Recent posts by damijin on Kongregate

Topic: Kongregate / "Hey! Are you running an ad blocker?"

Flight is SLIGHTLY better than Ball Revamped.

Topic: Kongregate / "Hey! Are you running an ad blocker?"

An argument for money:

Excluding a few anomalies like Fancy Pants (which, itself, is HUGELY responsible for the surge in quality of Flash games), the free games available to you on the Internet in 2006 were PRETTY BAD. Also, Armor Games looked awful.

http://web.archive.org/web/20060419081053/http://armorgames.com/

Think of how much the quality of content has improved. How many hit games from brilliant developers who put time, energy, blood, sweat, and tears into their projects. This happened largely due to an influx of money in the free games sector. The influx of money came from sites like Kongregate being able to find ways to generate consistent revenue from free content.

In your life — people are constantly going to try and get money from you. Some will do it politely, others will actually rob you blind — maybe even literally. At the end of the day, the question is whether Kongregate USES it’s money in ways that produce things that YOU enjoy playing. The game industry as a whole has radically changed due to gameplay mechanics and ideas that came out of sites like Kongregate. From the eyes of this game designer, the flash sector has transformed the world of video games. If they want money to keep on doing that, the least you can do is click “No thanks” on an ad that someone else MIGHT be interested in to keep innovators like the ones here innovating.

But I realize I’m on a forum. I love this forum. And the thing that forums do best is rail against anything inconvenient… so I suppose I shouldn’t have taken this so seriously.

Still though. Armor Games did look awful in 2006, rite?

Topic: Kongregate / Why does Kongregate ban those who request refunds?

There’s a lot of topics going on in this thread, but I just wanted to put this out here:

If you have a monetary dispute with a website or game operator of any sort, take the complaint to the company itself before requesting a charge back through your credit card.

I’ve had people lose accounts in MMORPGs that they played for 3 years (with hundreds of hours invested into their characters) due to company charge back policies. The fact is, companies like Kongregate (or virtually any game/service operator) cannot afford to deal with the issues involved in credit card charge backs. They MUST enforce a zero tolerance policy toward them. So, this goes for Kong and everywhere else — if you run into an issue where you truly believe you deserve your money back, talk to the website, not the credit card company.

Furthermore: NEVER give money to a site that you do not trust. If you don’t trust Kongregate, don’t give them your money. If you do trust Kongregate, then when something goes wrong, you will need to trust them to resolve it.

Topic: Kongregate / Stencyl

Originally posted by JudeMaverick:

I’m posting here so people can get excited about Super Ban Jude 3 for no reason.

If I am not in the game, I’ll be really really really sad. In exchange, I’ll try to work a character named Jude into one of my games here at Gameloft.

Topic: Stencyl / Dilution of Game Quality?

Originally posted by Hunkadunkus:

What about if D’s were awarded to creators of games above a certain rating?
Sure, Kong would be full of some of that Crash Course junk (See Post Your Stencyl Game Thread For More Details) however at the same, only the ones that get above, let’s say 3 stars, are eligible to award the developer a D.

This would also be a worthwhile solution if the issue were to become something that really warranted a change from the Kongregate administrators. I’m sure they would comply if the situation seemed to really be causing issues in the community.

Topic: Stencyl / Dilution of Game Quality?

Originally posted by Dynamite_Studios:

The problem I see with Stencyl is that there will be an increase in low-quality games. Sure, there will be a few good ones, but that’ll be by the people who enjoy it and dedicate lots of time making and polishing the game. If one would want to make a good game, he would look for the best tools. Some might use stencyl and get marvellous end results, but some might just want to post a lot of half-hour projects in a desperate effort to generate ad revenue. And since now people are not limited by a 30-day trial, it will happen more and more often. The good games will be enjoyed, but the vast amount of low-quality ones will be forgotten, and will just fill up the Kongregate servers with garbage…

The Idea behind stencyl is good, but it will allow people to make crap games. To avoid this, It would be an idea to implement some kind of quality test for it’s games.

This is relatively true. The thing is that Kongregate is already designed with this problem in mind. It hides low rated games by default. The site was built from the ground up with the knowledge that crappy games will be posted.

With that in mind, the only downside is an increase in folks with a D icon. A possible social/community issue, but when I see someone with a D, I check their profile to see what they’ve made. If they’ve only made trash, then that icon means nothing to me. If they’ve made great games, I compliment them on it and talk about it with them.

Those are the down sides.

The up side is that this makes game development more accessible than possibly ever before. There have been great tools for making games with high accessibility (RPG Maker and Warcraft 3’s Map Editor come to mind), but none of them allowed you to access the massive audience that this Flash game tool opens up to new devs. A 14 year old could conceivably make games that would generate more revenue than any jobs he could get at his local supermarket or fast food place. That kid could then hone his skills, develop lots of great games, and become a game developer at EA, or Blizzard, or Valve by the time he hits his mid 20s. The upside to tools like these outweighs the downside by huge amounts.

Game development has always been an arcane science. Those who understand the science are afraid of change. I knew I wanted to make games for a living from the age of 9, and by 23, I’ve managed to become a game designer at a major development studio. I would love to see more tools in place for others to follow that path. Stencyl is the best tool in existence so far for that purpose.

Topic: Stencyl / Dilution of Game Quality?

I think it actually does the opposite. Giving people the ability to skip a lot of the “heavy lifting” involved in traditional coding, allows the developers to create fun new systems and spend less time “re-inventing the wheel”.

So think about it from the perspective that every minute saved from the tool is a minute that can be reinvested in another direction, like creating fun new game play ideas, or improving art quality.

Topic: Stencyl / Welcome to Stencyl!

I’m a massive fan of Stencyl, and am really stoked to see it finally unveiled here on Kongregate. I know you guys will put it to good use. The potential here cannot be overstated. If the right people get a hold of this tool, it could be one of the best communities and centers for independent developers. I strongly recommend anyone taking a few days to really get into it.

I made Balls in Space in about 6 weeks, including the time it took to learn the tools and countless hours goofing around and tweaking little art nonsense. You can make games quickly and sell them to sponsors with this tool, and I really hope it introduces game development to a whole new audience of creators.

/endpraise! :D

Topic: Kongregate / Anyone else notice the new tip amounts?

Probably because <25kred tips are fairly meaningless in terms of $.

Topic: Kongregate / Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes (a note from AC)

Congrats!

Topic: Game Programming / game makeing programs

Originally posted by GameBuilder15:

What Stencyl game is it that got several sponsorships?

Balls in Space

I’m a huge Stencyl advocate. What it lacks in the area of freedom it more than makes up for in speeding up work flow and tons of free resources to make games faster. Those resources let me spend less time writing code and more time designing fun levels and ideas. I think that’s good for games in the long-run.

Also, for me personally, it’s really easy to use. It has a learning curve, but I really love the code blocks as opposed to traditional coding. It’s just much more visual and easier to follow for me than a huge web of text on a white background. Of course if you prefer the normal method of coding, it supports that too.

Topic: Kongregate / Scary games

It’s hard to make a legitimately scary game in the confines of a web browser, surrounded by chat, ads, and various other distractions that take away from the mood/atmosphere.

Topic: Kongregate / Rating Trends

I find that games with depth (often RPGs) start out a little low and trend upward.

Simple games, like physics puzzles and such or games that rely on a single gameplay mechanic tend to start out high and decrease over time before settling at their final score.

Topic: Kongregate / Creating Games

I used Stencyl to make Balls in Space and am using it to make my future games as well. It’s a lot easier than coding in a normal environment because it uses simple drag-and-drop code blocks and has lots of built-in examples. You can also code the traditional way in it if you want though.

Unfortunately it’s in closed beta right now, and they aren’t accepting many new testers — but open beta should start at the end of January or early Feb — so stay tuned for that.

Edit: Also, it’s built on top of Flixel, so it has all that Flixel and Box2d functionality.

Topic: Kongregate / We Want YOU (to help beta test our mobile app)!

Santa is buying me an Android phone for Christmas. Sounds lovely.

Topic: Kongregate / great games that don't have badges

Originally posted by CommanderObvious:

Super Ban Jude 2

Agreed!

Topic: Serious Discussion / AX: Drugs are not illegal, they never were.

Originally posted by BombCog:

Want to know what legal heroin is like? Break both of your legs in the UK and get to a hospital. I hear they’ll give you some, those scallywags. If you do it in the US they give you opiates instead!

Heroin is an opiate.

It only fell out of favor because various other opiates were clinically shown to be more effective and tolerable, and then heroin became such a dirty word that it could never really come back into use medically. Some countries still use it, but we probably use a ton of drugs today in hospitals that will be looked at with as much disgust in 50 years as heroin is looked at now.

Topic: Kongregate / Has Kongregate.com ever been on TV?

Yeah, I was going to say, Jim was on FOX News forever ago. It crashed the site.

Topic: Kongregate / Kongregate server in Chicago?

Chicago is a big hub for servers because it gets acceptable (if not good or great) pings to both coasts of north america.

Topic: The Arts / TheDavidCarney's Pixel Emporium

I like the hero animations up in the first post. I particularly like the illusion of a third dimension in the running, which is a tricky thing to do correctly. The head turn idle would benefit from a delay before he turns his head back. In the first post its a jerky whip head movement. As an idle animation it might look good to have him turn his head hold it in the turned position for a couple frames, then back to the original position.

Also, did you try removing the remaining eye from the last frame of the run (as though his head turned so far that neither eye is visible)? Theres like a 80% chance it would look awful, but a 20% chance that it would look right and add all that more depth to it.

Also, I have a bunch of levels for that Stencyl game I was telling you about. Hit me on AIM whenever, will show :)

Topic: Kongregate / Was buying Kongregate really a good choice for game stop?

Brick and mortar retail numbers not good? poppycock! digital distribution is a fad I say!

Topic: Kongregate / Guess The Upcoming Badges

@Samster No, I don’t.

If Greg asks me, I’ll say that I can’t see it being justified with more than 1 badge, it’s in the same score range as Action Turnip (also sponsored by Kongregate), so a single badge if any would make sense to me.

Topic: Kongregate / Guess The Upcoming Badges

Originally posted by Hokage4354:

A list of 3.75+ rated games that have API:

Take a Walk
Blockage
Epic Coaster
The Dreamerz
Deep Diver
(I know it’s not recent) Fantasy Online

Transformice doesn’t have API, and Pinball Adventure is only at a 3.69 rating.

My money is on the awaited badges for Epic Coaster, Fantasy Online, and maybe another one or two.

Trying to sabotage my ability to pay rent over a hundreth of a point, Hokage? Thanks :(

Topic: Kongregate / August - Greg Month!

Since I know theres not enough pictures of Greg to go around for shopping, here’s something from Jim’s facebook.

True story: Jim is 6’5’’, and Lee (on the right), is 5’. So you can try and figure out how tall Greg is. That’s a boeing 747 behind them, I know, his size makes everything seem smaller.

Oh, and the 747 belongs to Greg, they got it for him for Greg Month/wedding present.

Topic: Kongregate / Greg Month Avatar Contest! (round one)

Whatup.