September 10th, 2012 | By Erik Johnson
Tagged in: developer links | DevLinks | industry | industry news
In today’s Developer Links, some tips on story-directed game design from one of the developers of Amnesia. Plus, how to profile your game, how to get a job as an animator, and more.
Dinosaurs With Lasers? Sure, As Long As It Makes Sense (Gamasutra)
“Storyline and fiction are perhaps not elements you’d associate with the flurry of titles from indie studio Vlambeer. Yet developer duo Jan Willem Nijman and Rami Ismail take the underlying fiction in their games very seriously, whether the players actually notice it or not. During a GDC Europe talk titled ‘Sensible Nonsense,’ Nijman and Ismail discussed how building up a backstory and fictional world for your games is incredibly important to them, as these decisions then give structure to certain settings and gameplay elements injected into each title.”
The Self, Presence, And Storytelling (In The Games Of Madness)
“At GDC last week I gave a talk called “The Self, Presence and StoryTelling”. There will be a version of it up on the GDC Vault in 2 – 3 weeks I think and hopefully it will be free like last years’ talk. Before that comes up I will put up a pdf version of the talk containing a bit more information (something I promised at the end of my talk). You can get hold of that here:”
Help Theme 2012′s MOTY/IOTY (Indie DB)
“Modders and Indie Developers the Mod of the Year and Indie of the Year are almost upon us! Last years event if you did not know had a theme created by our of our community member and Indie Game Dev Genel Jumalon, we wish to make it a tradition!”
The Trick To Persuading Yourself To Re-Invest In Your Business (Cliffski.com)
“Ok, here’s something I’ve mulled over for a while. I read a lot of business books, and websites, and am interested in everything from the very early movie entrepreneurs (talk about goldrush…) right up to the silicon valley startup mania. One thing that often sticks out to me is the incredible speed with which a lot of the big companies accelerate at the start. They can go from 1 employee to a hundred in a year. That sort of growth is just baffling to a tiny little operation like positech…”
Lostcast Episode 22: HTMLd5 (Lost Decade Games)
“Lostcast is our podcast about HTML5 games. In episode 22, we talk about all kinds of goings-on in the HTML5 games space, including the Dragons Gameboard kickstarter, and the tools used to make HTML5 games. Don’t forget to comment if you want Geoff to blog more!”
How To Get A Job As An Animator In Games… (AltDevBlogADay)
“The competition for jobs in the gaming industry is getting increasingly fierce (many companies receiving 100′s of applicants for a single position), yet many applicants consistently make the same mistakes which hurt their chances of landing the gig. I’m going to cover some of the more common mistakes I come across, as well as provide some insight into what I (and most others) look for when reviewing an applicant.”
Using Chrome://tracing To View Your Inline Profiling Data (AltDevBlogADay)
“Ahh performance — that three syllable word that accounts for the headache-causing and most often avoided part of the game development cycle. Once in a development blue moon your manager will ramble into your office in a deep sweat, shouting about performance and expect you to do something about it. Eventually you’ll search the Internet to find ways to uncover the hotspots in your code. You’ll also learn some important information to consider when deciding what kind of profiling to use in order to discover where your code is spending its time.”
Your Favorite Octopus In Your Favorite Reverse Rhythm Game, Retro/Grade (Octodad Blog)
“We were lucky in that 24 Caret Games allowed us to put Octodad in as an unlockable character for all of you guys to play around with. (We particularly like him with the combination of Big Head Mode, and are honored to have him be part of the game.) Retro/Grade was released today and everyone with a PS3 should go buy it from the PSN as it’s an experience you can’t get anywhere else!”
Erik Johnson (295 posts)