Heroic Patterns Promo Video

Finally I have finished wrestling with the frustration of re-creating the promotional video, and also pinnacle 12. This time I took copies of the project as I did each significant piece. Still it worked fine this time.



I hope you like this video. It is a bit of a departure from my normal game promotional videos. This time however I was inspired to be more creative and less amusing with my take.

The most startling thing about this video to me though... is my accent. Yes that is me doing the voice over. I got exactly what I wanted.. and on the first take. whoop... Only 'Is that really my accent?'. Not always so English now it seems.

Gotta go, time for bed,

Laters
Da Voodoochief

Useful program list

I have been asked now again about what software I use to develop my games with. As I think the list is rather longer than I ever expect I figured I would start tonight by writing some on the list tonight. Whilst I try and re-create the Heroic Patterns Promo video.

1. NCH Software Wavepad. This is my go to SFX editor. It is so like most other good ones except it doesn't mess around. It is smartly programmed and works naturally, doing what you expect when you try it's features.
2. NCH software MixPad. This is a multi-channel sound editor. Allowing me to easily overlay various sound effects and music and get the whole lot balanced and sounding right. Then I can simply save it out mixed together, lovely. Again a sharply developed App.
3. Pinnacle Studio 12. This is a poorly programmed piece of software in my opinion, only it is excellently designed and I love that about it. It is my go to movie maker as I can knock stuff out so incredibly fast. But some of the bugs are so annoying and have been around since pinnacle verison2 or so.
4. Prism by NCH Software. This is my sound and music converter. It doesn't simply convert from one format to another. It also allows me to alter quality and pixel resolution of the movie. Great for spot movies on tablets etc.

I think that list about covers my audio and movie editing set of software. I am not sure what list to make next... I'll think about it.

Da Voodoochief

Stupid Pinnacle Software

Ya know, I love the way Pinnacle works. A single timeline etc and most of it's functions are easy and intuitive to use. But in parts it is simply a piece of crap. Namely it's stability.

I was working hard to get my Heroic Patterns promo video out tonight. It was mostly ready and simply needed a few higher rez screenshots and some tweaking with the transitions to make it about perfect. Today I managed to reveal the current state of it to me mates to see what they thought.

Still tonight however much I would like to finish it, I cannot. It is so frustrating and now it will be done some time over the weekend no doubt. I still have all the parts and I have the render I showed me mates to work from to get back some of the timing.

But ahhh! What a pain

Laters, I need to sleep,
Da Voodoochief

Heroic Simon Background Effects Video

This is a development video of the background effects I created for Heroic Simon. I love the way they turned out.



One of the interesting things that happened was when I created the rivulets from my finger touches. I decided that I would randomly choose a direction either matching the incoming direction or one of the two adjacent directions from this. I figured it would still have the rivulets going in sort of bendy lines away from me. However that was not the case as they tended to go around in circles and such. They were quite fascinating worms really, but not what I wanted. So then I changed the idea to use the direction the rivulet was needed to go and always randomize from that and not the incoming direction. This worked so well you can now see it in the video :)

Laters
Da Voodoochief

Games ready for publishing, I'm not

I knew this day was coming. I knew weeks ago. But dealing with it has just not happened.

I should be truly happy. Both versions of Heroic Patterns has passed Apples review, first time. Only now it means I have to publish the games, which means I am now back to putting out the games and trying at least a little to back them up. This means modified web pages on www.sorcerygames.com and doing the promotional video that I have STILL not gotten done, gah!

This should not make me frustrated, yet it is the way I feel.

Heck, I have Heroic Simon done as well. As of today when I achieved the last achievements and final testing was completed, the game could easily go to Apple to review as well. Eeek, I am so behind.

Not quite sure what to do right now, I think get the darned promotional video done is my priority, everything else just might fall into place after eh? Surely?

G'night
Da Voodoochief

Games supporting themselves? You Jest!

I have been playing Marvel Avengers Alliance on Playdom.com now for quite some time. I really enjoy the game, even if it does have it's issues.

Today they announced that the game was going to be closed down in a month. I have to say I am not really surprised by this announcement. It was only a few weeks ago that Disney who owns Playdom announced they were laying off 700 employees. A number of them had to go from Playdom for sure. What it also means is that Playdom MUST look at it's costs on its games and save money. Or put another way, focus on the more viable content and games they have.

Lets look at this for a minute..
on Facebook I did a few PVP seasons and could see that they had 800K to 1.2M players.. WOW!
on Playdom I could see with the same method there were barely 35K players.

I seems to me that supporting maybe 40K players (some did not play PVP) was simply not viable, unless the Playdom players spent a LOT of money on Gold etc. I do not believe the Playdom players did this as they have a low tolerance for what they called Wallet Warriors, never apparently realizing that these WW players were the ones keeping the game going. Playing for free (ad supported play) was never going to support an entire development team.

I really enjoy the game. Yes some of the quality could be lacking, and some of the decisions on balancing were atrocious, but it is good. I like spending time there. Also some of the other players (not the moaners!) are great to chat with. I shall miss them.

Still, to suddenly lose the game in a month is odd.. but in the end the game MUST support the cost of itself. If it does not, how can it exist, or even why should it exist...

all Indie developers face this at some point, once what they do goes out of Hobby costs and into real money. I am glad I am not in that position at the moment. As I struggle to get my Indie games noticed. But it does absolutely mean my games are smaller and less interesting in a lot of ways than I really want them to be....

Space Invaliens is such an example...

good night,
Da Voodoochief

Mythic Mahjong by my mate Chris

I am very lucky to call a guy named Chris a good friend. We have been in this industry now for many many years. He is a talented guy that recently finished up his first Marmalade created game for tablets. Today I received an informational email from marmalade and I see his app is featured. Here is a copy from the email I got.

As you can see is game is the bottom right one.. WOOHOO! Congratulations mate, it is a fantastic game that hopefully will do well.

Here is a link to the official Marmalade promotional site. Mythic Mahjong iOS.
Here is the facebook page link...  Facebook Mythic Mahjong.

I hope everyone loves this game as much as me and my wife do. Now go get yours!!!!

I am very excited to see what Chris can produce as his next finished game.

Laters
Da Voodoochief