Game Design, Programming and running a one-man games business…

Category: Uncategorized

New Toy

I posed for a picture once brandishing a klingon knife. It was my blog picture for ages. because of that pic, some people have developed an impression of me as a homicidal maniac with anger management issues. This isn’t helped by my hobby of shooting a recurve bow (at targets, not animals). I want to reassure everyone that i am a lovely cat-loving human being who is not at all a weapon-obsessed freak.

On an unrelated topic, a mate of mine gave me a late birthday present today. Holy crap its tough to load (80 pounds draw).

It’s a crossbow pistol, clearly :D

New monitor. Tempted, but why?

I haven’t treated myself to any geek purchases for as long as I can remember. i was waiting till I finished Kudos 2, and then combining that with my recently passed birthday, I think I can justify splashing out.

The thing is, I am a man of simple needs. The only things I want to buy are

  • A new house
  • A Prius
  • Maybe a new monitor

the first two are out of the question because they cost tons of money and I don’t have much, but the monitor is a possibility. The problem is, there really is nothing much wrong with my current one (a  19″ iiyama one)

So there is the option if buying a newer, bigger one, probably a 24″ widescreen one like a mate of mine got recently. This would mean a bigger screen res and desktop, which could in theory be handy for coding, and could in theory make games look mroe awesome. But Do I really NEED it? Is it not a bit gratuitous to buy one when I already have a working one sat here on my desk.

A new monitor is about £260 here. And it’s a business expense, and I’d claim the VAT back, so it’s slightly cheaper than that. On the one hand, it’s not a lot of money, on the other hand it’s profits from over 26 games!

Anyone here gone from a 19″ monitor to a 24″ widescreen one and gone OMFGZ! TEH AWESOME!?

talk me into/out of it…

Going Away

I’m going away for a few weeks tomorrow. It’s fairly good timing because Kudos 2 is out and stable and I really need time off! Hopefully I’ll come back and throw myself into some Kudos 2 extra patches and modding stuff, and then whatever my next game is.

I seriously doubt it would be Kudos 2 or Democracy 3, but it won’t be an FPS or a casual match-3 game either.

Feel free to hype up Kudos 2 to everyone you know while I’m gone :D

Internet Trolls

“Yeah, you are such a brave man. I mean posting on a web forum! With an alias! Wow, that certainly takes HUGE balls. It couldn’t possibly be because you want to plug your poorly made site.

I will give you one thing, you certainly have no shame (or maybe you’re just completely out of touch with the gaming world). You are willing to let people know that you produced those “games” that all consist of graphs and bar charts. Nobody would waste time to pirate your crap, let alone purchase them when they could have just as much “fun” making Excel spreadsheets or watching paint dry.”

People get really wound up on slashdot don’t they? Anyone who isn’t a signed up member of the pirate party who has a ‘F**K the RIAA’ T-shirt and thinks that Richard Stallman is the new messiah is REALLY yelled at.

It never ceases to amazes me the level of casual aggression, insults and abuse that passes for normal on the internet. Kids grow up thinking this is how people should discuss things. It really is not, and will not get you very far.

My first job was as a boatbuilder and bridgebuilder. Everyone was pretty fit, and we worked with chisels, knives, hammers, hacksaws and even chainsaws. Occasionally you would be dangling over a river from ropes a co-worker had tied in place.

We were all VERY polite to each other. You learn not to be abusive to the guy next to you when you are all effectively armed to the teeth and working somewhere dangerous :D