I just wanted to post a link to a blog post I made yesterday. I love business analysis, just for fun (yeah, I'm kinda crazy), so I created some rough numbers for Mojang over the past year or two. I don't get many comments on my blog, so feedback from the Minecraft community would be great. Especially from the business professionals out there. Carl Manneh loved it. Do you?
Hey, Just wanted to let everyone know that we are starting to get entries for the Zorts Art Challenge, but the contest is still on! Anyone that wants to submit artwork can do so at [email protected] And check out our website, www.zorts.net to take a look at the game and what we're up to!
Either way that I reply, there would be qualifications...
Yes, he should read it, but he should not follow any of the suggestions consciously. No he should not read it because he already has a plan and shouldn't get distracted by that.
Releasing the game early was a really interesting thing to do. It has proved to be a great idea and a terrible idea at the same time. On the great idea side it let him gauge the interest level in the game, raise funds, start a company, etc, etc. But also it has caused a major headache for Notch as we all vocally try and express what we think the game is and should become.
Some of the most fun of the game has been following it's progression over time and speculating on where its going to go. It's both good and bad. Commentary on the game design has almost become as much a part of the game as actually playing it. This creates a lot of noise. 100,000 fans each have their own idea about what the game should be. Unfortunately the game is not going to be any any of those ideas. The game is going to be the creation of Mojang.
Balancing that, great input is required for great output and it would be really foolish to ignore great game ideas... Not every idea is great though. They should listen, but not too closely. And we should not expect all our ideas to be included in the game. We should trust that Mojang has great idea's and will implement them. They have already created something spectacular. I think we can trust that they will continue in that.
I feel the first step to building your own city is to find your own style. Start with one building. Give it a use. Tell a little story with it. Once you have that one building done, take the basic layout of that building and do it again, but this time change the story a little and see how that changes how the building comes out.
Personally I tend to thing in D&D terms. Towers, castles, villages, huts. Having spent years doing the D&D graph paper thing I find it really neat to be able to build in 3 dimensions. But consequently my style doesn't really move beyond the sword and sorcery genre.
Some people like to make a single room that stores all their stuff and they can build from. I like to make a town where each building in the town is used to contribute to that 'inventory'. An Armor stores leather and finished suits of leather armor. A blacksmith with some furnaces, swords and metal armor. A Bowyer Fletcher. And so on. ANd then of course each of these buildings have to have a home built somewhere in town for the 'blacksmith', the fletcher, etc. As though there were NPC's running these shops instead of me.
The more character, the more story, you include in your town and the more you express that through little details, the better your town will look. Pick a style, make some basic rules about how and what you will build and then 'go to town'. :wink.gif:
Ultimately I agree. I would love to collect a whole post of people saying that though. With it I could suggest to the creator that alternate methods of delivering his game would be a good idea.
He did have a version on iPhone, but the amount of screen space makes it basically unplayable. I feel like it would make a good port to something like an online board game. Maybe leverage facebook, play with friends online. That kind of thing.
Finished up a neat little structure based on a map of some Egyptian buildings while watching Scrubs.
Polished my 2000 word paper on Activision Blizzard for my International Business Management Class due tomorrow.
Ate Chicken Tikka Masala and a somosa.
Did the dishes.
Swept the floor.
Maybe have lunch at some point.
At some point I should really look for a job.
Or maybe work on the computer game my team and I are creating.
Actually those last two may be the same thing.
Hey, I feel much better about what I have accomplished today! Thanks!
Now back to that paper.
I own a website for a game that is in production. Starting to feel like an actual game developer. :wink.gif: Come find out if I fail miserably or burn bright!
Mod edit: Sorry, but I have to lock this for advertisement. Stick it in your signature :3
At Boston Indies I met Erik Asmussen of 82apps.com. He was demonstrating a game called "New World Colony". I happened to sit down next to him and was one of the first people to check out the game. It looked amazing considering he has created the game entirely on his own. The graphics are polished and look very professional. New World Colony is so eye catching that as we were talking people would walk behind him and look over his shoulder the whole time.
Although it is nothing like Minecraft, I suggest you check it out and follow the games progress.
I am playing Dead Frontier yes. I've been interested in zombie games lately. Atomic Zombie whatever, not so interesting. Kinda annoys me.
There are things about Dead Frontier that annoy me... For example if you fire while reloading, the gun fires after you finish reloading. More rounds have been wasted that way. I do keep playing it because it is interesting. How often does the game get updated or changed?
ANYWAY: I'd love to help, but the only things I've ever been able to do are small low resolution creations and sprite editing.. :<
Meh. I really don't have that thin skin.
I think you should take a stab at it. Just because you have only done editing in the past, doesn't mean you cant learn and grow. I've never even edited a sprite... So you're one up on me in the art department. A friend of mine who writes for table top RPG's wrote a short story and sent it to me today. We may be posting it to the website soon (once he gives permission). He's not an artist or art director, but he's participating.
Give it a shot. If the idea inspires you, make something. Provide something. Even low res sprites are more sprite than we have right now. Plan out a model or a unit. Create some concept art. I'd like to take a look at anything you can come up with.
Sure. Creativity knows no limitations. I own one zombie movie, and have watched about three, so I wouldn't even characterize myself as a fan of the genre (well not yet anyway). But sometimes you have a good idea and you go with it. So far you are the first and only person who has said (paraphrasing) "Don't bother". Everyone else said "Hey, why didn't I think of that."
Other than zombies being cliche at the moment, do you have any other initial thoughts on why a Zombie RTS would be a bad idea? Do you have any specific feedback or just general dislike of zombies?
Mostly I just want to create a computer game. My five year plan is to create a company. You have to start somewhere... Besides if zombies are a bad idea, then I wouldn't want to burn any of my good ideas on my 'resume' project. :wink.gif:
I've been thinking about game design for years. Notch has inspired me to stop thinking about it, and start doing it. To that end I am the Creative Director for a Real Time Strategy game called ZoRTS. We need an Art Director to guide the look of the game. We also need a Sprite Artist (we're going sprite art not 3d rendering) to crank out Units, weapons, vehicles, and terrain items.
If you are an artist looking for a break in indie games or game design, check out our ZoRTS Art Challenge! Do you like to draw zombies? Post apocalyptic versions of the real world? This might be the game for you! https://sites.google.com/site/zortsgame/games
I know modders are dieing for Moding API... And truth be told I would enjoy being able to use mods. But it really doesn't make any sense offering modding support while the game is undergoing heavy development. I would think that modding support should be the last thing updated in the game. Granted that could be a long time from now. That is a lot of creative output to sacrifice.
Mentally I go back and forth on the issue. One thing I've been thinking about is more regular patch updates. If people had warning that their mods were going to break on specific days, that may make it easier for moders and the community to deal with.
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2
3
7
9
I feel that this combination would add the most storytelling/flavor to the game.
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I just wanted to post a link to a blog post I made yesterday. I love business analysis, just for fun (yeah, I'm kinda crazy), so I created some rough numbers for Mojang over the past year or two. I don't get many comments on my blog, so feedback from the Minecraft community would be great. Especially from the business professionals out there. Carl Manneh loved it. Do you?
Enjoy!
Jeremy Springfield
Creative Lead - The ZoRTS Project
www.zorts.net
blog.zorts.net
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0
Yes, he should read it, but he should not follow any of the suggestions consciously. No he should not read it because he already has a plan and shouldn't get distracted by that.
Releasing the game early was a really interesting thing to do. It has proved to be a great idea and a terrible idea at the same time. On the great idea side it let him gauge the interest level in the game, raise funds, start a company, etc, etc. But also it has caused a major headache for Notch as we all vocally try and express what we think the game is and should become.
Some of the most fun of the game has been following it's progression over time and speculating on where its going to go. It's both good and bad. Commentary on the game design has almost become as much a part of the game as actually playing it. This creates a lot of noise. 100,000 fans each have their own idea about what the game should be. Unfortunately the game is not going to be any any of those ideas. The game is going to be the creation of Mojang.
Balancing that, great input is required for great output and it would be really foolish to ignore great game ideas... Not every idea is great though. They should listen, but not too closely. And we should not expect all our ideas to be included in the game. We should trust that Mojang has great idea's and will implement them. They have already created something spectacular. I think we can trust that they will continue in that.
0
0
Personally I tend to thing in D&D terms. Towers, castles, villages, huts. Having spent years doing the D&D graph paper thing I find it really neat to be able to build in 3 dimensions. But consequently my style doesn't really move beyond the sword and sorcery genre.
Some people like to make a single room that stores all their stuff and they can build from. I like to make a town where each building in the town is used to contribute to that 'inventory'. An Armor stores leather and finished suits of leather armor. A blacksmith with some furnaces, swords and metal armor. A Bowyer Fletcher. And so on. ANd then of course each of these buildings have to have a home built somewhere in town for the 'blacksmith', the fletcher, etc. As though there were NPC's running these shops instead of me.
The more character, the more story, you include in your town and the more you express that through little details, the better your town will look. Pick a style, make some basic rules about how and what you will build and then 'go to town'. :wink.gif:
0
Ultimately I agree. I would love to collect a whole post of people saying that though. With it I could suggest to the creator that alternate methods of delivering his game would be a good idea.
He did have a version on iPhone, but the amount of screen space makes it basically unplayable. I feel like it would make a good port to something like an online board game. Maybe leverage facebook, play with friends online. That kind of thing.
0
Polished my 2000 word paper on Activision Blizzard for my International Business Management Class due tomorrow.
Ate Chicken Tikka Masala and a somosa.
Did the dishes.
Swept the floor.
Maybe have lunch at some point.
At some point I should really look for a job.
Or maybe work on the computer game my team and I are creating.
Actually those last two may be the same thing.
Hey, I feel much better about what I have accomplished today! Thanks!
Now back to that paper.
0
I own a website for a game that is in production. Starting to feel like an actual game developer. :wink.gif: Come find out if I fail miserably or burn bright!
Mod edit: Sorry, but I have to lock this for advertisement. Stick it in your signature :3
0
At Boston Indies I met Erik Asmussen of 82apps.com. He was demonstrating a game called "New World Colony". I happened to sit down next to him and was one of the first people to check out the game. It looked amazing considering he has created the game entirely on his own. The graphics are polished and look very professional. New World Colony is so eye catching that as we were talking people would walk behind him and look over his shoulder the whole time.
Although it is nothing like Minecraft, I suggest you check it out and follow the games progress.
Thanks guys!
0
There are things about Dead Frontier that annoy me... For example if you fire while reloading, the gun fires after you finish reloading. More rounds have been wasted that way. I do keep playing it because it is interesting. How often does the game get updated or changed?
I am jtspring over there too!
0
Meh. I really don't have that thin skin.
I think you should take a stab at it. Just because you have only done editing in the past, doesn't mean you cant learn and grow. I've never even edited a sprite... So you're one up on me in the art department. A friend of mine who writes for table top RPG's wrote a short story and sent it to me today. We may be posting it to the website soon (once he gives permission). He's not an artist or art director, but he's participating.
Give it a shot. If the idea inspires you, make something. Provide something. Even low res sprites are more sprite than we have right now. Plan out a model or a unit. Create some concept art. I'd like to take a look at anything you can come up with.
0
Sure. Creativity knows no limitations. I own one zombie movie, and have watched about three, so I wouldn't even characterize myself as a fan of the genre (well not yet anyway). But sometimes you have a good idea and you go with it. So far you are the first and only person who has said (paraphrasing) "Don't bother". Everyone else said "Hey, why didn't I think of that."
Other than zombies being cliche at the moment, do you have any other initial thoughts on why a Zombie RTS would be a bad idea? Do you have any specific feedback or just general dislike of zombies?
Mostly I just want to create a computer game. My five year plan is to create a company. You have to start somewhere... Besides if zombies are a bad idea, then I wouldn't want to burn any of my good ideas on my 'resume' project. :wink.gif:
0
Lol. Yeah, there ya go. HFCS is scarry.
0
I've been thinking about game design for years. Notch has inspired me to stop thinking about it, and start doing it. To that end I am the Creative Director for a Real Time Strategy game called ZoRTS. We need an Art Director to guide the look of the game. We also need a Sprite Artist (we're going sprite art not 3d rendering) to crank out Units, weapons, vehicles, and terrain items.
If you are an artist looking for a break in indie games or game design, check out our ZoRTS Art Challenge! Do you like to draw zombies? Post apocalyptic versions of the real world? This might be the game for you!
https://sites.google.com/site/zortsgame/games
Thanks,
Jeremy Springfield
0
Mentally I go back and forth on the issue. One thing I've been thinking about is more regular patch updates. If people had warning that their mods were going to break on specific days, that may make it easier for moders and the community to deal with.
1
2
3
7
9
I feel that this combination would add the most storytelling/flavor to the game.