Episode 3 – A new hope way of holding our meetings.
There were going to be a lot of new comers at this months meetup but due to the Corona Pandemic I actually cancelled the meeting… then very quickly wised up and we held episode 3 via Discord as a trial to see how viable it was as an alternate to the physical meets. We are already using discord (join us at DISCORD) for various topics but this is the first time we were going to do a proper meetup.
It was a viable option.
The were five of us there for the first Discord meetup but it worked, and worked well.
So without further ado here’s what we got up to last month…
Finlay's feat...
Finlay kicked things off for us this week telling us about the “Underground” jam he had taken part in. As Moray Game Jam was not happening this year (and just as well really!) Finlay and his team mates from the last Jam, The Openly Game Men*, held their own 48 hour jam, the theme was created by Emma, from emmasomedia.com, and she also did the game testing for the team… and they won! Congrats.
They created a pretty cool game in the 2 days of development, Misinformation.
Misinformation is a single control game, you need only a mouse for desktop or a finger for mobile. You must censor information that appears in the media each day as required. If you fail to do a good enough job, or censoring the wrong information will lead to punishment!
“Welcome to Vargova Information Verifiers.”
As usual with these roundups I haven’t done it justice so head over to ITCH.IO and play the game for yourself.
*I think this was the correct team name but will check with Finlay and correct if needed.
Rich poppings...
Richard from Frozen Well Studios showed off his remastered and refined balloon survival game ‘Up, Up, Up’. The game has evolved in both looks and game play, with a new constant moving screen as the balloon not only moves from left to right to left to right to… you get the gist, the player now also has to contend with the balloon travelling up the screen with spikes and other obstacles out to deflate you. The aim of the game is to last as long, or I guess tall, as you can, racking up the points on your way.
He has also started a new project based on Planet escape called Galactic Pioneer. A 2d pixelart Stardew Valley style RPG built in Unity. So far it’s looking really nice with some smooth movement mechanics including a new wall slide move. Looking forward to seeing more of this next month.
Head over to Frozen Well Studios to have a look at all of his projects.
Arcade cabinets and streams...
I (Stikkz Media) have been working on an arcade cabinet to house my, well… arcade games. It was almost at a usable state for the last meetup, and is now working… although still far from complete. It’s just a proof of concept and a bit of fun but it’s coming together nicely.
I’ve also recently started streaming again on Twitch, mixing it up with some digital art and Nintendo switch games like Brawlhalla, Thief Simulator, Animal Crossing and more. I will also be streaming all the games from the Game Jam 192 once the jam is over, so if you want to watch some game play, maybe even take me on in a match or two and see some art being created head over to twitch.tv/stikkzmedia and give me a follow.
Rounding up the round up...
Jamie provided some much needed questions and feedback on everything being presented which created great discussion and allowed Finlay to dive deeper into the analytics of Misinformation and the thought process that went into its creation, so cheers for keeping things moving Jamie.Looking froward to updates on Unamed Retail sim in the futre.
We discussed the upcoming Game Jam 192, which starts on the 17th of April. I decided that rather than trying to come up with a theme ourselves we would get an external body to create the theme. I dropped writer, developer and designer Phil Harris a message and he has agreed to create the theme for us so we can announce it on the day of the jam so we’re all set (cheers Phil). If you haven’t registered yet, or just want some more information on the jam head over to the Game Jam 192 page.
Until next time...
And that was it for this month (there was a lot more discussed but I forgot to take notes and screenshots!), we had fun and I’m looking forward to the next online meetup, if you are interested in joining in then you can get more details of the next meetup on the Monthly Meetup Episode: 4 page.
Until next time, stay in, stay safe and get ready for the Jam!
Cheers
Andrew
