Balthazar Auger

DEFENDER of the Favicon is a port of the original DEFENDER by Eugene Jarvis. This version, through webdev voodoo, was made to sit in the space reserved for Favicons in browsers: a mere 16×16 pixels!

Agreed, this version is much simpler than the original DEFENDER, which could mean that Mr Jarvis had already used his available space in a very optimized fashion. Nevertheless, this minimal version manages to capture the general feel of the game un just a fraction of the original space, which is quite commendable.

I strongly suggest you play this version and then play the original somewhere, in order to compare them.

Over at the community pages of Spore, the long-awaited (at least for me) “Sim-everything”, developers have released an early prototype, probably used to develop the space-phase, since it deals with gravitational interaction of particles.

From the article:

Usually these prototypes are never seen by the public, but we thought some of the more intrepid players out there might enjoy playing around with a few of our early Spore prototypes. Keep in mind these are not tested, supported or even easily explained.

I have tested this prototype, and it’s really not player friendly. However, since I started making video games, I’ve manipulated countless prototypes or small “code toys” quickly hacked together to prove a certain point or to test an idea. These objects end up being stronger references to the team than every document you will ever be able to write, and yet they are systematically forgotten after the game has shipped. (more…)

Sorry about the short absence, work got the best of me.

What I intended to talk about earlier this week was about the latest crop of projects to come out of ENJMIN. Every year around the end of June, first year students demo their interactive pieces to the public.

This year, a grand total of seventeen works were presented. Not all of them are downloadable yet, I’ll update the list as they hit the web. Read further for the full list. (more…)

While reading a very interesting post over at Chris Bateman’s blog about player choice in games, I obviously tried to find a constraint in how much power over the game you give your player, ranging from total (sandbox games) to none (his Guitar Hero example is quite fitting).

But then, reading it again, I wasn’t so sure it could be called a constraint. Player agency is a variable you can adjust while designing, but it has no real, tangible value you can set as reference. You can say “This game gives me more choice than this one”, but it’s hard giving both games a value you can compare mathematically.

(more…)

I consider control to be the last of the constraint categories based off the physical characteristics of play. Also, it is one of the few “universal” constraints I might talk about, as it is applied to any kind of games. I would even go as far as stating that most games are determined by some form of constrained controls. (more…)