I completely rewrote and extended my popular Basic Game UDK tutorial for the Game Developer Career Guide Fall 2012 edition. This new version has more detail, more steps, written for the latest version of the UDK, and has fully commented code.
It can be viewed for free here: http://gamedeveloper.texterity.com/gamedeveloper/fall2012cg#pg1
And here is game number two that I’ve been working on!
Press release:
Unmechanical is an award-winning 2.5D side-scroller which combines tricky puzzle solving, alluring exploration, and an engrossing atmosphere.The game had humble beginnings as a student project and since then both game and team has grown.
“Unmechanical has been about taking on something for real and working our fingers to the bone to get it done. It’s our hopes and ambitions combined into this very personal, unique, and awesome adventure that’s crafted with lots of love.”Said Marko Permanto, project lead for the Unmechanical team.
Unmechanical begins with a twist of fate as you’re spirited away by a network of coiled pipes into a mysterious underworld. You find yourself in a strange environment that pulsates from mechanic and organic machinery alike, and your journey to freedom begins. Flying freely through the odd and fantastic surroundings,a powerful tractor beam lets you pick up objects and interact with the world.
Your quest for freedom requires you to solve a great variety of puzzling challenges, and while it’s easy to pick up and play, later challenges may prove very difficult indeed. On your adventure you might also begin to understand what it all means–The underworld may be more than it seems, the fateful descent more than just chance,and you might not be entirely alone after all…
For more information about the game, visit Unmechanical at http://unmechanical.net/
The game started out as one of the game projects at the education Future Games where I teach. Originally put together in just 4 weeks, the little demo was received so well by everyone that the team decided to carry on with development. And that eventually led to the cooperation between Talawa Games, a new studio started up by part of the original team, and my own company Teotl Studios.
I joined the team about 8 months ago to get the game through its final stages of development. I have been responsible for optimizing all the art and levels, as well visually polishing up all the areas and ensuring the looks and style are consistent throughout the entire game. I also took care of the large majority of the PC to iOS conversion work. Tech/Level artist would sum up my work quite well. My own development work aside, as a company we are helping them with Steam and other business and distribution things.
The iOS version in particular is something that, from a tech perspective, I am particular proud of. We will be revealing iOS shots in the next couple of weeks but I managed to pretty much translate the PC looks to iOS near 1:1, including normal maps and so on at near no performance loss. I’d really like to produce one or two training videos to go over these iOS Unreal Engine tips and tricks I’ve learned later this year, though I am so very out of time all the time so we will see!
Other than this game I’ve also been busy handling the internships at Future Games the past half year. Following up and assisting our students throughout their six month internships, and visiting them at the various places where they went. That got me to visit a wide range of studios over the past few months, ranging from the biggest like Guerrilla Games and Dice to small two man indie teams like Oxeye Studios, the guys behind the indie 2D shooter Cobalt. The contacts aside, one of the big things I got out of the whole experience was probably the industry wide (for within this region at least) perspective and overview on how the industry is moving along.
As promised a while ago, the first of several projects I am currently involved in!
Kung Fu Superstar is an Unreal Engine martial arts game, and we’ve just released the anouncement trailer, along with an interview over at Eurogamer
I’ve helped them out by polishing and beautifying all the environments in the video. Lighting, particles and other effects, post process and color correction settings, skies, advanced materials, and so on. Also did some work on character materials and lighting setups.
Was great fun to do! I like the polishing stage the most of all steps, to really take an environment to the next level and make it shine, so I’d definitely be up for something like this again if anyone else similar projects going :)
More new stuff in a month, or two at most!
I am really busy with a hundred different things these days. Working on three different games, alternating daily between each of the games. Can’t show anything just yet, but by summer it should all be ready, if not released even! Last year was a bit of a slow year, but this year I am getting back up to full speed!
I am getting really good at mobile Unreal stuff also lately. I just managed to get large open high poly landscapes going on Ipad at 60 FPS, a mobile foliage system, smooth gradients with absolutely no sign of compression, normal mapping and pseudo specular without dynamic lights and with almost no performance impact, some cool usage of flares, and so on. One on the games I work on is also running on both PC and iOS using the exact same files and levels, I managed to get it to scale in both ways without compromising on both performance for mobile, or looks for PC. I plan to write tutorials on these, or make video tutorials, once I got some more time.
Also, Syndicate got released a few weeks ago. It is the game I worked as level designer/artist for the first 1.5 year of pre-production/production, until I left to work The Ball fulltime.
Otherwise I am still occupied with teaching and education. I am handling the internships for last years students and some day to day business at my school Future Games, and tomorrow I am starting a 4 day UDK course at a University in South Stockholm.
Couple of weeks ago my students over at Future Games completed their second Game Project of the year, again running on UDK.
Like previous times:
People in Sweden who interested in our school can attend our presentation March 22nd. We take in just 36 people a year and all of our teachers are industry people.
Goliath
Goliath is a side-scrolling puzzle platformer with a shooting element. Play as a seek and rescue bot as it tracks a distress signal deep into the wreckage of a downed mother ship and discover where you are and how you ended up there. Overcome hazards and enemy turrets as you progress through 4 distinctive environments to reach your objective.
Memento
A man, old and dying lies jacked in to a machine designed not to save his life, but to judge it. He is being forced to relive his memories, both joyful and horrifying, in the largest public trial since those of Nuremberg. The whole world watches with horrified anticipation as the hated old man spends his final hours reliving bloodstained fragments of his dreadful life.
Rennfahrer
Rennfahrer is an high octane racing game set in the near future. Burn through a stunning city vista high above the clouds while trying to stay alive as the cities defense system tries to hinder you from reaching the goal.
With games as “Wipeout” and “Trackmania” as inspiration, buckle up and get ready for adrenaline pumping speed and insane jumps as you race against the timer and drive for your life!
The Box Project
The Box Project is an environmentally puzzling platform adventure where you control a swiss-army box. The box contains all the contraptions needed to save the over-polluted world that remains, now that the humans have left for newer worlds. Spring over the junkyard, float through jets of steam, and collect fairies on your path to cleanse the world and make it anew.
Alex the axolotl
You play as Alex, a axolotl. You and your family gets taken from your natural habitat by man.
Set in a aquarium where you will have to swim through dangerous environments to try and find out what happened to your family.
Bad Luck
Bad Luck is a game which involves two different types of gameplay, a fast paced side scrolling shoot ‘em up, and a top-down logical puzzler. Each level swaps between these two modes in a challenging and different way, always keeping the players mind and reactions alert. You control a character whose bad luck has left them stranded alone on a planet, trying desperately to make their way to the surface. Unfortunately, bad luck keeps sending you in the opposite direction. With the help of the character’s various abilities (shooting, grabbing, dashing and manipulating time) it’s up to you to reverse the players luck and make your way out of this predicament.
I’ve updated the Simple UDK Game tutorial to reflect recent changes in the engine, and I’ve written an all new tutorial for a brand new Kismet HUD/Interface system!
This new system, written by Marko Permanto, and based on James Tan’s UI Kismet system allows you to build, control, and animate menus and HUDs through nothing but Kismet!
I’ve never gotten into Scaleform. I’ve always thought it is ridiculous to require someone to get and learn Flash and Actionscript just to get a little image to appear on the screen. When making indie games and prototyping concepts you need to be able to get result as fast and as easy as possible, and these Kismet blocks are a major step in the right direction in my opinion. I can make stuff appear on the screen again! Hurray!
We will be using this system in the upcoming UDK game Marko and I are working on – Unmechanical – Join us on Facebook also! We are hard at work at getting the game done at the moment so for the time being we don’t want to spend too much time yet on releasing screenshots and videos and all that, but we will soon begin ramping up our media efforts :)
Last September I started my annual fall and winter lecturing at Future Games. Normally we start the school year by having the students create a couple of traditional board games, followed by a few months of regular teaching before we let them make their first full games. Contrary to previous years, we decided to throw them in the deep end right away this year and have them make their own games after just 3 days of teaching!
At Future Games we are convinced that the best way to learn game development is by doing it. Theoretical knowledge is important, but at the end of the day you learn the most by trying things out, and by experimenting. Like many other developers who’ve started out before the era of “game development educations” I got into game development by making one level after another, one mod after another, and so on. We are trying to capture that spirit of proactive practically focused entrepreneurship many game developers in the industry have, in our education. If anyone in the vicinity of Stockholm would like to visit us, we regularly organize informal evening get togethers – follow the event on Facebook for information on when.
Either way, here are the results from our 35 new students and two weeks of work:
Knugen
In the age of knights, honor and treachery, the black (and merciless) king has been ruling the green lands of Landora since he slew the white kings father, who had been a just king for decades. Now the white king is eager for justice and to reclaim what (he believes) is rightfully his! Can he succeed? Or will the black king continue to rule it with an iron fist?
Knugen is a turn based, strategic two-player game where you affect your opponent, either by griefing him or helping him, by grabbing the goodies on the way to the throne. One must also beware, the race for the throne will awake blind spirits of fallen warriors from past times to fulfill their pledge to defend the throne from intruders!
Swipe in the direction you want to move and stomp your way through your opponent and the ancient, beautiful hallway to claim the throne for yourself! A quick and fun game with unlimited replayability to play whenever you want to show your friends who the real king is!
So, which king will prevail? The fate of Landora is your hands.
Mischief
“MISCHIEF!” is a family friendly multi-player game that features classic gameplay, that fans of traditional board-games will appreciate. Control one of four mischievous goblins seeking to earn their riches, and purchase the four mystical trinkets from across the realm. If things aren’t going your way, throw down a ‘Mischief’ card that will mess things up for the other players – Steal their items, teleport them away or just make them lose their precious gold! Featuring simple intuitive controls and cure colorful graphics, “MISCHIEF!” should keep you, and maybe your own little Mischiefs, entertained for hours!
Polarity
Polarity is based on a boardgame we all remember from our childhood: The Labyrinth, more commonly known as “the one where you tilt the board around to avoid the ball from falling into holes”.
Contrary to the original game, tilting the iPad has little effect on the direction of the ball. Instead you are to travel around the board attracting and deflecting yourself from the magnetic power plants by switching their polarity.
They See Me Rolling
Experience the next generation of labyrinth games! They See Me Rolling brings new life to an old genre, using open environments, dynamic obstacles and a revolutionary advancement system. Controlling a lonely and previously immobile rock yearning for the power of flight, you must navigate unique environments on your quest to steal the sandals of Hermes and finally fulfill your dream.
Jungleprod
Jungleprod is the latest sensation to hit the iPad! Using the iPad’s touchfunctions you will get a truly breathtaking experience swiping through the jungle! Tread carefully because the jungle is as lively as ever. Beware of Crocodiles, monkeys, and other jungle critters on your way to the treasure!
I have written a new UE3 tutorial: An introduction to Performance Profiling
Also, the 3DSMax Batch Export script has been updated with a small bug fix – Thanks “Keen”!
Currently going through my yearly fall and winter teaching sessions at Future Games in Stockholm. First thing I had the new class of students do this year was to build a UDK iPad board game, after just three days of teaching. The results were impressive, I will put it up here in my news later this year!
New tutorial!
I have written a step by step walkthrough tutorial on:
nDo2 is a new tool that hooks into Photoshop, and allows you to paint and draw normal maps directly in Photoshop.