All the basics for Invaders from Beyond! are now in place. The outer game logic is now working (completing levels, destroying ships, ending the game, etc). I've got aliens that get meaner as the game goes on and about a half-dozen different missiles dropping from the sky. I've got aliens that "get sick" when you shoot 'em, requiring a second shot to finish 'em off, and aliens that are better shots than others. All I need are some bonus critters heading across the top of the screen and the logic to give free ships and I'll have a complete game.

I also took advantage of that beta Terragen program that John Munsch mentioned a few months back. I used it to generate a collection of alien-looking landscapes for the game. The beta of the program still has a lot of limitations, like the size of the rendered image. Fortunately for me, the rendered images are almost the same size as the playing field for the game, so the resizing is imperceptible in my case. Using the PSP 5.0 smudge tool, I was able to rub out the polygons in the foreground of the image. Anyway, I updated the screen shot for the game here. I'm much happier with the look of the game now. The ship looks better and I've got a real background for the invaders. This particular shot also shows off the variety of aliens I've got available. The later backgrounds look better, with purple skies and yellow mountains.

On the miscellaneous front, I found a couple of cute links. Here's an article from Playboy magazine, actually a collection of clips from their interviews, in which celebrities talk about their favorite games. Monopoly and Backgammon seem to be the favorites.

Also, on the Monopoly official site, they are taking votes on what should be the next playing-piece for Monopoly. The choices are a biplane, a piggy bank (my favorite), or a money-bag. Unfortunately, they're not taking write-ins, so it doesn't look like there'll be a "Hank, the angry drunken dwarf" playing piece anytime soon.