Making Games Is Fun - Mar 18th, 2005

It’s so good to be back making games again! And I mean actually making them, not just directing somebody else to make them. While I enjoyed my time at Krome working on the TY the Tasmanian Tiger series, I was itching to get back to my roots and craft a game from the ground up.

So, while I’m getting the “next big thing” off the ground, I’ve been getting my hands dirty and making a game. Now, I know people say it’s impossible to make games unless you have a team of thirty or more (or one hundred plus, if you believe the PS3/Xbox2 hype), but it depends on what sort of game you’re making.

I’ve been putting together a fun little title that falls under the Casual Gaming umbrella. It’s called Word Shake.

The budget on this thing is less than the weekly “beer o’clock” budget at my old company. I’m using the free PopCap framework as my game engine (http://developer.popcap.com/index.php

) - this thing rocks and I have to say a big thank you to the PopCap team for releasing it. I’ve also used some of the sound packs from Garage Games (http://www.garagegames.com) for in game audio, the talents of a local musician for the music and have enlisted the services of Pete Mullins for the graphics. Pete is a talented artist and I’ve wanted to work with him for ages. He has extensive experience in comics, TV, film and games and is the best character designer/concept artist I know. What’s so refreshing is about this process is that I can go from concept to playable in such a short time, and it’s a game that I enjoy making as well as playing. I’ll keep you posted on its progress as well as how things are developing with the “next big thing”. John