SLASH Gameplays

SLASH game update, three new videos!

I'm not dead, if that's what you're thinking...

  We're back!  That's right!  I'm gonna start posting again! *crickets*

    I've actually been over-the-top busy lately, and stuff, and yeah... I've been participating in JoltKombat (a new GJ thing Zack Banack created).  I'm going head to head against wimpy-poo Orange08.  I know I'm gonna win... ah sweet victory.  For updates on, SLASH, visit the JK blog and the SLASH website.

Finally, on this new post, here are some screens of this new game. :)

Mini Contest 02 Winner: CRUSH Review

     The winner of our Mini Contest 02, Kris (Kris Games), chose for me to review his 

platformer, Crush.

     In Crush, you play as a weird block type thing (lol) that awakes in a weird world that has no color (colour).  Oddly enough, the story is based around regaining that color.  All of the graphics are in gray-scale form except for the background, which this contrast might not be the best.  The graphic style is smooth and simple though, and it works well.  In the game, you come across spikes, and static area's that hurt you. Falling through the view will also kill you.  It's rather hard, because the player can only jump when he is on a jump arrow icon.  As irritating as this is, it becomes more of a game-play object, that designs some very cool levels.  On top of this, you have portals you must cross through to get to other areas in the room.  These portals are sudden though, and the gravity you have when touching them applies to the gravity you get when falling out of the second.  This becomes irritating when you must fall at a quick speed and hit the up key precisely when you fall on a target.  But, yeah, I'm guessing most of the game is meant to be hard.  Especially concerning how hard the final boss is.  The story is a little cheesy, but most games never come with a story, it's a nice little touch to this game.  The music is great, and the game is filled with various sounds.  Overall this game is a short little one I recommend trying.  Though it's hardness, it's still a pretty well polished game.  Final score: 4.8 / 5

 Crush:

Graphics: 4 / 5

Gameplay: 4 / 5

Story: 4 / 5

Sound: 5 / 5

Overall: 4.8 / 5
Play here on: Game Jolt or YoYo Games





Second place winner: View Shelby's Blog here.

Congrats to all of the entrants, I hope I'll get another competition up soon! :D

Mini Competition 02: Results! (early)

  Well, my friends bugged me to release the results, and I guess they won!

We got a total of 6 entries, wow that was a ton! XD  Well, my estimate was 139, and the winner of the competition with the closest guess, was *drum-roll* Kris at 150! :D  In second place was Shelby S, whose guess was only 3 further than Kris', so I'm gonna be nice and give out a 'mini prize' :)  Kris can choose from any of the prizes, and Shelby wins a link on the next blog post, to whatever he desires. (to a game, a blog, etc.)  I'll give out the next blog post as soon as I can get what Kris and Shelby want.  Congrats guys!

Tis Halloween!

      Yeah, today is Halloween!  I'll try and get a very quick shooter game done today, and it'll be released just for Halloween.  Hopefully it doesn't suck too bad...  Holiday games rule though!  In other news, I'll be trickin' and treating tonight.  I hope I get a lot of candy! ;D

Mini Contest 02: Guess how many candies!

MINI COMPETITION 02: Guess how many candies!   

It's Halloween now (3 AM where I live) and I'm posting our next mini competition.  Guess how many candies (M&M's) are concealed within this graphic of a jar. :D (I swear that I have calculated my own guess and I will pick the winner truthfully)  If you guess closest to my guess, you can pick of three awards: 

1.) A game review.  

2.) Any type of help within a Game Maker game of yours 

3.) If you aren't a Game Developer or you don't want these, we can work something out.

You have 3 days to guess (choose your answer by commenting below, by November 3rd).  Be sure to guess your answer quickly, I will only accept each answer ONCE.

Email me at elecgm@gmail.com if you have questions. Happy guessing!

Contest 01 Winner: CLIMB review

  The winner of our first mini-contest here, Blok (Blok Studios), chose for me to review his most recent game, CLIMB!

     CLIMB! starts you off in a nice Atari themed atmosphere, in which the goal of the player is to escape the lava that is flooding a tower.  This lava rises after you quickly, so you gotta hurry!  Along the way, you may find yourself falling threw floors, these are 'booby traps' he has set up to trick the player.  Sometimes these can get very frustrating, but it will only take a few tries to learn where they are, and how to avoid them.  These various traps aren't over used, so they're just a nice little touch to the game itself.  The platforming is very basic, no friction, nothing you can do that is extremely precise.  This is exactly how the Atari version would have been, it's a very close clone of the gameplay.  With the gameplay and graphics both in favor of the Atari, what more could you ask for?  Well, this game has some shiny sound too.  The music is nice, and it fits the theme very well.  It is rather slow paced imo for such a 'rush-to-the-finish' game, but somehow it fits great.  It fits well with the Atari theme too.  Overall it's a great game that I recommend you should try out.  Though it's simplicity, it's rather awesome. :P  I'd give it a 4.6 / 5.

CLIMB! :

Graphics: 4 / 5

Gameplay: 4 / 5

Story: 1 / 5

Sound: 5 / 5

Overall: 4.6 / 5

Play here on: Game Jolt or YoYo Games

That new banner - Nikc-Nack!

  Yeah, our new banner at the top of our blog was created by my nice friend, Nikc-Nack. :D  Let's all thank him for it, it goes really well with the rest of our theme!

Also if you haven't noticed, I took the ugly blue bar off the site, and I made a favicon for it too. :)

Halloween tomorrow! :D

  Tomorrow is Halloween!  Too bad the next day is a school day. D:  So I can't go running around the neighborhood causing havoc: TPing' and egging houses at midnight... sucks doesn't it?  Well, yeah... But I'm still a trick-or-treat 'er. :D  I'll be up a little late, getting all that good candy and such.  Yum...  It sounds great already.  Heh, at least I hope I don't run into a few trickers that wanna steal my candy. If somebody stole my candy I'd be devastated... especially if they did it with a flamethrower. Oh yeah, me and W!TS are making a Halloween game, with a kid, with a flamethrower, and candy stealing.  Yeah, this'll turn out good. ;)

  I hope I get a lot of my favorite candies.  My personal favorite candy is Reeses peanut butter cups.  Yum, I love 'em.  If you have a favorite candy you should enter our weekly poll here - What is your favorite candy?  It closes in a few days, so maybe when your eating all that candy you'll be getting, you could change your mind. :P

New blog design!

     I just added a new background and tricked the blog out.  Be sure to enter our weekly poll!  We will have contests and such soon, so keep checking frequently! :D 
     In other news, we have a page counter at the bottom of the right panel.  This opens our first contest here. 
CONTEST 01:
     The first person to take a screenshot of the counter when the counter is over 400 visits, and they post a link of the screen in the comment's below, will get the chance to have their game reviewed right here on the blog! :D  If you win and you have no games, we can arrange something else.  Email me at elecgm@gmail.com if you have questions.  Happy counter-watching. ;)

Random Monkey - Update v0.01

  Mah monkeh game is turning out great! :D  Here's some screens of it's further progress -

 

Random Monkey Game of Awesomeness

  Yus, a new game finally.  It's been hard these past few days, waiting... waiting.... waiting.... and it still isn't here!  The YYG07 better start soon. >:E  In the meantime, I'ma making a monkey game for Toadfrogs Escape contest.  Monkeys do a lot of things, and escaping whatever I make in this, will work with them. :D  Screen (just an engine) -

New posters

     They look better full size, but I think they turned out very good. :D  GM8 sprite editor FTW.  Also, google images helped me out with the buildings. xP  I got a picture of the buildings in a real life city, and I edited them to make them less realistic and make them look cooler. :P  I guess I really don't need photoshop after all. :D  Btw, these posters are here for a reason.  I'm gonna make Electron the Game (based on the book story) for the YYG07!  I'll begin working on it once the contest is announced.  Until then, I'll be working on other projects and making some graphics!

Shooter without a name

  New shooter without a name, it'll be a new version of Æ, actually the engine is already better than the old one, and I'll be polishing this one up for the next few weeks. :D

Æ - released for now

  Old game in my files, Æ, was good enough for me to take back out of them and finish it.  It's still unfinished, but I released a WIP for now.  It is a rather challenging boss shmup/bullet hell game that takes place flying in a ship, fighting weird metallic bosses.  On the sides are rocks that will bounce you right off them.  I consider it a good shooter, and you should probably check out the WIP. ;)

KSE collab - Awesome Blob Game

   We've changed our collab idea again.  And this time, we have an awesome engine working. :D  Me and Shelbz have been working on adding to the nice platforming engine we gotz, and it seems pretty nice so far.  We're making more enemies and other neat stuff!  Here are some screens of things we have so far -

GHOST - Story?

GHOST - Story?

  Working on a nice storyline for GHOST, eh... lol... First off, the player is your average daily guy.  You work as a detective solving mysteries in the town.  The town has been acting weird lately and you are out to investigate.  First off, you go on a level down the streets to investigate.  Many hazards come along the way, and you finally reach an old building on the edge of town.  You see sparks and lights from one window, so you go inside.  When inside you don't see anything, and no noises.  Silence.  Next thing you know there is this giant demon thing inside the building and lights flash on, the monster roars with fury.  You're so shocked right now, you try to fight the beast.  After the 'boss' fight, you get away after using high voltage wires and switches to shock the beast.  But when you defeat it, it suddenly 'vanishes' in mid air.  Later you're in your room and open your journal.  You write about what happened...

     Later you find yourself out in the city, doing detective work.  You kinda forget everything every once in a while ever since what had happened.  But you try to live a normal life again.  One day on the job, there is a huge police scene, and you come to help.  Thieves have robbed a national bank, and they've taken hostages from inside the building.  You come with the police, and they telling the thieves to stop what they're doing, before it's too late.  One gets aggravated and goes to kill a hostage.  This hostage is a scared little girl crying.  He says he'll give the police until he counts to ten, to let them out safely.  10... 9... 8... and so forth.  At 2 your body is taken over. You run out into the scene and the thief thinks your out to get him.  He shoots you in the heart, and you fall to the ground, blanked out.  You die...

    More of the story coming soon! :D

BirdBrain 2, yipee!

Yeah, me and Kris are also making a game, a sequal to one of my previous games that won a compo, BridBrain!  And guess what?  The same little bird/brain is back, in BirdBrain 2!  Hehe...

Some screens of the engine -

New collab!

  Me, Kris, and Shelby S, will be makin' a new game soon!  No details yet, though, it'll (as of now) be a beat-em-up style game about a killer with hostages, will you be the hero and stop this fiend, or will you be the one to kill them?  Hehe, Shelbeh came up with this cool idea.  I hope this goes well! :D

Blaze, version 3

Go here for all updates and files.

     Ok, so... Blaze is coming along great!  I have a lot more finished on it, and the basics of the engine are all fixed up and ready to go (almost).  I have a fully functional gun set up, with variables so all I need to do is fill it in with the next gun I make. :)  The engine works very well, and it is set up in a forest with a lot of parallax scrolling, which makes the game almost 3D.  I like games set up like that, hehe.  So, I have some .exe's set up for you to try at the above link, any comments?  Join the forums, and comment there, or just comment on this post.  I need feedback! :D  Anyways, wish me luck!  I think this game might be the one to get me noticed out there! ~ Demo Engine

Blaze, version 2

Newest screen, here I have the almost finished title screen, or at least how it will look.  The guy with the gun is the player, he aims his gun towards the selected options in the menu, and when the player will select an option with the Z key, he'll shoot the button. :D

Blaze, hehe.

     BLIND has been put on hold, due to technical difficulties... so now I have Blok Asylum (old game, remake of Crazed Blok, by Self-Explanatory Games) coming back into development for Toadfrogs Escape Contest, and I'm starting a new game for Kris Games, weekly game challenge.

     So... some BA (Blok Asylum) updates, firstly, some screens of the new boss and snow levels -

     So next I have my new game, blaze.  No caps. :P  I do all my games in caps, so this is a bit different. XD  I have the titlescreen working fine. :D

 

     And finally, my new logo for the upcoming game for the comp 07, Electron. :D

 

Hehe...

BLIND started!

  Just started spriting for my new game, BLIND!  I was just in the chat and asked which game to make, trapeze or blind, and my friend Kris said blind, so there we go! XD  Well, I started the sprites, seen below, and I will be making this for Toadfrogs' Escape themed competition.  Play as a blind person who must escape a building burning down. ;D  Let's see how this goes!

Player Stance

Player Walk

New logo

Some Game Idea's

Just a thought, I could make a pretty neat game out of this logo, I think it would be a good idea. :)

 Old game, gonna be redone and finished sometime this year. :D

Zonex, a game that's already being made!  It's just something I made last month and I'm probably gonna pick back up on it. :)

Darkness, odd twist.

Excerpt from my new book, Electron. -

  '"You, you can't keep me here forever, I will escape!" I yelled at him forcefully.  He laughed at my weak outburst, and sat down on the decaying chair in the corner of the cell.  "And why do you think I can't?" he said in an eager tone.  He loved to engage in these fights with me, he thought they were enjoyable, because he knew he'd always win.  "Somebody will find out I'm missing, you know they will, and the moment they do, they'll track me down, they'll get here and kill you, they'll, they-" "Who will notice you're missing?!  You're family is dead!  None of them are still here, except for all the ones your dad and you forced away, neglecting them forever and went into your own world, as thieves...  They deserved to die, you all did, and you know it too.  Killing all those innocent people that never had the shyest of a chance ever in their hearts that day, to survive your killing's, oh you're not supposed to be here either, now are you?  You should be there with them, though look at where you are, I've helped you to this point, though things won't be the same anymore.  Now it's your turn to help me..."  I began to cry there on the floor, right in front of that monster... I didn't care about my, 'faith' or 'dignity' anymore, those were all gone now... I've been destroyed, and devoured by that beast.  "You... you're right John....  You always were... and I have to trust that..."  I looked up at him and saw a demon that lived inside of him, though I forced my mind to see him as a normal man, it hurt to do so, but I couldn't bear to breakdown again, I'd kill myself the moment I did...'

To be continued....

Old game, back in development! - GHOST

  Yeah, my old game I was making a few months ago, is now back in development! I'm adding the finishing touches on some of the old levels and I'm bringing in new levels too!  I'll have the tutorial levels finished soon, and then I'll start on the 50 level quest!  I also fixed up the engine and the graphics are way smoother now!

Old Graphics on angles:

New Graphics on angles:

  Just by checking off the interpolate pixels in the GM Global Game Settings fixed up the smoothness that much!

I'm also working on enemy AI right now, some of which is here -

I think it's looking a lot better!  Next on my to-do list: 1st Power of the ghost!

Other Blog - Wolf Studios!

  Me and a couple of my other game developing buddies have a shared blog of ours over at http://kebgames.blogspot.com/ or here.  Be sure to check it out often, we'll try and update it as much as possible!  We came up with the idea one night and got a few others to join and we've been updating it since then, it's a lot easier to keep followers interested when you have multiple posters. :)  Anyways, be sure to check both blogs out!

Welcome to my new blog!

  Here is my new blog!  I'll post as much possible!  First things first, I'll introduce myself.

 

Name: Zack Harmon
Nickname: Electron
Time doing what I do: 9 months

Hobbies:
Stuff without a computer: Drums, football (soccer kind), basketball, drawing, writing, playing with my dog, television, etc.
Stuff that needs a computer: Coding websites in notepad, making games, making programs, spriting, etc.

Skills: Programming, Spriting, Making Sounds/Music, Level Designing, and everything else I need to do to make a game.

What I use:
Game Maker 8
Game Maker 7
Notepad
Audacity
OpenMPT
and some other *horrible* programs I've made.

About Me:
I'm Zack, your average 13 year old game developer! I've been enthusiastically developing games for 9 months now, and my games have won some great awards in competition's. I just found Game Maker one day in December when surfing the web, and I decided to try it out. Well after that, I seemed to be hooked on game development! I've learned a lot more then just GM in the months I've had developing games and programs. I've also found an interest in coding websites, and I'm also a pretty good spriter! I'm somewhat a weird person though, the only thing I'll use to make my graphic's is a simple sprite editor used in Game Maker 8. Yet, some of my graphics turn out great and people will think I'm crazy spending so much time in the sprite editor and no other program. XD Anyways, if you need any help with anything, or you have a question, don't be afraid to ask! Just PM me your question, and I'll try to respond quickly!