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• Legality of similar games

  - by Jamie Taylor

  This is my first question on GD.SE, and I hope it's in the right place. A little background: I'm an amateur (read: not explicitly employed to develop games, but am employed as a software developer) game developer and took a ComSci with Games Development degree. My Question: What is the legal situation/standpoint of creating a copycat title? I know that there are only N number of ways of solving a problem, and N number of ways to design a piece of software. Say that an independent developer designed a copycat game (a Tetris clone in this example) for instance, and decided to use that game to generate income for themselves as well as interest for their other products. Say the developer adds a disclaimer into the software along the lines of "based on , originally released c. by ." Are there any legal problems/grey areas with the developer in this example releasing this game, commercially? Would they run into legal problems? Should the developer in this example expect cease and desist orders or law suit claims from original publishers? Have original publishers been known to, effectively, kill independent projects because they are a little too close to older titles? I know that there was, at least, one attempt by a group of independent developers to remake Sonic the Hedgehog 2 and Sega shut them down. I also know of Sega shutting down development of the independent Streets of Rage Remake. I know that "but it's an old game, your honour," isn't a great legal standpoint when it comes to defending yourself. But, could an independent developer have a law suit filed against them for re-implementing an older title in a new way? I know that there are a lot of copycat versions of the older titles like Tetris available on app stores (and similar services), and that it would be very difficult for a major publisher to shut them all down. Regardless of this, is making a Tetris (or other game) copycat/clone illegal? We were taught lots of different things at University, but we never covered copyright law. I'm presuming that their thought behind it was "IF these students get jobs in games development, they wont need to know anything about the legal side of it, because their employers will have legal departments... presumably" tl;dr Is it illegal to create a clone or copycat of an old title, and make money from it?

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• Design leaderboard ratings for quiz games

  - by PeterK

  Back in March 2011 i started the following post: How to design a leaderboard? Now my quiz game have been out for approximately a year and sold pretty decently. I am working on to update the game design and is again looking into the leaderboard design to make it better as i am not happy with it. Currently i rate players on number of correct answers, which is not good as it does not consider things like number of games, difficulty levels etc. I also have "extended" stats behind the UITableView (Leaderboard). A player can play based on three levels of difficulty: hard, medium or easy Difficulty levels can be mixed between players in a game Each game can be one to six players, so there can be single games or duels Between 2 and 30 questions per game As i am considering integrating Game Center Leaderboard i need to design a better rating system so i would like to ask for some ideas how to do the rating based on the above. I am thinking about how much a point would be worth and what it includes.

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• what knowledge would I need to make a good simulation games

  - by Skeith

  I have an idea for a game like theme park but don't know how simulation games are made. I am not some noob on his first game so I appreciated constructive answers instead of "its hard, don't do it". What I want is to know how simulation game mechanics are put together. I figure it would be heaver on the AI than normal games and not knowing much about AI would like to know some programming techniques I should look into for this style game. specific techniques please not just a book on ai. what sort of architecture would be used? I guess it would have some sort of probability engine with pre designed events that are triggered based on the AI state. Would it use a FSM or be purely event driven ? Any information on how a sims game functions would be cool.

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• Google Games Chat #6

  Google Games Chat #6 Google Games Chat is back once again. What kinds of crazy topics will be talking about this time around? Will Todd ever finish Skyrim? What Google employee and/or homeless person is sleeping behind the couch this week? Tune in and find out! Ask us questions in the moderator link! We might even get around to answering them! From: GoogleDevelopers Views: 0 0 ratings Time: 00:00 More in Science & Technology

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• Whats the best way of learning how to Develop Java Games

  - by Shaun

  As the Title says, the question is Whats the best way of learning how to Develop Java Games? Indeed there's over thousands of tutorials explaining and teaching you the basic's of Java and how It works but they are usually and majority of the tutorial's teaching you Java basic's are boring and don't push you as you could do. Basically, is there any tutorials out there that push you so and give you problems you have to solve and push your knowledge so you get a much better understanding of creating java games. This seems a ideal question for new people learning Java and hopefully should help newbie's learning Java. (Sorry if this sounds noobish).

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• How to design brain games [on hold]

  - by samesky

  I will wonder if anybody has some information about designing games for brain improvement. Recently lumosity is into a gear. I guess they research a lot or have experts. But is there any other research paper that is publicly available for designing the brain games ? Any equation or data that can help? Or what characteristics a brain game should have ? I am getting interested on this and search internet a lot, but unfortunately I could not find the core structure of it. It will really a helpful for me if somebody can give some information. Thank you.

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• How to prevent "underwater sight" in games

  - by CPP_Person

  In many games where the player can go underwater, it seems like when you look where the top half of the screen is in the air, and the bottom half the screen is in the water, it's almost like the water doesn't exist and the player is... flying slowly with water sounds? Is there a logical way to solve this? An algorithm? Doesn't seem like any solution has come up yet since many games still have this. I don't want to make the same mistake.

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• Should iOS games use a Timer?

  - by ????

  No matter what frameworks we use -- Core Graphics, Cocos2D, OpenGL ES -- to write games, should a timer be used (for games that has animation even when a user doesn't do any input, such as after firing a missile and waiting to see if the UFO is hit)? I read that NSTimer might not get fired until after scheduled time (interval), and CADisplayLink can delay and get fired at a later time as well, only that it tells you how late it is so you can move the object more, so it can make the object look like it skipped frame. Must we use a Timer? And if so, what is the best one to use?

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• STL for games, yea or nay?

  - by munificent

  Every programming language has its standard library of containers, algorithms, and other helpful stuff. With languages like C#, Java, and Python, it's practically inconceivable to use the language without its standard lib. Yet, on many C++ games I've worked on, we either didn't use the STL at all, used a tiny fraction of it, or used our own implementation. It's hard to tell if that was a sound decision for our games, or one simply made out of ignorance of the STL. So... is the STL a good fit or not?

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• 12.04 - sound is laggy when running games through Wine

  - by orzechowskid

  Lenovo U400 Wine 1.5.5 Ubuntu 12.04 with all updates applied I'm experiencing severe (~500ms) audio lag in all games run in Wine. Portal 2, Half-Life, World of Goo, and Fallout are all exhibiting this problem. When I run winecfg though and click the "Test Sound" button at the bottom of the Audio tab, the sound effect appears to play immediately. So I'm not sure what's going on. I don't think it's a problem with PulseAudio by itself since totem videos and Youtube clips both play in perfect sync. Anyone have any ideas on where to start fixing this? thanks! (edit: I thought this was limited to Steam games but I installed a non-Steam game and I now see that's not the case. I get audio lag in other apps too.)

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• Knowledge of a Language vs. Games in Portfolio

  - by RedShft

  How important is the knowledge of a language versus the games that you have developed in your portfolio? To be more specific. Personally, I dislike C++ for several reason(mainly due to it's complexity, and pointers, and I prefer D as my language of choice thus far. Due to this, I've written two games in D instead of C++ that are my personal projects. Am I wasting my time with D? Should I start using C++ again? For reference, I have 6 months of experience in C++. It's the first language I learned. I have messed around with SDL/SFML and a bit of Direct3D with C++ as well. Even though I like D, i'd rather not waste my time learning it, if it in no way will help me get a job in the gaming industry.

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• Do open world games need less backstory?

  - by Raceimaztion

  I've played a few open-world games and really enjoyed them, though the ones I've really enjoyed have generally received complaints about how little story there is to them. The Saboteur is one example of this. Fully open-world, good enough story (for me, anyway), engaging gameplay, and still has received complaints in reviews about not having enough story. Do open-world games actually need a full, all-encompassing story? Or can fun and engaging gameplay fill in the gap and let the designer get away with a slightly less complete story?

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• STL for games, yea or nay?

  - by munificent

  Every programming language has its standard library of containers, algorithms, and other helpful stuff. With languages like C#, Java, and Python, it's practically inconceivable to use the language without its standard lib. Yet, on many C++ games I've worked on, we either didn't use the STL at all, used a tiny fraction of it, or used our own implementation. It's hard to tell if that was a sound decision for our games, or one simply made out of ignorance of the STL. So... is the STL a good fit or not?

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• Watch Favorite Classic Movies in 16-Bit Animation Glory at PixelMash Theater

  - by Asian Angel

  Are you ready for a quick bit of retro fun? Then sit back and enjoy movie favorites like Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Back to the Future, and more in these condensed version 16-bit animated GIFs. Note: You can select your favorite movies from the list on the left side of the homepage. PixelMash Theater Homepage [via Neatorama] 7 Ways To Free Up Hard Disk Space On Windows HTG Explains: How System Restore Works in Windows HTG Explains: How Antivirus Software Works

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• Browse Through Radio Shack’s 1983 Computer Catalog [Scanned Image Set]

  - by Asian Angel

  Are you ready for a blast from the past? Then indulge in a bit of retro fun with this scanned image collection of Radio Shack’s 1983 computer catalog. Anyone up for a shiny ‘new’ TRS-80 computer for Christmas? Radio Shack Catalog RSC-09 Computer Catalog [via BoingBoing] Secure Yourself by Using Two-Step Verification on These 16 Web Services How to Fix a Stuck Pixel on an LCD Monitor How to Factory Reset Your Android Phone or Tablet When It Won’t Boot

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• Single-player pong game

  - by Jam

  I am just starting out learning pygame and livewires, and I'm trying to make a single-player pong game, where you just hit the ball, and it bounces around until it passes your paddle (located on the left side of the screen and controlled by the mouse), which makes you lose. However, I keep getting the error: "Cannot have more than on Screen object", which I can find no references to online really, and I can't make sense of it. I want to eventually make the game more complicated, but I need to make it work first. Help please! Here's the code so far: from livewires import games games.init(screen_width=640, screen_height=480, fps=50) class Paddle(games.Sprite): image=games.load_image("paddle.bmp") def __init__(self): super(Paddle, self).__init__(image=Paddle.image, y=games.mouse.y, left=0) self.score=games.Text(value=0, size=25, top=5, right=games.screen.width-10) games.screen.add(self.score) def update(self): self.y=games.mouse.y self.check_collide() def check_collide(self): for ball in self.overlapping_sprites: self.score.value+=1 self.score.right=games.screen.width-10 ball.handle_collide() class Ball(games.Sprite): image=games.load_image("ball.bmp") speed=1 def __init__(self, x, y=90): super(Ball, self).__init__(image=Ball.image, x=x, y=y, dx=Ball.speed, dy=Ball.speed) def update(self): if self.left<0: self.end_game() self.destroy() def handle_collide(self): if self.right>games.screen.width: self.dx=-self.dx if self.bottom>games.screen.height or self.top<0: self.dy=-self.dy def ball_destroy(self): self.destroy() def main(): background_image=games.load_image("background.bmp", transparent=False) games.screen.background=background_image the_ball=Ball() games.screen.add(the_ball) the_paddle=Paddle() games.screen.add(the_paddle) games.mouse.is_visible=False games.screen.event_grab=True games.screen.mainloop() main()

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• What is the best way to generate income from mobile games?

  - by Thomas

  As the title states, what is the best way to get income from mobile games? (taking into consideration that creating the games only costs a lot of time and the games are relatively simple) As I see it, there are multiple ways of getting money from mobile games, Selling them for a fixed price (seems like a high threshold for potential buyers) In-game purchases (I can imagine this only works for several types of games, I don't see this working well for monopoly unless you like really fancy hotels ;) Ingame advertisements / sponsorships Which way will most likely bring the most profit?

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• Professional Windows Phone 7 Game Development: Creating Games using XNA Game Studio 4

  - by Chris Williams

  In 24 short days*, my (along with the awesome George W. Clingerman) first book will be released:   Professional Windows Phone 7 Game Development: Creating Games using XNA Game Studio 4 (or as we like to call it, that damned 550 page monstrosity that nearly killed us) Weighing in at 552 pages and featuring a foreward by the legendary James Silva (Ska Studios, creator of The Dishwasher: Dead Samurai, The Dishwasher: Vampire Smile, I MAED A GAME W1TH Z0MB1ES 1NIT!!!1, and more...) this book gives thorough coverage of XNA 4.0 as it relates to Windows Phone 7. The book is written in a light, conversational tone, which means (unlike some books) you won't be compelled to gouge your eyes out with a rusty spork after reading the first few pages. At least, that’s the intent. If you do feel compelled to engage in some feats of eye-gouging sporkage, we (the authors of this book) would like to point out that we are not responsible and that seeking the help of a mental health professional might be advised. (We’re not qualified to dispense medical advice either.) The book is structured to introduce relevant material first, with code snippets and samples of how to use various phone features and XNA concepts, with helpful side notes along the way. After you've been exposed to a few chapters worth of concepts, you get the chance to bring them together by building a game that leverages those features. This book contains THREE (3!) complete games, including: Drive & Dodge (a racing game), Poker Dice (roll dice to make poker hand combinations) and Picture Puzzle (take a photo and turn it into a jigsaw puzzle.) Writing this book has been an incredible experience, and we hope reading it will be equally informative for all of you. We’re also happy to announce there will be a Kindle edition available, along with various other electronic media. Get your copy from Wiley.com, Amazon.com, Barnes & Noble, and anywhere else awesome books are sold. *more or less… some sites list the publication date as early march, but the official street date is 2/21/2011

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• Has anyone else read "Programming video games for the Evil Genius"

  - by Martin

  I bought this book called "Programming Video Games for the Evil Genius" by Ian Cinnamon. If there is anyone who has read or is familiar with this book I am wondering if they think it is worth reading. I am interested in making video games. I have already taken intro courses in C++, Java and Python and got through okay. I've been going through this book for about a month now(SLOWLY). All I have to do is type the code exactly in the book, BUT a lot of the code is not clearly explained. I do some research online but I usually still have some trouble answering my questions. Then I found stack overflow. It's been a ton of help. Right now I am trying to make a racing game right out of this book and I got to a point where the author left a bunch of errors in his code. One of the members of this website fixed it up for me, but added some stuff that I'm having trouble understanding. I spend more time trying to figure out the authors errors and fix them or get someone to help me fix them than I actually do learning code. I REALLY want to learn how to do this and I am ready and willing to put in the time, but I'm not sure if my time would be better spent learning from a different source. Are there any veterans out there that are familiar with this book and think it's worth it/not worth it? Should I try to move onto another book? Any advice for a fresh start for someone who wants to learn some video game programming?

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• Is there a portal dedicated to HTML5 games?

  - by Bane

  Just to get something straight; by "portal", I mean a website that frequently publishes a certain type of games, has a blog, some articles, maybe some tutorials and so on. All of these things are not required (except the game publishing part, of course), for example, I consider Miniclip to be a flash game portal. The reason for defining this term is because I'm not sure if other people use it in this context. I recently (less than a year ago) got into HTML5 game development, nothing serious, just my own small projects that I didn't really show to a lot of people, and that certainly didn't end up somewhere on the web (although, I am planning to make a website for my next game). I am interested in the existence of an online portal where indie devs (or non-indie ones, doesn't really matter that much) can publish their own games, sort of like "by devs for devs", also a place where you can find some simple tutorials on basic HTML5 game development and so on... I doubt something like this exists for several reasons: You can't really commercialize an HTML5 game without a strong server-side and microtransactions The code can be easily copied HTML5 is simply new, and things need time to get their own portals somewhere... If a thing like this does not exist, I think I might get into making one some day...

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• Styles of games that work at low-resolution

  - by Brendan Long

  I'm taking a class on compilers, and the goal is to write a compiler for Meggy Jr devices (Arduino). The goal is just to make a simple compilers with loops and variables and stuff. Obviously, that's lame, so the "real goal" is to make an impressive game on the device. The problem is that it only has 64 pixels to work with (technically 72, but the top 8 are single-color and not part of the main display, so they're really only useful for displaying things like money). My problem is thinking of something to do on a device that small. It doesn't really matter if it's original, but it can't be something that's already available. My first idea was "snake", but that comes with the SDK. Same with a side-scrolling shooter. Remaining ideas include a tower defense game (hard to write, hard to control), an RPG (same), tetris (lame).. The problem is that all of the games I like require a high-resolution screen because they have a lot of text. Even a really simple game like nethack would be hard because each creature would be a single color. tl;dr What styles of games require a. No text; and b. Few enough objects that representing them each with a single color is acceptable? EDIT: To clarify, the display is 8x8 for a total of 64 pixels, not 64x64.

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• Styles of games that work at low-resolution

  - by Brendan Long

  I'm taking a class on compilers, and the goal is to write a compiler for Meggy Jr devices (Arduino). The goal is just to make a simple compilers with loops and variables and stuff. Obviously, that's lame, so the "real goal" is to make an impressive game on the device. The problem is that it only has 64 pixels to work with (technically 72, but the top 8 are single-color and not part of the main display, so they're really only useful for displaying things like money). My problem is thinking of something to do on a device that small. It doesn't really matter if it's original, but it can't be something that's already available. My first idea was "snake", but that comes with the SDK. Same with a side-scrolling shooter. Remaining ideas include a tower defense game (hard to write, hard to control), an RPG (same), tetris (lame).. The problem is that all of the games I like require a high-resolution screen because they have a lot of text. Even a really simple game like nethack would be hard because each creature would be a single color. tl;dr What styles of games require a. No text; and b. Few enough objects that representing them each with a single color is acceptable?

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• Updating games for iOS 6 and new iPhone/iPod Touch

  - by SundayMonday

  Say I have a game that runs full-screen on iPhone 4S and older devices. The balance of the game is just right for the 480 x 320 screen and associated aspect ratio. Now I want to update my game to run full-screen on the new iPhone/iPod Touch where the aspect ratio of the screen is different. It seems like this can be challenging for some games in terms of maintaining the "balance". For example if the extra screen space was just tacked onto the right side of Jet Pack Joyride the balance would be thrown off since the user now has more time to see and react to obstacles. Also it could be challenging in terms of code maintenance. Perhaps Jet Pack Joyride would slightly increase the speed of approaching obstacles when the game is played on newer devices. However this quickly becomes messy when extra conditional statements are added all over the code. One solution is to have some parameters that are set in once place at start-up depending on the device type. What are some strategies for updating iOS games to run on the new iPhone and iPod Touch?

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• Designing rules to fight smallpox in Civ-style TBS games

  - by Williham Totland

  TL;DR: How do you design a ruleset for a Civ-style TBS game that prevents city smallpox from being a profitable or viable strategy? Long version: Civ-style games are pretty great. Bringing a civilization from cradle to grave is a great endeavor, and practicing diplomacy with hard-line human players is fun and challenging. In theory. In practice, however, many of these games has, especially in multiplayer, exactly one viable strategy: City smallpox, a.k.a. infinite city spread, a.k.a. covering all available space with 1-citizen cities, packed as tight as they will go. I suppose this could count as emergent gameplay, but still; it could hardly be considered to be in the spirit of the class of game. The Civilization series, of course, is stuck in their more or less fixed rule sets, established with Civilization. Yes, there have been major changes in some respects, but the rules pertaining to city building and maintenance have stayed pretty similar. So the question, then: If you build a ruleset for a TBS from the ground up; what rules should be in place to prevent Infinite City Sprawl from being a viable strategy? Or should ICS be a viable strategy?

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• Cleaning Up Online Games with Positive Enforcement

  - by Jason Fitzpatrick

  Anyone who has played online multiplayer games, especially those focused on combat, can attest to how caustic other players can be. League of Legends creators are fighting that, rather successfully, with a positive-reinforcement honor system. The Mary Sue reports: Here’s the background: Six months ago, Riot established Team Player Behavior — affectionately called Team PB&J — a group of experts in psychology, neuroscience, and statistics (already, I am impressed). At the helm is Jeffrey Lin, better known as Dr. Lyte, Riot’s lead designer of social systems. As quoted in a recent article at Polygon: We want to show other companies and other games that it is possible to tackle player behavior, and with certain systems and game design tools, we can shape players to be more positive. Which brings us to the Honor system. Honor is a way for players to reward each other for good behavior. This is divvied up into four categories: Friendly, Helpful, Teamwork, and Honorable Opponent. At the end of a match, players can hand out points to those they deem worthy. These points are reflected on players’ profiles, but do not result in any in-game bonuses or rewards (though this may change in the future). All Honor does is show that you played nicely. 6 Ways Windows 8 Is More Secure Than Windows 7 HTG Explains: Why It’s Good That Your Computer’s RAM Is Full 10 Awesome Improvements For Desktop Users in Windows 8

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