Au Sable
Gyromancer
PopCap + SquareEnix. Yeah, you will probably have sex with it.
Unreal Development Kit – free
This seems to be the big news that Epic was hyping a week back: a free edition of the Unreal 3 toolset, called Unreal Development Kit (or UDK):
“Our mission is for UDK to empower everyone to use our world-class game engine technology to realize their dreams. People have used Unreal Engine 3 to make games, television shows, architectural visualizations, student projects, medical training applications and so much more. Now it’s your turn!”
8 questions: Jakub Dvorský
Machinarium
A few weeks ago, Amanita Design released Machinarium, the game they’ve been working on for three years. We’ve been expecting this game for quite a while, so we bought it, played it and all we can say now is that we love it.
We got so thrilled about Machinarium that we couldn’t resist “stressing” Jakub Dvorský with another set of questions:
GMZzz: Now, after Machinarium has been released, can you say it came out as you wanted it to be?
Jakub Dvorský: Yes, I can say I’m really happy with the game. Of course there’s still some little issues, bugs and things I don’t like, but it’s almost impossible to release flawless game when your team is just 7 people and you don’t have any spare money for additional testers etc.
GMZzz: There’s an excellent balance between the game setting and the music. How did you work on this? I mean, did you had the music from the beginning or was it created based on that setting?
Jakub Dvorský: The music match perfectly for the scenes because each track was created exactly for its location after the location was finished or at least the background was already painted.
GMZzz: What was your reason behind making the full walkthrough of the game available in-game? It looks really, really good, but it’s also something that players are not used to getting access so easily.
Jakub Dvorský: You’re right, but the game is quite hard and we knew that it will be too difficult for many players (maybe majority of them), so we wanted to make it more accessible. We knew that if someone is stuck he will use any written or video walkthrough from the web anyway, so we created our own, much nicer and funnier and integrated it directly to the game. On the other side, you have to beat that mini-game to unlock the walkthrough so it’s not so comfortable to check the walkthrough every time you are not sure what to do next.
GMZzz: How was the game received by the gaming community (gamers, journalists, but also developers)? What do you think about its reception?
Jakub Dvorský: The reviews and feedback is awesome, we are very happy. However, we are also open to critique – it’s good experience for our next game.
GMZzz: How did the sales for Machinarium go so far? Do you see this as a successful and profitable project?
Jakub Dvorský: Yes, it paid off for us, even if we spent 3 years developing this game. Now we know that we’ll be able to continue in independent development, which is what we wanted to achieve.
GMZzz: Machinarium’s ending clearly left room for a second part. I know it’s (probably) too soon to ask, but what can you tell us about its sequel?
Jakub Dvorský: Hehe, yes you’re right, it’s too soon. We are not sure what will be our next game yet.
GMZzz: Besides Machinarium 2, what are you planing to do next?
Jakub Dvorský: We have one smaller project in the works – it will be interactive music video created by our lead animator Vaclav Blin. Very interesting piece, I hope it will be out soon, I guess in a couple of months.
GMZzz: Why isn’t there an English version of the game in a box on CD? When can we expect one? [Because we really demand one 
]
Jakub Dvorský: We haven’t find publisher yet, but no worries, we’d like to publish nice CD package on our own if we don’t find good publisher soon.
IGF 2010 main competition entries have been announced. No less than 306 games have signed up this year, which is A LOT. The finalists will be announced in January 2010.
flixel
flixel is a completely free collection of Actionscript 3 files that helps organize, automate, and optimize Flash games; an object-oriented framework that lets anyone create original and complex games with thousands of objects on screen in just a few hours.
Game Design for Social Networks
“How can interaction design inform game design practices in the context of designing games for social networks?
How can understanding of user motivations be formalized into design principles that would solve and inspire new design solutions in this particular design space? In the first of two parts, I explore specific issues that game designers will have to face when designing games for social networks.”
Small Worlds
Death Rally – for free
One of the golden oldies is now free. Woohoo! And vroooom! And BANG! and all that…
