Hello Kitty meets Pingu !?

Had a great idea today for a girl penguin to appear in the game.

Think of Hello Kitty meets Pingu complete with hair bow and an explosive set of flowers - cool!?

Turn Based Penguins!

One thing that hasn't been mentioned is that the "Penguin Game" is kind of turn-based. In each level you have a limited amount of turns that you can use and the different penguin types use a different amount of turns.

For example, in the screenie there is a number in brackets next to each penguin type. That isn't the amount of penguins you have but the amount of turns needed to "play" that penguin.

So for example the Parachutist uses only 1 turn and the Suicide and Diver penguins both take up 2 turns each.

This means that the player has to sometimes use a bit of strategy to get the most out of their turns. Run out of turns and the level is over :(

Penguin Screenie

Well here's a screenshot to show you the progress so far on "The Penguin Game" (hate that name!!). Click to enlarge it.

You can see the Suicide Penguin stood at the bottom of the screen near some crates. He's only got 1 second left before he goes pop - awww!

I've been playing around with the display for quite a few days now. I hate doing interface stuff for the score etc. Anyway, you can see that everything sits on the right of the screen. This is where you can select which penguin you want to use etc, etc.

Still not 100% happy with it, but for now it's staying as it is so I can get on with other useful stuff. A lot of the graphics are still programmer art or just temporary so I expect the game to look a lot different eventually :)

Dive, dive, dive!

Adam just sent me through the latest penguin graphics - "Diver Penguin" . . . and they look great.

He wears a diving mask and snorkel and shakes his head at you if you fail to get him in water. If he does land in water then he flips upside down and dives down to the bottom, collecting fish as he goes - lovely!

What's in a name?

I've never had a problem with naming any of my games. The name is usually the easiest part (or one of them anyway).

Skin & Bones, Ten Ton Ninja and Addictive Football all came to me pretty much straight away and I think really fit the games that they became.

However, I'm having problems coming up with a suitable name for my Penguin game. At the moment it sits on my hard drive as "penguin". The obvious choice would maybe be "Penguins"; but that's rubbish!

I've looked all over the net for info on penguins hoping something would jump out at me; but it hasn't. How hard can it be to name a game with penguins in?

All ideas welcome! Please feel free to post them in the comments section of this post or email me at mail[AT]addictive247.co.uk

Best idea wins a penguin (no it doesn't!)

Penguin Fun!

The small screenie shows two of the penguins in the game.
One is the parachutist. He floats down gently to the ground collecting fish on the way. He's probably the least exciting of all the penguins but he does have his uses.

The other one is the Suicide Penguin!
With rockets and dynamites attached, when he lands he does a 3-2-1 countdown (like in Lemmings) before blowing to pieces. Now that might not sound very useful, but he is.

The explosions he creates can break up ice blocks and destroy other objects that are in the way. If the other objects also blow up then you get a nice chain reaction effect.

The Suicide Penguin is my favourite so far. He has some nice little touches like closing his eyes just before detonation. How sweet!

Enjoying Penguins!

No, not the chocolate biscuit kind, although I do love em!

I'm still having great fun playing around with my game engine which involves penguins. I've just added a Diver Penguin who dives down through water collecting fish and a Gunner Penguin who er . . . likes shooting stuff!

The graphics are so far all "programmer art" (or shit as I like to call them) but Adam is now on the case designing the first Parachutist Penguin. I'll post pics soon-ish.

Back!

Although I never really went away!

OK, so the Wizard game (Colmar) has been put on hold for now. This just seems to keep happening to me lately. Up until recently every project that I started was always completed no matter what. Now I've got more projects on-hold than I know what to do with.

I also think it's down to an "enjoyment" factor too. Colmar got me excited to start with but then it tailed off rather dramatically. That makes the coding side of things really difficult for me. I have to enjoy every game that I work on right through to the end, which I have done on all my completed games so far.

So I've put things that don't excite me on hold and have been playing around with a little engine which may become a game. It involves suicide penguins, parachuting penguins, sky-diving penguins, diving penguins etc etc.
So far it's going well and I'm having a lot of fun playing with the different penguin types.

Is this the next game?? . . . "I don't know", would be the honest answer. Only time will tell.

One things for sure though. If it doesn't excite me still, then it's getting binned :)

Still Alive!!

Haven't been posting lately, so for that I apologize.

Had a bit of a break from the computer for the last week or so. Motivation seems to be my biggest problem. I'm sure I'll "get over it" but for now not much work is being done on anything. The most I do is check my emails and trawl the web.

I hate not being productive but my heart just isn't in it at the moment :(

Screen Res . .

. . will be 1024x768 - that is all :)

First Level Graphics

Above is a screenshot of the graphic tiles so far for what will be the first area of the game. It isn't the actual level design but is just how my graphics artist Adam put together the tiles to show how they could be used.

I'm really pleased with how they turned out. The next thing to ponder over is the screen res though. The graphics look great at 1024x768 but they look even better at 640x480 - proper old school! I need to look into the best way to do it though.

Size is everything!

Work is continuing on the first area graphics and they're looking really nice so far.

However, our main character may be a bit big for the environment! Now that might sound silly but the tiles look so good at their current size it wouldn't work if we increased them. So, do we reduce the size of the main wizard character??

Not sure yet. All the graphics aren't done yet so once they're all in I'll be able to make a decision.

Addictive 247 Summer Sale

It's that time of year again!

We're having a Summer Sale where all our games are now at the extremely low price of only $4.95! This offer is only vaild until 30th August 2009.

Be quick and get yourself a bargain :)

Super Laser Racer

Found this over at New Star Games and have to admit that I love it! It's fast, fun and frantic!

A nice touch is that it's really easy to get into.
By that I mean no stupidly long menus that take ages to get you to the game and no bloody ship configuration allowing me to change the paint job on my ship or any of that bollocks! Click, Click and you're in.

Go Play

Bugger!

Adam's on holiday at the moment and I'm really struggling with the style I want for the first area of the game.

Just when I decide on one thing, I change my mind and go in a completely different direction. The funny thing is that I know (in my head) what the other areas will look like.

Bugger!!