At GDC 2011 this past March, three of the world's best game designers participated in a contest called Game Design Challenge. Each presented their vision for a game that fit the prompt "Bigger than Jesus: games as religion" before an audience, with applause to determine the winner. Jenova Chen, John Romero, and Jason Rohrer all spoke, and Rohrer won in a landslide with his revolutionary game called Chain World.
Now that Google+ is open to everyone, there are a lot of new people who aren't techies trying out the service. When you first sign on, it can be overwhelming. I've decided to round up a bunch of resources to help you get started, and recommend some people for you to follow, if you want to stay on top of tips and new announcements.
Like a great acting performance, making a really good game is all about choices. While creating or playing a game, those involved have to constantly make small choices that will affect the outcome, either positively or negatively. And the only thing worse than choosing wrongly is not choosing at all. Too many games, especially today, stick to what they're supposed to do from the get-go and avoid making difficult, small, meaningful choices to differentiate themselves and make their performance...
Dead Island (PC, PS3, 360) had the worst launch of any game in recent memory. The wrong version of the game was released on PC, matchmaking was down for three days on PC, saves were deleted without notice making people start from scratch, and the Feminist Whore (a file found describing one of the character's skills) fiasco. The game just wasn't ready for release.
Grand Theft Auto 3 was the biggest video game of the last decade, by far, introducing open-world adventure games to consoles, a genre that now rivals shooters and sports games for market dominance. A huge map, decentralized narrative, and myriad of interlocking quests and objectives that happen in a flexible order all became hallmarks of the "new" genre, along with the ability to shape the morality and reputation of your character. And most importantly, all of the quests and stories are compl...
Difficulty Level: Moderate Photoshop Skills Photoshop isn't just for zapping zits and adding freaky colors to sunset pictures! You can use it for fun, altered-reality pictures, too. If you have a tripod and some friends, you can combine many exposures as separate layers and using layer masks, make one super cool image from many slightly cool images.
Deep in their heart of hearts, most Americans dream of having their car festooned with missile launchers and machine guns. Anyone who cuts them off or looks at them funny in traffic could be dispensed with quick and extreme justice, leaving a real-life James Bond and his passengers free to pursue their American dreams faster than everyone else. Racing games and shooting games are among the two most popular types of video games. So why aren't there more games where one can race cars and shoot ...
Moving up from a point and shoot to a digital single lens reflex camera is a big step. And actually, a DSLR can be a better buy than a new point and shoot, many of which rival the prices of entry level or used DSLRs. Keep in mind when you buy a new body, the lenses are the most important elements. Once you start investing in them, it makes it much harder to switch brands. So if it isn’t too late, do some research.
No game is perfect. Well maybe except for Super Mario Brothers 3. In the last two posts I've been praising Tera but it's not without its shortcomings.
In Google definitions a macro is defined as "a single computer instruction that results in a series of instructions in machine language". Basically a macro is a programming script that tells the computer what to do. You can tell a computer (via a macro) to move a mouse, click, type or do any task that a computer can do with automation. There are also many (primitive) computer viruses that are coded entirely in a macro script. There are many ways to create a macro script but I will only go ove...
Tis’ the season…for weddings! At the beginning of October, three of my college pals got married on the same day. This meant a ton of planning, parties, and presents for these three lucky ladies. This also meant that there were many a brides maid needing to make sure their bride was feeling special on such a wonderful occasion. One of the most exciting aspects of being the Maid of Honor is helping to plan the Bridal Shower, but it can also be a lot of work if you aren’t prepared. Here are 10 t...
Description: Admit it, having thousands of valid email Ids give you the power to do anything! Such as adding thousands of friends to your Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, etc profiles or promoting your article or blog in just a single click and much more! But how do we do it? I searched all over the internet in a hope to get a perfect email producing software but ended with just two -
There's gonna be a rumble.... For this week's GJ article, I thought I would jump right into talking about a mortal-lock favourite of mine: West Side Story. If you haven't seen it (and a lot of folks havent - dudes especially) and you want a lesson in filmmaking craft from a bonafide master then you kind of owe it to yourself to rent this undisputed gem.
Scott Pilgrim vs The World: The Video Game was released on Tuesday August 10th for the PS3 (Download only, $9.99). It will be released for the Xbox 360 on August 25th for 800 imaginary points. We spent a few hours yesterday on co-op and single player and here are our initial impressions.
Hey editor Mike here from thesubstream and I would like to welcome our newest contributor to the site, our tweens 'n' teens cinema specialist, my little sister Amanda. We're going to make her go watch all the movies that we don't want to see ourselves and then make her tell us and you about them. Up first: the Zac Efron vehicle Charlie St. Cloud.
Yes. That's right. The 2010 National SCRABBLE Championship (NSC) is almost here. In fact, it starts in less than 2 weeks! And if you were lucky enough to register for the competitions, you could win a first place prize of $10,000!
What separates Metro 2033 from other FPS games? Life. There are underground towns, markets, children, music, and so much background chatter than sometimes you can't single out a particular conversation.
I've been curious to watch one of these famed '3D' games for a while now. Last April at NAB, I attended several 3D panels and folks from ESPN suggested that one of the strongest experiences that would bring 3D into the home would be live sports. I've missed opportunities to watch the PGA Masters broacasts, and NCAA games, but being a hardcore Soccer (Futbol) fan, I've been most excited about this possibility. It did not disappoint, but not without some concessions. I will be as detailed as po...
I’m terrified of you. Yes, you- Director of Photography (DP). Your framing is beautiful, but your lighting could kill me, and my career. I am the Makeup Artist, and I don’t believe we’ve met.
Do you know how wonderful toothpaste is? Here's the scoop. If you've hung pictures or other thing on the wall that required a molly or anchor bolt, and you have to move them and you have holes exposed in your wall. Well "FEAR NOT", toothpaste to the rescue. You will need household items like - toilet paper, or paper towel, or paper napkin, or Kleenex tissue, a utility knife, hammer putty knife, sponge, primer/sealer, paint of your choice and of course the toothpaste.
Wondering how to set up Mozilla Thunderbird? Follow these simple steps: 1. When you first launch Thunderbird you are asked to create a new account. First click Email account and click Next.
Outside the realm of politics, where opposing sides are quite passionate and quite disagreeable, there are few areas in our society quite as divisive as Twitter. People who like Twitter love Twitter and are relentless in trying to co-opt the people they know into joining (this is both altruistic and an unsubtle attempt to boost followers).
If you're a diehard Apple fan, chances are the new iPad 2 caught your eye, stole your heart and emptied your wallet. Who couldn't resist the sophisticated slim-body design or its fascinating new Smart Cover? Well—it seems nobody could. And if you were late to jump on the bandwagon, you're still probably cleaning that dust out of your mouth because it took off without you—leaving the latest and greatest Apple gadget out of your reach.
Remember KODACHROME? That color reversal film from Kodak? The film that was the inspiration for Paul Simon? The only brand of film to have a state park named after it?
In my free time, I like to program in an image programming language called Context Free. You can download it at www.contextfreeart.org for free.
These days, eReaders are everywhere. For die-hard book nerds, eReaders offer the convenience of a full library without having to sacrifice shelf space. Sure, there are the paper buffs who swear that you just can't take an eReader with you into the bathtub, but when's the last time anyone actually did that? Face it, eReaders are convenient and here to stay. But there's a dizzying array of information out there, so what should you look for in an eReader?
Technology: The Less You Know the Better?
The Funny Thing About Dying - A Story of Coping With Loss
Over the years, I have enjoyed playing with Asterisk. I have found Asterisk to be extremely powerful and fun to play with. There are several books and many scattered how to articles out there, but most are outdated and the information required to build Asterisk from beginning to end can be a bit daunting. I wanted to combine all the steps into a single article and share my experience with everyone. If I have left out any steps please let me know.
This coming Friday, November 11th, 2011 is Veterans Day and everybody's celebrating! But only veterans and active military personnel can get the great deals being offered at restaurants and retail outlets across the country. If you need help locating some of those deals, below are all of the nationwide and local deals found across the Web. If you know of any more, share the spots in the comments below!
Since the invention of the printing press, books have been a dominant and iconic paradigm in our culture and throughout the world. During my years in elementary and high school, the digital world was on the rise sparking the conversation: Are Books Obsolete. Over the last year (or 2 at the most) that the term "Book" has started to make the shift from a physical object to the concept of a written work.
It’s hard to know where to start talking about a book like 2666. That’s partly because, in some ways, it’s actually five books. Published posthumously, the book begins with “A Note from the Author’s Heirs” explaining that, before his death, Bolano stipulated the book be published as five separate works. Instead, his friends and family opted to publish Bolano’s novel as he originally would have – as one single volume divided into five parts. Ultimately the five parts belong together. They shar...
Hello, everyone. My friend and I recently released a Defense of the Ancients (DotA) map that went viral and thought I should share it with Minecraft World on WonderHowTo since you guys helped me out when I first started making videos! We were featured on Kotaku, RockPaperShotgun, Gamespy, The Verge, Joystiq and many more websites!Exciting!You can see the full details below are head straight here for the downloads.
You're sitting in front of your grandmother's Windows XP machine that has the worst infection you've ever seen. Safe mode? No dice. Restore points? They're compromised. Even worse, all of the files are hidden and none of the executables will run! This leaves her computer in a bricked state. Without some serious CPR, it will be lost to you. Sure, you could just reinstall the system, but then you might lose all of that valuable data.
This article is dedicated to sugarcane, because we all want more sugarcane in Minecraft. The best way to generate sugar cane is with an automatic reed farm that uses pistons and redstone. The pistons push the canes into the water canal you'll build, then delivers them to the collection point at the end of the canal.
In my recent Darknet series, I attempted to connect the dots on the Deep Web. I covered the two largest anonymity networks on the Internet today, Tor and I2P. While my initial four articles were meant as an introduction, I ended up receiving a lot of interesting comments and messages asking the technical differences between the two. I'd like to thank all of you for letting me know what was on your minds, as you should always!
Many windows users, if not all, run into a virus infection once in a while. This is unavoidable when using Microsoft's operating system. Without digressing too much, the fact that Windows is such a popular OS with no controlled software sources makes it easy for viruses and malware to spread. And while there's a plethora of antivirus tools for Windows, sometimes infections (such as certain scareware) can disable the install and/or use of antivirus systems and render your OS unusable until cle...
Amazingly, a lot of people I know haven't even heard of SOPA or PIPA. Now, every English-reading person with an internet connection will finally have those two four-letter acronyms emblazoned in their minds. For the entire day today, Wikipedia's English-language site will be in total blackout in protest against the proposed legislation in the United States. And that's not all. MoveOn, Reddit, BoingBoing, Mozilla, WordPress, TwitPic and other popular websites are down today in protest.
Dungeon Defenders is the most exciting craft game on the Fall 2011 release schedule. I got a chance to play it at PAX in August and interviewed developers Trendy Entertainment last month. After more than a year of publishing difficulty and delay, the game finally came out on PSN, XBLA and Steam. I put about 20 hours into the XBLA version over the past weekend, beating all the campaign maps and racking up a huge pile of in-game money. It is not a perfect game. But it is a huge, challenging, an...
If you're interested in bypassing Windows and Linux passwords, there is a great tool from the good people at Kryptoslogic. Have you ever forgotten your administrator password? Have you ever bought a used computer with a password on it? Well, Kryptoslogic have created a boot-disc call 'Kon-Boot', which allows you to bypass any Windows 32 or 64 bit OS, as well as Linux passwords. There is both a paid and freeware version available.
