GameDevBlog

Did I mention I'm teaching at DigiPen now?

I'm teaching a class this semester, a "Technology for Designers" class - it's a survey of various technological topics (graphics, AI, physics, etc) to give them a good overview on topics they might not go into too much detail with in the rest of their curriculum.

A lot of smart people in that class - they've already taught me some stuff, including some cool Excel tricks.

Already more work than I expected, but seems like it might be a good way to bring in a little extra cash while I continue to foolishly pursue the white whale of indie game development.

Or maybe it's the worst of both worlds: not making enough to support the family, and at the same time taking time away from my indie game development. Hmm....

Whatever. Teaching seems to run in my family, so giving this a shot.

My wife's more successful than I am

My wife opened an Esty shop, CatShyCrafts, about the same time I launched sixty second shooter. She's made more money with it than sixty second shooter has ... and just made the front page of the Etsy newsletter, which is huge, sounds like the Etsy equivalent of being featured in the iPhone App Store.

So, I've been making games professionally for twenty years ... and she's been making crafts professionally for, oh, three months.  Hmm.

As you can tell, I'm jealous. But proud at the same time! Prealous. Joud.

Edit: (Cathy pointed out there's some implied sexism in this article - by pointing out that my wife's more succesful than me, I imply that the status quo is the reverse. But my main thing was really the disparity in experience! Anyhow. I also conflated money with success, as long as we're pointing out things I'm doing wrong.)

Why haven't I been blogging much lately, you ask?
I guess I just don't have that hour-a-week I used to spend on it anymore. Second daughter, for one thing.

For those interested, the games in the logo image are, left to right:
- Magic Candle 2 (or maybe 3, I forget)
- Die By The Sword
- Spider-Man 2
- Schizoid

Is GameFly Really Worth It?

I tend to have GameFly games out for a while.  I wondered to myself - is this really worth it?  If I just bought used games, would I not only spend about the same amount of money but also get to keep the games?

Turns out GameFly lets you look at your rental history.  So I did.  Turns out, for games I actually finish, I tend to have them out 4-5 weeks.  So that's a cost of $16-$20 or so in Gamefly time.  These are games that are still fairly recent releases, that I could buy for around $35.  

Factor in that some games I discover I hate and return immediately, and the savings goes up considerably.

And although sometimes I like to have the games for my collection, the truth is I almost never, never, ever go back and play those games again.  So there is just about zero value to me to keep the games.  

So.  Yes.  GameFly really is worth it.  And no, they didn't pay me to write this.

I would pay Intuit $50 a year to *not* make me upgrade

Last week at the office we were talking about how annoying Quicken has gotten lately - the number of clicks per transaction has doubled or tripled, and it has stopped feeling "Quick".  Maybe they've fixed that in the 2010 edition, maybe not, I'm too scared to find out.  Joel Spolsky's article is dead-on.  http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000017.html  Just replace "Office" with "Quicken".

In other news, the IGDA Leadership Forum this year is even better than last year's.  A full report will be forthcoming.

Sofia's a frickin' genius

Not only is she reading *One Fish, Two Fish* to me at bedtime, she started to learn to "program" today with Kodu Gamelab.

Ok, I was giving her step-by-step instructions, I don't think she could have done anything with it on her own.

Cathy's not impressed.  "She is almost five, you know."

Neat, neat program, though - as a primer to programming it's awesome.  And we could practically have written Schizoid with it - color-coded enemy bashing is built in.  A bargain at $5.

Why has sneakernet returned?

For us, it seems to be the cryptic security and permissions crap involved in sharing files.  We somehow couldn't find any of our memory sticks today and we resorted to attempting to share files.  It never works the first try anymore.  "You don't have permission..." if you're a public user, because the permissions have somehow been set incorrectly...or you need to log on as the owner of the box.  Or whatever.

Windows has taken us back to the dark ages.  Next thing our source control will stop working.

The Four Stages of "They Stole My Game Idea!"

It's just like the four stages of death, but in a different order.

1)  Anger.  "Those ^%$#ers!  I wanted to make that game."

2)  Depression.   "Sigh.  I guess there's nothing I can do about it."

3)  Acceptance.  "On the bright side, at least now I get to play it and I don't have to develop it myself."

4)  Denial.  (Once you actually get to play it.)  "Hey, this isn't the game I wanted to make at all!"

So I Lied

I didn't have as much free time over Thanksgiving as I thought, and only made it a little way into an article on my new pet "Drag" theory.  So now I don't know when I'll have it up.  On the bright side, Sofi loved Sea World and the beach.