Tag Archives: indie games

Mojang’s Scrolls to follow same release strategy as Minecraft

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Regular Train2Game blog readers will be highly aware of the success of indie game Minecraft, as well as its huge following among Train2Game forum users.

Some of them have been there since they purchased Minecraft when it was in Alpha, or in its current Beta form, and Mojang have revealed that their next game, Scrolls, will follow the same pattern.

“With our new game, Scrolls, we’ll follow the same formula as Minecraft,” said Mojang’s Daniel Kaplan while speaking at GameLab in Barcelona.  “That means we’ll release the game very early, at the minimal playable state.”

That means people will pay for it, play it, and give feedback from a very early stage, in essence, almost asking like a QA Tester. Kaplan also revealed that Scrolls has a five person development team.

“That sounds like a small team, but it’s very big for us. One thing that means is we’re going to have to outsource art,” he added.

As reported by the Train2Game blog earlier this month, Minecraft for the Xbox 360 IS being developed by Dundee based 4J Studios, and Kaplan says it’ll be quite different to the PC version.

“I don’t think we can have the exact same experience because of the lack of a keyboard, so we’re going to do a complete overhaul of the user interface, and make sure it works on a 360 controller.”

Kaplan also commented on the prospect of Mojang publishing games by other indie studios, something the Train2Game blog revealed the developer was thinking of last month.

“We’re looking for people with a similar structure [to Mojang],” he said. “People who are very passionate about what they’re doing. We’re also looking for games that last longer, and treat games as a service, like Minecraft does.”

“And of course, [they need to have] passion,” he added. “A lot of people join the game industry because of passion, but you should also learn that that’s what it takes to stay there.”

That last statement could describe many Train2Game students who are very passionate about finding work in the games industry.

So Train2Game, what do you think of Scrolls release structure? Will it mirror the success of Minecraft? And will you be jumping in straight away?

Leave your comments here on the Train2Game blog, or on the Train2Game forum.

[Source: Gamasutra]

Train2Game forum user favourite Minecraft passes 2.5 million sales

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Train2Game forum user favourite Minecraft has now passed over 2.5 million sales. The news was confirmed by Minecraft creator Markus “Notch” Persson via Twitter.

“2.5 million sales! That’s as much as Diablo 1 and FarCry, according to Wikipedia.” he said.

The numbers aren’t bad at all for a game that’s still in it’s BETA testing period and, as reported by the Train2Game blog, Minecraft will be getting a full release later this year.

The game will also be appearing on a variety of systems, with the Train2Game blog previously mentioning that Minecraft will be appearing on the Xbox 360 with full Kinect support. The indie smash hit is also heading to smartphones, as reported by the Train2Game blog.

Minecraft is a testament to Train2Game students that you don’t need to be working for a huge studio to be successful in the industry, and that producing indie games could be the way forward.

Yesterday, the Train2Game blog revealed that the 1.7 patch will add Game Design and modding elements to Minecraft.

So Train2Game, why do you think Minecraft has been so successful? Does it inspire you? Are you still playing?

Leave your comments here on the Train2Game blog, or on the Train2Game forum.

Train2Game forum user favourite Minecraft coming to Xbox 360, Kinect compatible

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Train2Game forum user favourite, and testament to how successful indie games can now be, Minecraft is coming to the Xbox 360.

The news was confirmed at Microsoft’s E3 presentation, and you can read more about what else is coming for the Xbox 360 here on the Train2Game blog.

Meanwhile, Notch himself as confirmed some information about Minecraft on the Xbox 360. The title itself will be Kinect compatible, but as of yet there’s no specific information about how motion control will be implemented into one of Train2Game forum users favourite games. All that Notch says on the matter is:

“You will be able to play it without Kinect BUT WITH THE POWER OF KINECT YOU WILL FEEL CLOSER TO YOUR GAME THAN EVAR BEFORE AND ALSO IT SAVES KITTENS”

The Xbox 360 version of Minecraft is a separate project to the original, which Notch writes won’t be a straight port. A team of progammers from a studio separate to Mojang will be taking care of the Game Developer side of things, while Notch will be the Minecraft Xbox 360 Game Designer.

He also reaffirms his commitment to the PC, something many Train2Game students will be happy about.

Originally a PC title, as reported by the Train2Game blog Minecraft will also be heading to smartphones in future. The game – still officially in BETA testing – has been downloaded over 2 million times making developer Notch a multimillionaire.

For more information about Minecraft – as of Train2Game students need it! – see the Train2Game blog.

So Train2Game, what are your thoughts on Minecraft for the Xbox 360? How do you think Kinect will be implemented? Does it interest you?

Leave your comments here on the Train2Game blog, or on the Train2Game forum.

[Source: Reddit]

How Train2Game students can help development of Ms. Splosion Man

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Ms. Splosion Man logoTrain2Game students – especially those on the Games QA Tester course – know that finding and reporting in-game bugs is a hugely important part of the development process.

Indie developer Twisted Pixel have announced they’ll be holding a multiplayer beta for Ms. Splosion Man, the follow up to their 2009 success Splosion Man, and Train2Game students have the opportunity to be involved.

There are 10,000 open beta spots available for Xbox Live users, which any Train2Game student can try and grab between now and 12th June on the Microsoft sign up page.

The Ms. Splosion Man beta will run from 6th June to 24th June, and participants will be expected to provide feedback. It’d make useful practice for anyone on the Train2Game QA Tester course.

“Participants will get two multiplayer levels each week, so play online often and send us your bug reports and comments to beta@twistedpixelgames.com.” says a statement by Twisted Pixel.

“The point of this early access program is to gain your feedback on how we can better your online gaming experience, so speak up.  Your voice will be heard and feedback taken into consideration.”

In order to take part in the Ms. Splosion Man beta, any Train2Game students interested must:

  • Own a retail Xbox 360 console with a hard drive.
  • Have an Xbox LIVE Gold Membership.
  • Have broadband Internet access at home.
  • Be willing to play the early access with others in the program if they know them or not.
  • Have time to play with numerous online gamers, and time to provide copious feedback.

For full details, see the Ms. Splosion Man website. The indie game is released this year for XBLA.

A number of game developers allow players to aid in production of a title, with recent examples reported by the Train2Game blog including Gears of War 3 and Infamous 2.

Train2Game forum user favourite Minecraft is also still in beta – a beta that’s been downloaded over 2 million times – but as reported by the Train2Game blog, gets a full release later this year.

So Train2Game, will you attempt to join the Ms. Splosion Man beta to gain experience beta testing?? Have you done it before? And how important is it to the game development process?

Leave your comments here on the Train2Game blog, or on the Train2Game forum.

[Souce: Ms. Splosion Man dev blog via VG247] 

Minecraft developer Mojang open to publishing games by other indie studios

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Minecraft is hugely popular on the Train2Game forum, with at the time of writing, the dedicated Minecraft thread almost on its 70th page.  The success of the title thrust indie developer Mojang into the limelight to such an extent they had to hire various extra staff.

This includes business development director Daniel Kaplan who recently spoke exclusively to GamesIndustry.biz and revealed a little about what life is like behind the scenes at Mojang.

“We are in a great spot right now, we can basically do whatever we want to. The hardest thing for us right now is to say “no” to all the deals we’re being offered.” Said Kaplan. “There are tonnes of opportunities out there for us right now. But we have to wait it out and figure out what’s the best thing for us to do.

“We get requests every week, it’s quite hard to sort them out, to figure out, okay, this is what we’re going to do. If you take one path then you can’t take the other, you know?”

Kaplan said that Monjang is interested in publishing games by other indie developers – it’s something that many Train2Game students would surely jump at the chance to be a part of if the opportunity ever came up.

“We hope to help people, to keep them involved in the process and create a successful game, to make sure people know about their games so they can create better games later on by themselves. So we’ll see how well we can work that position.”

The idea of helping up and coming games industry talent echoes calls from Peter Molyneux for the industry to offer more support to newcomers, as reported by the Train2Game blog. Molyneux also said that Minecraft is his favourite game of the decade.

Even with the increased in size of Mojang, the developers still feel that working in small teams is the best way to go about creating games. According to Kaplan, just three people are working on new Mojang title Scrolls.

“The biggest team is the Scrolls team, but that’s just three people, it’s still very small. We like to work in small teams, because we believe we can make decisions faster, or have shorter meetings, more creative freedom for the teams. So they’re small but very multitalented.”

And despite finding himself as an icon amongst the gaming community – including with Train2Game students – Minecraft creator Markus ‘Notch’ Persson  – is still involved with programming on a full-time basis.

“He’s working full time, he wants a 100 per cent focus on coding. As far as he’s concerned, he doesn’t want to be going to any meetings at all so he can just sit down and code. He’s working 40 hours a week, just like we do, so he’s very active in the company.”

Kaplan added that Mojang are also open to the idea of producing games for consoles.

“We’re always looking for new platforms, and consoles are very interesting for us, obviously. There are huge possibilities for us there. But I try to believe that Minecraft will be looked at just like Doom was. That created the first FPS game, if Minecraft is the first game to start a genre of voxel engine, sand box games, whatever you want to call them, we’ll be really proud of it.”

Minecraft has been downloaded over two million times, and last month the Train2Game blog reported that the full-game will be released in November.

So Train2Game, what are your thoughts on the possibily of Mojang publishing games by other studios? Do you think it’d provide a massive boost for indie developers? And are you pleased to see that despite his success, Notch is still focused on coding?

Leave your comments here on the Train2Game blog, or on the Train2Game forum.

[Source: GamesIndustry.biz]

Zombie Cow on balancing creativity and commercial viability of indie games

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Time Gentelmen Please Train2Game blog image

Many Train2Game students have pooled their resources and set up their own game development studios. These keen Train2Game students – who are already developing their own games – may find what one UK independent developer has told GamesIndustry.biz very interesting indeed.

Dan Marshall of Zombie Cow spoke about how indie developers need to find a good balance between making a game not only creative, but commercially viable enough for the game developers to make an income from it.

“You’ve got to walk a tightrope between what you want to do and what you have to,” Marshall said in an interview with GamesIndustry.biz . “You’ve got to make stuff that people want, and you’ve got to make stuff that you want to make.”

Speaking about Zombie Cows recently cancelled sequel to indie hit Time Gentlemen, Please! He said

“It’d be lovely to make another adventure game, but that’s probably not going to bring in enough cash to keep me doing what I’m doing.”

“If you look at the big games from the last couple of years or so, it’s been Super Meat Boy and Limbo and Braid and that sort of stuff. Should I be making things along those lines, because there’s obviously a market for those? Then suddenly you start to sound very boring, but it’s the reality of it.”

It sounds like a question many Train2Game student developers may have to ask themselves. There are plenty of great ideas out there, but when it comes down to it an independent game needs to be successful enough to bring the game development team an income.

Marshall also explains how not enjoying producing the game was on of the reasons development on the title was stopped:

“I wasn’t enjoying making Revenge of The Balloon-Headed Mexican and that’s one of the main reasons that it ground to a halt. If I wasn’t inspired by it, how could I expect anyone else to be? It would have been a really good game, I just don’t think it would have as good as Time Gentlemen, Please! and that’s the core of why it was cancelled.

“You’ve got to make stuff that you want to make because you’re the one sitting there typing for 12 hours a day making it, but you’ve got to make something that other people want as well in some capacity.”

That last point is some good advice for Train2Game students. They need to ask themselves if they don’t enjoy their game, is it possible for the consumer to do so?

Of course that isn’t to say a creative and innovative independent game can’t be successful! Just look at Train2Game favourite Minecraft ,which recently passed over 1 million sales. You can read much more about Minecraft and the reasons behind its success on the Thoughts of Train2Game blog.

So Train2Game, what are your thoughts about needing to find a balance between being commericial and being creative? Do you think its something you’ll need to apply to your games? Or in future are you willing to take a risk developing a game that’s very creative, but isn’t guaranteed to sell very well?

As usual you can leave your thoughts here on the Train2Game blog, or on the Train2Game forum.

[Source: GamesIndustry.biz – log in required]

Train2Game student favourite Minecraft passes 1 million sales

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Train2Game blog Minecraft Image

Indie success and Train2Game forum user favourite Minecraft has now passed the one million sales mark.

The creator Marcus ‘Notch’ Perrson announced the news on his blog with a small update that simply read “Minecraft just passed one million sales.” And given that Minecraft costs over $10 to purhcase, Notch is now a very rich man….all thanks to a game that has only recently entered its beta stage!

The success of Minecraft is sure to be something many Train2Game students with aspirations of their own will admire. Especially those involved on the unofficial Train2Game Minecraft server! The Train2Game forum thread about the runaway indie success now stretches to over 16 pages.

It’s not just Train2Game students who are impressed by Minecraft, with many publications including Eurogamer and PC Gamer declaring it one of the games of the year

Notch still has plenty of plans for Minecraft, and recently wrote on his blog that it should get a full release by the end of this year:

“We’ve written down major goals that we want to do for Minecraft release, and it looks like the release will happen sometime late this year. Hopefully we’ll be able to set a date soon.”

He also added that he plans to make Minecraft even more fun:

“Because I want to avoid us just focusing on reaching release, I suggested that we should dedicate 50% of the development time in Minecraft towards adding fun new stuff. Basically, any developer working on the game (two people at the moment) can just come up with something they’d want to add on a day-to-day basis, as long as the rest of the team thinks it’s a decent idea. If it ends up being fun, it gets added.”

It’s amazing to think that such a huge game is being developed by such a small team, but it’s something that Train2Game students will no doubt be encouraged by. You can read a lot more about Minecraft on the Thoughts of Train2Game blog.

So Train2Game, what are your thoughts on the success of Minecraft? Is it worth all the hype? And what do you want to see Notch add to the game?

As usual, you can leave your thoughts here on the Train2Game blog, or on the Train2Game forum.

Get five great indie games and help charity with the Humble Indie Bundle

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Humble Indie Bundle

This may have already been pointed out on the TrainGame forum, but it’s such a good cause we’re putting it here on the Train2Game blog too.

A group of independent developers are not only offering five great indie games that Train2Game students will want to play, but you can pay what you like and the money goes to charity. The original Humble Indie Bundle was a great success which raised a huge amount of donations for charity.

Now there’s a second Humble Indie Bundle which once again not only gives you the opportunity to own five great indie games, but also donate to kids charity Childs Play or the Electronic Frontier Foundation when you buy the pack. You can hand over whatever amount you want for five games that when bought separately would cost $85!

So what games can Train2Game students add to their collection by buying the Humble Indie Bundle? Well you will get Braid, Cortex Command, Machinarium, Osmos, and Revenge of the Titans.  You can find out a little more about each of them by watching the Hundle Indie Bundle #2 trailer below.

Humble Indie Bundle #2 has already been a huge success making over $500,000 in just one day.  At the time of writing, the bundle has brought in a total revenue of over $680,000 with the biggest individual donation coming from Minecraft developer Notch who handed over $2000. (You can read more about Minecraft here on the Thoughts of Train2Game blog) As I write this, the Humble Indie Bundle has been bought almost 93,000 times.

The average price paid for the Humble Indie bundle currently stands at $7.33. The Average donation by Windows users is $6.12, the average donation of a Mac user is $8.27 while Linux users are handing over an average donation of $13.66. It looks like Humble Indie Bundle #2 might raise more than the original!

Once again, Train2Game students can pay what they like for five great indie games. It’s an offer that really should be taken up! You can hand your money over to a good cause here.

As usual, you can leave your thoughts here on the Train2Game blog, or on the Train2Game forum.

Xbox Live & PSN the ‘perfect platform’ for risky games

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The PlayStation Network and Xbox Live are the ideal platforms for publishing creative or risky games, according to Another World creator Eric Chahi.  Speaking  to GamesIndustry.biz about the decision to release upcoming game Project Dust by digital means only, he said:

“There’s no distribution or retail to worry about – no manufacture or production costs, so it’s less risky for a publisher to sign an original game. I think it’s the perfect platform for this kind of game that’s not really mainstream.”

Chaci also added that the lower price of digitally distributed games is also an advantage “At retail games are more expensive, whereas on XBLA and PSN they’re cheaper, so you can reach more people.”

Recent Indie hits such as Joe Danger and Limbo seem to support the theory that the PlayStation Network and Xbox Live are great platforms for smaller developers – like Train2Game students – to publish games. This is even if a recent report suggests that most games are bought on discs.

So Train2Game, do you think it releasing a game on the PlayStation Network or Xbox Live is the way forward? Or are you looking at other ways to publish games? Also, what do you think of Project Dust? The trailer is below.

As usual, leave your thoughts here or on the Train2Game forums.

Want to make games for PlayStation Home?

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You'll be able to do much more than this soon.

Sony has formed a partnership with independent game label Codename which will see a series of indie titles released exclusively on PlayStation Home. Some of these new games are being produced by ‘undiscovered first-time developers’

Therefore, perhaps it’s possible that a studio formed by Train2Game Games Designers, Games Developers and Games Artist & Animator students could be released through PlayStation Home in future? It could happen you know.

Of course, some of you may be completely unfamiliar as to what PlayStation home actually is. So what is it? Well it’s designed for online social gaming on the PlayStation 3. You design your own avatar  – and their house – wander around the environments, meet people and play social games like bowling and chess for example. Cynics might say it’s just an attempt to mix Second Life and the popularity of Xbox Live avatars. What do you think of PlayStation home?

Personally, I haven’t used Home since it was introduced in 2008, and generally prefer to use a PC over a PlayStation 3 console for online games. However, there are large numbers of people that use PlayStation Home, with Sony stating there are over 14 million active users.

Anyhow, back to the games. They’ll be made by indie developers – which could be you in future – from all over the world, and there are four titles that’ll be released in the coming months:

Dueling Gentlemen, created by Odd Gentleman, players strategize the right moves on a giant stage in Home’s Plaza, to outsmart opponents and win this old-time battle for honor and prestige.

Minor Battle, created by Peanut Gallery, winner of the IndieCade 2010 Audience Award, a team-based game where two teams run around a cube of four screens to beat each other in a capture-the-flag style platformer.

Super Awesome Mountain RPG, created by Codename, a blend of tabletop board games and fantasy RPGs, where players ascend a fantastical mountain in Home’s Central Plaza using a custom animated figurine.

Cogs in 3D multiplayer, a multiplayer version of Lazy8’s diabolically clever Steampunk-style game, this gear-based puzzler will also be a dynamic public spectacle in Home’s Central Plaza.

They sound quite interesting don’t they? And they’re just the first of many that will become available to PlayStation Home users in future. Founding Codename partner Jesse Vigil is excited by the new partnership with Sony.

“We’re thrilled to be partnering with PlayStation Home to create and develop games that step outside the parameters of traditional game development and we’re really looking forward to the creative opportunities that lie ahead.”

“Our model of pulling together teams of developers and allowing them to make their creative dreams a reality has only one main tenet — any game created for PlayStation Home is graphically and visually entertaining to both play and watch, at the same time.”

So Train2Game students, would you jump at an opportunity to develop games for the PlayStation home? Do you think it has the possibility to provide an indie developer with their big break? Or do you think that the whole scheme will be forgotten about in the near future?

As usual, you can leave your comments here or on the Train2Game forum.