3D Gamestudio Gamedevelopment 3DGS A6 A7 - free engine tutorials models shaders textures codes

There are a lot of new things at the Conitec 3DGS Homepage. New pictures where added to the Screenshot Gallery such as Stromberg a new techdemo and Kabus 22.

In addition Lite C seems to have reached a final status? This is what you can see at the english site. At the german the link still contains the word beta. For those of you unfamiliar with litec here a short quote:

The purpose of this lightweight language is the quick and easy creation of multimedia or graphics applications, or 2D and 3D computer games. It’s syntax is similar to C. So the source code of a lite-C program can theoretically also be compiled with any other C/C++ compiler. However, due to its native support of multimedia objects like sounds, images, movies, GUI panels, game levels, 2D and 3D models you can achieve results with a few lines in lite-C that would require hundreds of source code lines with other C/C++ compilers.

But lets come back to Kabus22. Today was the very first day, that i heard something from this project. It seems to be some kind of horror game for matures. A Video can be found at the Conitec Downloadsite.
All in all it looks pretty good! The best is that it has athmosphear and the style seems to be perfect for that setting. If i would have seen the shots and video anywhere else i wouldnt have guessed that it has been made with A7. Only few teams have done that bevore… But be warned under the video is stated “Warning: this game is not for the faint at heart!”

Maybe all these new content is a sign that the A7 release is not so far away anymore…? Who knows.

I was already on my way to my warm bed when i discoverd that a brand new episode of Indie Superstar was announced by Ichiro in the Conitec 3DGS Forum namely Season 2 Episode 2. Unfortunately it takes a while to stream the video from YouTube. That means the bed must wait! New is a Text Transcript of the Show wich is especially useful for people who are not so fluent in the english language or want to practice understanding.

This time Ichiro introduces the following titles from other indie developers in the usual funny way:

Frets on Fire
The Shivah
Mr. Robot
The Antique Chronicles
OvO

It is really impressive what other teams can accomplish. These are huge complex projects. That show especially the two adventures with spoken text and lots of story/animation work!
OvO is even some kind of Playstation 2 Eye Toy Clone, where you have to make fun of yourself while you try to pop baloons or make a window clean in front of your webcam. A very funny partygame when not only your webcam is watching you jumping around like a freak. :p I did not even know until now that such programs exist for the PC.
PC GAMER says about Mr. Robot that it is ‘…the most enjoyable independent game I’ve played since Defcon!’ and because i liked the setting of this game i downloaded the demo. But i wont go into much detail here, i only want to say that its worth investing some more time - both for watching this great episode and diving into the demos. Thanks for this worthwhile 8 minutes!

GameProducer.net has posted 4 ways to get your game reviewed. This matches my last blog entry perfectly. I especially like the nice use of google - if you search for other well known casual games such as tribal trouble for example + the word review or even rank, test and so on you find sites reviewing those games.
Chances are if your game is not so bad your game will be rated too if you drop those sites a line. Also search for interview, i for myself are eager to read interviews from game sites talking to other indie developers about success storys. So go ahead and write your own today, but first read this post

As Damocles suggested here i have opend a little Thread in the Game Business Forum that deals with the topic of publishing.

The goal is that the communtiy discusses some points and in the end we can sum this up and transform it into a tutorial for everyone who wants to publish a game or 3dgs project. The following points should be discussed…

#1 how to make advertisements for your project. how much to invest for that. where to put the ads?

#2 payment systems. wich are the best for customers. wich work with 3dgs, wich 3dgs version do you need for that.

#3 where can you upload your demo to. wich casual game portal is best suited.

#4 what legal issues do you have to take care of including licenses, taxes, laws and so on.

Those are the main issues to make clear for all, so that people who never ever jumped into the cold water of publishing a game wont have to make any bad experiences. But for this to work the thread relies on the help of those who already have successfully (more or less) finished and published a game.

Ichiro from Dejobann Games the maker of Galaxy Rage has said for example, that a very, very good “Press Release” is the most important thing. He also supplied a Link to that topic - thanks for that. I really hope that this thread will grow and we end up with a good tutorial. Thanks.

Geppert Software has released a free backup tool wich backups projects with just one click. The description on the homepage reads:

Fast and easy Databackup with help of the XCopy - Command and an easy intuitive Windows Interface; Files can be copied with lots of options.

The tool is still in a development status and freeware - use it at your own risk. If you have suggestions for it, just let the author know in the forum thread.

Download it here: http://www.firma-geppert.de/Download/xCopyDesigner.zip

I recently searched for a software to allow me to make license free music for my games with minimal effort and without big license restrictions. Many of todays programs are either too expensive or you get forced to sign restrictive license agreements where you have to put a logo, or link in the final product. So the easiest solution is to make the music by yourself.

Finally i found Magix Music Maker Professional from the year 1999. It may not be the best in terms of user interface or usability but its more than enough for little music - even without prior in depth knowledge of making music. It also comes with around 15 CD’s packed with samples for almost every musicgenre, there are even some real life samples included. All of them without any license fees and usable for whatever you want.

Unfortunately its no more available in stores here in germany, if you are lucky you can find it still on eBay. Rock and Roll!