Down to...three issues.

I got the saving and loading working.  Now I just need to make the saving not make the game stop.  One step forward and one step back.  The worst part is that I can only work on it while I'm at home and not cleaning or watching the kids.  That's like 30 minutes a day, and deploying the game to the xbox is pretty slow.  Needless to say, I don't get a whole lot done that way.  I'm hoping to get them released at the same time, but I haven't been able to make much headway on the xbox version.  What to do?

Well, I'm still working on the website.  And the demo for Siphon Spirit isn't done yet.  I'll wait on the PC version until those are ready.  There's not a whole lot to do for the Siphon Spirit demo on my end.  I'm fairly certain that I'll have the website finished before the demo is done, so as soon as I get the website ready to roll I'm going to start on my next project.  It's going to be completely different from March to the Moon and will not the be sequel.  It's a fairly short project and I'm hoping to finish it in 3-4 months.  I'll start on March From the Moon after it's finished and I've had the chance to read reviews and see what changes people want.

Down to three issues

Yup!  Just three things left until I can get it in to be reviewed on the xbox.  1. Get the saving and loading working correctly.  2. Display correctly on TVs.  3. Make the screen transitions faster.

I made some progress with 1. yesterday.  I think I'm really close on it now.  Today I'm stopping by a friends house so we can find out what it looks like on a HD TV.  I'm not cool enough to have one myself.  3. is going to be a lot more tricky.  Hopefully I can get it figured out.  The PC version is done but I'm waiting until we get a demo for Siphon Spirit up to help advertise for that as well.  I also need to finish making the new califergames website.

Sorry for the short post, I'm feeling exhausted :(

Failing on the Xbox

Okay, the website is coming along pretty well now.  I just wish the porting to the Xbox360 was going so well.  There's a LOT of slowdown in the game that needs to be cleaned up.  It's perfectly fine on the laptop, but on the xbox it's just not cutting it.  I also need to change the saving stuff and resize the screen.

I'm close, I really am.  Hopefully it will be done soon (and heck, the PC version pretty much is done.  I just need a demo).  I hope to be able to start a new project soon.  Or maybe even TWO new projects...

Getting ready to port to the xbox

Well, the only thing that's keeping me back from putting the game out is the lack of a website to sell it on.  However, I can still put it on the xbox.  I think.  I haven't actually put it on the xbox yet, but I do have a Creator's Club membership and have gotten another XBLIG game onto it and reviewed it.  Hopefully I'll be able to get it on the xbox tonight and get it on there.  I've been busy revamping the website (still) and have started on the March to the Moon section now.  Going to work on the Siphon Spirit section next and hopefully have a short updated demo of it before March to the Moon comes out.

Making websites.

In order to actually sell March to the Moon, I'm going to want a website.  Sure, I could put it out on XBox LIVE Indie Games without having a website, but I think it's better to have something for people to go visit if they end up liking the game.  We're hoping to have a new, updated demo for Siphon Spirit as well so that we can get more people to see it and hopefully be interested.  As for March to the Moon I just need to add a screen for people quitting the demo and it's finished.

But since I apparently don't want to sit back and relax at all, I already have the design doc done for my next game.  Since I haven't done any work on it yet (aside from planning and documentation) I don't want to talk about it yet.  One thing I am going to say is that it is NOT the sequel to March to the Moon and it isn't a big game.  I hope to have it finished in 3-4 months of starting.  I will probably take a small break before starting that project to add another 50 or so levels to Siphon Spirit to use the advanced spells, which got added in after I'd already made a number of levels.  The reason I'm not jumping into the sequel for March to the Moon is that I want to have a chance to get some feedback and see what people want to see before I jump in.  3-4 months after release I should have all the feedback that I can reasonably expect.

It's video time!

First up, let's watch the trailer for March to the Moon!

I'm pretty much done on it now.  I just have a few bugs to clean up and test a few abilities.  After that, I'm just waiting until we finish setting up the LLC and the bank account we're going to make for it.  After that's up I can get on the Creator's Club and actually put my game on the XBox.  Looking forward to finally getting a game finished!

But wait, that's not the only game we've got a video for!  Here's a video of Siphon Spirit in action.

Looking good!  It actually looks better on my laptop, but the compression I did on the video makes it look a bit darker than it already is.

What else is going on?  I'm glad you asked!  Peter and I are completely remaking the site so that it's more of a Califer Games thing instead of just a Siphon Spirit thing.  On top of that, I've been doing some planning for my next game.  I've done my research and I'm going to write the design doc today.

I LIED!

I didn't mean to, it just kind of happened... I was planning on the fourth beta being the last, but now people are actually talking more about the difficulty levels. The general consensus now is that it gets too easy, especially in Hero mode. I'm going to go for one more round of testing where I introduce something to make the game more difficult and also make getting multiple skills more attractive.

Aside from that, I've been really busy setting up Califer Games as an LLC. It's going a little slow since we're trying to make sure that we actually do it right. We're trying to get it done now so we can set up a bank account and use that to pay for server costs so that we can get a server and COMPLETELY revamp our webpage. Since it's being hosted by google pages there's no place for us to upload files to. Hopefully soon I'll be able to get a demo done for people to download. You know after I finish coding the site so I can show the game that I coded.

Maybe I'll just take a nap.