Recent posts by garin on Kongregate

Topic: Games / GEARS OF WAR 2 is it bad is it good

Cliched premise doesn’t mean bad game.

Topic: Kongregate / Are Kongregates latest games getting worse?

Greg is a computer. He’s basically ELIZA modified to use more WoW references.

Topic: Kongregate / Question about revenue payment.

The verification period is an extra 30 days before you get your payment.

Topic: Games / Item Guide for Monsters' Den: Book of Dread

Once I use the Journeyman’s Stone what will happen. Will I be able to teleport back to where I was, or am I stuck there until I defeat the boss.

It triggers a battle, but you can retreat or die (provided you’re not on Hardcore) and try again, you don’t lose the stone.

wouldn’t it be nice to say which white item converts in which purple item?

The upgraded item is a random unique of the same type as the original item (eg sword, tower shield, leather boots.) The level of the item is changed to the current dungeon level.

Topic: Kongregate / Some notes about dealing with stolen games on Kongregate

Yeah, the stolen witchhunts are definitely hurting the reputation of the site amongst developers. I think arcaneCoder’s suggestion is a good one, but I also think its worth attacking the problem from the other direction in trying to reduce the amount of genuinely “stolen” games that are uploaded. The upload process could probably do more to drive home the idea that the games you upload are supposed to be your own work.

Topic: Kongregate / New comment filtering!

Also block the posting of images in the comments

Yeah. There’s no need for them at all, and plenty of room for abuse.

Topic: Kongregate / Penny Arcade Expo 2008

I’m not going to make it, sadly. I was looking forward to it but my travel plans have fallen through. Sorry guys, I know I’ve shattered a lot of dreams today. Hopefully you can find a way to have a good time despite this tragedy.

Topic: Kongregate / Ad Revenue?

It’s not strictly linear. There are often several factors that go into determining the rate in online advertising, like the country where the impression originates.

Topic: Games / Unresponsive Buttons

Make sure you have the newest version of Flash Player.

You can always find the most recent player at http://adobe.com/go/getflashplayer

You can see what version you currently have installed here: http://kb.adobe.com/selfservice/viewContent.do?...

Topic: Games / Sonny in wrong category?

It used to be in Adventure & RPG. I believe its category was changed when it was hacked (with the Michael Jackson image.)

I don’t think anyone has cared enough to move it back yet.

Topic: Kongregate / Kongregate at PAX 08

Sure, I’d be keen to meet any fellow Kongregate-type people. Hopefully I can make it there, it’s all a bit last-minute and kind of a logistical nightmare. Shame there’s no Kong booth this year.

Topic: Kongregate / Kongregate at PAX 08

Is there going to be any kind of official Kong presence at PAX this year?

Topic: Kongregate / Upon winning Monthly/Weekly Contest...

I never had to do anything like this. Just relax—if they need something from you, I’m sure they’ll ask.

Topic: Kongregate / Exclusive Content is pretty annoying

Typically you have a primary sponsor, who pays for your game on the assumption that it will drive traffic to their site. Exclusive content is part of that, because it makes it more likely the user will click through to try out what they’re missing.

Sometimes another publisher decides they’d also like the content unlocked, so they pay the developer a smaller fee to get a full version which only works on their site. (provided the agreement with the primary sponsor allows it)

Warlords and Monsters’ Den: Book of Dread are good examples: both primary sponsored by Kong with exclusive content, but if you only played them on Armor Games you probably couldn’t tell that.

Topic: Kongregate / Exclusive Content is pretty annoying

It’s true that there are some sponsored games with content exclusive to Kongregate. In these cases, other sites (like Armor Games) will often pay the developer for their own site-locked version of the game with the extra content available. Kongregate currently does not do this, which is probably why you’d notice this issue more on Kong than elsewhere.

Topic: Kongregate / Armor Games Exclusivity stuff = BS

Yes, they are free. But they’re mostly one-man-and-his-copy-of-Flash-MX: these are designed with ad based revenue in mind (if, indeed, they were designed with any revenue at all in mind), and while they are products of very talented people, (with a few exceptions) they are not salable in the same way that something like “Exit” or “Sam & Max” is.

You’re lecturing a Flash developer on their business model. arcaneCoder gets it; you do not.

Nobody else is talking about retail sales. It’s utterly irrelevant whether you’d pay for the game or not. The fact of the matter is that many of the more popular Flash games would not exist without the promise of sponsorship and the exclusive content that sometimes entails.

Topic: Kongregate / Partial Versions of Games on Kongregate

What I don’t understand is why would developers need sponserships? The only reason I would see why a developer would need money for a game would be to buy Flash o_O

Contrary to popular belief, developers are actually human. Thus, they require things such as food and shelter.

Topic: Programming / Reuploading Deletes Save file..

This has never been an issue with my games. If you’re maintaining the same filename and not messing about with the code to manage the saved games, I can’t imagine why it would happen.

Topic: Games / A Question About MD:BoD

No, you’re still right. They are the campaign item.

Topic: Games / A Question About MD:BoD

You use them like a scroll or potion- double click, or drag to portrait/paperdoll. You need to have a stack of nine before it will do anything though.

Topic: Games / sonny miscategorised?

I think this must be a carry over from when it was hacked, but I’m not sure why it hasn’t been fixed yet.

Topic: Programming / Duplicating in AS3...

I couldn’t even find a way to copy an array without resorting to map, or something more complicated.

Call slice() without any arguments.

Topic: Programming / This is driving me nuts... (more boolean troubles)

@garin: onClipEvent is a handler, not a function, so the scope isn’t an issue. If it was a function, it would use the scope of the object it was attached to.

AS2 is weird as hell. Carry on.

Topic: Programming / This is driving me nuts... (more boolean troubles)

I’ve never used AS2, but it certainly looks to me like it’s a problem of scope. You’re declaring “attacking” inside the onClipEvent function, which means it’s not going to be accessible outside of that function. Or is AS2 really lax enough to allow this? You might try (modifying Kalinium’s code):

var attacking:Boolean;

onClipEvent(load){
    var speed:Number = random(20) + 3;
    trace("LOAD speed = "+speed);
    _x = 600;
    _y = random(400);
    attacking = false;
    trace("LOAD attacking = "+attacking);
}

onClipEvent(enterFrame) {
    trace("EF_T attacking = "+attacking)
    if (attacking) { 
        _x = 0;
    } else { 
        _x -= speed;
    }
}

Topic: Programming / The "this" Keyword

An object is an instance of a class. By script they mean a block of code written in ActionScript, yeah.