Category Archives: Developer

Train2Game News GameLoading Rise of the Indies

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GameLoadingGameLoading: Rise of the Indies is a feature documentary exploring the world of indie game developers – their craft, their games, their dreams, and how they have forever changed the landscape of games culture. The project is currently crowdfunding through Kickstarter to help complete post-production.

Filmmakers Lester Francois and Anna Brady have clocked over 100 hours of interviews with both high-profile and up-and-coming indie developers and industry figures from all over the world. The stories that feature in the documentary are only the tip of the iceberg, with the team currently offering an additional 23 videos on youtube, with more scheduled to be released regularly over the next few months. Popular videos include BitSummit in Kyoto, Dutch Game Garden and Mike Bithell – ‘Story and Gameplay’

The exclusive Member’s Section on their website features longer more in-depth interviews available to Backers. The member’s section is a great resource for indie devs and fans. Those wanting to be a member can do so by backing the kickstarter The Final Push.

GameLoading’s Kickstarter, which launched last week is on track to raise the $50,000 needed to fund post production. Featured on the kickstarter page is the new GameLoading trailer, which has been touching the hearts of audiences across the community. It offers a heartwarming and positive message about developer culture, despite the recent negativity in the industry.

GameLoading features interviews with Davey Wreden (The Stanley Parable), John Romero (Doom), Rami Ismail (Vlambeer), Alexander Bruce (Antichamber), Lucas Pope (Papers, Please), Richard Hofmeier (Cart Life), Phil Tibitoski (Octodad), Zoe Quinn (Depression Quest), Steve Gaynor (Gone Home), Christine Love (Analogue), Mike Bithell (Thomas Was Alone) and dozens more.

The film will demystify what goes into making a game, examine the processes of different studios and individuals, capture the excitement of industry events like PAX and GDC, ponder why we play and what success means, and explore where this art form has come from and where it may be going.

Train2Game News UKIE publish first mapping of the UK’s games industry

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UKIE LogoThe true value of the UK games industry has been unlocked by big data, showing it may be double the size of previous estimates. A map of the UK games industry is published today by Nesta in partnership with Ukie to map the industry’s value, shape and size.

The research shows that there are 1,902 games businesses in the UK and the economic value of these could be as much as £1.72 billion – double the official estimates for 2011 and 2012.

For the first time the games industry has been measured using ‘big data’, not official SIC (Standard Industrial Classification) codes alone. The researchers combed online product directories like MobyGames and review sites like Metacritic and GameSpot to create a new list of games companies not previously measured because the official codes did not capture them.

Key findings in the report include:

· There are more companies making games for iOS platforms than any other – around half specialise in iOS games. A recent example of this is Fireproof Studios, who won the Apple 2012 iPad game of the year award and the BAFTA award for Best British game 2013 with their game ‘The Room’.

· There has been an explosion in the number of new games companies, with a 22 percent annual growth in the number of active companies between 2011 and 2013. This includes some already very successful companies like ‘CSR Racing’ developer Boss Alien and 22 Cans, a Guildford based start-up led by Peter Molyneux.

· There are 18 games industry clusters in the UK with a critical mass of games production activity, supported by more advanced broadband infrastructure and universities supplying games talent. This group is led by 12 games hubs with a particularly strong games presence: Brighton, Cambridge, Cardiff, Dundee, Edinburgh, Guildford and Aldershot, Liverpool, London, Manchester, Oxford, Sheffield and Rotherham, and Warwick and Stratford-upon-Avon.

Jo Twist, Ukie CEO, said: “We know that the UK’s games sector is again becoming a real global success story and seeing Nesta’s estimates of there being over 1,900 games businesses in the UK, potentially generating £1.7bn in GVA, reinforces this more than ever. It’s great to see such a wide geographical reach, with games clusters now existing across Britain. We now need to build on these statistics to help support these clusters and encourage more investment and support for the sector, to make the UK truly the best place in the world to make and sell games. That is what our policy manifesto framework aims to achieve.”

Juan Mateos-Garcia, lead author of the research for Nesta, comments: “The big data approach that we used allowed us to get a real-time snapshot of the UK games sector, based on what companies do instead of what standard industrial classification they select when they get started. As many people – including the government – have suspected there is a big discrepancy between the official statistics and the actual size and shape of the UK games sector. This report should help address this data gap, allowing industry, policymakers, educators and investors to track the geography and evolution of the sector, and put in place smart actions to support it.”

Ukie Vice Chair and BIS Creative Industries Champion Ian Livingstone CBE said “As a sector, the video games industry is hugely diverse and fluid, with specialist talent working in clusters across the UK. This research shows where and why clusters of game development emerge in the UK, and the importance of access to finance, infrastructure and talent. It is important that the superb content developed by UK games studios gets the right backing to help scale to global markets. With this report we have a powerful, real-time tool to help existing and new investors identify potential investment opportunities in the sector.”

Tain2Game News Android Retro Gaming Tablet

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The JXD S7800b has introduced itself as the ultimate Android retro gaming tablet. Capable of playing PS1, Dreamcast, MAME, N64 (and pretty much everything before it) the handheld has quickly become a favourite amongst the retro gaming scene.

Built on the Android operating system, the system is user friendly and intuitive, enabling you to navigate around your favourite retro games with ease using the touch screen or game controllers.

With 8GB internal memory the console is capable of holding thousands of your favourite retro games right out of the box. A Mini-SD slot enables you to expand the memory with up to an additional 64GB.

The HDMI port gives you the option of playing your games on your TV.

    Multiplayer using local Wi-Fi
    Play on your TV using HDMI
    Save and load your progress
    Add your own games via USB or downloading via the web browser
    Assign keys to your favourite touch screen games and use the controller
    Connect a USB controller for even easier use (including Xbox 360 controllers)

The full list of supported consoles/systems currently on the Android platform are: PS1, MAME, Dreamcast, N64, NeoGeo, Atari, NES, SNES, Gameboy, Gameboy Colour, Gameboy Advance, SEGA Master System, SEGA Mega Drive, CPS1, CPS2, Amiga, Commodore 64, ZX Spectrum and many more!

The JXD S7800b is available now at Europe’s Number One Gaming Destination, Funstock.co.uk.

Train2Game News Gauntlet Released

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Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment today released Gauntlet, a fully modernized reboot of the celebrated dungeon crawler, on Steam for PC, offering full support for SteamOS and the upcoming Steam Machines shipping next year. Developed by Arrowhead Game Studios, the game is available for an M.S.R.P. of £14.99.

“This new digital version of Gauntlet innovates on past titles while staying true to the brand’s legendary four-player format,” said David Haddad, Executive Vice President, Publishing Operations, Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment. “Multiplayer gameplay is at the core of Gauntlet’s appeal and now gamers have the option to play with friends and family locally and online.”

Players select from four classic fantasy-based characters: Warrior, Wizard, Valkyrie, or Elf.  Each character has its own distinctive play style and unique strengths and weaknesses.  Upon selecting a playable character, the gameplay is set within dungeons where the object is to fight through the chambers slaying evil creatures and completing challenges.  An assortment of special items can be located in each dungeon that can restore the player’s health, unlock doors, and shift the odds in the player’s favor with magical relics which can aid the player in surviving longer in the Gauntlet. The enemies are a vast assortment of fantasy-based monsters, including ghosts, grunts, demons, spiders, sorcerers and skeleton warriors.

Players can improve their heroes’ abilities and powers by unlocking achievements called “perks.” Multiple difficulty settings add to the game’s replayability.

“The Gauntlet franchise has always been a great source of inspiration to us and we’re extremely proud to work with Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment to bring back this classic,” said Johan Pilestedt, CEO of Arrowhead Game Studios.  “We wanted to create a Gauntlet that was true to the original, with updated visuals and a feature set that resonates with what the original game could have been, had it not been for the technical limitations at the time.”

Gauntlet consists of environments like dusty crypts, dark caves, and fiery dungeons, each with varying styles of gameplay. Some dungeon maps allow players to explore and fight their way through chambers slaying evil creatures, completing challenges and discovering hidden secrets and gold.  In other levels, Death itself chases players through an unpredictable labyrinth. There are also endurance maps where players must defeat waves of monsters to survive.

Gauntlet is rated PEGI 16 for Violence, Blood and Gore, with a setting to disable the game’s gore. You can enjoy the launch trailer below.

Train2Game News Steam Game Discoverability

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Valve logoValve has made some major changes to the way users discover games on its digital distribution platform Steam.

The new Discovery Update revamps the store’s home page and presents recommendations based on past purchases, recent gameplay and friend recommendations.

Also new is the curators list. Users can create their own list of games, based on a sci-fi theme for example, and recommend games based on their tastes for other players to see and subscribe to.

Steam will still retain some of its more traditional elements however, such as displaying popular new releases, recently updated games and top sellers. Users though will now be able to customise their homepage to display which of these categories they want to see.

Game searching has also been updated, and now allows users to discover titles by entering a tag or a basic description of a game they would be interested in playing.

Through a new traffic data analytics system, developers will be able to see where their game is appearing on the store, how many times it has been shown, and if those impressions have resulted in game page views.

The revamp is Valve’s response to the growing number of games being released on Steam. Since January, 1,300 new titles have been added to the marketplace, a significant increase on previous years and more than a third of the store’s total lifetime releases.. In total there are now more than 3,700 games on Steam.

Source: Develop

Train2Game News Unity working closely with Oculus

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unity-logoDuring Oculus Connect, Oculus and Unity Technologies announced that they have expanded their strategic partnership that will strengthen Unity’s engine support for Oculus, providing the 3.3 million strong Unity development community with cutting-edge tools to create incredible virtual reality experiences for the Oculus Rift and Oculus VR Store.

The new partnership will introduce a new dedicated Oculus add-on for both the free and Pro versions of the Unity platform that the Unity community will enjoy at no additional costs. The Oculus add-on will include stereo imaging optimizations, 3D audio support, deeper Unity editor integration, inclusion of the Oculus Rift in the Unity development and debugging workflow, integration of Oculus-specific APIs within Unity, and direct publishing to the Oculus platform.

“There are so many incredible VR projects on Unity, and this partnership will make it even easier to build more great experiences for the Oculus platform,” said Brendan Iribe, Oculus CEO. “We’re thrilled to be working with Unity to put world-class tools in the hands of developers.”

“Oculus and Unity have been working together for a long while now and share a giddy kind of excitement for the future of virtual reality,” said David Helgason, CEO, Unity Technologies.

“Oculus is an innovative technological leader that is ushering in a new era for creating fully immersive interactive experiences, not just of games, but of all kinds. We’re incredibly happy to play a role in this and see that our entire developer community, who are already producing some really incredible stuff, can bring their crazy ideas to life inside the Oculus Rift.”

Oculus and Unity’s work to make Unity a powerful development tool for virtual reality development has resulted in hundreds of Oculus projects created using Unity technology, including Lucky’s Tale, DarkNet, The Gallery: Six Elements, and Titans of Space.

Train2Game News Student offering her artistic skills

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LUC52101Train2Game Student and three time game jam winner, Chloe Martin is offering her artistic skills and knowledge to those in need.

Chloe is on the art and animation course and was previously a member of Digital Mage, along with my self, who were featured at The Gadget Show Live in 2012 as part of the Make Something Unreal Live contest sponsored by Epic Games.

After her continued success through previous game jams Train2Game invited her to be a mentor at the last game jam in April which she did an excellent job as. Using her knowledge and talents to help new students.

She is now looking to update and improve her portfolio by offering to help other Train2Game students with their coursework or any projects they may be working on. Chloe is a highly talented artist and will be a huge asset to your work.

Chloe is primarily a 2D artist but also can do 3D work if need be, dependant on what you are looking for in your project or coursework. This will be something she will be doing in her own spare time as she does have a full time job and is continuing to study on her own course.

You can find samples of her work on the forum by following this link: http://www.forum.train2game.com/album.php?albumid=485

This is just a very small fraction of the work she can do and she will provide more examples on request.

If you are interested and want to contact Chloe you can email her at booya127@live.co.uk

Train2Game News UK Top 20 Games – 22.09.14

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DestinyDestiny has held off the might of Disney and Link and retained the number one spot in the charts. Disney Infinity 2.0 entered at number two with Hyrule Warriors at number three. Lower down the charts Theatrhythm Final Fantasy: Curtain Call has entered at number seventeen.

All formats

Week ending 20 September 2014

POS.  TITLE  PUBLISHER  LAST
WEEK 
1 – DESTINY ACTIVISION 1
2 DISNEY INFINITY 2.0 DISNEY INFINITY –
3 HYRULE WARRIORS NINTENDO –
4 WATCH DOGS UBISOFT 3
5 THE SIMS 4 EA GAMES 2
6 – MINECRAFT: XBOX 360 EDITION MICROSOFT 6
7 CALL OF DUTY: GHOSTS ACTIVISION 4
8 MINECRAFT: PLAYSTATION 3 EDITION SONY COMPUTER ENT. 9
9 THE LAST OF US: REMASTERED SONY COMPUTER ENT. 5
10 PLANTS VS ZOMBIES: GARDEN WARFARE EA GAMES 8
11 THE LEGO MOVIE VIDEOGAME WARNER BROS. INTERACTIVE 12
12 GRAND THEFT AUTO V ROCKSTAR 11
13 TOMODACHI LIFE NINTENDO 16
14 TITANFALL EA GAMES 15
15 DIABLO III REAPER OF SOULS ULTIMATE EVIL BLIZZARD 13
16 SNIPER ELITE 3 505 GAMES 20
17 THEATRHYTHM FINAL FANTASY: CURTAIN CALL SQUARE ENIX –
18 TERRARIA XBOX 360 CLASSICS 19
19 LEGO MARVEL SUPER HEROES WARNER BROS. INTERACTIVE 16
20 METRO REDUX DEEP SILVER 14
< previous week
Leisure software charts compiled by Chart Track, (C)2014 UKIE Ltd

These charts cannot be reproduced either in print or online without obtaining permission from Ukie. If you wish to reproduce the charts in print or online, please contact david.smith@ukie.org.uk for the appropriate license.

Train2Game News EGX 2014 Developer Sessions

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EGX 2014Gamer Network has announced the full developer sessions line-up for this year’s EGX event, taking place next Thursday 25th to Sunday 28th September at Earls Court, London.

This year’s line-up is arguably the strongest in the show’s history, featuring future blockbusters like The Witcher 3, The Division, Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare and Dragon Age: Inquisition alongside fantastic-looking indie titles like Never Alone, Heat Signature, Volume and The Magic Circle.

The developer sessions are often a very popular part of the event giving you a look into the developers mind and thinking between some of the most important decisions behind the years blockbusters.

The four-day schedule runs from noon UK time (BST) each day. If you’re heading to the show, look for signs to the developer sessions – and remember to leave a bit of time for queuing as they often prove very popular.

The full schedule is as follows:

TTHURSDAY

12pm – Dead Island 2 (18+)
Yager’s senior gameplay programmer Isaac Durham Ashdown talks about zombies in the Hollywood Hills with Dead Island 2.

1pm – Dragon Age: Inquisition (18+)
Neil Thompson, director of art and animation at BioWare, invites visitors to discover the vast open world of Dragon Age: Inquisition through a gameplay demo and more.

2pm – Death, Stealth, Money & Power in Elite: Dangerous
Combat, piracy, bounty hunting, trading and exploring – David Braben explains how you can do it all in Elite: Dangerous.

3pm – Roll7 Exclusive Announcement
The team behind OlliOlli and Not a Hero take to the stage to announce something brand new.

4pm – The Next Total War
Creative Assembly reveals the next title in the award-winning Total War strategy series.

5pm – Alien: Isolation (18+)
Al Hope, Alien: Isolation creative lead, introduces a behind-the-scenes look into how the team at Creative Assembly created the incredible new Alien world. UI design lead Jon McKellan and audio designer Byron Bullock reveal how they created the immersive world of Alien: Isolation including bringing back the original Alien cast for the first time.

6pm – Never Alone
Gloria O’Neill of the Cook Inlet Tribal Council and Alan Gershenfeld of E-Line Media share their approach to inclusive development for Never Alone (Kisima Ingitchuna) as a model for sharing, celebrating and extending world cultures through compelling, commercial video games.

FRIDAY

12pm – Eurogamer Let’s Play LIVE
Gamer Network video heroes Gav Murphy and Ian Higton present a live Let’s Play of something incredible!

1pm – The Division
Brand art director Cortes Rodrigo Javier presents the realisation of the world of Tom Clancy’s The Division, and how the team at Massive developed some of the key pillars of the ambitious brand new IP from Ubisoft.

2pm – Heat Signature
Gunpoint developer Tom Francis will be flying through an infinite galaxy and hijacking randomly generated spaceships in a live, unscripted playthrough of his new game Heat Signature, explaining things as he goes.

3pm – Until Dawn
Supermassive Games presents a live playthrough, with commentary, of Until Dawn. The session will be followed by an audience Q&A.

4pm – Company of Heroes 2: Ardennes Assault
Company of Heroes 2 director Quinn Duffy will be joined by producer Greg Wilson to give COH2 fans an in-depth look at the all-new standalone content, Company of Heroes 2: Ardennes Assault.

5pm – Nuclear Throne
Nuclear Throne is a game about action and randomness. Vlambeer’s Rami Ismail talks about randomness in games, how Nuclear Throne handles its level generation and how all of that leads to the challenging game that so many people have been playing over the past few months.

6pm – Battlefield Hardline
Steve Papoutsis, general manager of Visceral Games, details the inspiration behind Battlefield Hardline and how his team at Visceral are putting their own, new stamp on the Battlefield franchise.

SATURDAY

12pm – Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare – The Art of Inspiration
Glen Schofield of Sledgehammer Games talks Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare’s creative development.

1pm – McNeil & Pamphilon Go 8-Bit with The Comedian’s Comedian Podcast
A very special edition of The Comedian’s Comedian Podcast with Stuart Goldsmith, interviewing McNeil and Pamphilon about their career, with a focus on their live videogaming/comedy show “Go 8-Bit!”

2pm – Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor (18+)
Bob Roberts, lead designer at Monolith Productions, brings the latest news on this open-world RPG.

3pm – The Magic Circle
Jordan Thomas demonstrates the core gameplay and themes of The Magic Circle – a darkly comic story about the hero of a legendarily unfinished game who attempts to complete it from the inside.

4pm – Volume
Mike Bithell will be showing a few unseen mechanics from Volume, his upcoming PS4 and desktop stealth game, and doing a live Q&A.

5pm – Evolve (18+)
The Turtle Rock team presents a unique multiplayer runthrough of Evolve followed by a Q&A session.

6pm – The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt (18+)
Using the latest video and gameplay stills, CD Projekt presents the various mechanics which combine to create the living and breathing world of The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt.

SUNDAY

12pm – Dying Light (18+)
Maciej Binkowski, Dying Light’s lead game designer, unveils some exciting news regarding Techland’s new game.

1pm – Hellblade
Dominic Matthews will discuss Ninja Theory’s new title Hellblade, the studio’s bold independent approach and an update on the game’s development so far.

2pm – LEGO Batman 3: Beyond Gotham
Arthur Parsons, game director at Traveller’s Tales, will present the latest on LEGO Batman 3.

3pm – Lords of the Fallen
CI Games’ executive producer Tomasz Gop presents an exclusive look at the upcoming action-RPG Lords of the Fallen, providing an in-depth discussion of the design process behind the game’s challenging yet rewarding combat. Showcased via all-new gameplay, attendees will also get the opportunity to put their questions to the developer.

4pm – Tearaway Unfolded
Rex Crowle and Michelle Ducker present a playthrough of Tearaway Unfolded for PS4, highlighting the exciting new gameplay mechanics in this expanded retelling of the BAFTA award-winning Tearaway.

5pm – Online Worlds with Dean Hall
DayZ creator Dean Hall argues that multiplayer sandbox gaming is the future.

Train2Game News Havok plans for the future

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Havok PhysicsThe middleware physics specialist, Havok, plots the future development of its newest physics platform.

Back in 2003, when Havok released its first physics technology to games developers, the impact was considerable.

Crates and barrels in virtual environments the world over enjoyed a new status as strategic playthings of gamers spoilt by a new way to interact. Half-Life 2 set a new standard, and in the following years physics-powered ragdolls and gravity guns became staples of contemporary game design. As the years went on, Havok and the in-game physics it championed never went away. Instead, they became standard.

Then, in 2013, Havok’s reinvented physics tech found its way to studios and now, in the second half of 2014, Havok is building a new template for what physics should offer. Already it is able to have thousands of objects interacting in a realtime, interactive scene.

Havok is pushing further still, ever set on bettering the impact on games. It’s what Havok’s head of product management Andrew Bowell describes as a renaissance not just for physics, but the ideas and potential to impact gameplay, parallel game systems and the creative method of environment artists.

“Describing what we’re doing now as a ‘renaissance of physics’ is not to say physics in games ever went away,” he says. “It’s been our bread and butter for years. But our latest release of Havok Physics isn’t only faster, using less memory and giving higher quality results; we’re also returning to a point where it is pushing gameplay in ways not seen before.

“I mean real cinematic gameplay at a new scale. Instead of 100 objects, we are now pushing it to a thousand, or ten thousand, or one hundred thousand objects in game. When they see that, game designers’ eyes light up.”

As Bowell reminisces about times when stacking ten physically controlled crates used to draw a crowd to a monitor, he and Havok field application engineer Steve Ewart show live, realtime, interactive demos of thousands of boulders tumbling down cliff sides, clattering together and gathering around the structure of a bridge, or soldiers influencing pillars of smoke with a fully automatic gun that unleashes a plume of tinned beans.

The demos may at times be aesthetically absurd, but they prove a point. As Havok continues to push physics, vast interactive game worlds unlike anything seen in consumer products before are increasingly possible. And as Ewart guides a sports car through a demo environment, using its wake to gather a sea of autumn leaves into neat piles, he makes an important point.

“A few crates or ragdolls was one thing, and there were great examples, but if a developer could build dynamic systems through their entire environment that work as a complete, grounded system, there is so much to be done with with gameplay,” he says. “Imagine a world with smoke effects, intricately destructible buildings, swarms of insects and such, that the player can influence directly, all interacting and controlled physically as a single dynamic system, providing information coming out of the physics that informs AI control and various other systems.”

It’s immediately obvious on seeing the demos, that a huge leap forward in the number and complexity of physics controlled objects offers devs a rich toybox of ideas to plunder.

“What we do must give the developer something they can use; something that informs other systems in powerful new ways,” says Bowell.

Source: Develop