"I don't know, this whole blogging thing seems weird?!"
"People will see it"
"Okay let's see how this goes"
If this conversation happened a year ago, I'd never even fathomed the idea of trying to market myself or my game in this manner. But having followed my share of game developer blogs, and becoming a developer in my own right, I guess I now have something worth blogging about.
My name is Jason Collins. I also go by Chicago2000 across the internet. I'm currently a student of video Game Programming at Humber College. The reason I'm taking to the blogisphere (is that even a word or how you spell it???) is because I plan on sharing my experiences with making a project called our capstone.
It's the culmination of all the work we've done across the semester, allowing us the freedom to make whatever game we want to make with the freedom to sell, or not sell it. Ultimately it's supposed to be the lynch pin of our portfolio.
Now seeing as this is day 1 of the project, and I will be updating without a schedule, I'll start today with the quick Coles Notes (Cliff Notes in the states, outside of North America you know the one) about myself, and the project I will be plugging through.
In short, I was born in 1982, I used to be a cook with a college diploma but after several years of trying to maintain a family on that lifestyle I decided to follow in my parents footsteps and become a computer programmer. Much to their dismay, I went to specialize in games.
In my early years of cooking I worked with (and lived with for a short time) an Australian man at KFC. He introduced me to this neat little game called Australian Rules Football. The best way I describe the game to North Americans is the mutant love child of Soccer, Rugby, and Basketball. There's more to it than that and that brings us to where we are now. I loved the game, I loved rough games all my life and the sport I've always been good at was wrestling. So a sport where I could take my athleticism from the past, and my love of rough sports just magnetized me to the game.
Why am I mentioning that, well the game I am currently working on is in fact a mobile version of Australian Rules Football. It's tentatively titled Aussie Rules: Drills and Thrills. My goal is to make a game in the vein of the mobile version of Backbreaker, with a series of mini-games based around the base ideas of Australian Rules football. I noticed a lack of visibility of the sport in North America, and I want to try to change that.
Now that said here we are, 8.5 months away from the due date of the game project for school. Maybe longer for my full release and I'm starting to talk about it and make incremental progress on the project. So far I don't have much to show, except maybe the reason I'm picking the engine I'm deciding on.
I've decided on Unity as my engine for several reasons. The first of which is portability. I want this on as many mobile devices as I can get it on so I'm targeting Android and iOS. As a result, I plan on making controls for the OUYA as well, and if that is the stunning success it promises to be, expect a version of the game there too.
Also I've chose Unity because after 5 minutes of fiddling with collision models, I have what I can only describe as working ball physics. Watch the oval,
From here it's just a matter of applying the right forces in the right places and most of my drills will be set.
The exciting part at this point as well, is that we get to meet with 3D animators in our school next week, in order to get decent looking models for our project and make our games slightly more marketable. So I'll be working with someone to get players, proper balls, and maybe a stadium to play the game in.
All in all here we are. I'll be updating as often as I make updates to progress or as often as I have more stories from my personal trenches to share. Feel free to let me know what you think or offer suggestions. I'd love to hear what people think about what I'm working on, or their opinions on anything I say here.
A journey begins, it's dangerous out there, take these:
Sound's like an awesome concept, hopefully EA will catch wind of this and put you on the next project.
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