Comments for NickCummings.com

Comment on The opposite of progress by Nick Cummings

Nick Cummings — Wed, 21 Jul 2010 04:58:11 +0000

Aaron: That’s impressive! I wasn’t aware Javascript could be used to do anything involving complex stuff with sprites, but I hadn’t heard of Canvas before either. That’s pretty exciting, especially because I actually understand the basics of Javascript. I’ve got a billion ideas for games of all kinds, but right now I’m just trying to find something that would be easy to make and hopefully fun to play. That’s as good of a starting point as any, I think.

Madeline: That’s exactly what I’ve been looking for: some sort of simple, accessible toolset that lets me focus on doing fun, creative things, even if there are some significant limitations (kinda like with LittleBigPlanet). I’ll check those out. Thanks for the encouragement!

Comment on The opposite of progress by Madeline Henry

Madeline Henry — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 15:42:16 +0000

Hmm. The comments engine seems to have eaten my first one. Well, here goes:

Though I don’t necessarily doubt your programming abilities, you should consider trying more accessible tools like Game Maker/PyGame, if only so you can get back into the mindset of putting your concepts to life and releasing them. There are no commercial limitations to publishing your projects through either format, and they’re both versatile enough (with a gentle enough learning curve) that I can see myself putting a project or two out with either before I’m out of college.

Don’t give up; you can do this, comrade! I believe in you!!

Comment on The opposite of progress by Madeline Henry

Madeline Henry — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 07:00:25 +0000

Honestly? Even though Flash is a recommended format for getting your games out into the open, you’d probably be better off starting from scratch with Game Maker or Pygame. The tools themselves are cheap and easy to experiment with, manuals are easy to get a hold of, you can still make your finished games commercially available if you really want, and only assholes on messageboards will give you shit for using them.

Not that either of these should be a final step in an illustrious game design career, of course! As far as getting used to making games and putting them out is concerned, I think this is your best bet.

Comment on The opposite of progress by aaronpk

aaronpk — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 01:40:31 +0000

Turns out the browser can do a decent job at powering a game engine using Canvas. Torgie put together a little proof of concept this weekend. He doesn’t want anybody to see the code yet so I took a screenshot instead: http://www.flickr.com/photos/aaronpk/4809290693/in/photostream/ This is written entirely in Javascript! No Flash required. What kind of game are you trying to make?

Comment on How to excel at being unemployed by Nick Cummings

Nick Cummings — Thu, 08 Jul 2010 00:59:59 +0000

Seriously! Pursing your dreams is the sort of nice, naive thought that I was brought up with throughout my childhood, and unfortunately the real world couldn’t care less about my aspirations. Oh well.

I’ve never been much of a crafts person but I’m hoping to keep writing more. I doubt I’ll ever get any money for it thought. Maybe I should start screen printing too?

Comment on How to excel at being unemployed by eye-shuh

eye-shuh — Wed, 30 Jun 2010 21:49:40 +0000

Totally with yah! I’ve been trying to keep busy and not pull out all my hair watching the little I have saved slowly drain away. I’ve been working on craft projects as well hoping to perhaps figure out a way to make a few bucks while I find something real.

Having dreams is too hard dang it!

Comment on How it’s going so far by Nick Cummings

Nick Cummings — Sun, 16 May 2010 17:27:01 +0000

Hey Calen,

Thanks so much for the positive feedback! It’d be fantastic to have you on board in whatever capacity that you’d like to contribute. Audio’s definitely one of the things I know almost nothing about — I only took one electronic music course in college — so yeah, I’ll definitely be in touch.

I’m meeting with a friend of mine this morning to discuss the process and practicality of working on a game with people in different parts of the country, so I’ll get in touch with you after that and let you know what my current thoughts are on platform, game concepts, etc. Whatever we do will almost definitely be cross-platform and probably in Flash since that’s what I’m currently learning, so you should be able to stick to your Mac-based applications.

Thanks for the encouragement! I’ll be in touch.

- Nick

Comment on How it’s going so far by Calen Robinette

Calen Robinette — Thu, 13 May 2010 21:12:30 +0000

Hey Nick!

I’d love to do some audio design for anything you come up with. I’ll be sure to keep up with how you’re doing and just shoot me an email if you need anything done. I’m pretty good with mac based digital audio interfaces (Pro Tools, Logic) and I have a copy of Sound Forge that I can learn how to use if what you’re doing is mostly PC based.

Good luck! It’s good to see you pursuing what you want to do.

-Calen

Comment on The glamorous lifestyle of the modern legal assistant by The Backlog: Sandbox of Chaos edition « Silicon Sasquatch

The Backlog: Sandbox of Chaos edition « Silicon Sasquatch — Mon, 05 Apr 2010 23:55:13 +0000

[...] You’re allowed to decide exactly what type of shady life Nick (the character, not the legal assistant) lead before he was dragged into the zombie apocalypse, or why Bill has what looks like stains of [...]

Comment on Why failing to write a novel was a good thing by Script Frenzy: Because writing a novel’s for suckers « NickCummings.com

Sat, 03 Apr 2010 21:06:00 +0000

[...] might remember that I attempted and subsequently failed to complete National Novel Writing Month in November of 2009. That’s all right; whatever; [...]