I downloaded a few 8-bit synthesizers and tried my hand at some chiptune improvisation. This is what I came up with after about 20 minutes. I was going for a “dark castle”, like Bowser’s Castle or Castlevania.

I’ve spent the last hour working on sprites for Olive. This is the final product I came up with. It could use some work later. Now to try my hand at a walking animation… aww yeah.

Started work on a new platformer, basically just to get the hang of designing something other than shoot ‘em ups. These are all gross/placeholder sprites. Right now the idea for the game is based on Ice Climber, and you play as my new kitten, Olive. :3

EDIT: I changed the link above to a MediaFire link.

Y-You want to try my game, d-don’t you? ;_;

I made a game as a final group project in a class last Winter. We had 3 weeks to make this game and that turned out to be a much shorter time than we had imagined, of course. The game was originally supposed to be a shoot-‘em-up with three levels, and a boss at the end of each level. Due to time constraints, we settled with two levels and two bosses. Most of the development time consisted of me trying to figure out how to use Game Maker and how I could get the game mechanics to function properly. Most of the game’s graphics and sound are placeholders, as in taken from other sources (for educational purposes, of course). However, the reason I’m posting this game in this blog is to record the progress I’m making. I’m going to re-balance the game and give it all completely self-made resources. Currently, the only things we didn’t take from other sources are the background art and boss art (drawn by another person who was in my group, and edited by me to better fit the game) and a few of the smaller sprites/effects such as bullets and some of the explosions.

This “Version 1.5” is titled as such, because in the original version of the game that I presented to my class, this vertically-oriented shoot-‘em-up had a horizontally-oriented screen resolution (clearly I did not have much experience with shmups when we made this game). I changed the game to have a vertical orientation, making it much more natural to look at and play. I altered the bosses (and gave them new background art, temporary art anyway) and a few miscellaneous parts of the game to fit this new orientation. It didn’t take long, but I decided it was a big enough change in the game to warrant this version number change. I won’t bother uploading the original game right now.

In this version of the game, there are still some rough spots. The “flash” effect when using a bomb does not fit the new screen resolution, and the second boss’ “final attack” is totally broken and useless. That’s alright though, it was extremely uninspired and simply shat out to meet our deadline. The GUI in the corner is also pretty lame, but I think I literally drew and implemented it the night before the game was due. Also if you happen to finish the game (press ‘G’ for godmode - This must be pressed every time the room changes) there is a grey screen where the credits were supposed to be (they were lost). I still wanted to upload the game and get feedback. No, it’s not in a state of being a really awesome and well-designed game but at least I have a starting point and I accept criticism with open arms. If I end up redesigning every last detail of the game, so be it.

Also, the name was a joke decided between the group. It was probably the LAST part of the game we decided on together, and came up with it on the spot.

I’ll be awaiting feedback! Thanks for reading. :)

I just found this game and played around with it for about 20 minutes. Very detailed and well-polished. Though a bit hard to play without a mouse (using a laptop currently). Follow the link to the author’s Tumblr page for the game. You can download the current version for free! I’ll definitely be playing this game more in the near future.

An excerpt from this page about the game:

“What is “A Nation of Wind”?

“A Nation of Wind” is a freeware video game featuring elements of gameplay from both “Arena Shooters” (like Geometry Wars, Super Stardust, and Asteroids), and “Real Time Strategy” games, (such as Populous, Starcraft, and Actraiser). 

Set in a world of floating islands and airships, the player is tasked with commanding a ship and establishing/defending colonies. Players will be forced to deal with the bizarre creatures that come up from the lower atmospheres to wreak havoc on their airship and settlements, while appeasing the god’s of the land and eventually bending them to the player’s will.

“A Nation of Wind” is currently developed by one intrepid artist, Jameson Wilkins. He is a freelancer with several years of experience in the browser and mobile gaming markets, and has studied game design and art the entirety of his life.