Haha, well I knew I was up against it, especially when I was running into so many bugs. I didn't download any games during the contest at all. Focusing on it for just a couple of days isn't so bad! XD

I do find it surprising when people stop to watch movies during the contest.

See, Im the opposite, I hate having to Juggle around my physical Media [...]

Well, yeah, this I also agree with. We're in a funny transitional stage in terms of media! I'm grateful for services like Steam (though less so because I mostly use Mac), and I sometimes email EXEs to my gmail of small pieces of software that I own.  I really like Lexaloffle's system where you can enter your email on the site at any point and they'll email you up to date download links.

But yeah, collectable tat is still desirable.

I posted up a timelapse video of my development!
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=VIXWbK5JIAw&feature=channel_page&fmt=22

Well, yeah... in a magical happy world it would be nice if PC games worked like console games, and it would certainly be nice as an option in some cases, but it doesn't really seem relevant any more.  Also, lots of people run games on laptops now and heavy disc access is a bad idea with those things.

...but yeah, packaged games are cool, especially if you want to give them as gifts. 

So, how often do you find yourself actually using the disk? Do you just install it once and leave it until next time your build a PC, or are the games designed to run from the disk? (which is probably a bad idea!)

I just took a quick look at your LJ, Rinku, and stumbled across some weird anonymous comment. The anonymous comment system irritates me, it is either used by jerks or by people who don't understand that they sound like jerks unless there's some context as to whom the comment is coming from.  I considered re-enabling it a couple of days ago, but quickly remembered why.

My LJ isn't the most personal thing, really. If you read it you'll see that most of my thoughts tend to be about work anyway, and anything else is kept in 'friends only' entries.

So, I'm veering towards the idea of having a 'blog' which will be 'most' of my LJ entries, and my LJ which will be all of them. I figure this will be easier to keep up to date.

Of course, now I have the even bigger problem of what to have as a homepage.

One thing I'm seriously considering is using a system such as 'Intense Debate' to handle my comments. I've seen a lot of Wordpress users get spammed up like crazy, and I'm worried about having to maintain a set of comments on my own server.  It would also mean I can build my blog any way I see fit, so long as it supports RSS.

How do you find maintaining your comments? Ever suffer from spam?

I think it's a valid point about keeping your personal life on your LJ, and keeping it off your other pages.  I could probably still include my work specific entries on my livejournal. It would feel less weird for people whom are interested in my work, but not in me, so to speak.

So on the other issue - where do you stand with regards to content? If I post nothing but comic artwork for two months, and nothing but game development talk for two months, would that be too peculiar for you to follow?

True, and livejournal has that too.  I think some people subscribed to 'tumbledrop' blog specifically.  However, that is limited to savvy followers only.

I'm a comic publishing guy when I'm not doing comics, and I have a number of comics in print in floppy or anthology (paperback) format, and I love it. There's something very desirable about a physical product like this.

I've often thought about how I would make a boxed version available of games I make if I sold them, and there have been titles that I'm fond enough of that I would be thankful to buy an 'official' product version of.

For example, I bought the soundtrack to Ico mostly because I wanted any collectible I could find for my favourite game, and this is the only thing I could get (other than the japanese guide book, which I also have).

I think the desire for physical media is limited now though, so it had better be NICE! I want to see elaborate 'limited edition' boxes, bonus content, filled with artwork and for the boxed product to be something the player is happy to own. Oh, and I want it to use mini-DVDs too, because those are much more desirable.  And a beautiful comic-style manual.  People can pay extra for the disc version, and they'll get their money's worth.

(of course, with this all said, I'll probably just make browser based games for the next 5 years and by that time no-one will have DVD-drives in their machines...)

'Interactive Art' seems fine to me for the most part.

Unfortunately, it does make me think of the term 'Interactive Fiction', which is one of those genre names that I never got on board with.  I'm still content to call them 'text adventures', despite the obvious inaccuracies.  The Ludus Novus podcast says 'with a Game or piece of Interactive Fiction' twenty times per episode, for example, and it always sounds a bit weird.

But for the most part Interactive Art is fine.

Defect is an interactive art piece.
The Graveyard is an interactive art piece.
Rez is not an interactive art piece.

Seems fine to me.

I'm currently unsure what to do with regards to my blog. 

I use Livejournal as my blog.  I have done for the past seven years, and I don't have any real plans to change that.  However, I feel 'out of the loop' because Livejournal doesn't have an effective system for non-registered users to post comments. (You can allow anonymous comments, but it doesn't ask the poster for a name or email so they tend to read as purely anonymous, which is no good)

So, I'm considering making a game development focused blog which will mirror my gamedev posts from Livejournal, but have its own commenting system available.  This seems like a good solution, right?

However, what about the rest of my blog? Should I avoid putting anything art, music, or comic related in this blog because it is focused on games development?  Should I keep my personal blog entries off it for the same reason?

I realise that when people read a blog it is often for a specific purpose. For example, if someone makes a game, you want to follow their development of new games, but do you necessarily want to hear about their day to day activities?

So, the question is... is it necessary to keep multiple blogs, or do tags suffice for filtering content? Is it 'unprofessional' to have personal, non-project related posts on a blog? Do you tend to tune out if the blog content changes pace in this manner?

(  Here is my blog,  and here is my current homepage, which is out of date and has no mention of games)

I'm somewhat at a loss as to where I should go with these, and I'd like to know your thoughts, especially from those of you whom have a selection of game developer blogs on the RSS readers. Opinions please! 

I love this!

However, yeah, I think the background should be much lower contrast to let the little guys show up a little better.  I think the background is a little fussy right now, and I much prefer the bark with green cracks than the tree bark with brown cracks.

Ah, thanks for the tips with regards to Inform. I'll be sure to pass that information on to her so that she has a more pleasant starting experience with it.

I think I'll hold off on recommended ADRIFT just yet... partially because I don't want to confuse her with multiple suggestions, and also because she seemed quite taken by the notion of natural english definitions of objects and locations in Inform.

But largely because ADRIFT's logo makes me want to poke my eyes out!



....

...BLEEEAAAAARRRRGGHHH *vomits everywhere*

I'm serious about this, that logo makes me doubt the integrity of the software, and the screenshots didn't do much to sway me either.

A friend of mine is keen to get into Interactive Fiction, but is scared of programming.

Is 'Inform' the best thing for her to use?
http://www.inform-fiction.org/I7/Welcome.html

Does anyone have any pointers as to how she should get started?

Well, pressing space won't do anything on a YouTube video. ...Obviously I realize that it may not be an actual YouTube video, as in, you know, hosted on YouTube...but basically it's a YouTube video.

Amazing! ^^

I'm not working on this, but I kind of want to! This is just a rough mock-up, I could never settle on the specifics of the gameplay.

On LD13, should also post increpare's entry:
...
because it's brilliant.  Also, it only takes 2 minutes to play, so it's easy to review!

Agreed

agreedagreed!
It has become my new 'you haaave to play this' game.

Wow, that was unexpected! It works amazingly... especially because the bottom of the screen is exactly what I'm used to seeing! XD 

Increpare you are a genius, I bow down to you!

It also looks a little like Midna.

I totally get where you're coming from though - I don't do a whole lot of art but I find it's something you need to be very aware of.

I think so long as there's a distinct class of game objects (like entites that you interact with) that are drawn with outlines it looks fine, but if everything has outlines it looks messy and can get very hard to read.

Yeah, that's the thing. Firstly, sprites are difficult to judge without seeing the background that they'll be placed against.

Also, sometimes it makes sense to go with an outer line on handheld games to make the characters especially high contrast on a small and (previously...) dull screen, with potentially LCD colour offset due to viewing angle. The handheld castlevania games have an outline for example.

However, an incomplete fussy black outline is pretty common amongst amateur game art. In my opinion, circumstantially, your mileage may vary, and other words to this effect.