Games festival 2012

We now have Jake Woodruff, a computer games modelling student from Derby, doing some graphics for us. He usually works in 3D, but he's designing our robots as 2D sprites in Photoshop. I handed him a whole bunch of photos — things like tin cans, car parts, robot pieces — and he's putting them all together to create our handicraft droids. Theo is now adding a particle system to the game so that our robots explode into flaming chunks when they hit the back wall.

Once again, Unity has come up trumps. Parameters include the speed, colour, size and number of particles as well as how they behave — so they can physically interact with planes and cascade, creating sparks, or you can create an explosion that's followed by the elements seemingly floating away in the breeze.

It's all achieved through a series of slider bars — even an idiot could do it. I couldn't do it. Right now, Theo is putting the sound effects into the game as well as setting the environment up so we can add background textures. He's just spawned a plane, using the pre-fab meshes already in Unity. Then he made it so it faces the camera, and is now planning to spawn some of our texture tiles onto that plane so we have a background.

As for the textures — I made those! I went out onto the streets of Soho this morning and took photos of metal grills, brick walls, manhole covers, entry code pads in doorways I've then tweaked the shots in a free online photo editor Pixlr which is amazing, by the way and handed them over to Theo as lossless PNG files. We might not use them in the final game but it's something to fiddle with for now, while we're waiting for help from one of the two floating artists. Jim Griffiths, a creative producer at Mediatonic , has written a preview of our game!

It's pretty complimentary:. But the important thing is that everyone comes back for a second and third try, eager to get to grips and survive beyond the first few bars. And how is Jim finding life as a journalist? I've done game jams before as a coder and it's a really useful thing - I feel like I want to get more involved, but I have to hold those opinions back; instead, I'm releasing them through the writing! Also, knowing the team has read what I've written is It comes with a range of traditional game sound types like 'jump', 'explosion' and 'power-up' and you can just tweak all the parameters and then save out as a wav.

It's fun. I think we've decided to go with a sort of Oliver Postgate handicraft look for the game. I'm searching the web for photographic images like tin foil and crumpled paper that we can use for textures. Looks like it's all going swimmingly - in line for that Develop award eh?

Theo didn't sleep. He's been up all night, coding. In the time I was away, he has put in a menu system including a rudimentary front-end and a 'game over' screen. He's also snuck in a power-up that moves the character forward, so players get to slowly recover their position during the action.

I think he's earned the right to mess around. I'm going to the kitchen to make a bucket of coffee. Okay, I admit it, I've had a little rest. I rolled out my sleeping bag in the office adjacent to the room that we're all working in and kind of slept for four hours. Most of the journalists and some of the students did too — getting to the toilets last night meant tip-toeing through a maze of prostrate men. This is a glamorous assignment. It's in the morning and we have a working game!

It looks very basic, but the gameplay is there. There are two characters both of whom travel along an upper and lower plane. You have two buttons, one for each character, and hitting the button causes the relevant avatar to switch between his planes. The idea is to avoid the obstacles, guiding both characters simultaneously as they move along. If a character hits an object they're dragged to the end of the screen — if you reach the edge, it's game over.

We're going for a tense, Super Hexagon feel — just escalating toughness. This is cool! In case you're still not sure what we're doing here and I don't blame you, because it's here and I really don't understand it myself , let veteran developer and game jam organiser Will Luton talk you through it. This is the crew at journodevswap twitter. Turns out making games in a very short space of time is all about compromise and bargaining.

It's a tightrope between pushing yourself and accepting you can't do everything. So we've changed things. Getting the jump move to work in Unity was a nightmare — there were weird irregularities in the physics engine — we don't have time to figure out what's going on. So now we're having two characters, each running along split screen worlds.

The player controls both simultaneously, but neither has to jump: when they reach an obstacle, they 'swap' to the plane below. That doesn't sound easier does it? It is, though. Apparently it is. Updated at 2. This is what our game looks like at the moment. You're viewing it in the Unity editor. This is where you build each level and tweak values. It's also got all the project files, allowing you to manage assets — that's any graphical object that appears in the game.

Unity treats everything as an asset: code, models, text — all of this stuff is managed in the editor. You can also debug the code here, too. While the games writers have been struggling with development, the professional developers at the London Games Festival job swap game jam have been having their first taste of journalism. The four developers had to hand in their first articles about the four game hack projects at 10pm. Here's the one about me!

Check the photo link out in that tweet. That's me trying to download Photoshop CS6. I'm scanning in textures that I've crayoned on to post-it notes. Totally high end stuff here. Developer Spotlight: Backbone. Developer Spotlight: Bot Gaiden. Developer Spotlight: Duster. Developer Spotlight: Going Under. Developer Spotlight: Hundred Days. Developer Spotlight: Papetura. Developer Spotlight: Pillowheads.

Developer Spotlight: Unto The End. A unique art style combining hyper abstract visuals, with careful and creative sound design to create a one of a kind experience in squirrel surveillance. Part 3 of the long awaited final chapter of this terrifying and dread filled experience. Everspace 2 is a space based fast paced shooter, deep exploration experience with classic RPG elements. Fights in Tight Spaces. Our interview with James Parker, Director.

Inspired by action films, Fights in Tight Spaces is a deck builder mixed with turn based tactics. What happens when a spider enthusiast and game fanatic get together? An adorable platformer about a spider on a journey and all the friends she makes along the way. The SGF crew blends-in or at least tries too with a pack of robots in Unspottable! Walk like robot but punch like a human in this 4 player party game where deception and timing is key. Keep your eyes peeled and your fists ready!

The speedrun pros fawn over the fast paced and intense acrobatics in this playthrough of Super Mombo Quest! Check out this wild and wet tongue world! Oats and Spike unsheathe their sabers in a duel to the death! Hellish Quart is a physics based realistic 3D sword dueling game that brings the tactical feel of 17th century fencing to the modern day.

Who will escape and who will decapitate? Watch to find out! How do you make a cute puppy dog even better? Keep the best half of its body, and combine it with another to make a PHOG! Sumichu and Andy work their way through this incredibly cute co-op puzzle game where the rewards are some belly-rubs and the world is your dog-park!

In the sugar-stuffed world of Cake Bash, only one sweet treat can be the tastiest. The only way to decide the best delicacy? By beating the others into submission! Join the Steams Games Fest crew as they battle pigeons, flying cutlery, and most importantly each other in this sickeningly sweet game. Assembly Lines are meant to be efficient, right? Well, maybe not! Supermarket Shriek. A man, a goat, and a shopping cart. Traditional food and drink will be available for attendees, and vendors will sell a range of souvenirs to commemorate the occasion.

This affordable event is meant for the whole family. We are from the York area and we were wondering if you have any need for more bands to play your event?

We are an Irish Rock Band and we would be honored to play at your event. Thank you and I hope to hear from you soon.