Suzanne Ciani Creates The Soundtrack For A Pinball Machine

Sony Japan Mocopi [motion-tracking system]

 There was a time when Microsoft's Kinect hit the ground and was a huge step in technology in the motion system race, maybe not for the games since the crown remained for Nintendo's Wiimote. Sony even cloned the Wiimote with the more mature designed PS Move - colorful and ludic. Unfortunately when it arrives the race was already over. Kinect's reduced to a hype toy for experimental projects while abscondite by the general public sight since Project Milo was a LAME joke in the market.

Talking about lame jokes, looks like the money is on metaverses nowadays - they never learn, uh?

In a young market with the not-so-convincing meta verse by Meta and its compelling legs problem, in addition to crypto verses not attracting that much sympathy - except for tech bros... Sony gets the color and ludic out of the closet again with Mocopi. The brand presents us with a Bluetooth kit of six button-like tracking tags — one for your head, hip, both ankles, and both wrists — connecting with a smartphone app to input motion data to compatible services. 

It really feels like you can just grab and start doing shit, isn't it? With a popular appeal that might-could-maybe-probably be a huge Mark Zuckerberg friend to solve his legs issue.

Sony is also releasing a software development kit (SDK) on December 15th that links motion capture data with metaverse services and 3D development software, such as Unity and Autodesk MotionBuilder.

Mocopi has a retail price of 49,500 yen (about $360) and is currently due to release in Late January 2023.

More info at The Verge

Inside The Creation Of Sekiro's Soundtrack With Yuka Kitamura

The Witcher 1 Doc [Eng-Sub]

Random Dev Notes: Reviews

I've been thinking about reviews and some stuff that does not make sense. Up until now I've received 836 rating with reviews in one of my games. 4.07 stars. The majority were nice stuff with positive messages. Some others were feedback about some device/game issue. A lil plain hate. There were also some religious intolerance in stuff that is not even religious at all. I love all reviews. Read and reply all of them.

But there is this lil things that really annoys me:

A) Criticize a game for asking for "android/ios" login. Generally this devices came with in game achievements stuff. I put it because this add a lot more immersion and new challenges for the players. But I got some minor accusations of scam. Nonsense.

B) Criticize the game for lacking innovation. If you play a game that is a total rip off of something, I can understand the feeling. But when you see a project labeled as: "my first project". With some original gameplay, the question that remains is: it is an obligation to innovate? Creating something unique as a feeling is not enough? If a game delivers what it proposes, isn't that a fair play?

C) Criticize for the size of the game. Wait. This information is on the download page. I know that it sucks because of the device space, but hey! This seems like a device problem. The game, the proposal is there. And it might be heavy. It is like desiring to travel and criticize the place for being far from your house. What I as a player really dislike is to download a game, open it and it starts to download heavy content - and can not close until is done. This is a pain in the ass. But my game in question does not have this, and still got criticize.

D) Criticize for the download time. This can be an internet issue, not the game at all. Or maybe it is the C problem. But again. The info is in the download page.


Writing this just to release this "impotency" feeling after reading some of it. But I know that I did a little well tied project. And I am feeling well about it. Just random notes.

Redesign of Game Characters [Angry Birds movie trailer]

I saw this new video for the Angry Birds movie:



And was thinking about the game characters design evolution. I think it is funny that a character works for a game, make success then it just don't work anymore, need to updated. If Sonic got critized by his legs, what to say about Red? The Angry Bird main character?

I believe it was on Dreamcast that Sonic start growing long legs to looks cool.

If it was to follow the original design, the cover should be like:

fanart by Age-Velez

Well. I'm Ok with creative freedom to design. But legs growing looks like a trend for Sonic haha

In the Angry Bird trailer I notice that the ball shaped bird grow up legs and "wings" (that is arms in reality). A humanoid bird like. Looks like when Tweety (Piu-Piu / Piolin) was turned into a monster in the Mr. Hyde episode:

Is this to be easier to make animations and stuff or to be closer to a Minion-like design and renew the brand? I don't know. And hell, is this kinda of a 'mischaracterization', isn't? I know that for human characters it is kinda easier to make an evolution. But it is really obligatory to RE-make the entire character if it will change media/hardware?

Polygon shaped to well human rendered looks a normal smooth evolution for Lara Croft

Nintendo evolute Link from Legend of Zelda series with a nice plot twist at some point. With a Cartoon version on it promotional stuff and in-game character also.

Ok! Another human shape. Let's think about...ugh... Jigglypuff? From Pokémon. Got a pretty smooth 3D conversion.

Jigglypuff wildly appearing on GameBoy

JigglyPuff on SmashBros 

And not a... AGH JESUS, my EYES!!

by SoupAndButter

Ok that the real-plot-wise evolution kinda look like the actual design choice for angry bird... but this is not Jigglypuff anymore. It is a Wigglytuff. So.

A Wigglytuff

Talking about Nintendo and Pink stuff, what about Kirby? Kirby started on GameBoy, as you may know, Gameboy is monochromatic. So at the beginning Kirby was kinda pale. With the evolution of console, GameBoy Colour and stuff. It got Pink. In Canvas Curse it got a ball shape to interact with lines users generated on the screen and move rolling. Kirby still stayed Kirby as we know. It was like Sonic turning into a ball to do his shit. Not like his limbs fall down or something out of the blue. And we have the Epic Yarn design that is my favourite. The original concept is still there, but it is completely different aesthetically. This is genius. :D

Hi, Comic Sans. :'(

Welp. Who am I to judge? But I think if Angry Bird suits fine for T-shirts, games with a lot of styles... why not try and animation with a similar approach? The Red on Angry Bird movie looks like a monster. Not a bird. Thinking about the marketing, the products... Think about it as a "plushie"... This character looks 'huggable'? Ok... it is an ANGRY bird... but C'mon. Look how adorable the original concept looks like on this:

The original concept also looks neat with 2D animations:

Keeping the original design would work for an Angry Bird 3D animation?

Anyway, the movie looks ok to watch with your little fellows from family. Just wondering if this redesign was needed and how the marketing can gain or suffer with it. The Angry Birds is kinda saturated and the "Angry Birds 2" game didn't make a commercial triumph. The name can deceive too. Like it was the second game. There is Angry Bird of everything. Star Wars, Shakira, Racing, RPG... everything! Maybe this movie bring a new refreshing breeze to the franchise. Because thinking on the other side, with legs and arms/wings a lot of new game concepts can be made. Creativity freedom is valid, always. Let's see how it turns out for Rovio fellows. And what you think about it? Did you have a character killed by evolution? Or did it make the character more awesome yet?

Space☆Spacy [iOS & Android]

iOS:
https://itunes.apple.com/app/space-sp...

Android:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/de...

Fighting Game Docs #games

More Than A Game


Super Smash Bros Documentary (Insane 4 hours doc)


King of Chinatown - 2011 (Documentary)


EVO: A Documentary


Fighting Dreams: The Rise of the Fighting Game Community


Here Comes a New Challenger - Fighting Game Community Documentary


Fight Night: The Melbourne Street Fighter Arcade Community

Bonus:
Chinatown Fair: a documentary



Also, check it out
Street Fighter 25th Anniversary Doc

Back in Time: SNK Neo Geo

Pixel Pioneers: A Brief History of Graphics

[Doc] World of Warcraft: Looking for Group

[Red Bull Music Academy] Diggin' in the Carts: Ep 1

[Red Bull Music Academy]

Ep 2 & 3
Ep 4, 5 & 6

Video Games Are Good

Are you Creating or Digesting?

How feminism helped me perceive my creative emaciation.

This text is intended to creators of anything. To perceive and identify traces of shit, real shit, on their works. And try to work more deeply in connection with your creations.


March 2014 was when I released my first commercial game: North Wind: Trill of Consciousness

But it was in the end of 2012 that I finally sit down to develop something.
I did what anyone would do first: flirt with some plot. As I didn’t know how to draw anything digitally, I did some layout resembling Thomas Was Alone design. But I make it smoking. A black rectangle smoking.

At the time, I was fascinated by CAVE games, and wanted to create a manic shooter jammed with some Evangelion scheme. It turns out a regular Sci-Fi about spaceships with a weird Bionic Commando “wife arm” twist. ¬¬


THE PROBLEM

I gonna explain detailed the plot but... I am very, very ashamed of it. But shame is good. Shame is the perception of something that was going to the wrong way.

The plot: A Scientist that uses Woman DNA for creating organically spaceships. The reason to use woman DNA was about the better reaction to the feelings. - Yup - In the end the whereabouts of the real woman were missing. 

So … agh. His wife was a pink rectangle. She was missing. And the guy was on a quest to destroy the evil corporation. I was using female element to make a dude looks awesome and have something to do.

Boo me.
Seriously.

After I tried to draw the first spaceship, I got a bat. And the game was looking like a horizontal stick platformer. With bats. I gave up on plots to focus on the development of a unique gameplay that would make sense for an iPad Quest.

The “Role Playing Puzzle” gameplay idea was so good that I glimpsed an opportunity to create something mine that really matters. So I rescued a series of stories I’ve been writing since 1998 and made a spin off for this project. Still poisoned with tropes, I set a Warrior and a Damsel with a vampire, sure, kidnapping the damsel. And, obviously, the warrior goes for the rescue.

The twist: the Warrior transforms into a werewolf near vampires. In the final boss, the warrior as a unconscious beast and not recognizing his Damsel would kill her. Bringing a sad finale to story.
...
Yes. I was using female as a disposable element to construct my male character emotions.

Boo me. Again.

I was ok with that at first. The development was marching ok. The game was almost in the end...
until I reach:

THE PERCEPTION

Then I meet Anita Sarkeesian. Not in person. But in videos. I watch it all. All tropes.



Some details I would disagree with her. Because some games you have to go until the end to make some statements. But man, you can't ignore the load of cliché that is all over the place.
All same shit over and over and over and over and over and over again.

Anita K.O. me. My game that I treated with so much care was just one more in the middle.
I was wounded. I got on my bike to take some air and when I realize:

I'm not creating.
I am digesting. 

I’m digesting all of those games I’ve being consuming these years.
I am not developing MY product I am digesting my cultural food.

This is shit. A product of digestion is shit.

Anita bring the discussion to the game scene. She poked us in the eye. It turns up to a point where all things can get really confusing. There is some good opinions out there, but also, for some, a game with male protagonist is like automatic bullshit. Some could go even further, were games created by a man = meh!

These days I read a twit of Lisa Hignett (@LisaHignett):

"I care about both genders making games by their own merit!".

Merit - a good word to use when creating your characters also.
Do they matter for themselves, first?
Am I using my female characters respecting their existence in the context, or just building up the “awesomeness” of my male character?

For these questions I highly recommend you to watch all Tropes vs. Women videos.



I keep it written down on my pocket notepad all the described tropes.
To keep in mind these six clichés.

1- The Manic Pixie Dream Girl
2- Women in Refrigerator
3- The Smurfette Principle
4- The Evil Demon Seductress
5- The Mystical Pregnancy
6- The Straw Feminist

Run away from it somehow. Scream!

After that you can start "dating" with you characters. Know they better. To realize if you are creating or  justing 'pooping' female characters, there is The Bechdel Test. Quoting the Feminist Frequency site:

The Bechdel Test or the Mo Movie Measure is a type of litmus test to assess the presence of women in movies.  It originated from Allison Bechdel’s comic “Dykes to Watch Out For” in 1985.  Here’s how it works, a movie just has to pass these three simple questions: the first, are there two or more women in it who have names, the second, do they talk to each other, and the third, do they talk to each other about something other then a man.

For games I think that the questions could be:

1-Are there two or more women in it who have names?
2-Do they need assistance of a male?
3-Do they are over sexualized because 'why not'*?
*this last one is not agains't hyper sexualized woman. Since everyone is free to do whatever with their lives, the issue is the context, the character individual personality plot and not just to "build audience"

With all these tools I could make a good plot now? Can't I? Well...

MORE PROBLEM AFTER PERCEPTION

Title of a Polygon article:

Ubisoft abandoned women assassins in co-op because of the additional work.

Additional work.

I was already almost a year doing the game. Alone. With no money. Coding. Composing music. Evolving my characters from black rectangles to a sprite frame. The sprite frame to a Texture Atlas. With memory leaking everywhere. It was nuts. And I realized my plot was shit.

All the suffering, all the sweat… My new unique gameplay on the line. Man, my plot couldn’t be the weak link here.
I do embrace the additional work — happy.

I couldn’t remake the core elements of the game. But I could give it a little deeper background. Drop some meaning on some places. Seasoning the elements. Avoiding or toying with the tropes. Please note that I am not a feminist genius, and the end result is far from being considerate The Modern Plot of the Year.

But I think I manage to fix some punctual problems, and let the plot background expand far more better than before.

Another problem I faced was: brief texts. The game is iPad only, and as a tablet player, long texts RPGs are very tiresome for me. iPad is heavy, I want to go to action fast. So to present the plot I develop a limited chat space. And some plot details stayed out - it is normal tho. A lot of games explain themselves on guides or let things open for people make theories by themselves.

THE FIX

First fix: my main character was not a Warrior anymore. It is just a boy.
Second fix: The damsel is the warrior now. An Amazon warrior. With a name: Makayla.

In the game, Dir does not want to rescue or save Makayla. He wants to impress her. He admires and is thanked to all her patience being his tutor. He is an accidental fool, creating a bravery that he does not have, going on an adventure with some unknown partner just to make her proud of him.

At some moments Makayla would camouflages in the roles of some tropes.
Like after get attacked by an Incubus: Women in refrigerator
Disappear with the castle: Damsel in Distress
Reborn as a vampire: The Evil Demon Seductress
But she never play the roles of it per se. During the game Makayla is passing by her own quest. A quest of confidence and freedom that she desires since the beginning — for her and also for Dir. The consequences of the adventure for each one is different, tho.

“Jauss takes over the notion of horizon which he names “horizon of expectation” and means by it the sum total of reactions, prejudgments, verbal and other behavior that greet a work upon its appearance. A work may fulfill such a horizon by confirming the expectations vested in it or it may disappoint the expectations by creating a distance between itself and them.”
— Jauss, Hans Robert: Aesthetic Experience and Literary Hermeneutics

CONCLUSION

So yeah. I said I was no feminist content genius. The main protagonist still a male fellow. Not the best of fixes but as the base of my game was already set, toying around with the flaws, seasoning some elements, made the story resolve themselves.

I’m sure in the future I can do a better job. And this text is just to show that even aware we tend to march to some cliché situations. The actual culture affects our creational process without we don’t even noticing it. We must be aware every time and try our best to untie this trope knots proposing a fair entertainment for everybody.

I‘m glad that I could perceive and fix it. Thanks Anita and everyone who is out there waving the flag — and taking some bullets. From a random damsel to a solid warrior that conducted the entire game concept. I hope Makayla could be impressed. x)

I have some female friends that aren't much favorable of man talking about feminism. I kinda understand that. But after watch "A Trip to a Grocery Store", maybe I can do better then just listen to it.


I think that if society is giving me any privilege because I am male, I want to use this to show how ‘privilege’ can make me a moron.

North Wind: Trill of Consciousness - First level!

Hey guys! Yup I made a game and stuff. I am not very good talking about my own stuff. Usually I do better praising other works. You can watch the trailer here:



So, to be fair with this creation of mine -that I'm pretty proud of- I will make a quick Walkthrough. How to beat Level 1 first "puzzle".

:D

So, this game is exploration with puzzle. Not focusing on combat, when you hit an enemy it is a brawl, dude. You get damaged and so do the enemy. That is a wild world out there.

Anyways.

Posture!
First, the best way to hold the iPad to play North Wind: Trill of Consciousness is like a huge Game Boy. Portrait position. Four fingers of each hand holding the back of the iPad and leaving thumbs free!

Start the game, a menu screen will load with a "New Game" mark on it. And a huge yellow button.
You can see some marks on the screen.

Swipe menus! (First time playing? Press the yellow button and jump to "Starting the game" section)
The standard language is English, you can skip this if you want to play that way. 
Swipe the top mark (on the title) to change the language. If you swipe once, you get the Brazilian Portuguese language setting. If you try one more swipe you will manage to see some Japanese characters, but no access to it - that's normal! It is under construction. Soon I will release the Japanese version.

If it is your first time playing you can skip this one:
Swipe the middle mark (on the 'new game' or 'level: x deaths:x') and it will appear a message asking if you want to delete the actual game. (if you have already played, sure). Press the yellow button twice to confirm the complete deletion, and the game will reset to 'new game' once again.

With the language defined and the 'New Game' on screen, press the yellow button. A mini story will pop while the maps are loading.

Starting the game!
The game starts with Makayla (the blonde pixel sprite) waving at Dir! Dir is our main hero. He is just a boy occasionally mentored by this blonde Amazon. Go there meet her. The game don't have a tutorial like: 'go left, press jump'... because I assume that you have already played a game on your life and can figure stuff out. But if you can't: use your thumbs to press the directional grey buttons. The purple button is jump!

When you reach her, you may have learned how to walk, and how far can you jump! Nice. You get and item from her. A shining pearl it is pretty useful on dark places, like this nice cave you are about to enter.

Keep going down. You can slip trough the rope at left or just jump right at the floor. Height won't kill you on this game! Go at the water, float till the other side. Keep walking right until a scene begins.

Dir sights a bat. You have to kill it to impress Makayla. But Dir felt a tremor and as you may have noticed something pretty odd is happening out there. A bunch of monsters and stuff on sky. Wow. Makayla must be in danger. Dir still need to beat the bat. Like I said before, lean on it! This is not super Mario, so you don't need to hit the head. Just tackle him down. You will get light injured.

Now the path is opened, you can go back and see what the hell is going on! Apparently Makayla is heavily wounded. And your future doesn't look brighter. 

Boss: Incubus

Incubus is ridiculous strong for a boy! You can try your best... you can't reach him.

The only thing remaining here is: death..ops! What? 

Werefox!

When Dir faces any Vampire, the smell of these creatures do some inner damage on his mind. After Dir is beaten up, an inner fox souls takes place. It is more strong and can jump higher. Incubus is no match for you now, perhaps his energy balls are a lil annoying and protect him. Avoid them, hit him and kill it.

After beating the boss, the Mandragora monster will lose all its energies. And will be back as a seed. Dir get it and attach it on his body. Now he is able to absorb purple energies. Beware! If a monster attacks you with a purple energy it can hurt you - because they are full of evil intentions. When you get these energies standing still on the wild is pretty safe. Mandragora will eat it and will get stronger. 

Small energies give: 1 energy point

Big energies give: 5 energy points

Get the energy and Mandragora will level up.

This is basically a "not declared" tutorial. You manage to understand the basics of play.

You can see this whole process at this video gameplay made by TouchGameplay:

First level puzzle.

After first level up you will be able to swipe and change the screens! (Like it happened when the Incubus appeared). You can only swipe between 3 maps at level one. But is pretty enough right now.

Stay away from screen divisions. Hold off the buttons and wait. Did shining lines appeared on the screen? 

NO:

You are on some wrong spot. Stay at a lower place on the map.

YES:
Great! The map screen are now divided on 3 pieces. #Top, #Middle and #Down. You can also notice some marks on each piece. Green arrows show that there is some maps to the right! If you swipe to the left you can access them. The red bar indicates that you can't swipe that map yet. On the screen above you can notice why: Dir is on the map. You can't swipe it if Dir is on it or if Dir is in the middle of the line. The reason is clear: Dir would not divide himself in the middle! With that in mind let's advance.


-if you want to beat the game by your own guts, don't read bellow, try your best and good luck. if you are stuck tho... keep reading-

To stay easy I will call maps by numbers.

MAP1: with the cave and castle as background, the Rock Fields
MAP2: with the forest and egg at top of a mountain, Rock Forest or something like this xD
MAP3: the lava abandoned pit, The Pit

First thing:
Change the #Middle to MAP2
Change the #Top to MAP2.
(just swipe to the left one time each).

You will put on screen part of the forest map.

So make this configuration:

#Top MAP2
#Middle MAP2
#Down MAP1 --> you are here

Jump to the #middle map, and climb the mountain at right, until you reach the "egg" at #top.
Change the #down to MAP2.
Change the #Middle to MAP1.

You see a little opening? Go there, take the little energy inside the cave at #Middle. continue going down until you reach #down! Now you are at the cave made by the dwarfs! Watch out for the traps!!
Change the #Middle to MAP2.
Keep going up until you can reach the #Middle. Grab the bracelet. Now you can break grey boulders!
Yay! :D

And that is it. You get your first item. Now you can explore some new areas. Now is up to you, folks.

Hi. I’ve made a game.

Hi. I’ve made a game.

Yeah. Video games. When I was a baby my mom wanted me to have some tech stuff. She always loved to see tech stuff at the time. And bought me an Atari. I grew in a religous family with strict rules about playing. “There is moment just the right moment for everything”. They don’t wanted a spoiled addicted child, I guess. I was addicted but pretty obedient. I got a Mega Drive yeaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaars later. So I have played Atari a lot. Pitfall was the best.

But my favourite childhood games were Golden Axe and Streets of Rage series. I was a SEGA boy, since my first console right after an Atari was Mega Drive (Genesis). I would later get a Super Nintendo. But the colours, speed and kind more upbeat/mature music of Sonic make Mario just a kid game for my taste.

For Super Nintendo I loved the game Yu Yu Hakusho Final: Makai Saikyo Retsuden (at the time people at Descalvado, where I lived, used to call it Namcot Final - damn japanese titles lol). And for PC: Ultima VIII.

I always told my sister that I would be video game music composer. Just because I could do some freaking noises with my mouth. What a stupid, stupid child I was. haha

So I always was like thinking about ~working with something to do with games~. Simple like that. Like a kid wants to be astronaut. 

Being professional

But the things got serious when I saw the intro of Legend of Zelda, at a store on a shopping at São Carlos, Link riding Epona. No sound - I was outside the store. I didn’t had contact with older Zelda series before. First time meeting Link. I was like: I want to do this. I want to do video games. 

And I started to look about it, study. I see the term game designer. I was like: no shit. 

While some friends were ~tasting teenaging~ drink wine at central square, I was so hooked with King of Fighters on a local Arcade. I even started to do my own Video game project. A fighting game called North Wind. Each team had 3 fighters. And I started to draw them a lot with Yu Yu Hakusho references. I started to write a lot of background story. My mom said it was a bit confusing. And my dad criticise that “why all the characters sounds like japanese names”.

It was the first time I take a step out of my references and started to create my own stuff. I even did a small class of Game Design with a japanese teacher. It was in 2000 I guess. The fighting game got bigger and turn out to be a RPG. x) At the time an english teacher who came from Wales lent me a Zelda cartridge to Game Boy. Man, I love that game. It was a black cartridge. Original! It was AWESOME!! Zelda always impact me like that. 

Starting prototypes

I moved from Descalvado to Franca. At college, a physics teacher knew my desire of working with games and showed me RPG Maker. I started my first game production right there. I made a lot of “Beta’s”, North Wind got a lot of characters and branches. It was a mess. I lose a lot of content with HD burning and stuff. A teen drama. 

My North Wind game scripts got a lot of content. Zelda was on my head. Castlevania was on my head. And then it happens: Castlevania: Symphony of The Night.

dammit! I need to work with games so hard. lol After that time I tried some school at USA but they do not want foreign at the moment.

In Brazil, at the time, there was a post graduation course at a far away city. I was like, ok…I will do anything and go post graduate. That was my silly mind at that moment.

So I made Advertising.  …

My father works with Marketing, and speak about it at lunches - so it would be easy for me (4 YEARS DUDE, SERIOUSLY??).

In my mind I really wanted to avoiding programming. I always thought that: I’m a game designer, I have to think about experience. And schools make you hate math, so in the end you don’t know how cool math can be.

The university really screw me up. I started an innocent guy, doing ads classes and as hobby a RPG for the university. An horror game about a girl that wakes up in the university and it is already late. She is surrounded by large roaches, ghosts… a flying lizard?? and she need to explore the university to get the fuck out.

I never finish it. My mistake was to keep upgrading RPG Maker on all it versions. With this, I had to do a lot of “rework”. 

But at a bright side It was my first interaction with programming: the basics, if/else, fork conditions,  scripts in Ruby. I was really on it.

But I was having a hard time: I didn’t like advertising. I wanted to quit classes in the end of the second year. But my mother don’t accept it, so I finish against my will. Some teacher were really monsters that craft ego outside of our selves. I was transformed on a dick person. In the last year of university I was a total dick.

There was 3 stuff that happens to me that split me out of this nonsense moment:

1- The lost of Graduation hat

I have a musician friend that I helped a lot to pass the classes while he could totally focus on his music, so when he saw that I lost my hat he gave me his and said:

- you can have it, it is important to you than it is to me

That thing really hits me. I was like: this is not important to me. Why I care about this hat anyway? Simbolize something I don’t wanna do.

A nail on my brain. A crack on the ego persona.

2- The architecture student waiting for the bus

The dude was trembling, smoking 3 cigars per second… I asked if he was ok, he said:

- when this all finish (university), I hope I can go back to be who I was.

Another nail on my brain. A bigger crack on the ego persona.

3- The girl I had a crush

Then I saw a girl I used to like on the first year of university. She used to be a very mean to me, but I wouldn’t care. Every time I tried to be clever than before and make she smile. But she would always be hard on me. Always. Thinking about that, my experience with girls on university was so lame. Maybe this helped to make myself a dick too. lol Anyways. But then I met her again. The mean girl and the dick me. I thought: bla… she just hates me.

She was with a big smile, talking with me. I was like: is she drugged? But she said that really liked me, because no matter what she would say, I always gave her a smile.

Bang! my ego persona was killed. I was blinded. I created a being to finish the university, but the creature continued on me. Everything makes sense again. Fuck this university. Where was I this whole time? This is not important to me, I want to make games.

And that is why I am so bad with girls. lol

So I start to study, bought books, stuff. I wanted to know terms, professional methods. I got my old University Horror Game and tried to make it a popular game. I remake it and used Marimoon as character. I’ve used a popular girl in Brazil because I wanted to get feedback. Certainly her fans would play it and talk about it. What was the point to make a game and nobody knows about it? 

Despertar de Mari

Mariland

With this experience and feedback I could build up my confidence. My plan was: go to Japan, sit in front Konami’s door and beg a job until I starve. That’s me! My father was so worried, because I was deadly serious. I told him: If i have to work with ad I prefer to kill myself. And he was like: woa, calm down. I was a lil misguided about things. Started to do Theater classes. I was searching things to handle experiences, create characters and stuff - voice acting would be pretty awesome too. I was searching this aspects of creation and stuff.

Then Ubisoft came to Brazil with a game designer position. That was my time. But…. What should I send? a curriculum? pff. thats lame. I have nothing. RPG maker prototype with pixel pop artist? don’t make me laugh. I was empty handed. I researched and saw they want to make a DS game. So I made something that I am pretty proud of. I’ve found a DS game maker stuff. it was a pretty basic stuff that could make homebrew games to run on flashdrives and specifics cartridges. It could run on DS. The software had a lot of limitations and watermark on screen. It was really no good. So I started to edited the programming on Text notes. and compile with Eclipse I guess. And I freaking made a curriculum running on Nintendo DS. 

I was stunned. I made the package, It was ready to send, I open the Ubisoft site and: no position available. Dammit! What?

I was late. So I tried the old good internet, found the place Ubisoft was, send it anyway.

No response. I tried to call, emails. Until a day an HR guy answer me. He told that find it pretty impressive and in the first opportunity they would call me. I was like: happy!

And then my parents get divorced. That was quite traumatic. They were divorced but living at the same roof. My sis was married, And I was the only one here. I felt like I was holding them. Like a needle. And then Antonio, my friend, invited me to go to São Paulo. He don’t even had a home yet. He was living with some familiars. And even still he invited me. “come here we managed to do something”

:~

And I leave everything behind for the games. Even a girl I was with at the moment - for unbelievable it looks like. At São Paulo I was searching for any job. Just to stay close to Ubisoft. I past 3 months of total despair. Low money.  No job. Low food. Living under a roof by favor. But I manage to get a job finally. A cool one. Sell video games at a bookstore - how cool is that? A good experience. I met a lot of cool dudes, learn a lot about the market. But after 8 months, I was consumed. I did a lot of side projects in the meantime (paper, concept) and sent to Ubisoft.

some characters done with Antonio/DS project

some characters done with Antonio/DS project

Some facebook game prototype

Some facebook game prototype

No answer. Then I discovered the HR guy that was my contact wasn't at ubi anymore. Plus Antonio leave São Paulo. I was quite alone. I manage to live with my friend John for sometime. I even did a 4 days project - on my xmas vacation.

Reroute 2 Remain

Reroute 2 Remain

Reroute 2 Remain

Reroute 2 Remain

But John had a serious accident right after and came back to Franca. And I was alone again. And I left SP for the first time. I thought: in 3 months I will be back.

I made another project, and Antonio was back to São Paulo. I asked if I could spent a weekend at his house to send a project to ubi. He said it was cool. I went there. Sent the ubi the project. And in the same afternoon I got a call. I got a job. Not at Ubisoft, but as game journalist. What a plot twist. 

I work for Pop.com/games. Had a column about japanese games, met a lot of my personal heroes (old journalists from loved magazines). Tested some games. Learned a lot. I also visited some game schools. At the time "Game development" courses was trending. But was kinda disappointed. I made a distant course on Java. Made a lil game of pong. lol

I also had some interviews on new companies spawning at the moment, but I was rejected because I don't had experience - the enterprise don't have either... ¬¬ anyways you can't judge experience. A shower in the rain is a experience. Frustration is a experience. Moving on...

At the time Pop never wrote any article about indie games nor national made games. But I showed the game Talbot Odyssey (Miniboss) to the guys and they were very impressed and permitted to write an article about it.



Miniboss was like a relief for me. Finally a good stuff that mixed art+content. I was really angry with national scenario and Miniboss really made me proud of being a Brazilian wanting to work with games. I made quite a raging article. But my editor like it and approved it. After a while I get out the job. São Paulo is a very expensive city. I came back to Franca without perspective. Found myself in 3 shit relationships. I was really down. Broken. When Antonio came back from São Paulo to live in Franca. He and a fellow were about to open an animation studio. And ask me if I knew how to do apps for iPhone. I never knew shit about apple stuff. Just that were expensive stuff.

But I said: I can learn. I did a curriculum on DS godammit

My father helped me with an iMac, I got an iPhone.

I got seriously fucked up with money. I've started to study like was no tomorrow. 

The guys ask me a lot of prototypes. They got tons of ideas. Child books. Child games. Shoes catalogues. All for iPad. I had to do on iMac, go to the fellow house, got his iPad, came back to home build it, goes back to fellow and present it... But there was a serious problem. I made the prototypes, but it ends there. Nothing happens. The guys wont do nothing! When we got our first client I got so excited that I bought an iPad with the help of my mom. It was my last breath. It was also the last breath of the group. We got disbanded. I was bankrupt. 

It was a really fucked up moment. My mom helped me a lot. I was living under her roof again. I was marching to 30 years. I was a failure. I just hated myself because nothing goes right.

I tried talk with people. With the indie people from here. But everyone seems to be occupied with a lot of stuff. People were doing things. Traveling. I feel that I was interrupting them. Being annoying. I don't want to bother no one. I just want to know if I can help. I can do stuff for mobile.

But nobody wanted mobile because there is “just shit games”.

I said, “well this is a good scenario. maybe this is an opportunity to make a good game”

But I was kinda alone again. And my confidence was down the river.

Then I said. I will do this shit. I will do an entire game on my own. Art, music…everything. I don’t know how, but I will. I will draw a stick. Like that minimalist Street fighter characters.

I’ll try my best. I will not bother anyone. I will just do it. I knew that indie scene was about a community, people helping each other. And stuff. But now I feel like I was the anti-christ of Brazilian indie. I got myself inside my cave (bedroom). Don't bother anyone. And make something depending on no one. 

There is a lot of people out there that don’t do any games. Don’t do any apps and start speaking on how to do stuff. List rules. People gaining money trying to teach something they don’t personally achieve. While some may not achieved but researched a lot and have some basis to speak, there is also a bunch some o crap. I research a lot in the middle of garbage and could find also a lot of cool and precious stuff. For this game I’ve used my feelings and a lot of searching on Stackoverflow (I did just one question but I manage to figure it out by myself - nobody understand it anyway :~ Yup, I've deleted all my code haha).

I don’t make a game to be commercial. I made a game out of an idea I had and believe. I wanted it to be mine game, so I used old papers I had written when younger. I wanted to make it cool for me and respectful to all the references I love.

And the first success tip I read on internet was: to make a successful game, give it a short name. And that is how it is born: North Wind: Trill of Consciousness.

Because list of rules sucks!

[soundcloud]

Konami

I love this enterprise. :~

First Person Mario: Endgame (Final Level)

If you haven't seen yet, check it out the first level clicking here. This one is the final level.

[Peta] Pokémon Black & Blue: gotta free 'em all

And Peta strikes back the gaming community! After developing the Super Meat Boy parody, they now uses Pokemon as they "target". Peta's Pokémon Black & Blue: gotta free 'em all. Remember that they also publish Super Tanooki Skin 2D: Mario Kills Tanooki (protesting agains't Mario Tanooki Cloth ) and another one that is a protest against McDonalds using Mario -Nintendo again- as reference: Super Chick Sister). Uh, and I almost forget the Peta's unauthorized version of Cooking Mama: Mama Kills Animals.

Apparently Peta loves/hates Nintendo so much that can't lose 'em of sight. And this Pokemon game get the gameplay references pretty well crafted. The attack effects and consequences, it is all there. Wrap trapping enemy. Take down hitting with recoil. Peta is pretty nerd I must say. Nerd and angry.

There is also custom moves like: protest and group hug. Attacks that get not so good effects at all. Just strategic "enemy status down" features that every old player must know that at lower levels is a pretty fool nuisance - mainly cause you won't be able to heal, so you cannot afford a wrong strategy.

The plot is about a protesting Pikachu that breaks free and starts his quest agains't trainer oppression  You have to fight trainers and release their pokémons that, eventually, will join your party. As about all RPG, I skip the blabber. So...yeah, don't know any individual plots. Sue me. Pretty sad the Tepig with ears cut btw. :~~~

In your path you will find Joy nurse and other fellow NPC pocket monsters that will give you bonus gifts: a sad video, wallpaper and a trading card game. I don't give attention to the gifts, I must confess. Don't know exactly what is the TCG stuff at all. I just endure till the end. I will not embed the game in the blog cause, as featuring in all Peta games, the sound starts playing automatically. So...it is a burden.
About the soundtrack: pretty generic. The battle theme is pretty good. Sure, it is a rip off from the original, so...

If you want to play, please click the link right here.

In my humble opinion, Peta is not focusing on the games itself - not 100%, maybe 40%... mmm. But using its reference as a real world statement. Every kind of information and "makes you think about something" stuff is pretty valid in warchildPost beliefs - despite the annoying ich in thoughts about using something indie like Super Meat Boy to do a protest... Or maybe I'm dead wrong and Peta is just a scum losing focus of real world problems. -anyways- Life is just once. Let's try to take the best of everything - not like pirates or vikings... I mean: conceptually.  ¬¬

Hey, wait!! What about trademark and copyrights?
A: Don't know folks.
I don't have a clue why games like Streets of Rage remake goes down and this damn protest flash parodies are on.

If you are lazy to play every game cited above - cause you have played your whole childhood or are tired about Peta attacking the game world - you can check the videos below.
It was really a hell of a time passing through all the 5 seconds skip ads and the "hello everybody" or super techno/rock intro of nerds super "funny", "headed" and always opinionated about everything in 99% of videos. So difficult to find a -CLEAN, with the soundtrack on and with no SPEAKING MOTHERFUCKER- gameplay video. So please, enjoy!

Cooking Mama: Mama Kills Animals


Super Tanooki 2D


Super Chick Sisters


Pokémon Black & Blue