I am making a goddamn good looking engine so I can make games and more games out of it, of course, as long as I decide to.

12/12/02:
Currently working on GUI (buttons, menus, etc).

My compiler generates one error message: "does not compile."

quote: Original post by Impossible
Are you doing all the art by yourself and have you started yet? 200 pages is a lot of art, even in a year. Pro comic book artists work pretty much full time on one book, and usually only do one or two things (there are usually inkers or colorists.) Even then they only produce about 32 pages a month. I guess 384 is a lot more than 200 and you''re probably working in black and white, but I assume you aren''t working full time. I''m planning on doing a graphic novel\comic type thing but I''m not doing the writing (and if I''m lucky not doing the inking either) and right now we''re shooting for like 64 pages by the end of the summer. It took forever to draw a 4 page comic, and it takes me more than a year to fill a 100 page sketch book with random stuff. So 200 pages of detailed comic art in a year (working casually) blows my mind.

Luckily I am neither the only artist nor the primary artist. I''m writing the plot outline (2/3s done), designing the clothing (halfway done)and architecture, inking and coloring, assembling panels into pages, and adding speech bubbles and captions. Nathan is turning my outline into a full script, and Alina is doing the page layout, character design (60% done), and line art. We''re also using an art style that''s slightly less detailed, which makes the drawings not take so long. IMO next Christmas is an optamistic deadline, but not an entirely unfeasable one. We haven''t decided yet whether we''re just coloring the scene-opening tableaux or the whole thing, I have to see how that works out. I color with colored pens for details and markers for large area fills, which takes a lot less time than some other methods - I can do a page (inking and coloring) in 4-10 hours depending on its complexity, then maybe another 3 hours to scan it, clean it, assemble it and add text; whether I''ll have time to do that with every page depends on how fast Alina draws. I''m not going to school this semester, and Alina has a secretarial job where she has lots of freetime to draw, so we could concievably do 18 pages or so a month.

Me and my friend have decided to work on remaking Nintendo''s Zelda: a link to the past, using OpenGL.

I''m currently working on a new script called "War of the Wingmen" about men and women finding love in futile places like nightclubs using futile tools like seduction.

My current game project is the same on I''ve been working on for three years, a mass market adventure game. I''ve been spending most of my time lately sketching 2-D finished black graphite line art of the character ensemble, the environmental diversity, foos, bosses and NPCs. Since I lost my last two sponsors, and I am waiting for rewrite orders on the last script from the studio, that''s just about all the time I have with the sole exception of developing some new holiday recipes.

Addy

I'm working on a story for an RPG about twins who're destined to save the world but are kidnapped and seperated at birth. One's on the side of good the other's on the side of evil. It's called The Order of the Phoenix for now.

[edited by - Mr_Rational on December 15, 2002 11:37:48 AM]

I''m working on a 3D real time strategy game (code named "RTS3D"). RTS3D takes place during the 18''th century and has a large emphases on naval combat during that time. For more info, you can take a look at my web site http://waltsgames.iwarp.com/rts3d.html .


-Sam.

http://waltsgames.iwarp.com

RTS3D -- a 3D Real Time Strategy game
http://waltsgames.iwarp.com/rts3d.html

quote: Original post by Mr_Rational
It''s called The Order of the Phoenix for now.

Erm, you''re aware that''s the title of the soon-to-be-released next Harry Potter Book?

Well, aside from work (where I''m writing this instead of porting code), I''m putting the finishing touches on a pen and paper role playing module. This was supposed to be a relatively quick and dirty project ("Your mission is to rescue the mayor''s daughter by entering this fighting tournament and beating everyone up.") for a game primarily designed to facilitate stylized beatdowns. But, due to my overactive imagination, and having more time to work on it then planned, it turned into a project that I''m thinking about polishing and putting up as an online resource. The ideas I''m trying to communicate to my players are mostly centered around offering kindness to others, seeing a cause through to the end, and on seeing the value of teammates. Of course, these are all in because of our last set of games, which I love to complain about. Mostly it''s a rough situation, due to the people involved in it, and the sticky nature of trying to plan anything interactive.


s&s, I''m kind of courious as to where the socialism vs. capitalism aspect comes in. Oh, and could you please explain what the difference between a Theme and a Motif is? = )

Addy, the synopsis of your script is intriguing. And what sorts of layouts do you use for describing areas? I always like having a reference image nearby, but mostly it''s a mishmash.

After this, I really want to work on and probablly post about ways to create semi dynamic stories and situations. Mostly this is from watching and playing the latest WWF Smackdown game. It just plain blew my mind watching it.

quote: Original post by ThoughtBubble
s&s, I''m kind of courious as to where the socialism vs. capitalism aspect comes in. Oh, and could you please explain what the difference between a Theme and a Motif is? = )

A theme is basically a moral, philosophical, or political argument or opinion. Most games/books have three or more of these, whereas a short story should only have one. Common themes are altruism vs. selfishness, loyalty vs. betrayl, courage vs. cowardice, basically any virtue/vice pair.

A motif is a set of associated tropes. A trope is a symbolic idea like a unicorn or an ark or a phoenix - basically an object that has lots of ideas/emotions culturally associated with it. Motifs generally have strong visual elements. So ''pets'' as a motif might include the tropes cage, leash, collar, food dish, grooming brush, breed papers, etc.


Socialism and capitalism - in my worldbuilding the dominant alien culture has matter manipulation technology such that they can basically synthesize any object they want, and copy any object they can get ahold of. This naturally prevents them from having anything like a capitalist economy, because the only things they could sell are ideas, and even with those they can be pirated as soon as anyone has them, like copying CDs. So this alien culture adapted by ditching capitalism, and they have a socialist society. OTOH this society keeps groups of sentient pets, and there is scarcity within the pets'' micro economies, so they have token, barter, and capital economies. And the humans who stumble into all this have a capital/credit economy.

I''m working on XAP, a retro shooter designed to wile away those idle bong-induced moments/evenings.

There''s a diary at http://www.javagaming.org/cgi-bin/JGOForums/YaBB.cgi?board=volunteer;action=display;num=1039105813 which might be amusing.

I couldn''t half do with some sprites

Cas