What's New
Wednesday, May 14th
Still stuck in Thesis Land
I am still going crazy trying to get my thesis done, but we're getting closer to that final May 23rd deadline. So I don't have much time for updates, but in the meantime here's a quick new article on AudiOdyssey that came out in Tech Talk.
Wednesday, April 30th
Quick Update
I don't have much time to write today, but here are two quick interesting articles you might be interested in:
GTA IV has come out with all the expected (negative) buzz that surrounds it. I think Rock Star's people are brilliant - they get tons of free press without lifting a finger or spending a dime. If I get a free chance I plan on doing a full blog post, but in the mean time here is an interesting article by Richard Bartle with addresses the game critics that are getting furious over the release of this game. I like his writing style; the man doesn't mince words or beat around the bush. Enjoy!
Also, here is a short article on my more recent endeavors for the 100K competition. It talks a bit about the work we are doing for the Brain Gym games, and about our plans for the business. I'll be coming out with a facebook prototype version of the kinds of games we'll be making, I should have more on this in May.
Three weeks until I finish and can come back to life!
Monday, April 21st
Graduation Craziness
I'm going to be a bit slow with updates over the next month or so as I'm neck deep in thesis and trying to graduate come May. So hold tight and I'll have more for you soon.
During this break, if you'd like to know more about
- My thesis
- My upcoming games
- Or any of my other work
Feel free to drop me a line. Address is on the left.
Monday, April 14th
PlayStation Eye talk by Richard Marks
Richard Marks, the designer directly responsible for the PlayStation Eye, came to his alma mater to talk about his work at Sony. For those of you who aren't familiar with the Eye, it is the PS3 descendant to the EyeToy, a PS2 camera input device. You set the camera up underneath the TV so it can see you, and then you can see a picture of yourself on the TV and interact with the games simply by moving around! It's a great concept, except the technology has proven much more difficult to get working correctly than traditional button and joystick interfaces.
The EyeToy did ok in America, selling over 1 million units, but really did well in Europe where over 8 million units were sold to a population apparently starving for intuitive, natural interfaces. One of Sony's big hopes with the Eye is to move it more towards American and Japanese audiences who typically are the largest game consumers around. But this effort has proven fairly difficult, and there have been several hang ups along the way.
The first problem is that though the technology is impressive, it is not robust. The Eye, and previously the EyeToy, can do many things well. The new incarnation can capture streaming video at 640x480 resolution at 60 frames per second with a 70 degree field of view (that is impressive, trust me). It boasts a 4 microphone array that can input directional sound. And of course the PS3 is a mini-supercomputer, so vision algorithms can run tons of processing, including some pretty decent facial recognition.
But the Eye can't compensate for poor lighting well - if you are holding a green ball in a mostly green room, the Eye will have trouble seeing the ball. It has no understanding of what is human and what is an object, and therefore meaningfully interpreting motion is a real challenge (was that a hand that moved? Or a ball? What should it simulate?) These points aren't meant to detract from the hardware and software that went into the product since it really is an impressive package, but at the end of the day if it can't tell what's going on more than 85% of the time that is a real problem.
The worst hurdle the Eye faces, though, is a lack of a killer application. Most game designers simply don't know how to make a fun, engaging game using the affordances the Eye offers. The vast majority of games that have been released can almost be considered tech demos, showing off camera functionality but never presenting the feel one gets while playing a deep, complex game like Mario or Halo. And until that killer app is made I'm worried that this great piece of hardware might be doomed to relative obscurity, since someone always has to blaze the path and show others how it is done.
I really hope I get the chance to work with the Eye at some point, the possibilities are tantalizing.
Rick's talk ended with a bunch of really interesting demos including a great video with about a gajillion rubber duckies, and he fielded a lot of hard questions from the audience. I was lucky enough to grab him for a while and talk to him too, and I was very impressed as he really understands how important natural user interfaces are and where games need to go next. I can't wait to see his future work.
Here's the original PlayStation EyeToy
And here's the new PlayStation Eye. They don't look like much, but I think they're a big leap forward from traditional controllers.
Tuesday, April 8th
AudiOdyssey News
We just got a Post Mortem detailing how AudiOdyssey was made published in the Game Career Guide! It's a pretty interesting read which tells all about which parts of the development process went well and which fell flat - go check it out!
Also, AudiOdyssey was recently featured in an MIT radio segment. Put together by Allyson Collins, it features interviews with Kestrell, Clara Fernandez, and myself. Click below to hear the whole feature, it's around 5 minutes long.
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I really like the image, it is uber pimp.
Friday, April 4th
Video Game Physics!
What's a game without physics nowadays? It seems like just about every game that comes out touts how it's physics are more realistic than everyone else's, and why that makes their game superior to everyone else's. But what does it all mean? Today we'll discuss three predominant forms of physics: Particle, Hard Body, and Soft Body. I know that this isn't a comprehensive list of all the different types of physics out there (i.e. boob physics) but these are the most common types.
Particle Physics
Particle physics deal with a collection of small, frequently single pixel particles. These particles all have some small mass, and can freely interact with each other or solid objects. The upshot is that particle physics are great for modeling gases, liquids, explosions, and forces (i.e. the thrust coming out of a rocket). This model is also useful for showing lots of scientific phenomenon, like pressure exertion or chemicals floating in liquid (we even used them in Immune Attack to show chemicals in the body!). While it may be hard to imagine what I'm talking about based on the description, it is much easier to see and play around with on your own: Check out the Falling Sand Game for a fun and addictive way to learn about what particle physics can do. Just so you know, the game has no instructions, so just poke around, try different things, and see what happens. You might also want to try playing a variation called hell of sand for a different take.
Hard Body Physics
These have been around for a while, really coming in to their own right around 2000. In many of the old video games, objects didn't behave according to reality; objects would float in midair even if they weren't supported by anything, and it was impossible to move or destroy objects no matter what. Hard Body physics changed all that. It does so by applying forces to all objects (like gravity), and by calculating the collisions between all objects and applying forces appropriately. Half Life 2 may be one of the first, and best known, games to really do this with every object. This means if I go up to a chair (or a crate, or a motorcycle, or anything) and hit it with a crowbar, that object will fall over or be knocked away appropriately. More recently this has led to a new game genre, with big name hits like Crayon Physics Deluxe, as well as interesting lesser known titles like the Phun Physics Sandbox (I like this one because it has particle physics too).
Soft Body Physics
The problem with hard body physics is that they model everything as though it was made out of steel; you can kick a chair over, but you can never bend it. You can make a football and throw it, but you can't ever make a Nerf football that you can squeeze. Soft body physics changes that by allowing for the creation of deformable, squishable objects. It is usually done by creating a hard body frame (a "skeleton") and then stretching a sheet of polygons that can deform at the edges over it (the "skin"). Soft body physics is computationally much more expensive than hard body physics, and it is for this reason that we are just now starting to make games that can do it. Microsoft has released Jelly Car which seems to have the beginnings of such physics, but I wouldn't be surprised if it is some sort of elegant hack rather than real physics calculations (after all, the file is too small, it runs on PC's even if they aren't fancy, and it is only 2D, not 3D). Little Big Planet, pictured below, promises to be the first game I've seen that really does it right. However, it was announced over a year ago, and I still haven't seen any news about when the release date will be.
If this game ever comes out, I'm going to be sooooo excited to play it. That is, until it turns into a bunch of Second Life furries yiffing. Then I'll be done with it.
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I wish things were less crazy in my life.
Saturday, March 29th
Fun Japan Pictures
Time for some fan service! I just came back from Japan, and while I was out there I visited a small island off the coast of Tokyo (Enoshima, or 江ノ島 if you can read Japanese). While I was wandering around I couldn't help but feel like I was in a Zelda game? Here's why.
Right when I arrived, I was greeted by a temple shrine which of course had it's own little donation pot. This one had a bit of a twist, though:
If there's one thing I know, it's the symbol for the triforce. Apparently here it's supposed to be a symbol for good fortune, and according to tradition donating some money and making a prayer is likely to make you more prosperous (though I suspect you might be better off just keeping the money).
After wandering around the island for a bit, I found this demon guy guarding a local school. His identical twin brother (not pictured) is guarding the path opposite him. Needless to say, this guy is either a demon miniboss or some mad Kakariko villager about to ask you to embark on some ridiculous journey involving cucco chickens.
A little while later, we ventured into a cave (read: dungeon) in true Zelda fashion. To their credit, they were nice enough to remind us we were in a video game by having triforce lights (read: torches) lighting the path.
And at the end of the cave? The dragon boss, of course! You can see him here guarding his treasure, ready to assault any green capped elves that might try to take it from him. We would have attacked, but there was a fence blocking the way, and I didn't have the proper tool to get by the fence yet. Maybe I should have brought my shovel?
I suppose that's Japan for you. I'm sure if I had traveled to a different island I would have found wild chocobos running wild and kids with impossibly large hair running around with equally insanely sized swords.
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One more thing: Happy birthday Mom! Hope you had a fun b-day vacation.
Friday, March 21st
Bill Follow Up, Denis Dyack, and Too Human
Ok, so more on Bill 1423: a public hearing was held, and Kent Quick from Second Life represented the local gaming community and spoke out against the unnecessary legislation. It remains to be seen whether or not this stupidity will be passed, but if it does it will almost certainly be struck down soon by the courts as it is too vague. The bill speaks of "banning the sale of violent video games to minors" but it doesn't define violent video games (it actually rips the wording straight out of the pornography legislation). So if I'm a video game retailer, and I sell games, how do I know what's considered "too violent" and what isn't? And if I mess up, do I go to jail? Because that's the proposed punishment.
Anyway, it's not too late to act out against this bill, so if you have the time and inclination please write your MA state senator (see post below)
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OK, on to something a bit more fun. Denis Dyack, founder and president of Silicon Knights, came to MIT to speak about video games and art. You may recognize some of his work, including Eternal Darkness: Sanity’s Requiem (Gamecube), Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes (Gamecube), and Too Human , an upcoming XBox 360 title.
Denis' talk centered around Too Human. A third person action adventure set in a futuristic world, which while science fiction in nature is actually heavily rooted in Norse mythology. The story centers around Baldur, a "god" (cybernetically enhanced human) who is trying to fight a losing war to save humanity against an overwhelming force of robotic warriors. The irony is that as the game progresses in order for Baldur to fight effectively he must get more and more cybernetic implants, thereby losing his humanity. In fact the whole crux of the game centers around the fact the Baldur is "too human", and must lose his humanity to overcome these difficulties.
The story is certainly gripping, but what I really loved was the level of attention that Denis and his entire team spent on the project. All of the games themes are based on Norse mythology, and from the talk it seems to have permeated all aspects of the development process. Art asset generation was done in a way to evoke the feelings of viking warriors, beautiful Scandinavian landscapes, and even boat-like architecture. When the music has words, it is all in Norse. The plot draws heavily on old stories of Norse gods and their interaction. It seems that all of these aspects were carefully thought through over several years to yield one final polished result.
Obviously, there were some compromises - it's impossible to fit in everything you really want in a game, and after pressing Denis I got the impression that they were forced to cut out some features due to negative testing feedback. However, that's how testing always goes, and Denis was quick to point out that when these hiccups happened the team was quick to find new and better ways to design better gameplay, artwork etc.
Overall I have to say it was a pleasure hearing Denis speak. He's a really smart and self conscious game designer, and he has a very deep understanding of the medium he's working in. I also liked the fact that he did human computer interaction stuff for his computer science master's :) Anyway, I'm really looking forward to grabbing a copy of Too Human when it comes out and playing it, it looks like it'll be terrific:
Here are some screenshots. They don't really do the storyline or art theme justice, but then a video game isn't meant to be viewed as an image, so I suppose these will have to do.
I go to Japan on Sunday! I'm very excited.
