Flash Game Blogs

So I had a long night yesterday, finishing off some unloved project that I've been delaying for some time now and as some sort of personal reward for being so brave I played a bit with my "play media on the wii" idea...

I had written the service for getting drives, dirs and files a few days ago (don't try this on real a webserver :) ), so I *just* had to do some flash frontend ...

Oh well, I should have known better ....

To give you a basic idea of what I was thinking of, here's a (sized) image:


I thought that fiddling with scrollbars would be a no-go on the Wii, so I came up with the idea of a dragable "canvas".
So you can click on a drive, which opens the folder list for it, clicking on a folder... you get the point.

Now here starts the tricky part ...
Once I had the drive list done, I noticed that it lists floppy disks and CD/DVD drives, too. I either had to give the drive type when getting the list from the service or don't show them (in both cases this means to mess with the service's code - that for quick and easy).
The next thing I noticed that the service currently doesn't care if a directory is hidden or not (and if it is hidden, I might need to know in my flash file).

Well, it doesn't end there (of course not), because I might need to know some more about the files inside a folder (size is obvious) - oh and what is if there are some more files/folders (say you have a folder with 1000 images or mp3s) ...

That clearly killed my idea of a quick solution, I'll have to heavily modify the service (although I had to do that anyway) and there are some quite important things to consider for the swf (I may have to drop the drag idea).

We will see.

nGFX

There have been a lot of these contests popping up lately. Contests are a lot of fun and many have extremely tantalizing awards for the winners. If you have just made a great game (or plan on making one) you might be tempted to enter your game into a contest.

However, if one of your goals is to get a fair monetary value for your game, we would caution you to carefully look at the terms before entering.

Some contests have little or no ‘cost’ to enter. For example, entering your game into the weekly and monthly Kongregate competitions doesn’t limit you in any way. You don’t need to add any branding to your game. In fact, the only requirement is that you integrate their scoring API into your game, and upload your game to their site.

But then there are other contests that are not as lenient as Kongregate’s. These contests require you to give up your ’sponsorship’ in exchange for entering. They ask for exclusive branding and distribution of your game just for the ‘chance’ that you might win something. Personally we think this form of contest is a TERRIBLE idea from the viewpoint of the developer.

The reality of it being a ‘good’ or ‘bad’ idea is determined purely by the numbers.

If a contest is paying out $20,000 and 10 games enter… then it might not be so bad with the average price per game at $2000. And the odds of winning the contest are not too bad. Take that same contest and have 100 games enter… now the average price per game is $200. And even with a great game, the odds of winning are now greatly against you. Sure, there will be a few big winners but there will be a ton of great games that could have gotten a great sponsorship offer that then end up with NOTHING. We cringe when we read through the contest results and see a game that we know could have gotten $1000s in a sponsorship earn an incredible $0. And oftentimes the developer has completely lost all chances to make money off of the game since the contest also restricts the ability to sell non-exclusive licenses or use in-game advertising such as MochiAds.

With that said, we would like to point out some competitions that are currently going on that we feel are great choices for flash game developers. In contrast to the restrictive competitions listed above, these competitions have terms that are extremely reasonable, and if used in combination offer some potentially serious returns! And if that weren’t enough, if you play your cards right, you could also get your game sponsored on top of everything else.

First there is the Jay is Games competition. Really there is only one requirement to this competition that could prove detrimental, but we seriously think it is minor and wouldn’t mention it if we had anything else to pick on about the competition. The requirement is that you must include a movieclip on your main menu that links back to the JiG competition page. There are other requirements, like allowing JiG to host your game, not releasing your game until it is released by JiG, and putting MochiAds and MochiBot into your game, but these are actually beneficial to the developer in our opinion. They will have some effect on the ability to seek a sponsorship, but we will address this below. This is a very brief overview of the actual competition and we suggest you check out the official details at the site if interested.

Next we have the MochiAds competition. Like the JiG competition we really don’t see much to complain about. In fact, you don’t need any special branding or logos in your game to enter the contest. The requirements are simple: Get your game approved through MochiAds, implement the MochiAd leaderboard API, enable game distribution through their site and viola you’re done. The only potential downside we could see an argument for is having to use their leaderboard system, but it is very easy to implement and it gets the job done nicely. Unless you have some strange compulsion to make custom leaderboards we think it is another great tool to add to your “developer’s arsenal.” Of course, the effect on sponsorship opportunities again takes a hit from this competition. But now we will explain how it actually isn’t as bad as you may think. (And we suggest you check out MochiAd’s official competition site as well:

Some tips if you want to enter the MochiAds competition, JiG competition, and get a sponsorship.

State clearly to the sponsor that you are entering these competitions and that this means:

1) You must keep MochiAds in your game, and you will be using the MochiAds leaderboards in game. You can negotiate if you want to ALSO submit scores to the sponsor’s high score system.
2) You must be allowed to keep certain Jay is Game branding in the game. Specifically a movieclip on the main menu of your game that links back to the JiG competition page.
3) You must retain distribution rights to your game. Although, if the sponsor also wants to distribute your game that should be fine, and in fact helpful.
4) The sponsor cannot release the game until it is released on the Jay is Games website (probably March 4th). Also, you should not enable MochiAds distribution of your game until AFTER your game gets released on JiG. This is because the JiG competition requires that your game not be released until the competition has started (to make the viral award fair). This should work out well since the MochiAds competition deadline isn’t until April 1st, giving you almost a month of leeway. Just remember to enable MochiAds distribution once your game is released on Jay is Games, once you do this your game will automatically be submitted to the MochiAds contest (if you already have MochiAd leaderboards and approved MochiAds running in your game).

If you add your game to www.FlashGameLicense.com (which, of course, you should ;)) then you should state all of this info in your game info and long description fields on the FlashGameLicense website. Also, make sure you select the appropriate checkboxes when adding your game.

We will say that entering the competitions will limit the number of portals who will want to sponsor your game since you are restricting their options, but there are many good portals out there that would be willing to sponsor your games under these terms. And having MochiAds in your game will always ensure that you will get paid for every gameplay it gets, so this is an option we always advise trying to negotiate with a sponsor, even when you are not entering your game into a competition. Another option is to list your game as available for non-exclusive ONLY. This basically states that you do not want a sponsor, but you are willing to sell site-locked versions of your game to anyone interested. And we always suggest you change your game to this on the FlashGameLicense site once it is sponsored IF your sponsor allows you to sell non-exclusive licenses… it gives you yet another way to make money!

Also, and this is important, make sure you do not distribute your game until you have gotten a sponsor! The sponsor will want to have their branding in all distributed versions of the game on the web (barring any non-exclusively licensed games if they allow it), so make sure you leave them that option. And this should be true ANYTIME you are seeking a sponsorship. So, for Mochiads you’ll want to implement the ads and the leaderboards but do not turn on distribution until you have made a deal with a sponsor and the game has been released on the Jay is Games website. And for JiG, you’ll want to wait to submit your game until you have a sponsor because JiG may put the game up on their site when they receive your game. So you may also want to state to potential sponsors:

5) Must make a deal by [insert date here that leaves you enough time to enter competition]

We want to reiterate that last comment. DO NOT distribute your game until you have gotten a sponsor, finalized a deal, and gotten their permission to release the game. If you do not want a sponsorship, or want to sell non-exclusive licenses ONLY, then feel free to do what you like, but otherwise your first step should be to get your game sponsored. And be sure to tell any potential sponsors that games entered into these contests are specifically being pushed to be distributed as widely as possible. That is a huge plus for gaming portals.

We also want to go back to what we were saying before about Kongregate. They also have a great system of contests, and they occur every week and every month, so you can actually enter all three contests and - if you have a REALLY good game - potentially make $11,750!! And this would be on TOP of whatever you were to get from your sponsorship! And not including all the great prizes like iPods, Tshirts, free software etc…! We think that is definitely deserving of three sentences with exclamation points in a row.

So, to summarize:

• Make sure that you know all of the details of a competition before you enter.
• Never agree to give away exclusive rights to your game.
• Seek a sponsorship before entering a competition (and be open with potential sponsors about what you intend to do with your game).

If you follow these guidelines you will keep the options to monetize your game open, so even if you don’t end up in the competition’s first place spot, you’ll ensure that your game remains a winner.

We hope you found this information helpful. Happy competing!

Chris Hughes and Adam Schroeder
www.flashgamelicense.com

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© Flash Game License for MochiLand, 2008. | Permalink | No comment

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Yay, the second update is out!  This one includes:

* A Restart Campaign button has been added
* Campaigns 1 and 2 are slightly easier
* Fixes a few bugs that have been discovered
* Adds 1 new challenge mission open to everyone
* Adds 2 new challenge missions for those who purchased the extra content
* Adds a whole new turret, the Artillery Tower, for those who purchased the EC
* Includes a few minor interface adjustments

Here’s a demo video of the artillery tower in action!

I know I haven’t posted on here lately, I’m freakishly busy.  I promise I’ll get more posts on here soon!

New Making Games Blog Entry By Jeff Fulton

MochiAds is pleased to announce our new Leaderboards service, which allows you to easily integrate high score tracking into your games. The service works much like MochiAds, in that you can easily add them to your game using only a couple of lines of code. Once you do, you’ll be able display a simple widget that allows your players to view your game’s top scores and submit their own.

The Leaderboards service is simple to use, but that doesn’t mean it’s short of features. You can add as many leaderboards as you want to your game, and the leaderboards themselves are very customizable. Here’s the features at a glance:

• Change widget colors to match your game.
• Track scores as numbers or times.
• Rank scores highest to lowest or lowest to highest.
• Display daily, weekly, monthly scores, or show all three.
• Show or hide statistics like dates, ranks or player location.
• You can show leaderboards without submitting a score.
• Usernames can be supplied by your system, or you can allow the player to enter it in the widget.
• Player names and last scores can persist from session to session, and you can retrieve this information to use in your game.

To get started with the Leaderboards service, you’ll first need to log in to MochiAds. You create and maintain your leaderboards on the MochiAds site, where there is a full-featured system for creation, customization and management of your leaderboards.

Each leaderboard belongs to a game in the system, so you can either add your game or work with one of your existing games. Just click on the “leaderboards” link on your game’s page (fig.a)

fig.a – The leaderboard link on the game overview page.

Click “Create Leaderboard” and you’ll be taken to a page where you can enter all of the settings for your leaderboard. You can define a title, which will appear on the widget, as well as tweak scoring settings, colors and which columns you want to display. You’ll be able to see all of the changes you make immediately in a live preview right on the page.

Once you’re done, click “Create Leaderboard.” On the next page you’ll see a download link. Download the ZIP package, get the example code and you’re ready to go! The ZIP package contains the API code you need for your game, as well as example implementations and documentation (fig.b)

   
fig.b - The ZIP package download and file structure.

All of the code is contained in a “mochi” folder within the AS2 or AS3 folder – just choose the version that your game is coded in. The API classes will work with the Flash IDE as well as with FlashDevelop using MTASC or MXMLC.

For detailed information about how to integrate and use the Leaderboards service, you can check out the online API documentation. Also, check out this great tutorial by Emanuele Feronato.

Also worth mentioning are some other cool features that you may not notice immediately. If you look at the sample game in the download, you’ll see a menu where you can start playing the game or immediately see top scores (fig.c). If you call the leaderboard with no parameters, you can display the top scores without submitting any score. This is great if you want to showcase your highscores on the main screen of your game.

Also, the “Enter Name” button allows you to see how the widget works if you send it an existing username. For instance, if you already have a user login on your game then you can send the username along with the score. In this case, the score will automatically be submitted when the leaderboard loads.

Finally, there’s one more really neat feature called “persistence.” This automatically saves the player’s name and last score when it is submitted. You can use the API to retrieve this information to display to the player the next time they play your game. That way, they can see what score they need to beat their personal best.

We hope you have fun with this exciting new service. We can’t wait to see it in your games!

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© Geoff Gaudreault for MochiLand, 2008. | Permalink | No comment

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I made it... I made it! To page 52 of Games for Windows Feb '08! Dark Cut 2 has a small featurette in an article about free games that you have to play! I'm really excited about this magazine coverage. I have also been in Edge Magazine (UK), Web-User Magazine, and in a few others as well, but this is just the icing on the cake for me. Games for Windows usually will only lightly brush on Flash games when they feature anything, so it is quite the honor.

MochiAds and Gaia Online are proud to announce the launch of the Become a Rock Star Flash Games Contest! Our contest is back, bigger and better than ever with $25,000 worth of cash and prizes.

But that’s not all — this is also your shot at fame and glory. Gaia Online will be scouting the contest entries for star talent for potential game development contracts.

Here’s how the prizes stack up:

Rock Star Prizes

Our lineup of excellent judges will judge your games.

• 1^st: $5,000 + iPod + T-shirt
• 2^nd: $4,000 + iPod + T-shirt
• 3^rd: $3,000 + iPod + T-shirt
• 4^th: $2,000 + iPod + T-shirt
• 5^th: $1,000 + iPod + T-shirt

Gaia Audience Prizes

Members of the Gaia Online world will play and vote on their favorite games.

• 1^st: $1,500 + iPod + T-shirt
• 2^nd: $1,250 + iPod + T-shirt
• 3^rd: $1,000 + iPod + T-shirt
• 4^th: $800 + iPod + T-shirt
• 5^th: $700 + iPod + T-shirt
• 6^th: $600 + iPod + T-shirt
• 7^th: $500 + iPod + T-shirt
• 8^th: $400 + iPod + T-shirt
• 9^th: $300 + iPod + T-shirt
• 10^th: $250 + iPod + T-shirt

So, what are the requirements to enter? Let’s talk about what we don’t require, first: no requirement on a theme and no exclusivity on the game(that means you can still have your game sponsored). Double entry with the current Jay is Games contest is not only allowed but encouraged.

Basically we ask that you run MochiAds in your game, allow distribution, and use our latest MochiAds Leaderboards service to enter the contest. Get the full details from our contest page, and read the full text rules here. You can also check out an example of the Leaderboards and a tutorial from Emanuele Feronato.

Good luck!

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© Ada Chen for MochiLand, 2008. | Permalink | No comment

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It's so long ago I've posted something that it's untrue. It may be because there was nothing much to say during that time, that is projects not really game related or so absurdly NDA protected that even to mention the general direction would be ... well expensive.

You surely remember my last (!) post where I have a bit of a rant about the media capabilities of the Wii (still no games on it for me, though). Right now this neat piece of hardware sits beneath the TV left of it's bigger and way more often used brother the xbox 360. All I do with it (you remember: playing Wii Sports after a lot of coding) is using it as TV based web browser.

Webbrowser ... well that brought the idea.

(OK, that and the fact that we had some friends here and wanted to look at some photos from the last party. One of them (a "no gamer") asked if there would be some music to play along and I had to admit that it's not working anymore (due to the glorious photo chanel update))

So inspired be the fact that I got the 360 playing my mp3/fotos/movies from my pc in no time, I started to set up a small test environment webpage on my local IIS to see if I could use the browser to browse my pc's hdd. And of course it works.

So I wrapped the output with some XML and viola I had a flash 7 swf that I could use to browse the directories on my pc. Well done.

The only drawback atm is the fact that there has to be a webserver running ... I guess you can't convince most people to install an IIS on their PC to get some media on the Wii. After a few minutes of thinking it came to me that I could write my own - or better integrate cassini (an open source micro webserver) - to host the services for the Wii ...

Well, let's see where that leads to ...

nGFX

[edit] just found this while hunting for informations about the Wii browser flashplayer ...
http://my.opera.com/[..]flash-7-and-not-8-or-9

New Tutorials Blog Entry By Steve Fulton

New Tutorials Blog Entry By Jeff Fulton

We are happy to host in our games showcase Training MicroMonk, from the italian developer SixFingers. In this game you will have to help a (micro) monk keep the balance for about twenty minutes, through ten levels of difficulty, trying to reach your zen!

Have fun!

Well the latest game went up 2 weeks ago, its called Synapsis and its a voyage into the mind of David Carter, a completely odd adventure game that I’ve been trying to make for about 3 years. The production started about June time 2007 but the idea had been floating round my head in various forms for ages, the only problem was that it was June before I’d got good enough at programming to be able to make it. The actual game is pretty straightforward as I really didn’t want to do anything too illogical although the settings and the atmosphere of the game is really “David Lynch”. I’ve half got the sequel worked on but I need a break, this game completely did my head in during the last month of development.

The game was half designed by Jason Jackson, who was at work experience were I used to work,  his 2 rooms were the church and the cell, I thought he did a pretty amazing job.
Its been reviewed on a couple of the big casual games sites like Jayisgames and has gone down really well. I’ve also had endless people email me in the last week for help as they are stuck, if you are one of them there’s a really nice synapsis walkthrough on mousebreaker.

Now that its finished I’m taking a well earned rest from stupid projects and am going to sit back with a beer and watch football for at least 3 days before starting on the sequel.

Anyway enough of me waffling on about, if you want to loose 15 minutes of your life go and play Synapsis.