| Leadwerks wins engine race - Sunday January 31 2010 10:37:32 | |
|---|---|
 |
After a month of thinking hard and looking at all my options I have opted to buy a license for the LeadWerks engine. The trial for leadwerks didn't include any sort of way of being able to test your code so it was a bit of a gamble but I was so impressed with the tutoral videos and the SDK demo. Now that I have the engine on my pc to play with I am even more impressed. Its a fast OpenGL engine that's easy to talk too and has features that you would find in the Crytek engine. It costed twice as much as all the other engines I was evaluating but it comes with more goodies. First there is the world editor, a WYSIWYG real time landscape builder, model importing tools, material editor. As well as a bunch of models and assets to use in games. While my current project doesn't need the use of landscapes it does open up more possibilities down the line. At the moment I am working on porting my games prototype from xors3d into leadwerks. This is a complete rewrite but progress is going very smoothly. A download of the prototype will appear on my forums soon. |
| Announcing Advanced Tactical Space Battles - Thursday December 31 2009 12:53:08 | |
 |
As meantioned in the post below I am working on my very own game. The codename/working title is Advanced Tactical Space Battles. Details on what its about are still going to be light. But its a 2D game in a full 3D engine which will play partly like Star Control, Star Flight and PSI 5 Trading Company. Today I took the first real step forward licensing one of the engines I will write it in. BlitzMax. Blitzmax is a fantastic language to program in. Its fast and easy to pick up. In the past I had BlitzBasic on my Amiga which was also a dream to work with. Best of all Blitz is a NZ product. Xors3d being lined up for the render engine, this may change to MiniB3D or leadworks depending on where I go and xors3d heads. At the moment xors3d is still looking like the render I will be licensing as it just works and is what the prototype uses. The thumbnail for this post is a actual screen shot from the prototype now compiled as a stand alone program and up for download for any one classed as a Yamama Vet. If you have been around my site since the JK2 days and are still in good standing with me you have instant access to all prototypes, alphas, betas and final product. |
| New layout for a new year - Monday December 28 2009 12:56:28 | |
 |
A few months back I created a entire new back end for another site which I integrated into my own website today. Thing is on the front things still looked the same, so I decided to start redesigning the entire look for the site. First off to make things cleaner and also to prepare for the game I am writing. BTW, I am using Java script on the site to make things work, if your menu looks fugly then you need to make sure you allow yamama.co.nz in your java script white list. There is still more changes to come and I plan to use the main site a bit more to post info instead of just the forums. |
| World of Warcraft Client Patch 3.2.0 - Wednesday August 05 2009 07:11:08 | |
 |
The druid make over patch has been released today. As well as the new 5 - 10 - 25 man raid, the new battleground and all the other changes to the game. The servers are currently still down for maintenance but should be back up 3pm PST. Full updated patch notes in rest of the Article.  Click for full article |
| Some of my Favorite game intros - Sunday June 28 2009 22:16:06 | |
| I was playing the Witcher tonight and every time I do, I can't help but watch its intro. Game intro's should show you what the game is about, they should draw you in the best way they can. The Witchers intro is near perfect as it gives nothing away but introduces you to the world and the main character. This got me thinking of other intros I have enjoyed over the years and thanks to the power of you tube you to can see them. To start with, here is The Witcher intro which got me going on this post. Click on the full article to see more classic game introductions. Click for full article | |
| World of Warcraft PTR Patch 3.2.0 - Friday June 19 2009 12:31:12 | |
 |
Alot of crying over these new changes but I think its going to be great. Highlights: * XP via PVP - Level your toons now just by playing battlegrounds * Druid Skins * New 5 man, 10 man and 25 man content * Changes to badge loot. Naxx and Heroic badges will open up new options for loot Also a whole lot more other changes. Full patch notes below. Click for full article |
| Cold Night in Eversong - Friday May 29 2009 07:08:45 | |
| World of Warcraft Client Patch 3.1.0 - Thursday April 16 2009 18:59:21 | |
 |
The Secrets of Ulduar patch was deployed yesterday featuring The Argent Tournament. This is a huge 700mb+ patch that is the first wave of balance changes for classes. Some classes got nerfed, others got a few buffs but most have been changed radical in some way. The other biggest change is dual specs. Now I can bear and boomkin too. Click for full article |
| WoW Patch 3.0.8 - Wednesday January 21 2009 07:55:16 | |
 |
The first patch for WoTLK is now live on the realm servers. To me this is the Bear / DK patch as most of the changes effect bear tanks and DK tanks. Full patch notes in rest of the article. UpdateA bug in the patch/server update has caused realms to crash when the battle for Wintergrasp ends ( every 30 mins ) Blizzard plan to shutdown the Wintergrasp event until a fix is found. Click for full article |
| Blizzcon 08 - Monday October 20 2008 09:55:59 | |
 |
Blizzcon this year was HUGE. Yet I can't help but feel it didn't really produce any big surprises. The big announcement this con was the new Wizard Class for Diablo 3. The Diablo 3 information was great and it gave me a clear idea of the direction Blizzard is going with the game. They want to keep the core action gameplay and item collection that made Diablo what it is but expand on the RPG elements and character customizations. The biggest thing they showed was the new rune system which allows you to augment your spells and attacks giving different effects. The thing that struck me is this system seems like what inscription was going to be in WoTLK before they chickened out. They showed bouncy fireballs and other cool effects applied to spells with runes. Another thing that stood out was the random quest system. To keep with the true feeling of diablo they wish to have two types of quests. Main story quests which feature more static locations and random quests which can pop up anywhere. Diablo 2 only had static style quests, as you played the chapters you did everything in a linear order in a random world. In Diablo 2 it will take quite a few plays of the main story before you see all the random quests that are in the game. Sadly due to the amount of people at Blizzcon I didn't get a chance to play the hands on demo of the game. For some reasion the Diablo section was the same size as the WoTLK hands which only seemed ¼ full most of the time. The Diablo section had cues up to 4 hours just to play it. I did get to play Starcraft 2 some more. The zerg were full playable this time and so set to work on giving them ago. Sadly it turns out they are currently underpowered and I got wiped out by a zelot rush in under less than 10 minutes. Still I got to see some of their new abilities and units. The queen is the biggest change, she is now a ground unit that can build creep generators as well do other functions. Partly the reason I got rushed was I was trying to get my little zerglings to fly. They were so cute and keeped distracting me from building up a force. Lastly there was a lot of talk about WoTLK. Sadly most of this wasn't new news but the future direction of the game was interesting. Blizzard want you to play the character you want to play, not what your guildmaster wants you to raid with. They also want the game to be less reliant on consumables, drums of war, potions, food buffs etc. Lets face it, farming this stuff sucks and it will be nice when its gone. I personally feel some people have become to reliant on potions and not on learning how to play the game properly. They showed some fly thoughts of the upcoming dungeons which look interesting as well as lake wintergrasp in full swing. I just couldn't help feel that those videos were scripted as they looked too awesome to be true. Huge battlefields with massive siege game play. The new battleground looks like a beach assault playing like Wolf:ET. With turrets and tanks. We got to meet Oxhorn again which was nice and he gave us a Oxhorn badge. The costumes were amazing this year and there was more cool stuff to look at with the vendors. Toys, miniatures and other things. Besides Blizzcon we also had a great time at Disneyland. It was the off session so we had zero cues while waiting to go on rides. Much better than last year and we did a lot more. Also we headed down to Seaworld which was just amazing. Just their Autumn is like our summer in a heatwave. So Blizzcon and California was a blast but it feels good to be back home again. |
| Warcraft 3.0.2 patch - Saturday October 18 2008 18:29:46 | |
Echoes of DoomWhile we were away at Blizzcon, Blizzard released the massive upgrade to Warcraft to pave the way for WoTLK. The patch has turned the game upside down. Classes are all completely different, UI mods are broken, ret paladins can kill things and all the new graphic features are in the game ( Longer view distances and Shadows ). Read more for full change notes: Click for full article | |
| WoTLK 13 / 11 / 08 - You are not prepared ! - Tuesday September 16 2008 07:12:43 | |
 |
Well in this case Blizzard. They have around 2 & 1/2 months to fix the beta and try and finish all the content they have been adding. Then balance ( nerf ) all the classes. I am excited but I didn't expect it to be so soon after playing the beta. Of cause the release has nothing to do with Warhammer coming out this week, I am sure of it  The Collectors edition will contain the following: — The Art of World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King, a 208-page book featuring never-before-seen images from the game. — An exclusive in-game pet: Frosty, the baby frost wyrm. — A behind-the-scenes DVD containing over an hour of developer interviews, the Wrath of the Lich King intro cinematic with director's commentary, and more. — The official soundtrack CD, containing 21 epic tracks from the game, along with exclusive bonus tracks. — A mouse pad featuring a map of the newly opened continent of Northrend. — Two World of Warcraft Trading Card Game March of the Legion(TM) starter decks, along with two exclusive cards available only in the Collector's Edition. Much the same as TBC one. I predict that the 3.0.x patch will be released on live around or after Blizzcon. As it will be needed for the Blizzcon mounts. Most of the nerf's will take place after this as millions of people race to make the perfect cookie cutter build on the live servers. |
| Blizzcon 08 - Saturday August 16 2008 18:01:09 | |
|
Somehow, with all the chaos and F5 mashing to refresh the Blizzard Store, I managed to score two tickets to Blizzcon last week. My flights and accommodation is booked and all I have to do is wait until its time to go. This year its going to be different, this year I have Tyranni coming with me. So now I have someone to hold the camera when I get my photo's taken with all the hot bloodelf models who have been hired to have there photo's to be taken with Warcraft freaks like myself Like last year, if possible I will do updates on my website about what I find and discover. Unlike last year I'll have upload capabilities coded into my website a bit better and I hope to find a PC which I can upload photo's from. Anyway, that's all for now. I'll be updating the Blizzcon forum with info as it comes to hand. |
| WoTLK Beta - Patched - Sunday August 03 2008 09:45:59 | |
 |
The beta was patched yesterday adding more polish to the game as it grinds slowly towards its release date. Patch info can be hard to find and I have noticed some changes on my warrior which I can't confirm ( main one is no longer doing 2.5k per weapon, per swing with titans grip )What we do know is mages and shamans get a lot of changes. Also the lighting engine seems to have had a bit of a buff as seen in this screenshot: http://www.xfire.com/screenshots/quanhanbin/ss_file-7d947771b9cfef3391961684a0c37e42380a6b72.jpg The Zeppelin at Warsong hold still isn't docking correctly causing the horde to make a plungeg to the floor below, but hey, who uses stairs anyway. I still haven't had a chance to test the Death knight area since the last patch. They threw out the old Necropolis and put in a new one. Click for full article |
1 to 14 of 292 |
 | |
