So, I have finally decided to join LD this time around. I have been following it for about a year now, joining on the IRC and reading posts, but I’ve never really had the chance to join, until now.

With only 16 hours to go, I still need to sort out my toolset and figure out the rest of the tools I need. So far, I know I plan to use Ogre3D for graphics and Netbeans IDE for coding. I will probably use the boilerplate code from this Ogre3D sample framework as a starting point. I will also try to get things working on both Windows and Linux, but my primary development will be on Windows so if the Linux side gives me grief around the end time I might drop it from the initial submission.

I will follow up shortly with my workspace photo, and I will keep posting here and to my blog at blacktopgames.com all throughout the competition.

I’m looking forward to this…

Here’s my workstation photo:

There’s less than 4 hours left for the starting time, and I had to spend the whole day outside. As I said earlier, I still haven’t even set up the development environment, and I haven’t settled on which API to use for audio and physics. Rough start, and there’s a possibility I might have to go out tomorrow, and I’m going out Sunday morning for sure.

I’ll probably work on setting things up from now on until the competition starts and I find out what the theme is, then I’ll go to sleep and maybe think a little about the type of game I’m gonna make, and hope to wake up early tomorrow to get myself on an early start.

Oh, did I mention my time zone is GMT +2? Basically what this means is that the theme will be announced at 4 AM my local time. *sigh*…

Tags: deskphoto

Dual Monitor Workspace

I just got so jealous of all the people who had dual monitors in their workstation photos, so I decided I wanna have a dual monitor too!

Tags: deskphoto

Full of much needed energy...

Here goes my first food entry, an energy bar for a much needed pick-me-up. Just something to keep my cogs turning until the competition starts.

Tags: foodphoto

In my previous post, I was undecided on which tools I plan to use. This is mainly due to the fact that I was in the middle of attempting to shift towards open source as much as possible, and I’m not done getting everything worked out yet. Therefore, after some fiddling around, here are the tools I will use:

• Windows Vista / Ubuntu Linux Karmic
• Visual Studio 2008 (Windows) / Netbeans IDE (Linux)
• Ogre3D for graphics
• OpenAL for audio (if there was any)
• Photoshop (Winodws) / Gimp (Linux) for images
• Sfxr for sound effects
• Blender for 3D models
• mIRC (Windows) / xChat (Linux)
• My phone for taking photos
• ChronoLapse for timelapse screenshots

I think that about covers it. As you can see, I might end up switching back and forth between Windows and Linux, but I hope I can get things working on both of them soon enough.

[Edit] I forgot to mention, as I said in the last post I will be using this framework as a base for my game…. [/Edit]

Tags: tools

Waiting for theme announcement…

So, after staying up till 4 AM waiting for the theme announcement, and then staying an extra hour thinking about ideas, I finally went to sleep after I got a decent enough idea.

It’s morning, and it’s hour 8 of the competition, and all I have so far is an idea that I’m trying to think of how to implement in 3D and without dreaming up any fancy artwork (because I am capable of none!). I went through the posts people have made so far, and I can already see I’m behind, people posted their first screenshots already! I guess I better get coding!

But, I think I need some breakfast first…

My breakfast

Breakfast is served…

Just a black screen for now

I got the ogre framework code running, and I’ve already started stripping down the demo code. I should start making some progress now…

Tags: screenshot

Here’s my first timelapse video, for the stuff I worked on this morning. I am still where I was here visually, but I’ve written some code since then. Nothing to show yet, but stay tuned…

EDIT: Due to the fact that this wordpress here keeps removing my embedded video, I re-posted it to my blog here.

I just gave my two weeks notice at my day job. From now on it’s just me, computer science research, and game development. All day. All the time!

I’m going indie…!

[edit]Here’s a post on my blog with more about that…[/edit]

I see everyone has already started making their “I’m in” posts, and there are lots of new participants as usual. I might actually take part in LD compo this time around, but since I have other stuff on my mind, most probably I’ll just end up taking the time to do a little game for the Jam. In both cases, my platform of choice would be flash, and I’ll use:

• Language: AS3
• IDE: Flash Develop
• Libraries: FlashPunk
• Graphics: Photoshop (or public domain images, if I end up with the Jam)
• Sound: as3sfxr

Did I forget anything? I guess not. Anyway, good luck to everyone, and hopefully I’ll actually get to finish a game this time around, at least so I would have something to show on my website.