Veck: Special Edition

Date of Release: Developer: Genre: Platforms: Mode: Engine: Languages: Price:

April 2007 Smayds Shoot 'Em Up Windows Singleplayer Custom English Freeware

Veck SE is an immensely fast-paced romp through fifteen one-minute-long levels, with massive firepower upgrades every minute...(it) draws on many classic arcade titles...though everybody assumes it’s Geometry Wars clone, this isn’t strictly correct.

 Thats what the developer of Veck SE says and I guess there is no need to say anything else.

Making pong

Pong is a very old game, a very popular too. There are many versions of it, some of the interesting ones might get listed here.
But what I want to write now is that I am making a version of Pong!
It will be out soon, by tomorrow, maybe. Maybe not. :P

Warning Forever

Date of Release: Developer: Genre: Platforms: Mode: Engine: Languages: Price:

July 2003 Hikware Shoot 'Em Up Windows Singleplayer Custom Japanese, English Freeware

Warning Forever is a 2D vertical scroll shooting game in which the player keeps on shooting down enemy crafts which increase in size and firepower with each craft being shot down. Since, each craft is made with a procedure, there is no end to the game: you can play until the time ends (which increases when an enemy is killed and decreases faster when the player is killed).
 

Components of a game

Since the game is to be played by a person other than the developer, we must make sure that what the player gets is good - no matter how we made it. Henceforth, I found these to be the main things a person looks for in a game to rate it:

• Graphics: of course, the first thing one notices is the objects, environment, etc. of a game
  
• Sounds: a silent game may not be the best one
  
• Control: if the character, vehicle, etc. doesn't go where you want it to or do what you want it to, thats bad
  
• Idea / Objective: this tells what the player has to do, must be something interesting
  
• Gameplay: this decides whether the player will continue playing the game after seeing all the points above or not
  

What is an Indie game?

In all the excitement of making a blog about my Indie game endeavours, I forgot that some of the readers may be unaware as to the meaning of an indie game. So, I thought lets define it for them using Wikipedia:

Independent video game development is the process of creating video games without the financial support of a video game publisher. While large companies can create independent games, they are typically designed by an individual or a small team of as many as ten people, depending on the complexity of the project. These games may take years to be constructed from the ground up or can be completed in a matter of days or even hours depending on complexity, participants, and design goal.

Indie video games are often grouped together with shareware, freeware and open source software. Indie developers are generally motivated by strong personal interest in the title they are working on, often a niche game that would not be produced by the mainstream. They tend to belong to some sort of community (usually Internet-based) which recognizes developers.

Driven by digital distribution, the concept of independent video game development has spawned an "indie" movement. These games often focus on innovation, and have occasionally become extremely successful.

Kyntt Stories

Date of Release: Developer: Genre: Platforms: Mode: Engine: Languages: Price:

August 2007 Nifflas Platformer Windows Singleplayer Multimedia Fusion 2 English Freeware

Kyntt Stories is a 2D platform game in which each level is its own little adventure.

Kyntt Stories is the sequel of Knytt. It has great environments and puzzle elements. Its made so that anyone can easily make levels, each level supposedly telling a different story (hence the name). Every level is divided into screens which appear when you go at the edge of the map as opposed to the more common scrolling action (the developer said it looks better the way it is and I couldn't agree more).

The playable character is named Juni, who can be anyone depending on the story of the level, as explained in the cutscenes and in-game objects. During the game (or right from the start), she may have powers ranging from simple ones like run and jump to special objects like umbrella for gliding.

Play before you make

Before making a game, one has to play many, to get the general idea of what's possible and what's popular.
So, I went by to look up many games which I'll discuss next.

Hello world!

And so start yet another blog. This time about my path of learning the indie game development.
Should more people be interested, they are welcome to team up, in either the learning or the blogging or both.