en-usCopyright GP Studios 2026https://www.gpstudios.com/rss/blogshttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/lets-get-physicalI usually start these posts with a brief apology. I know it’s redundant now, but I’m such a gentleman I just can’t help myself.
Here we go…
Sorry.
I used to post more often on here, but unless I’ve got some exciting news it’ll likely remain about once a month for the time-being.
Perhaps once I move into other areas of development I’ll have more stuff to talk about, but recently it’s mostly been more of the same old graft which I’ve already covered on previous blogs.
As you can probably make out it hasn’t been particularly enthralling of late, but I have kept up a nice pace and workflow which I’m happy with.
There’s more areas to think about and concentrate on now that the world and all the rooms are established, but I’m still stuck performing a series of fairly tasks. Perhaps the next few weeks will be a bit more interesting and diverse.
There’s so much still to think about it makes me dizzy. Menus, character animation, interaction screens, minigames... I could easily go on but if I]]>Fri, 02 Jun 2017 20:03:26 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/lets-get-physicalhttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/anniversary-blogYeah.
Oh hey!
Sorry as usual for the lack of updates, I’ve been pretty busy the last few weeks.
Unusually I’m writing this blog in an uncharacteristically positive frame of mind. I think I’m at the point now where I'm almost ready to get stuck into the real meat and bones of the game, and I’m really looking forward to it.
Up until now, most of my time has been spent on things besides the game engine or interface. It’s strange to consider that a year into this project, it still feels like I'm in the preparation stages. That’s not entirely true, but that’s often how it feels.
This is due to the fact that I am still, relatively speaking, a bit new to this. Not just Unity, but game-development practices outside of Flash in general.
All considered, it has been a massive learning curve, there still remains plenty to learn (namely anything to do with graphics and rendering), but otherwise I feel significantly more at ease with this design]]>Fri, 28 Apr 2017 19:08:41 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/anniversary-bloghttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/excuses…
*cough*
…
*sniff*
So...
How about the... uhh, things. You know?
OK, clearly I’m long overdue my scheduled regular update, but I’ve got a very very good a reason.
I don’t usually go much into my personal life on this blog but, I’ve got to tell you...
I’ve been away on holiday.
My bum fell out.
I’m pregnant.
I’ve got cancer.
And it’s serious… which is why I’ve struggled to get much done since my last blog!
58 tumours in total. Apparently that’s quite a lot, but my oncologist said he can have them out by Friday! (He’s very talented.)
Yeah.
None of that was true, except for the bit where I admitted getting very little done.
At the time of my last post I was about to integrate the new ‘world’ with the rest of the project, but somewhere along the way I got lost in a mad whirlpool of my own design. It’s been a very circular, static few weeks.
The way I designed the world to begin with had some fundamental problems. I spent a very long time recently trying to resolve them, but with little]]>Mon, 27 Mar 2017 18:12:00 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/excuseshttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/friday-friday-gotta-write-blog-on-fridayEveryday for the last 2 weeks it’s been on my to-do list, but somehow I never get round to it. But tonight I’m making a concerted effort. That’s commitment, folks, only 2 weeks later than my word.
It’s been a busy few weeks. I’ve gotten a lot done but as usual it’s a little short of my intended target.
I’ve spent almost all of my time in the 3D editor and photoshop - modelling, painting, unwrapping and texturing the static environment.
I’ve described in previous blogs how enjoyable and relaxing this I find this, but after so many weeks of performing the same dull repetitive tasks, I’ll be glad to move onto something else to put it mildly.
I’m a little apprehensive to show pictures as it’s not quite there yet.
The models have to exported into the game editor before I can finesse the look of materials and textures, however it makes sense for me to finish modelling before I bother with that.
So]]>Fri, 24 Feb 2017 16:52:46 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/friday-friday-gotta-write-blog-on-fridayhttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/greyprintsI’m seriously overdue on my blog schedule, sorry about that. I’ll try to post more frequently, lately I’ve not had much material to blog about.
As any regular reader will probably gleam by my lack of presence, with regards the new Wasted Youth game, things feel increasingly troubled and depressing right now.
As ever, the list of things to do increases faster than I can progress, and it feels like I’ve been running on the spot for the best part of a season.
I hate to go on about the negatives in the blog as so often when I read it back to myself it reads like a dreary letter of complaint to myself. I’ll try not to focus on the negatives, but unfortunately, that’s largely the headspace I’m in at this moment.
Another reason I’ve felt a little shy of returning recently is that I keep flip-flopping on my approach to things and I’m a little embarrassed to keep flaunting my haphazardness.
For instance, my last post largely was about some of the game-editing tools I was creating for basic room]]>Tue, 31 Jan 2017 15:40:34 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/greyprintshttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/a-change-of-tackChristmas and New Year’s fell at an awkward time of the week, that’s my excuse anyway.
Unfortunately, I haven’t got nearly as much done as I’d like since last posting.
It’s a little dispiriting to think that the short video I made of the character walking around the school was 5 months ago now.
*sigh*
On the face of it, things don’t look massively different since that video, besides decor.
I’ve spent most of my time creating editors and panels and whatnot to assist design, instead of, well, designing.
It’s maddening to think I’ve been working 9 months or so on this now, and I’ve still not gotten round to some of the most basic aspects of the game engine.
I think that's just the nature of the beast though. When a custom game editor is involved, the engine seems secondary.
I hope the work I've done up until now pays off. The whole point of creating a game editor is to speed up game-development, but in my case I may have miscalculated the need for such tools. After all I]]>Tue, 03 Jan 2017 15:49:35 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/a-change-of-tackhttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/another-boySorry I’ve just eaten a pizza.
Apparently it’s been three weeks since the last post, it feels longer than that though... that’s a good sign.
Without going into specifics, I feel like I’ve gained a bit more focus on what I’m aiming for now. The countless decisions and what-ifs are better defined and increasingly answerable.
It seems the fog has lifted a little and I hope it stays that way.
That said, as ever I have to remind you that no matter how productive a week or 2 or 3 are, they represent a mere a pixel of the full image, but it’s better than it’s been for a few months now, so that’s something.
There’s a good reason for this increased productivity, it’s because the majority of my time recently has shifted from the logical side of things (coding, game-engine stuff) back to the aesthetic side (3d modelling, painting, texturing, etc), which I find a lot more enjoyable and easier.
There’s a sense of finality to graphic design that I don’t get with coding, and it requires little]]>Mon, 05 Dec 2016 18:08:37 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/another-boyhttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/wallsOn the subject of Wasted Youth, things continue to creep along, but not at anything like the pace I’m aiming for. I’m feeling a bit better than when I wrote the last blog post, but that’s not to say things are going swimmingly.
Recently I’ve found I have to put a lot more forethought and concentration into coding, which over time induces a lot of mental strain. So often I get foggy-minded whereby a simple task becomes an ordeal.
I’d love to stick my head in an MRI and see what the hell is going on in there sometimes when I’m struggling. It’s got to be a mess in there.
Aaanyway… so be it.
Some of the problems I face are just so damn simple on the face of it that I feel a pang of embarrassment even mentioning them on here. I’ve covered some of the issues in previous blog posts, like the camera conundrum, but there’s one that continues to mock and torment me.
Walls.
Walls?
Yeah, walls.
As a game developer, constantly seeking answers for my own problems through discussion]]>Mon, 14 Nov 2016 18:11:05 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/wallshttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/flyI’m not having a very good time.
It’s practically impossible not to entertain the notion on some level, that the project is heading down a similar route to past efforts - some sort of doom-laden abandonment bucket.
And it’s stressful. It’s become a genuine source of grief for me recently.
Lots of sighing, lots of rubbing the side of my head in contemplation.
Fortunately for you lot, there’s nothing else to avert my attention. This is it. Unlike other difficult periods there’s usually something else I desperately want to do instead. Not this time, for better or worse I’ve locked myself in.
And as if things couldn't get any worse, an overly excited housefly is currently occupying the strict no-fly zone above my head. It’s driving me crazy. I’ve made several attempts to kill it with a mousemat but it remains unscathed.
So why are things still shit?
(I just got that fly, I feel a bit better now)
The usual]]>Mon, 31 Oct 2016 17:55:50 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/flyhttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/stall-log-1Today however, writing this blog feels like honouring a pointless tradition. Frankly I’d rather ignore it and post an excuse on facebook instead.
Recently I’ve found myself getting stuck in a groove, running in circles, a bit of an old habit of mine unfortunately.
A system I came up with to synchronize game assets between Unity and my 3D design software allowing for more functionality has become a massive, neverending chore, among other things.
This has happened to me time and time again with recent projects. I start coding with a vague goal in mind, but I end up digging a hole, a deep hole, and I keep digging, and then I realise I’ve spent 2 weeks digging a hole and I'm not sure why, and now I’m in a massive fucking hole.
So what’s gone wrong exactly?
It’s difficult to explain, but essentially I’ve started something that required more]]>Tue, 27 Sep 2016 18:01:04 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/stall-log-1https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/wasted-youth-progress-report-14Come along... There we are, are you sitting comfortably?
CHILDREN: YEAAAH!
Ahem… Three Moons ago, I was sitting at my desktop writing untold amounts of COMPUTER CODE !!
CHILDREN: OOOOOHH!
But then I noticed a terrible problem, children... My computer code WOULDN’T COMPILE !!1!
CHILDREN: OH NOO!!!
It turned out I had made a grave and frightful mistake! It was... a SYNTAX ERROR !!!1!!1!
[CHILDREN BEGIN SHRIEKING AND CRYING]
------
Sorry I can't just write a load of stale techy guff without showing on my part bit of self-awareness. I know some of you like to insist in the comments that it's not dull but I beg to differ!
Right then, let's get on with it. In the last 2 weeks I’ve achieved some things which are pretty cool from my point of view, but they’re mostly conceptual and possibly hard to describe. I feel I’m going to struggle to put it to words, but I’ll try.
I LOVE GRIDS
Firstly, I’ve devised a way of cutting the]]>Tue, 13 Sep 2016 18:31:14 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/wasted-youth-progress-report-14https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/wasted-youth-progress-report-13an example of a slow news day
Slow news week I’m afraid.
Here’s the problem: I’ve spent most of my time recently working on some pretty ethereal stuff which is hard to write anything interesting about.
Just to clarify, this isn’t bad news, I've been productive but there's very little evidence which I can present here.
As I approach the 6 month mark (gulp) I can finally sense that I’m getting somewhere.
To make a pointless analogy for just a moment, it’s like I’ve been lifting weights for so many weeks with no noticeable results, and I'm just like 'what the fuck!?', but recently I’ve noticed a difference in my … uh, triceps? Nevermind.
Especially in the last 2 weeks I feel I’ve really got to grips with coding for Unity’s engine.
It’s quite an enjoyable process now since I’ve overcome the basics, I no longer need to resort to online documentation every 5 minutes.
I have to say the inbuilt Unity game engine is pretty excellent. Having spent years with Flash]]>Tue, 30 Aug 2016 18:04:42 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/wasted-youth-progress-report-13https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/wasted-youth-progress-report-12I’m in a slightly better mood for it this time. Had a bit of a powercut earlier and lost a couple hours of work, which was pretty annoying. Also I’m still a little anxious with the pace of things (as is my tendency). As I go deeper into the project it feels like I’m getting slower and slower, and these posts get harder and harder to write. Oh well, better just carry on regardless, right?
So I mentioned I was going to finally start work on the game engine last time… well, that’s not happened to any large degree.
What I have managed though is to establish more of a workflow, easing the process of designing the world.
It used to take a lot of manual work just to import a few 3D models into the project. I’ve sorted that out now so I can simply export it from the 3D editor right into Unity without any problems.
I’ve also worked out a system for object grouping which speeds up placing repeated objects. Generally I’ve worked to streamline the process so it all goes a bit]]>Mon, 15 Aug 2016 19:04:23 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/wasted-youth-progress-report-12https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/wasted-youth-progress-report-11Sorry guys, if you haven’t guessed already this is going to be a bit of a moaner.
While I haven’t slowed down in terms of work and effort towards this project, it’s just not been looking very dynamic recently. Considering the vast amount of stuff I’ve yet to work on, I’m starting to have that apprehensive feeling again, what I’ve previously referred to as my ‘wobbles’.
Being realistic, if I carry on at this pace it’ll take considerably longer than a year.
That’s not being glib, it’s just what it is.
The problem with writing these updates every 2 weeks is it often lands when I’m feeling pretty unenthused by the whole thing - and then you get one of these whiny blog posts.
It’s not ideal is it?
To get back to the game itself, it’s not looking quite right at the moment. Let me explain:
For the last 2 weeks I’ve carried on creating yet more objects.
I’ve got]]>Tue, 02 Aug 2016 19:01:33 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/wasted-youth-progress-report-11https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/wasted-youth-progress-report-10It feels like these updates are getting harder and harder to write. I’ll try my best but I can’t imagine this'll be a good one. Got some pics if you’re interested.
Since I got my little blue guy running about the place I’ve avoided that side of things. There’s all sorts of gamey stuff that I’ve yet to delve into (clearly). My recent time has entirely consisted on design.
It’s probably a good thing I’m not rushing to do the gamey stuff at this moment. As a commenter stated from the last blog:
On a serious note, I think that if you need to spend that time learning about unity and such, do it. I'd much rather see the game being high quality - delayed - even for a year instead of you just rushing it through while completely ignoring the learning process and ending with a bad product.
Wise words.
I’m sure I’m repeating myself, but it can’t be stated enough what a total novice I’ve become now that I’m using Unity. Many aspects of it are very simple and easy to learn for a beginner as]]>Mon, 18 Jul 2016 18:57:04 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/wasted-youth-progress-report-10https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/wy-gameplay-videoI’ve managed to record and upload some gameplay footage too. As usual I must stress that this is nowhere near complete.
To be honest I feel a bit embarrassed to have to show you the game in such an early state, but if I’m writing updates every 2 weeks this is all you can expect.
Warts-an-awl.
Here's a piccy to get you in the mood.
Blue Boy stands an iconic pose between some shittily placed low-poly trees
If I visualize a progress bar for this project I’d estimate I’m at around 10%, probably less. The reason it's going so slowly is not my perfectionism getting the better of me, far from it, it’s simply that I’m still learning. Also it was my birthday last week so I had a short break and spent some time playing computer games.
This is as fast as I can go right now without resorting to amphetamines.
Before the video, just a brief description of what I’ve been doing since the last post.
It’s been a]]>Tue, 05 Jul 2016 19:18:26 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/wy-gameplay-videohttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/wy-progress-report-8I’ve really felt like putting this off until next week, but I’m doing it anyway just for you lot, you lovely people (aww).
I don’t think the last 2 weeks haven’t been very productive.
It’s not like I've spent less time on it than usual, it’s just I haven’t got much to show for. If I look at the snapshot I took of the project from 2 weeks ago it looks about the same.
I’ve mainly been fiddling about in Unity and coding in C#, creating bits and bobs, creating my own editing tools and utilities, some of which have little to no purpose except to teach me.
That’s how I’ve spent the bulk of my time, it doesn't amount to much.
I’ve been wearing in my new shoes basically. I’m learning quite a lot about Unity and 3D in general, so it’s not time wasted (nopunintended) but, what can I say - it's been a bit slow.
Don’t fret though! I haven’t come here empty handed, in a last minute effort I baked some delicious cakes (gifs).
Anyway, it’s not all bollocks, I’ve designed]]>Mon, 20 Jun 2016 20:10:42 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/wy-progress-report-8https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/wy-3d-school-picsI’ve been working with Unity for a month now but I’m still only just getting the hang of it. There’s some fundamental concepts that I’m struggling with still, and it appears to be a lot less functional than I originally thought.
Annoyingly I’m finding some of the more technical stuff a lot harder to research. And the questions I’ve asked on discussion boards and the like go unnoticed and unanswered. It’s kind of frustrating, I’ve yet to find a really good source for information. It might be time to shell out a few quid for some physical reading material.
Despite the difficulties, I’m still happy with this new direction. It seems pretty definitive now that this is the right way forward, and I hope it makes the best possible game that I’m capable of.
Since last time I’ve still barely]]>Mon, 06 Jun 2016 17:24:11 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/wy-3d-school-picshttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/wy-progress-report-6Since last time I’ve been very busy working on the game and for once I can look back at my post from 2 weeks ago and feel quite pleased with myself on the progress I’ve made.
Usually I find time goes very quickly when I’m deep into a project, but the 3D character model seems like something I did several weeks ago.
I hope this is an indication of something good.
You might notice I’m a day late on this post (every fortnight on a Sunday). I lost track of time during Sunday as I spent the entire day from morning until midnight crafting 3D models. It’s quite a nice state of mind to be in, concentrating so hard that hours fly by without notice. 3D design reminds me of arts and crafts from my youth. Measuring and cutting MD, moulding things out of clay, even painting. It’s very satisfying.
The vision I had for the game has changed somewhat since the last post. I was thinking of making the game a blend of 2D and 3D, a style that I quite enjoy in other games. However, I’ve]]>Mon, 23 May 2016 18:31:29 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/wy-progress-report-6https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/3d-character-testI made this in about a day with Blender.
This is my first attempt at sculpting anything. I've been using Blender for about a week now having little to no experience in 3D design previously.
I was designing simple objects like furniture and found the knack for it very quickly.
So I thought what the hell I'll try a 3D person, even though I had no intention of using it for Wasted Youth.
As with any sculpture, I started with a cube and worked it into the result displayed.
As I sculpted away, refining the finer details I noticed I was making it more and more realistic.
I hope I can make it a little more cartoony, and improve on the freaky facial features.
As you can see I've given him ears, hands, feet, but I'm afraid the result might resemble those freakish Photoshop creations titled 'What would Homer Simpson look like in real life!'
So as happy as I am with what I've managed to create, I'm not sure]]>Sat, 14 May 2016 13:13:33 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/3d-character-testhttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/back-to-square-1They say ‘any progress is good progress’. Hooray!
It's not a bad thing though... Actually, I’m quite relieved. Here’s what’s happened…
I mentioned a few weeks ago how I’d often had ‘wobbles’ of confidence. Since the last post after several more wobbles, I realised I just wasn’t doing it right.
The amount of fundamental bullshit I had to deal with before I could even start making a game was ridiculous. Creating a game on your own from scratch is by no means easy, but it shouldn’t be this hard.
At this point I was coding in the Haxe language and a fairly new game engine called Luxe.
As much as I liked both of these things, in the end it turned out no task was simple.
Another problem I was facing was the lack of a decent visual editor for creating a world.
I’ve been using a tile editor for the most basic elements of the]]>Sun, 08 May 2016 19:45:45 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/back-to-square-1https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/wy-progress-report-3I’m sorry to say It’s not been all that great, and if I’m honest writing this update is just about the last thing I fancy doing right now. Waaah, poor me.
Anyway, here’s what I’ve been up to.
Basically I’m just trying to get to a point where I’m making ‘the game’, instead of all this boring stuff which frankly isn’t very interesting, but unfortunately the parts of Flash I took for granted are taking a lot of time to set up this new framework.
My focus last week was on getting a basic UI system working, but unlike Flash, even something as simple as a functional textbox or a button requires quite a lot of work.
While the game engine I’m using is very good, some things (like GUIs) aren’t up to the standard that I’d hoped for.
Since the last post it’s become increasingly apparent to me how difficult the task of making a game is nowadays if you decide not to use Flash, or more limited devkits like Construct2 or GameMaker.
It’s made me wonder recently]]>Sun, 24 Apr 2016 19:05:44 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/wy-progress-report-3https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/wy-progress-report-2Since then, I’ve mostly spent my time finding some free, open source software and script libraries, and butchering them for my purposes.
Admittedly, I’ve only touched the surface in developing the actual game engine, I’ve been concentrating more on creating an easy system for generating graphics and game assets.
"Buckle up buckarroo!"
Unfortunately I can’t just draw something in Flash and have it magically render without any thought or consideration.
Just keep in mind I’m still transitioning and I’m not finding it terribly easy.
I mentioned last time I was considering making the world out of tiles, much like I used to with RPG Maker before my foray into Flash, so I found myself a tile editor (it’s called Tiled if you’re interested).
But it isn’t that simple. Unlike most ‘tiled’ games, my tiles come in all shapes and sizes, and they have special properties that need to be taken into account]]>Sun, 10 Apr 2016 20:20:29 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/wy-progress-report-2https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/wy-lets-get-technicalThere’s still work to do with the site, you’ll notice the ‘Showcase’ section is still just a placeholder, which I’ve intended to do every weekend since but there’s so much shit I’ve had to do I just haven’t found the time.
I’ve been really busy though. Honest.
What I plan to do with this blog over the course of development is to update and inform you every 2 weeks with a progress report. And if I don’t do one on time be sure to wig the fuck out and call me unpleasant names (don’t actually do this).
In the last few weeks, the work towards the game has mostly been prep.
Lots of research, writing, testing scripts and software and whatnot.
Just to clarify - Wasted Youth will not be a Flash game... or just in case I change my mind - I am not]]>Sun, 27 Mar 2016 17:19:17 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/wy-lets-get-technicalhttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/and-were-backThis is the new site, hope you like it.
Have a look around, it doesn’t look like much I’ll admit, but it’s better than what we had before.
I decided against doing a user login system in the end, but if I change my mind I could implement it in no time at all.
On the arcade side of things, I was thinking of maybe doing a rewards system, like EXP and levels, badges and whatnot, but considering how small our userbase is nowadays it probably wouldn’t that wise.
I’m open to suggestions, tell me what you think through the comments or by getting in contact via the contact page.
You'll notice we're now using Disqus for posting comments. With the old system I wasn't even aware of comments that weren't posted in the news section, so they were largely unmoderated and unresponded to.
Now I can see everything, it means we can have a bit more of a chat in the comments. I expect I'll be on here a bit more often, possibly writing blogs more regularly.
The reason I took a break recently was simply because I]]>Sun, 06 Mar 2016 13:12:21 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/and-were-backhttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/news-post-65Sorry, I took a little break and stopped reading and replying to comments for a few weeks. I prefer to read them in bulk instead.
It might have looked a bit disheartening of me when I reposted Jim’s post from pastebin, but it wasn’t really. He more or less expressed my thoughts and explained my apprehensiveness pretty well.
It's true though, as many of you have gauged, I’m not jumping up and down in excitement at the prospect of spending many months of hard work to produce something with very little reward.
Now, this might sound a bit yucky, but if I knew there was a large cheque at the end and some sort of recognition, I’d be dancing a jig at the prospect of working on Wasted Youth.
Honestly, between the 30 or 40 of you who regularly check the site for news, if you could each send me a big bag of money I’d do whatever you want me to, gladly. Undeserved wealth is the key happiness right?
That’s not to say I have no artistic integrity, but in the position I’m in I can’t afford to fart away]]>Mon, 02 Nov 2015 16:09:23 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/news-post-65https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/site-2-0-still-pendingIt’s clear what you all want me to do, and while I haven’t made any decisions yet, I can clearly see potential for this in the proceeding months.
It must be said though, while a lot of you responded positively, I have many doubts on the feasibility, and I’m perhaps a bit more apprehensive than I was a month ago. Obviously I’ll have to put in a lot of effort to rally the troops as it were and to get the word out.
Fortunately, I have a working prototype (Part 1) which people can play, but I do wonder how I’d go about raising interest for something seemingly out of thin air.
What would a publicity campaign consist of? Spamming on social media and discussion forums? Do I need to make a video go viral on YouTube? I’m not too privy to this kind of thing… uh, marketing.
And let’s not forget it’s been over 4 years since Part 1 was released and it would be deluded to think that news of a kickstarter]]>Thu, 17 Sep 2015 15:49:04 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/site-2-0-still-pendinghttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/a-brief-outline-of-an-ideaHere's some thoughts I've been thinking in the last month or so, figured I might as well share it with you…
The problem with attempting to complete Wasted Youth right now is it's simply not worth the effort, unless I’m guaranteed a worthwhile return it just doesn’t bear thinking about.
I have so many half-finished projects, committing myself to another which requires considerably more work just doesn’t make much sense. However, I am aware that the longer I leave this, the less support / hangers-on from the original players of Part 1 (as made apparent by recent comments on the previous news post) … Even so, unless I can secure a deal with a publisher/sponsor or crowdfund or a combination of the two ala Shenmue 3, then I don’t see myself completing Wasted Youth any time soon. So]]>Wed, 19 Aug 2015 12:10:42 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/a-brief-outline-of-an-ideahttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/not-deadHi guys! I’m not dead!
It’s a little embarrassing how often I have to say that sentence.
It’s 2015, Christ! I’ve just had to write a letter to my accountant reporting another crap year, and we’re talking 2013… 2014… well, it was beyond crap, shitter than shit, fucked beyond fuckery.
So here’s the lowdown:
New site design IMMINENT (You should realise any statement or measure of time coming from me can mean anything, so imminent is as good a words any)
I’ve been working on redesigning the site for the last month, and since the new year I’ve been working on it and nothing but. It’s looking good, I’ve got the hang of this HTML 5 lark. It’s a piece of piss. Javascript? Not a problem. CSS? Well, I’m still getting to grips with you but you’re not as scary as I once thought you were. I’m not great at any of them, but I know a lot of scripting languages these days.
So there’s that. If there’s any regular visitors]]>Wed, 21 Jan 2015 14:13:02 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/not-deadhttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/jigsaws-funI started it 12 days ago, worked on it for 6 days, took a break during christmas and I’ve only just come back to it today.
As boring as it sounds, it’s a jigsaw game. It struck me I had never seen a decent jigsaw game in Flash, so for fun I started making one. I never intended to spend any time on it, but after a day of working on it and realising it could mean having a game out in January, I decided to focus on this project instead of 40 Chambers.
I wanted to make a jigsaw puzzle game that allowed for very large puzzles. Originally I wanted to make a jigsaw with 2,000 pieces because I remember doing one of this size one summer when I was younger.
I was able to generate puzzles of up to 10,000 pieces large with surprisingly little lag, but it soon became apparent that the largest acceptable size I could get away with was 1,000. Unless I used ultra high resolution images to convert into jigsaw pieces, it’s just impossible]]>Mon, 30 Dec 2013 12:55:40 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/jigsaws-funhttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/the-master-speaksI think I’ll address the comments I’ve been getting recently in the last few news posts, because the level of vitriol and hatred towards me seems to be getting out of control.
Because there’s not a user/login system I can’t tell how many of you are there really are in the comments, I’ll assume there’s about 10-20 of you.
To those of you who are pissed off that I’m not slaving away at ‘Wasted Youth, Part 2’, I apologize that I ever stated or gave the impression that it would be out soon. I have a tendency to not fully realize how much work a project requires, as I’ve made clear time and time again.
You have to realise that this is mostly a one man operation in terms of game development.
It’s not a very rewarding job. I sit here everyday doing this from the morning until the afternoon in the hope that the work I’m doing will at some point be worthwhile.
At this point, I would be fooling myself if I didn’t admit that it doesn’t feel worthwhile right now. Actually I think it definably]]>Mon, 04 Nov 2013 14:02:03 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/the-master-speakshttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/somewhat-belated-news-postSorry for the lack of updates, there’s been very little to report on of any interest, apart from some general inactivity.
In my last post it was my intention to get together a trailer that would show some exciting scenes from the game, but as you’ve probably worked out I never got round to doing it. It was a good bit of motivation though while it lasted.
Since then, the game has been in a bit of a state. I spent a couple day reconfiguring the system by which a level is created, because there was some significant lag happening between levels. So I did that, and then I had to fix a bug. and After fixing that bug, another bug was revealed, and so on and so on. I queried with myself whether to just revert back to an old healthy version and just live with the minor inconvenience of a massive lag spike between levels, but I had faith in that I was almost finished.
Well, long story short, I had a solid 2 weeks of bug fixing frustration, all because of this one minor change. I couldn’t have predicted]]>Mon, 16 Sep 2013 13:38:36 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/somewhat-belated-news-posthttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/a-little-updateThis is just a quick update, but I hope to do a BIG update next week maybe.
In the last 6 weeks I’ve been doing nothing but working on 40 Chambers, but it’s still not complete. STILL!
I’ve been working on it a little harder than usual and it’s been quite fun, so motivation is not my problem right now. It’s just not moving as fast as I’d like.
So, this is the plan. By next week I hope to have the game in a state so I can record some gameplay and edit into an exciting trailer.
I’m not so good with video editing software, so it might be a little more difficult than I’m expecting, but nevertheless I’m pretty confident I’ll be able to create a nice looking 30-60 second trailer to maybe whet your appetites (and maybe sponsors’) for the upcoming game.
For now, here’s this rather short clip.
…
I told you it was short.
In other news, it’s hot as fuck in Devon right now and I want to die.
‘Til next time.]]>Mon, 22 Jul 2013 14:02:34 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/a-little-updatehttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/new-game-gigabuddySorry I haven’t been posting much recently, there’s not been very much to report on recently so I’ve been keeping quiet.
Last week however, we released a new game called Gigabuddy.
It’s an addictive, challenging platformer. It has an impressive 100 levels, each one engaging and well-designed.
If you enjoyed CrateRun, it’s likely you’ll enjoy this.
Please play it and rate it on Newgrounds and Kongregate, links below:
Play Gigabuddy on Newgrounds
Play Gigabuddy on Kongregate
Regarding my game (40 Chambers), despite the rather dire situation, things are progressing nicely right now.
The official beginning of Summer is but a couple weeks away, and I’m currently enjoying the South West of England’s shockingly pleasant weather. I think it’s doing some good for me.
And in other news, remember the pile of dead birds? And the rice? And the Cornflakes?
Well, I came across something a couple weeks ago that blows all that stuff out of the water... What I found is truly bizarre and surely can’t serve]]>Tue, 04 Jun 2013 12:55:24 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/new-game-gigabuddyhttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/new-game-sotaI apologise for the lateness, I was going to write something last week but then I didn't.
And to be honest I almost didn't do this today, but I knew that if I didn't do one soon it’ll have been over a month of silence.
You may have noticed we’ve released another game.
It’s a somewhat quieter affair than the last few, but we were happy to sponsor this game nonetheless. The game is Sota: Level Pack. I know - catchy name!
The game is up on Newgrounds and Kongregate, please help us out by voting and rating it on those sites.
Newgrounds: http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/617056
Kongregate: http://www.kongregate.com/games/exelents/sota-level-pack-a
We’ve also got another game that will be released next week hopefully, called GigaBuddy - a very retro platformer, like something from the 1980s!
You may have noticed that I promised another game with our logo on it in the last news post (or maybe the one before), but unfortunately that one went a bit tits up.
In short, the bastard took our money and]]>Tue, 07 May 2013 13:29:08 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/new-game-sotahttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/the-continuing-adventures-ofSo, I’m aware that I haven’t been updating you on the progress of the game recently.
Judging from the comments, I doubt you care though do you?
Between sponsoring Farflung and releasing CrateRun, progress on 40 Chambers slowed down quite a lot.
The constant emailing managed to suck up a lot of my time that I would otherwise have spent working on the game.
Since Monday things are more or less back to normal.
There’s no new sponsored games this week, but we have 2 more that will hopefully be coming out in the next couple weeks.
I’m going to keep things brief. I tend to waffle on a bit on here, and I don’t think it amuses those Wasted Youthers.
Just to clarify, Wasted Youth 2 is my next project. As soon as I’m done with 40 Chambers, I’ll finish doing WY2. Please please please stop filling the comments with anger and vitriol because I’m focussing on this project. It is nearly done.
Anyway, here’s some new pics of the game:
And here’s the Main Menu of the game. I’d like to hear some feedback]]>Wed, 10 Apr 2013 14:14:28 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/the-continuing-adventures-ofhttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/new-game-craterunWe've just uploaded CrateRun, created by erase.begin.
It's a challenging survival platformer, but very doable and lots of fun.
Give it a go and see what you think!
Click here to play!
And we have more on the way.
Look back here next week for another sponsored game, and hopefully some news on the progress of 40 Chambers.
Enjoy the new game, see if you can complete it and then compete for the top of the highscores table!
Farflung is now up on Newgrounds, please go and vote favourably to help us out!
Farflung is also on Kongregate, again please go and vote! Thanks!
See you next week!]]>Mon, 25 Mar 2013 17:07:48 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/new-game-craterunhttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/new-game-farflungWe have sponsored and released a new game called Farflung, created by Lee Valencia (Leebo Games).
It’s simple, fun and very addictive. We hope you enjoy it.
Click here to play!
Within the next couple weeks we will be releasing another game, and if all goes to plan we’ll be releasing at least a few more in the near future.
Stay tuned for more info in the coming weeks.
Now onto less exciting things...
It’s hard to believe a week has passed by so quickly.
And despite the exciting release of our new sponsored game, this week’s gotten off to a bad start. I’m currently writing this on my laptop because my desktop computer is having a bit of difficulty functioning like a computer ought to. ie, it’s not working.
I’ve been having problems with it for the last few days (for reasons I don’t know) and this morning it decided to act so sluggishly and crash so often that I had to do something about it.
For the last few months, I’ve been enduring Windows]]>Mon, 18 Mar 2013 13:10:14 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/new-game-farflunghttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/um-nothing-much-reallySo, what have I been up to the last couple weeks? To be honest it’s all a bit of a dull uninteresting blur.
In my spare time I’ve been looking into website design and everything related. I have learnt a lot in the last week or so.
I’ve also been improving a few things on the current site. Unfortunately you won’t notice any of them because they’re mostly background things.
I believe certain elements are working a lot quicker now, the random game boxes in particular.
Looking through the code again, it really is apparent that the person/people that designed this site really didn’t know what they were doing. It’s a total mess, and when I compile it on my local server, (ie - on my computer) I can barely see the page due to so many warnings.
Anyway, here’s a quick thing I made. It’s not that exciting really, just a glimpse of what the layout might be for the index page:
I’m wondering If I should keep the large featured games slider in the new]]>Tue, 12 Mar 2013 14:44:50 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/um-nothing-much-reallyhttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/gps-2-0-coming-soon-maybeI have some fairly interesting news. Nothing to jump up and down about, but it’s positive.
Firstly, we’re looking into sponsoring games again. We haven’t sponsored anything since Tree Of Life, which did very well. We just haven’t seen any games that we thought were worth investing in.
It’s a bit too early to say, but I’m hoping we’ll get sponsorship rights for 2 or 3 games, maybe more, so if all goes to plan you’ll be seeing our logo on some fun games within the next few weeks.
Secondly. Last weekend, I was doing some research into web design. For a while now I have been playing with the idea of redesigning the site.
Originally back in 2009 we paid to have it built, having no knowledge of web design at the time. Over the years though, I’ve had to learn a few things in order to maintain parts of the website, IE - fixing security problems, modifying/creating a page. So I am quite proficient in HTML, PHP and MySQL now, and I can create]]>Mon, 25 Feb 2013 17:26:11 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/gps-2-0-coming-soon-maybehttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/chaaangesSince I last posted, a few fundamental changes have been made to the game.
It’s a little ridiculous to be making these sorts of changes so far into development, but me and Dave felt they were necessary. Me more so though.
One of the commenters on the last news post mentioned something along the lines of having civilians follow you around instead of just giving them a gas mask and leaving them to jump up and down like some early 90’s crusty, blissed out on E and dancing their way into oblivion.
Hmmmm said “The game looks awesome! But is it possible for you to add an option that makes the people follow you...”
Well, the initial idea was that you’d lead them to safety, but I decided that it would be too unreliable/difficult to implement, and there was a possibility of enemy interaction being further complicated, so I passed on the idea.
The alternative though was to hand out gas masks to civilians and let them fend for]]>Mon, 11 Feb 2013 13:51:36 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/chaaangeshttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/tech-trubs-birds-gameFor Christmas I got myself a shiny new Motherboard for my computer, with new RAM and a sound card. It was a delightfully nerdy morning of unwrapping presents.
Later on Christmas Day, I set about removing the old motherboard and putting in the new one.
It all worked without a hitch. So many wires to remove and plug, and I didn’t forget a single one.
Unfortunately though, on the 27th I started having problems. I couldn’t connect to the internet. Weird, huh?
So for hours and hours I tried finding ways to fix it, thinking it must have been due to something I installed the day before.
At one point I had to restart the computer, and when I did, it didn’t turn on again. Nothing. Tried unplugging and plugging into the mains... nothing worked.
Despite being quite certain that I had bought myself a faulty motherboard, I routed around inside for other possibilities, because the thought of removing the]]>Mon, 28 Jan 2013 15:03:29 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/tech-trubs-birds-gamehttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/problems-tech-name-rottersOh wait, it’s the end of the world today isn’t it? Sorry, forget about Christmas, we’re all going to die at exactly 23:59:59. That’s the way God plays it. Right down to the second, the cheeky old fucker.
I guess that means that the most westerly segment of Earth has already experienced the Apocalypse. So, Alaska’s already gone, but New Zealand still has over half day left. Lucky kiwis.
So, why am I sitting here writing my website to people I’ve never met or known when I am just mere moments from God’s wrath?
Calm down, the world’s still here. The Mayans were wrong. The film 2012 was wrong. It was just a psychopath’s fantasy of what it would look like if billions perished (but it looked cool, right?)
All that hype for nothing, or as Flava Flav once said, “Don’t Believe the hype.”
I’m sure I’ve said that Flava Flav thing once before in one of these little blog posts I do so often. I must consider him a very wise and]]>Fri, 21 Dec 2012 12:48:00 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/problems-tech-name-rottershttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/new-game-detailsApologies for the lack of an update. I’m glad to say though, that this is due to how busy I have been with work and not because there is nothing on which to update.
I revealed last time that I was working a new project that was neither Wasted Youth or Bunny Invasion. The reason for this was that Bunny Invasion had stalled quite massively, and hadn’t moved in a couple months.
My original intentions were to create a game in a day. That idea quickly went out the window and we decided on a premise. It was originally assumed it would take a couple weeks. Since starting it, it has been over a month and there is plenty of work left. This is mostly due to not realising the total amount of work that was needed, and also because progress has naturally slowed over the last few weeks.
And now I shall reveal a bit more as it is almost finished. Here’s the premise:
The game is set within a 50 story high-rise building. It has been taken over by a terrorist group.
The protagonist (ie – the guy what you control)]]>Tue, 30 Oct 2012 12:27:12 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/new-game-detailshttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/oopsSo, regarding the last post… should I apologize for reneging on my word… again?
If you’re a regular reader of my monthly/bi-monthly rambles, you’ll by now be fully aware that this is one of the things I like to do. It’s a perverse hobby of mine. The negative comments are a plus. I’m a sick, sick boy.
Oh, and before I forget – THANKS FOR THE UPLIFTING COMMENTS, GUYS! They were quite deserved, but still… How come Chris Brown has #TeamBreezy and I get you guys. Sheesh. You have better things to be angry about.
Anyway, so what happened is, after writing that news post, I got about 1 week, maybe 10 days of good work done, and then it all went a bit tits up.
I had to spend a few days doing something else and it completely threw me off my stride.
It then became very slow progress as usual.
So, up until a few days ago, I was still slogging away. Slogging. I use the word slogging because it]]>Thu, 27 Sep 2012 17:37:20 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/oopshttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/im-backIt’s been over 2 months since the last post and I apoligise. I’ve been meaning to do this for what seems like months (which is true, as I just said it’s been over 2 months) and it has a been an almost daily struggle with myself to write this.
I seriously have no idea how some bloggers/twitterers do it. The idea of writing so constantly and fluently makes me feel a little ill.
Now, for once I’m going to acknowledge the “fans” (did that require air-quotes?) of Wasted Youth, which I don’t think I’ve ever done. Again - apologies, fans, I shouldn’t ignore you.
I haven’t read all of the comments that I receive on this blog, but I get the general gist of it.
Oh, and I should make it clear by the way that Wasted Youth has not been deleted, but those comments claiming so have been.
So as I understand it, a lot of you are quite nonplussed about the everlasting delay of Wasted Youth Part 2. I won’t apologise again because that would sound ingenuine. But I am]]>Wed, 22 Aug 2012 18:26:02 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/im-backhttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/just-quicklySince we last spoke I was still struggling with Bunny Invasion 3. That's very much still the case, but I am hopeful that the game will come a lot closer to completion in the next few weeks.
That's often been the case with other games. You work slavishly on something and see little or no progress over a long stretch of time, but then all of a sudden, there's colour and it looks somewhat complete.
Part of the problem with Bunny Invasion 3 right now is that a lot of things have not been fully decided on. I've perhaps fooled myself into thinking that it's no big deal and I can work around them, but recently I've realised that they're actually stopping me from doing a lot of stuff and confusing other stuff too.
There's a lot of confusing stuff... In general.
As usual, I wish I had more work to show you, like pictures or videos etc., but this time I have a good excuse. Tomorrow I'm going to the Lake District (above) for 5 days, and I need to be up pretty early. It's almost midnight, I should]]>Wed, 13 Jun 2012 18:02:16 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/just-quicklyhttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/nothing-much-to-sayBunny Invasion 3 is trundling along slowly, which is to be expected by now. I’ve been caught up the menus and interface recently. I find I really struggle with that stuff: layout, colours, themes. I’m not satisfied with how it looks or how it feels, but you know, that shit really doesn’t bother most people.
However, I’ve just spent most of today animating the bunnies and drawing different states of decay for their body parts. I would show you some of my better bunny animations, but it takes me upwards of 5 minutes to isolate, compile and upload an animation like that, and frankly I simply can’t be arsed.
Next time I’ll make a special effort to maybe show a working demo of the game, some waves or some menus. I’m not sure. Maybe that’s the drive I need. I have one month to create a passable demo of Bunny Invasion 3.
That’s exactly what I need – a time]]>Fri, 20 Apr 2012 18:07:31 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/nothing-much-to-sayhttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/some-more-bunniesInstead of the usual news post where I write almost a thousand words on nothing particularly interesting, I’ll just show you these pictures of bunnies for our upcoming game, Bunny Invasion 3.
They’re not coloured in, mostly just black and white apart from the odd splash of colour to discern what is bunny-nipple and what is bunny-vagina.
It’s nothing inspired, but I thought it might interest you to see that I have been doing recently.
Here’s some more bunnies.
I’ve got a few more concepts for bunnies but they’re not ready. Well, that said, none of them are ready. You’ll likely find that there’s some shown here that won’t be in the final product.
Anyway I hope that made a change, rather than the usual depressive rants I go on and on with.
For more than 6 months now, apart from the odd period, things]]>Mon, 19 Mar 2012 19:02:30 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/some-more-bunnieshttps://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/damage-reportThere isn’t much to report this time (not like usual, of course). I just felt it would be appropriate to update the last news post on the front page to one that doesn’t mention Christmas. Because it’s February.
I’m thinking of changing the name of this section from ‘News’ to the more appropriately named ‘Damage Report’, because that’s mostly what I’ve been reporting on from behind the GP Studios news desk.
So, here’s the damage report:
Since January, I have been working on another project that is not Wasted Youth, Part 2. I’m afraid to say, Wasted Youth, Part 2 is not currently on my to-do list. It will be done and out by the end of the year I am quite certain, but because this is a business and all, it was starting to feel pretty ridiculous concentrating on such a large project that was very unlikely to pay off.
Also, as it’s been made clear in the past, Wasted Youth has slowed my abilities to a crawl. I’ve been occupied with it for over 2 years straight.
Slowly, it’s]]>Sat, 04 Feb 2012 17:36:40 +0000https://www.gpstudios.com/blog/view/damage-report