Seems like I make one post per week that consists of multiple topics that I can't cram into a 140-character Twitter. So I'll keep following that meme.

I've gotten no meaningful sponsorship offers from anyone for the new Flash Think Tank, so I'm just going to go with plan-A, which is to pull the site-lock and start uploading the thing to as many game portals as I can find and soak in a few bucks from ad-views. Seems like everyone running a game portal or a Flash promotion site is currently at GDC, so I don't think this'll get the quick traction that Pop Pies 2 got.

Not that I expected that anyway. Pop Pies has its own friggin' fan group on Facebook (and I didn't start it), so it was a foregone conclusion that PP2 was gonna get some eyeballs.



I got a request to submit a proposal for a Batman-themed game for the Mochi-WB contest. After getting a couple of my fears allayed by the organizers (i.e. am I gonna be making you guys a game for $4k that could potentially be worth more elsewhere), I put together a proposal for a game. Apparently they'll be contacting the winning entries sometime next week, so I'll find out then if I'm one of the people chosen.

I won't give away the whole plot, but my submission was a puzzle game with explosions. I've only made about six of those now. I think I'm getting into a rut :)



We're getting all self-sufficient over here at the compound. I planted four rows of onions that are happy as can be as well as some mint and rosemary that I'm hoping will take over a corner of the yard and choke out the other weeds. Mint is a weed itself, but it's a weed that smells nice and looks good floating on the top of your drink, so why not.

Shelly's planted a half-dozen other veggies with varying degrees of success. She started from seeds, so she's not getting the "instant gratification" I got from planting sprouts and watching 'em perk right up.

We did discover that the local herbivores don't like to wait for the peas to grow up before chowing down on 'em, so we might continue to grow them in the greenhouse.

We also started making some wine and cheese as a companion for the beer. Making mozzarella was easy and cheap (several pizzas worth of cheese from a $2 gallon of whole milk) and is awesome on pizza. The wine has been bubbling away for a week now. While I'm all for guzzling the whole batch right now, Shelly's on some weird kick about how you gotta let a wine age before you can quaff it. Dunno where she got that silly idea.

We're also about to bottle up another 50-odd bottles of homebrew beer. Let the depression hit. We got cheap brewskis!



Oh, and it wouldn't be a visit to the Bargain Basement Blog without a cheapass pennypinching tip. So here's the one for today. . .

Starbucks is my favorite respite for "Low Priced Luxury". It's a place where you can get something decadent that's not too bad for your health along with some wifi and/or a newspaper, all for under four bucks. It ain't a Lexus, but I don't like Lexus's anyway so I'll treat myself once a week to some foo-foo-coffee.

In the past, I'd order myself a latte, which is a shot or two (or three) of espresso mixed with steamy milk. And it's not cheap. It's around $3.75 for the large. Mind you, a large latte is a pretty filling breakfast with enough caffeine to make you break out in a sweat, so it's not too outrageous.

A little under a year ago, Starbucks introduced their "Pike's Place Blend" coffee as well as the "Misto", which is basically a latte made with brewed Pike's Place instead of espresso.

And IMHO it's 95% as good as their latte and a dollar cheaper.

My only warning is that you have to order these at actual standalone Starbucks stores. The Starbucks' that are built into your local grocery store or Target don't have the Pike's Place coffee on tap, and a Misto made with the old "house blend" isn't nearly as good. Not sure what it is, but the difference is noticeable.

Also check back here to navigate Starbucks' "free wifi" deal. As an added bonus, if you use a registered gift-card to buy your coffee, they won't charge you for a squirt of coffee flavoring (vanilla, hazelnut, etc).



And finally. Just so I can prove that this is indeed a programming blog. Here's a handy piece of code. Flash has had the ability to tint and color movieclip object forever, but the way it was done (at least in AS2) was always pretty hairy. It worked, but it requires about three steps to do the seemingly-trivial operation. Here's a nice little function that'll do the whole mess in one function call.



It extends MovieClip, so if you have an existing movieclip, you can just paste this code in and colorize your objects like so. . .

myMovieClip.setTint(255, 0, 0, 50) // turn this object 50% red

So if you're making a Pac Man game and you want four colors of ghosts, you can just make one ghost MovieClip and tint each instance rather than some more difficult solution.