to take a number of newgrounds member… and smash their face against a scanner. Then put it to music… Should be awesome! Here’s my pic.

So, as some of you may have heard, Sony is planning to announce the “PSP Go” at E3 2009. I only have one question for Sony… Why?
The PSP Go will basically be the biggest waste of money for 2009! There are rumors of the number of changes that will be in this “new” system. The PSP Go is getting rid of the UMD format for games. This is a one of the only good thing for the system. UMDs are sluggish and loud. Getting rid of them is an advance. Another (an most likely the biggest) change is the new look. The PSP Go will feature a slide-out panel that will house the buttons and analog stick… yes, you read right. The PSP Go will only have one analog stick. The is the one decision that makes me wonder if the people at Sony are mentally retarded! This is the biggest problem with the psp! If the psp had a second analog stick, it could easily dominate the hardcore, portable gaming market! I’m just waiting for microsoft to come and make it all right! (or maybe apple could get into the video game business (not counting the iPhone)) At launch, Sony will be offering 100 classic and new games for the system. The big game that’s coming out is Gran Turismo Mobile.

Here is a artist rendition of the PSP Go

Artist Rendition of PSP Go!

And here’s another (that I like A LOT more) but it isn’t even close to what it really will be

a better version

haven’t made a post in a while!
This is mostly because I normally make posts about my flash games and animations, but I’m still working on my game Splorg. So there really hasn’t been anything new to post. But I do have some music that I made on my Newgrounds Channel if you want to check that out.

The biggest news lately is that I founded a new village on the browser game, Travian.

Making my own contribution to the “art game” world, I decided to make the game Glide. It is a short game that let’s you experience what it’s like to float around and be free! Collecting the good pieces is the main point of this game. There are also bad pieces that hurt you when you hit them! I used some different programming techniques in this one, and most of them work really well! The way the player is formed was completely made up by me! It’s a new system that compares the current position of each point on the circle, to it’s “perfect” position. Hope you enjoy it!

Glide

So after playing many games and watching a few reviews, I decided to make this prediction for the future of gaming.

I think that the future of gaming is in “art games.” Art games are games that really are not for the hard-core gamer. They are based more on graphics and smooth gameplay rather than splattering the guts of your enemy on the opposite wall. The objective in these games are not always clear and they require more thought. The point of many of these games in to simply make you think. An example of this is Flower. This is a game where you are a flower petal that blows around in the wind. This shows us that nature can be beautiful and industrialization may not be the way to go.

Another example of an art game is flOw.

Both of these examples are made by the same game company, I think.

There also other examples that are on the web. Some these include:
Colour my Heart
Aether
Coil

more can be found at BioShock and F.E.A.R.
These games are using the atmosphere of their games to make it more realistic. These games are not considered “art games” because they lack the free flowing feeing that the previously mentioned games have. Take Aether for example, it gives you no instructions other than the controls and the story. It doesn’t tell you what to do, or how you have to do it. This also occurs in the game Coil. Coil may even do this more!

So that’s what I think the future of gaming is! They are fun, rewarding, and thought provoking.