GameDevMap is just that: a map of game developers and publishers, searchable and sortable by various criteria.  I wasn’t sure it would catch on– but I was quite wrong, as you can see if you swing by.  It’s quite comprehensive, and pretty dang current.

It’s run by Gaurav Mathur, who I worked with a little at Double Fine, and who’s now at Factor 5.   Looking for a game job?  Just curious?  Prepping to invade your favorite game developer’s office and steal an advance copy of their game?  Check out GameDevMap!

I was trying out some lesser-known and indie games the other night. In between instructions on how to move crates, or which sequence of keys to press to retract your landing gear, I stumbled across Vigil: Blood Bitterness (links are to reviews).

I read the summary in this ad, but as is common with marketing copy, I tuned it out and didn’t really grasp what it was saying. So I’ll repeat it here, to help it sink in. The protagonist– you– is a man who’s killed his entire family. You eat the faces of your slaves for sustenance. This is all presented in only black, white, and orange, in an unintelligible language (okay, French) heavily distorted. It feels every bit as twisted and unsettling as it should.

Technical issues kept me from proceeding, so check out the demo (also on Steam). It’ll just take you a few minutes to download, and unlike many games, it’s great within the first few minutes. One caution: I’d wait until you’re somewhere that you can play this in the dark, with the sound cranked.

Remember with Dan Hsu was calling game journalists on the gifts and junkets they received from publishers? Remember when he actually asked Peter Moore a few tough questions?

That was back in 2005. How come I haven’t heard anything like that since then? Have I missed the news? Are tough questions now so unremarkable as to not create a stir? Did the attempt at making game journalism respectable just not pan out?

Press for the latest Videlectrix game, “Where’s an Egg?”, had me over at the site for a while. I realized there are a ton of games there I’ve never played, and some of the ones I have played are quite fun (Peasant’s Quest!). They really do a great job of imitating (and then parodying) the old-school PC games I remember.

Do you have a favorite Videlectrix game? Do you like the text-adventure gameplay of Thy Dungeonman? The thematic awesomeness of Trogdor? Let me know if you have a one true love (here’s their catalog if you don’t remember them all).

An evil force is growing to the east. Rumors are beginning to circulate of sheep horribly butchered, or entire villages of halflings roasted alive, their souls harvested by goblins to feed their malevolent master. You, brave adventurer, must– well, actually, you’re the guy doing all the killing. You’re not so much “brave adventurer” as you are “supremely villainous overlord”, and your job is to keep rebuilding, keep growing, and cover the land in darkness.

Overlord kicks off this premise with confidence. The developers use their obviously thorough knowledge of every fantasy RPG device and cliche to turn the whole lot on their head, and deliver an experience full of humor and personality. The first 30 minutes are executed with a higher degree of all-round polish than you see even in many of today’s most expensive titles.

I’ve just finished playing the demo, so I don’t know how things develop from there. Reviews for the XBox 360 version are averaging around 75%, which is probably based on 80% for the gameplay, plus 300% for being awesome, and then docked 305% for the camera.

As fantastic as it is, Overlord is not unique in playing off the tropes of the fantasy RPG. The genre is full of such examples, such as the Bard’s Tale remake, or the bizarre save-load parody in Baldur’s Gate II. Or check out the upcoming Dungeon Hero, in which the dungeon-dwelling goblins are likened to a noble underclass, eking out an existence in their squalid ghetto:

As far as I can tell, traditional fantasy is the most self-referential and genre-aware of any game setting. Some of this is certainly because of its overuse: every gamer is familiar with the setting, the characters, the archetypical stories. Developers pick the genre for this familiarity, but in order to interest the audience, need to progress beyond a simple retelling of old AD&D campaigns. While traditional fantasy certainly feels tired when done in some games, other developers manage to turn that overuse into a strength, playing off of our shared knowledge to build something new.

Postscript: I just stumbled across this interview with Rhianna Pratchett, “writer and co-story designer of Overlord”. She’s a freelance writer for games. I had forgotten about her involvement when I played the Overlord demo, but now of course it makes sense. I’d expect that selling writing services to game developers would be a difficult task. (”No, we’re cool– the hero, Axedong, must collect the four elemental crystals. My brother’s an aspiring Hollywood scriptwriter, so we’ll bring him in to write the dialog a month before ship.”) However, Overlord shows the difference a good writer can make. Judging from this article, Rhianna already had quite a few gigs lined up in late 2006, including Heavenly Sword. There’s hope!

Just a quickie, since I’ve seen this question around a lot.

If you follow Paypal’s instructions for their basic shopping cart (the one that takes the visitor to Paypal from your site, with their “Add to Cart” button), the “Continue Shopping” button will not work in Firefox.  It also opens the window in a new tab, and may make it full screen height.

The workaround is simple.  In each form tag, put target=”self”.  Add a new input tag, type=”hidden”, name=”shopping_url”, value=”whatever_url_you_want_continue_shopping_to_point_at.html”.

Armchair psychologists frequently try to make too much of players and their avatar choices, but this fantastic collection of gamers and their avatars side by side is a fun watch.  Anshe Chung is a fantastic avatar.  Also, MMO faces have a long way to go (I’m looking at you, Everquest).

I’m implementing yet another XML-based object creation architecture, and wondering if I’m reinventing (reimplementing, really) the wheel one time too many.  I’m looking for the basics: tweak object attributes in XML; reload on the fly; easily add new object types.  Basically, I want a pretty standard data-driven engine that pulls pretty much everything from level data to player info and quest/mission/plot progression from a bunch of XML files.

It may seem like it’s not that much– there are a million free XML parsers out there– but there’s always more to it than you’d think.  What information goes in attributes vs. children?  How do you handle reloads of changed data?  How much control do the objects being created have over parsing?  What about saving data out?

Do you know of anything that fits the bill?  C++ source code is best, but even a well-written, modern article describing a game-relevant architecture would be great.  I’m definitely noticing the paucity of game development writing compared to other sectors: I dug up a couple tiny game-related bits from 2002 that basically told me I should try using XML, while I also dug up many highly detailed case studies of XML-based GUI app creation.

This video’s for John, who’s into crazy game-as-toy stuff like this.  (I, on the other hand, want to know how the quirky puppet feels about living in his infinite physics toolbox prison, if perhaps that toolbox isn’t an existential statement on life, or if maybe we couldn’t just give all the puppets guns and play some capture the flag.)

Everyone who’s tried bringing RTS to the console so far has failed in creating a truly usable control scheme.  Ensemble’s spent a lot of time and money trying to get it right for Halo Wars, so I’m always on the lookout for good information on the title.  Here’s Joystiq’s brief writeup:

To demonstrate, Devine moves a central on-screen cursor to a group of UNSC soldiers loitering about the middle of a large base. Where the analog stick and cursor move, the camera follows. A tap of the A button selects an individual unit and pressing X sends it it towards the location of the cursor. A double-press (resist the urge to say “double-click”) of the A button selects units of a similar type and holding the same button down creates a much larger reticle for sweeping over every character you wish to include.

Tying the cursor to the camera is, I think, essential.  Still, a “cursor” may be missing the point.  I wonder if analog thumbsticks for manual multi-unit selection are ever going to feel good.  Then again, Halo’s aim assist really transformed the FPS experience on the console, so I’m hoping for the best.

(By the way, here’s the first gameplay footage of Halo Wars.)