A proper week, this week. Waiting for a 6 hour render gave me plenty of time to play about, and I think I came up with some niceties, this week.
Game : Waiting : COME ON, ALREADY!
Amiga themed, like Boing!
Game : Lemmings : Just Dig

Blimey, that didn't take too long.
<a href="https://socoder.net/uploads/1/iphoneshot2.png"><img style="float:right;" src="https://socoder.net/uploads/1/iphoneshot2_thumb.png"></a>
Well, it DID, but it took significantly less time than I thought it would.

iPhing "View Based" Jumpstart

A series of tutorials that will allow old-style coders to quickly grasp the bits and pieces they need, to develop games for iPod/iPhone/iPad (iPhings)
<a href="https://A...

Uhoh, the ratio's dropping!
No matter, this week's been SUPER busy, what with it being the week I finally got a Mac.
As seen the other day, I re-released <a href="https://AGameAWeek.com/2010/05/8-brand-new-freeware-mac-games/">8 of my games for Mac</a>. It's not just Steam on Mac!!! You can play UFO246, too!
Today sees a couple of extra bonuses.
<a href="https://socoder.net/uploads/1/JNKPlat_2010_edition_(Screenshot_18_May_2010_094853).png"><img src...

With all the Mac stuff, I've not had a chance to do a new game.
NOOoooooo!!!!!!
I suppose I could rush something in the next 24 hours, but I'm much rather be playing with those extra trimming, and getting things a little nicer.

First off, Gravity Bombs. Not touched it yet, but it definitely needs at least one tweak. .. the Mac's "Superior" (bah) Magic Mouse has a lot going for it, but it also has an inability to right click whilst holding down the left mouse button. Which is prett...

Cracking game, this week!
What started out as an unknown game, quickly became fantastically playable. A remake of the little WarioWare UFO Spike thing that I made last week, only with more spike things than is probably sane!
In the end, the game's turned out quite a lot like a Geometry Wars clone. I wasn't expecting that, but there it is!

Two fire buttons, Z for left fire, X for right fire. I wonder how long it'll take for people to realise that, without me having writ...

<a href="https://socoder.net/uploads/1/DSConverts.zip">DS Converts : Part One</a>
As much as I tried to make the 2 versions compatible, I did mess a few things up along the way.
Plungers and Darts move at a slightly different speed, and even Platdude runs at a different "steps-per-block" speed, too.
It's not a whole lot of a difference, but there's enough changes to have broken some of the levels.
So, rather than having a "Load my Levels" option, I'm doing thi...

It's Platdude Time!
<a href="https://AGameAWeek.com/complete/JNKPlat_2010_20100420A.png"><img src="https://AGameAWeek.com/complete/JNKPlat_2010_20100420A_thumb.png"></a>
Guide Platdude through 45 puzzling platform levels, dodging darts, fleeing flames and always being mindful of mines!

Yeay! Platdude's on his way!
Here's the first teaser..

Odd things to spot.

No release yet, it's nearly ready, but still so far away!
Not to worry, it's Platdude's month, so let's carry on.
By the end of this month there'll be a PC version, and a Linux version, too.
That's hopefully apparent by now.

I've spent ages working on the whole Music Engine thing, and so far it's not sounded 100% great.
Today's work got it up to about 75%, or thereabouts.
As Background music, it does it's job. As anything more, it's a little lacking. So I think I'll just say "That'll do!" and carry on.
JNKPlat 2010 + random'ish music, coming soon!
I'd post a new High-Def screenshot, but you can't really screenshot music, and I've not really done any new graph...

As most of you know, I'm a bit crap at designing levels. I tend to leave that kind of thing to random generators, or other people!
Today I'm designing a level, and it's taking AGES!
It's already 10 o'clock, I've been at it for about 2 hours, and I've managed to make about 1/8th of a level.
That's 1/4 of it done, for those counting!

I don't usually repost this here, but. What the hey!<br>
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(URL "https://groups.google.com/group/socoder-newsletter">Sign up, it's fun, and weekly, and written!!)<br>
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1. The AngryBirds thing. I'm not about 80% convinced that all was just a co-incidence.
My iPod played up whilst Angry Birds was on, the game went away, the problem went away, the game came back, a different issue occurred.
So, perhaps it was just some odd occurrence.
Who knows.

When I first started to think of "A game that uses Badges" the name "Dungeon Badges" stuck in my head, and slowly but surely evolved into Dungeon Badgers.
Over the course of the week (during which I was finishing off Centipong 2) the idea had evolved to include a garden, a house, a cat, and of course.. mushrooms and... arrghh! A snake!
Today's post is a brief description of the game that was in my head, before it got thrown out and replaced with an idea that could be drawn a wee bit quicker!

Eeek..
It's scary to even consider this, but there's no free-forming games for a while.
We're in a zone now, and I can't stop it even if I tried!
Tomorrow's game is about ready, although I'm still missing 4 little parts that I might wimp out on!

<a href="https://socoder.net/uploads/1/argh.png"><img src="https://socoder.net/uploads/1/argh_thumb.png" style="float:right"></a>
Because there may or may not have been resulting copyright issues, I've left this post on the backburner until the magazine went off the shop shelves. Usually I'd happily scan in a bit of a page if my games are mentioned, but this time it's a whole entire page, and that's a completely different kettle of fish. (Although, to be fair, I'...

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Socoder Newsletter
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This week, I've decided to try something a wee bit different.
If you're a fan of previous AGameAWeek games, you'll notice that I'm more than a little crap at designing levels.
It's a slight issue, but one that I've never bothered to care about.
Usually, any games that NEED levels will include a built in level editor. And folk who like the games will spend minutes trying to make one, and that'll be half the fun.
The trouble with this theory, of course, is ...

Sometimes you can start a game and it grows and grows and is wonderful.
Other times, you get about 10% through, and realise it's just not working out.
Game Idea 1
This week started with a word game. A decent enough idea, place the tiles in a scrabble-esque crossword style, and make words.

Blimey, that got complex!
<a href="https://socoder.net/uploads/1/blockmansGreatBigMenu.png"><img src="https://socoder.net/uploads/1/blockmansGreatBigMenu_thumb.png"></a>
Starting with "World 1-1, 2-1, 3-1, 4-1, 5-1" I built a set of sideways Arcade menu start points.
Then I added the old "J/K" gameplay options in the style of World 10-1 and World 25-1.. Although from 6-1 and after, the theme isn't predetermined, and it's just picking random themes each time!

If you're currently coping with a bad bout of depression, it's probably not a great idea to download this week's AGameAWeek game, because.. quite frankly.. it sucks!
As I type this, the game currently consists of a badly drawn dog, a badly drawn bit of grass, and a few badly drawn birds.
I've hit a dead end as far as this game goes.
I also hit a dead end with Arcade Slots, and I even hit a major blockage with Blockman Gets More.

I think that's everything!!
hmmm..
I added the last (earliest!) stuff into the archive today, and I think I've pretty much done all the PC stuff, now.
(URL "https://AGameAWeek.com/GameList.php?ShowJust=159"><img src="https://AGameAWeek.com/complete/JNKFruit2K3_20030818B_thumb.png">

And so another week trundles by.
I had hoped to finish off the ever elusive games, this week, (the RPG and the Patent Wars), but that doesn't appear to be happening at all.
Oh well.
If they happen, they happen. If not, carry on.

I'm sat here at 11pm on Sunday night, trying to think of a game for Tuesday.
It's not happening..
I've spent all week long adding games to the archive. That's to say, I've spent all week playing all my old games, and having a whale of a time..
I guess that has a disadvantage, being that I haven't coded jack all, all week.

The big-ass catalogue is now up to 68 games, and I've reached a bit of a stumbling block.
If you search for (URL "https://AGameAWeek.com/GameList.php?Find=multiple+games">"multiple games"), you'll find a few games that have more than one internal game.
Today I'm tweaking the engine so that it counts each of those seperately inside the nice ever growing total.
I wasn't going to do that, at first, but then I came across Platdude's Retro Collection, and decided to do it.
It'd be a sh...

I was struggling to come up with an interesting game, this week, when my Mum decided to show me her latest highscore on Yahtzee.
..
Pling!
New idea!