I think we should have community hookup, so that we can find people to work with or release forums, perhaps with a level limit on who can start new threads.

I really like this idea.  Posting art is all fine when it's the artist who's starting the project, but if a good programmer with bad art skills has a really good idea for a game, they don't really have a good place to go.  I fall more into the artist camp, so I could post in that thread if I want to, but I think a "Link Up" sub-forum would be really great.  A lot of the best games are made with small teams, not just one person (there are exceptions, of course).  Knytt Stories, which I think is viewed as a one man Nifflas project really had quite a lot of contributors.

Simply put, the caliber of games on TIGS will rise dramatically (they already have in 07/08) once we shift into a more collaborative approach to indie development.  Designing a game has a lot more facets to it than painting a picture, and I think the medium lends itself to teams of 2-5 quite nicely.  I mean, just look at all the great Indie partnerships we've had already, Derek and Alec for instance.

Personally I'd like to see front page comments gone and just have a sub-forum for it with a link to the thread from the article.  There was even a time (a Braid article, I think) when someone impersonated a forum member (Fish, of all people), which caused some confusion in the forum thread about what Fish thought of the game.  This doesn't seem to be a regular occurrence, but still, I don't like that its so easy to do.

And thanks for being so fast to create the Tutorials sub-forum Derek.  I'll try and contribute something GM related when I get the chance.

Well, Namco Bandai has made a DS Panda pet game.  I really hope Panda can't get sick...  That would be sad.

Oh, and to sweeten the deal, the game comes with a bonus DVD called Secrets of the Wild Panda.

I know it's not indie, but I think this should be front paged anyway.

[taught typing.]

You're not bashing Mario Teaches Typing were you, because that game was the shit!

I mean, come on, he taught typing.

And so my impression of Nifflas is safe

Seconded.  He's probably my favorite indie because with the Knytt games he combined two things I love, atmosphere and non-violence, and he did such a fantastic job with them.  Night Game is going to be so sweet! 

Niff has explained his involvement (or lack thereof) on his forums.  He does seem to be quite involved with Nicalis, but I don't think that involvement extends much beyond Skymning itself, which has been confirmed not to be a code name for the Cave Story port.  He said that he's done the odd thing here and there for the project, but nothing huge.

http://nifflas.ni2.se/forum/index.php?topic=3978.270

I'm still waiting for Paper Mega Man.  Or even better, Lego Mega Man.

im sure its not its way too early to be judgmental just wait!

Yeah, there's no way the music will be a problem.  Niff wouldn't let that happen, as his reputation for atmosphere (which includes music) would be seriously damaged.

I'm not sure what kind of studio this is and the structure of it, but is Nifflas one of the "higher-ups"?  If not, he might not have much control over how this turns out.

Dude, the studio's name is Nicalis, and Niff's real name is Nicklas Nygren.  Seems like a pretty big connection to me.

Also, Nicalis' existence has been sort of known for quite some time because people on Niff's forum found something Nicalis posted on gamedev.net to try and hire people for a secret WiiWare/PC project called Skymning.  It list Niff as the Director/Lead Artist on Skymning.  Here's the link to that:

http://www.gamedev.net/community/forums/topic.asp?topic_id=484719

Haha, now that I check, there's a thread from about a month ago in the Skymning sub-forum about how Nicalis had Cave Story videos removed from YouTube and no one knew why:

http://nifflas.ni2.se/forum/index.php?topic=5733.0

I checked that out; pretty cool for something that's procedural.  With a bit of tweaking you probably could make a pretty sweet procedural music shmup (something there aren't enough of IMO).

And my procedural music generator beats this hands down

You built a procedural music generator?  Do tell...

im sure its not its way too early to be judgmental just wait!

Yeah, there's no way the music will be a problem.  Niff wouldn't let that happen, as his reputation for atmosphere (which includes music) would be seriously damaged.

Yeah, but that's still not as manly as Contra.

Why did you have to post that Renton?  I think you should just email it to Pixel now and wait patiently for a response.  Or just send it to Nifflas, given that he's involved with the port and gets back to people, though maybe not when it relates to an image of that caliber.

Oh, and Derek, love the exploding Hitler.  I want a T-Shirt with the four progressive head explosion sprites on it showing the sequence.  I think if I wore it I might get singled out in crowds though, and that's not great.

This sounds awful!

I suppose it's an interesting idea, but that's not enough.

That's why I called it terrible. People love Pi way too much.

This is just terrible:

http://gizmodo.com/5058930/music-based-on-pi-keeps-bodies-movin-forever

Discuss.

[NIFFLAS]

As someone who really doesn't care much about Cave Story, I think there's a detail here that need emphasizing:

Nifflas is involved!  NIFFLAS

Assuming Pixel is fully involved with Nicalis, I think they need to hire Fish and Cactus and then dominate the world.

BTW, has anyone contacted Niff about this yet?

coming soon into you.
maybe tomorrow.

This reminds me of Superbrothers. Coincidence? Perhaps.

Yeah, me too.

It's around one of my groups of friends, the nerdy PC gaming one, because we've all seen it.

Donkey Kong kill screen coming up!

I can't decide whether or not I want that to be our new meme...

modeling in sketchup is a joke.

Do you mean that in a good way or a bad way?

And if you mean it in a bad way, then just go to the 3D warehouse and look at some of the car/plane models people have built to see just what can be done.

Yup, I'm saying first one too.  More docile, which in this case I think is good.