Healer.. as they call me!

I was running hastily towards my target whom I thought would be the last person to summon me in the middle of the night. Its been a while since she called me up and asked for help. I looked at my Zenfone. The crystal clear display showed 10 past 1 am time and an 18% battery life. I was more worried of the time than the remaining battery, for i know, even at 18% my device can be with me another half a day. Its the time that I don't have.

"Are you the Healer?" many hopeful eyes ask the same question "Can you really heal me?". I don't know when and how I was being called "Healer", but the expectations from these acquaintances always worried me.It been over two years now. "Can I really heal them all?" I always ask this question to myself because I was confused whether it was a boon or a curse.

And now I'm running towards her. To "heal" her. She wants me to heal her. "Can you please heal me?" were her last words on the phone, each word had hit my eardrum like a thunder bolt. I couldn't help but chant this while i was charging towards her... "I'm coming my love. I'm coming".

Since the inhuman days of Damian apocalypse, there have been weird cases of abnormality among humans. An uncontrolled spread of a germ species called Koida in the human bodies gripped the nation with fear. The symptoms showed excessive swelling of a body part that would soon spread all over body. And the end result is much more horrifying when the veins would burst resulting in instant death of the host. The cure? well that's the tricky part. There was no cure. No medicine, nothing. Once the body is made home by koida, it cannot be removed because it cannot be caught and it multiplies overtime.

This is the point where I come into picture. Because I can see what others cant. The koida. And I can do what others cant. Kill the koida. May be that's why they call me "Healer". But how can I tell them that its the device in my hand that does the magic and not me?. Yes. My Zenfone. This mysterious device that happened to be in my possession, has mysterious powers that cured the infected people. But now was not the time to think about this. My beloved had been infected with it and I have to save her at any cost.

As I reached near the destination I felt a relief that I was able to reach in time. But what came next was beyond my control and worst of my nightmares.

I entered the building to find her in the center of the hallway. Lying there. Still. I can already see the swelled right hand of her. Suddenly I felt lifeless. I hurried towards her. Checked her pulse. She was breathing. She opened her eyes and said "You came? I knew you will". I felt alive again.
Without wasting any moment I took her right hand on my lap. Unlocked my Zenfone, did the necessary cryptic gestures that started the PixelMaster. I just know the name PixelMaster and the fact that it is the most powerful camera that can scan to any microscopic levels through human body. It started emitting 400% more light even at the battery level of 17%. Immediately I focused it on the swelled part. The koida was nowhere to found. I scanned throughout the body for over 10 minutes. Alas, there it was on Left shoulder, in a state to multiply and swell the left hand. The PixelMaster showed the koida on 6"HD ZenUI. Clearly it looked like a leech.
I focused the blue light on it. This helps the koida to stay stationery and blocks its movement. Then turned the light to crimson color and intensified the light. I kept on intensifying it. The koida felt the burn and started moving. But in vain, it was already locked in the PixelMaster view. It was a matter of over 5 minutes when the koida burned to its death. I was relieved. The swelling will fade away soon once she is awake. I felt happy.

The happiness soon faded away as I heard a loud "thud" noise on back of my head. I was hit by somebody from my back.I cried in pain. My eyes started closing. I realized my zenfone was not in my hand. Within the last few seconds of my consciousness, my zenfone was nowhere to be found, neither I could see who hit me. "I'm sorry!" i heard a feminine voice. It was her, awake and in possession of my Zenfone. "I'm sorry! I had to do it" was the last words i heard from her.
I was tricked for my Zenfone. "Am I not a healer now? have I lost the power?" I thought to myself before it was complete black.  




for:
http://www.asus.com/campaign/zenfone/IN/
      

DTH gaming

Since the Digitization of cable TV in India, there have been myriad developments in this field to provide quality content to the consumers. Also the TRAI is making it compulsory for people to have STBs installed. This has resulted in large scale penetration of this technology to millions of household. People now get superior picture and sound quality, a large number of channels, movies on demand, HD channels. But one more underrated feature that this technology provides is video-games.

For me the most important point about this technology is this underrated feature. Digitization of Cable TVs have brought video-games to the people. It penetrated games in the living rooms. Kids and their families now have video games on their finger tips. This is equally fascinating as it is with the video-games penetration via Smart Phone in India. Now if you think logically, almost all homes in India now have access to video-games. This over-the-air game content offered by DTH Providers is mostly free. And even if they charge consumers it is very nominal. For example, the Active-Games pack on TataSky is Rs.5/day. Absolutely affordable. This, i think, is extremely critical if we want to see gaming-culture in India. Easy and Free access to video-gaming to masses will increase awareness amongst them. This will make people believe that video gaming is a good fun activity and worth spending money on.

So, recently I played Krish3 video game on my TataSky STB. Now though the positive points I stated above is valid but there are negative points as well. These games as of now lacks in quality. The games itself are very slow with poor graphics and repetitive/minimal gameplay. This is of-course result of the fact that the STB hardware are not suitable or infact not manufactured to run high powered games. The only difference with the Smart Phone gaming is being that games on Mobiles are much more robust, graphically wonderful and also has 3D gaming. Games on STBs are 2D only. So though kids may like them but they will eventually get bored of it. These games are not at all meant for Harcore gamers. Only casual kid gamers may enjoy it to some extent.

Having said that, if we look into the advancement in this technology then, even the STBs will be powered with softwares like Android. Android powered STBs are already in the market. Imagine the OUYA like game console integrated with the usual STB functioning. Now this will be something interesting to look for. Consumers in India will witness this very soon.  

#myouyaiscoming

Time to rejoice. My OUYA console has been shipped and will reach at my place by 30th May. Finally! Ouya guys kepts their promise. Here's an excerpt from the confirmation mail that I got yesterday:

#myouyaiscoming

Soooo...we thought you’d like to know that your OUYA is en route to your doorstep and you can now track your little game box with big dreams using the tracking number below.

I know you’ve heard this from us before, but allow us to say once more...

YOU helped to make OUYA come to life.

YOU helped to give the support necessary to make this vision a reality.

OUYA would *not* have happened without you.

And for this, we thank YOU.

We hope you love the product and that you’re proud of what we’ve built together.  As you know, OUYA will continue to evolve as we make improvements and iterate based on your feedback -- so keep it coming!

Your order was shipped via DHL Express Worldwide, and is estimated to arrive May 24, 2013 - May 30, 2013.

Yes I believed in it and now its here. Proud to be its backer! 

"Finding Fluffy" game-play video.

I'm dreaming: To make Shiva Trilogy game

Yesterday I was at a book launch and book signing event of Amish Tripathi's last masterpiece in Shiva Trilogy: "The Oath of the Vayuputras". And during the Q&A session with him one of the fellow fans asked him a "bomb" question: "Hi Amish. Now that it is a known fact that Karan Johar would be making a film out of Shiva Trilogy, as a fan, I ‘am much worried about the production design. Aren't you?". The first response to the question was given by the crowd with a roar of laughter. This laughter showed the sheer acceptance of the satire of imagining Karan Johar making the Shiva Trilogy movie. Amish on the other hand gave a positive answer assuring that everything will be good. I would rather say he was diplomatic in answering that question. 

After this particular question and answer, my day dream engine started. What if the question was like this: "Hi Amish. Now that it is a known fact that Jaran Kohar would be making a Video Game out of Shiva Trilogy, I ‘am much worried about the production design as a fan. Aren't you?". Whatever the crowd would have responded and whatever Amish would have answered to this question, here's how, i dream, Jaran Kohar should make the game:

Shiva is a charismatic character and as Amish put it, he is a cool god. So the game has to be a Third Person game so that the person could actually see this character in live action. The novel is full of action and realization of character who rose to become a God. So the game has to be an Action Adventure like "Prince of Persia".  Keeping the story in mind the game-play should be such that, the player playing as Shiva himself must feel the power of being a leader, a warrior, a lover and a dancer as well. The player, along the journey, must also learn what is evil and what does it takes to defeat the evil and how to prevail the goodness among masses. Hence the game-play should have a decision making engine for many sequences in the story, the player would have to understand the evil characters in order to defeat them in combat. Moreover, Shiva being an angry god, the player must feel the rage in the combat. And speaking of combat, the combat system should be mix of bare hand combat, war like action sequences by controlling the troops with cinematic action and choice making, a one on one combat for special sequences, and massive action with plethora of weapons of Indian origin.

These are my minuscule ideas out of numerous ones, that I think Jaran Kohar must keep in mind while making a AAA title out of Shiva Trilogy.

   

Global Game Jam Bangalore 2013 Recap

The Global Game Jam 2013 at Bangalore concluded on Sunday 27th Jan. A 48 hrs of thrilling experience to develop a complete game was the best event happened to me since 2013 started. First of all I had no idea how could I complete a game in just 48 hrs. Second of all, of all the people came there, i knew no one. And from what I read on the jam site, I have to develop a game in a team formed randomly. "Hmm, Lets see" is said to myself and joined the formal presentations that followed.

Three formal presentations took place where the Art Director Nick talked about Art in games, organizer Joel talked about Rapid Prototyping and Agile methods, which I already knew, and Shivam Gupta, another organizer, who is a school student by the way, gave presentation about GGJ survival. I was comfortable already. The theme was shared with all and we were forbidden to share it with the outside world unless all GGJ events got the theme. A formal code of conduct. The theme was "HEART BEAT" . We have to create game based on this theme. It will be fun and challenging, I thought.

Next thing was to get in to a random team. The people I met to join in a team was the first and the last and as it turned out, the best. Kapil Ratnani, Pankaj Bhambani and Soumik Pal and myself started working as team "Wee", as in, Nintendo "Wii" :).

My idea was to keep the game simple yet funny, I knew my skills and my tools and also made sure that the team was comfortable with it. After few ideas and brainstorming session, we decided to create the game based on a theme where love, heart beat and something related to searching will come. The result was "Finding Fluffy" where a cute boy must find his lost puppy in a dark deadly jungle.

Our game's objective was that, the player will have to search his lost pet in a dark jungle, listening to his pet's heart beat. While searching he will have to be aware of the wild animals and other dangerous environment conditions. He will have two options, one, listen to the environmental sounds and make out the danger or the heart beat of his puppy and complete the level. Two, keep an eye on the visible circular area (as a result of candle/lantern he is holding), do not get near the hazards, and find the puppy. Everything with respect to development of the game went very well. 

Kapil and I knew Android. And Kapil also had an Android Phone. Perfect for me. So I convinced the team to go with Android and AndEngine, because we had the right tools. Pankaj being a XDA programmer helped in game art and Soumik did the reasearch for game assests, which he did very well. Pankaj's implementation ideas for the "overlay" functionality and game art was commendable. Kapil did the crucial audio functionality of the game very well along with some collision detection logic. I handled the complete game design, level design and programming of the gameplay, AI etc.  And so after the 30+ hrs of hard work we had our playable game ready with complete game life cycle. We called it "Finding Fluffy" :

 On Sunday evening after 3pm, we all joined in the Dhruva cafeteria were final presentations began. 

Then finally, I started with my presentation:

I dint realize that the moment I was presenting my game, Rajesh Rao, the CEO of Dhruva was present there. Also with him was Anand,. This is the person who gave a talk on content creation titled "Beating the Mythology" in Game developer conference  in 2010. Now he works at Zynga, Bangalore.

After the presentations were over. The calculation of the voted points took place. I swear to god, I did not believe that "Finding Fluffy" would score the fourth position with a cumulative score of 7.83. Though the scores were informal and have no value in the event. But at that moment it felt good.

My teammate Kapil did a very good thing. He asked Aanand and Rajesh to play the game. They both liked the concept very much and the overall design of the game. They also criticized the game which is the most constructive feedback I will consider. They said that the game is difficult to play for a normal mobile game player. They said that we should polish the game with more constructive feedback to the players and make it more easy to play.

I then personally met Rajesh and talked to him about current developments at Dhruva and more specifically Android Game development. I got a positive response. He was very humble. So I asked him for a pic :)

 And finally here is my team. An excellent team effort by Team "Wee" :

  

Im thinking: Why video games are so fun?

Fun is a simple notion easily misunderstood by majority of us. We know that fun is a feeling of being happy. This is true. But we think that there is fun only in some limited activities. We are skeptical about why some activities are so fun for some people.The answer is, we are only limited by our experience, thinking that fun is bounded.

Gaming is exactly that kind of fun most often misunderstood by people. Even worse, they don't even try to understand.Games are the most advanced products that challenge the latest technology. If developing games challenges the technology then playing games challenges the player in every possible way. Let me put that in double quotes:

“Games have immense power to convince you that, no matter what, you can win. Games guarantees you a success. When a player plays a game he knows that he can solve all the virtual challenges thrown at him.This is the single most important achievement games provide to the player. The probability of you wining the challenge is almost 100%. But games demands struggle. Games demand focus. Games demand concentration and Games demand practice.”

And this is why I think games are fun. They are virtual pleasures, agreed, but worth a shot if it can make you happy and put a smile on you face.

I'm thinking: Why video games can be BAD?

I think the main reason to call video games bad is purely psychological. Games are bad when the player completely forgets about the real world and finds solace only in the virtual world. Many thinkers, scientists etc call this as "game addiction". Well i don't. I'am neither a thinker nor scientist but I'm a true hardcore video gamer and I think video game addiction is not what the general definition goes. Game addiction for me has a very different meaning and understanding. I will explain it some other post. But the point is, I, as a video gamer do think video games can be bad. This is because games are only meant for fun and entertainment and nothing else. And when a player considers games as his only work/job, he is in trouble. He is in trouble psychologically.

If you find such a player then there is something wrong with his daily life. Such people do not find the real world challenging enough or do not find the world around them more rewarding.The exact thing that a good fun video game provides. There can be various reasons for them to think this way. They may not be happy with the way things are going with their school or college or work life, peer pressure, bad or ignored parenting. The list can be big. And so is the reason why people who don't play games think that they are bad for their children/spouse/friend.So you see, it is a psychological problem, isn't it?

The other reason I think why a game can be bad, is the game itself. 7 out of 10 games are not worth playing. They would either be gruesomely violent, have horrible gameplay or show content which is not suitable for the age of the player. This will definitely affect the person playing that game. And i think the ESRB ratings wont stop the age groups to play games not meant for them. Game developers should know that action is good, but also action should be fun. Somehow the "fun" part goes missing while creating a graphically awesome, massive action packed game, for most of the developers. And when such game falls into the hands of the wannabe player, it will only ruin his gaming spirit.

Gaming Culture

In India, Bangalore is the video gaming hub. There is no second thought about that. But there is this one thought I just cannot ignore: Gaming is extremely expensive here. I mean if you want to enjoy the latest released Halo4 on XBOX360 and BlacksOps2 on PS3, you will have to shell out close to Rs.200 per hour. 200 Rupees per hour? Are you kidding me?. I know these are high end console games, but don't you think this is over expensive. Even the online PC gaming will cost you near 100 bucks. Still expensive for an average Indian expenditure.

If this is the situation in Bangalore and happens to be in other parts of the country, then how are we supposed to have a video gaming culture here?. Yes, we do not have a video gaming culture in India yet. A culture is defined by the participation and the awareness of the people across age groups.Having said that ,the gaming participation is inversely proportion to its cost and directly proportional to its awareness. The more affordable gaming will be, the more participation it will get and will create even more awareness. And a land where every single rupee spent demands acceptable returns, the current gaming conditions are not fruitful.

Current gaming condition is limited to Social Games on Facebook, Google+ and Mobile games. These games are mostly freemium. Even though this has definitely set the momentum, it is not enough to say that we have gaming culture. It is too soon to say that. But until and unless we keep pace with the gaming world outside India, we will be behind. To improve the conditions, I think, below bulleted points could help in the near future to guarantee a gaming culture among us.

• Good Fun games should be created here in India itself. Not many games, but a few GOOD games. Look at "Angry Birds".
• More and more people from all age groups should get access to free video game playtime. This includes consoles like PS3, XBOX360,Wii and handheld consoles like PSP,WiiU. Let them experience the power of gaming for free. If you can convince them that gaming is worth spending money on then it will set the wheels rolling.
• And last but no the least, The gaming cafes should have affordable charges and schemes. and should remember that gaming is for everybody and not just rich pocket people. Cafes are the best way to experience games before buying the hardware or without even buying it. I have spent countless hours of my gameplay in gaming cafes. They are worth every penny if made affordable. I have played PS2 games in my city for Rs.10 per hour. Now hows that?       

  

Gamification

There is a saying... "When the student is ready, teacher appears" 

Coursera.org had organized a course on a topic called Gamification. Coursera is a non profit organization with an objective of educating the world with free courses. And Gamification was the first ever course being offered there.Gamification is a new term getting noticed by the world recently. A one line definition for this term will be "to apply video game concepts to the non game context".

The saying above applies to me perfectly. "When i was desperate to learn about Gamification, Coursera was there to offer the first ever Gamification course".

Why was I so eager to learn about Gamification from the outside world has a simple answer. I saw it coming. I saw gamification happening around me. It is a beautiful concept that when applied correctly can positively upgrade your product, service, customer relationships etc. that too in a fun way. Look at StackExchange.com, Foursquare.com and more recently the Mozilla Open Badge.

Gamification is very new concept. Though there have some traces of gamification earlier as well but this is the time when it is taking a firm hold in the Web industry, mobile industry and the world.



RNN6EY8N5E45

Solving Box2D build issues on Ubuntu 10.04

While building Box2D on a Ubuntu 10.04 system I faced many problems. After lot googling and trying different solutions I finally built it successfully. The solutions are scattered on the net. I have collected it in this blog at one place because i think i have faced all build problems :) .  

1. Download Box2D from here :
wget http://box2d.googlecode.com/files/Box2D_v2.2.1.zip

2. Read the Building.txt file that comes with the download carefully.

3. I faced problem while building the cod with premake. The error message was :
 The problem was that the vpaths are added in the premake 4.4 version only. Hence the problem. Read this:  http://code.google.com/p/box2d/issues/detail?id=250. This solved 'vpaths' problem.

3. Another error you may face is :

==== Building HelloWorld (debug) ==== Creating obj/Debug/HelloWorld make[1]: *** No rule to make target `../../HelloWorld/Helloworld.cpp', needed by `obj/Debug/HelloWorld/Helloworld.o'. Stop. make: *** [HelloWorld] Error 2

This is a typo.Read this : http://box2d.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=8490. This problem will also be solved.

4. Again after successful building of HelloWorld. You may face below problem :

==== Building HelloWorld (debug) ==== HelloWorld.cpp Linking HelloWorld ==== Building Testbed (debug) ==== Creating obj/Debug/Testbed Render.cpp Test.cpp Main.cpp TestEntries.cpp Linking Testbed /usr/bin/ld: cannot find -lGLUT collect2: ld returned 1 exit status make[1]: *** [bin/Debug/Testbed] Error 1 make: *** [Testbed] Error 2

Read this to solve the issue:
http://box2d.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=8768&p=37500&hilit=cannot+find+lGLUT#p37500

5. Cmake problem :

make
[ 29%] Built target Box2D
[ 59%] Built target Box2D_shared
[ 60%] Built target HelloWorld
[ 61%] Building C object freeglut/CMakeFiles/freeglut_static.dir/freeglut_callbacks.c.o
In file included from /home/gaurav/Documents/me/Box2D_v2.2.1/freeglut/freeglut_callbacks.c:29:
/home/user/Box2D_v2.2.1/freeglut/freeglut_internal.h:111:39: error: X11/extensions/XInput.h: No such file or directory
make[2]: *** [freeglut/CMakeFiles/freeglut_static.dir/freeglut_callbacks.c.o] Error 1
make[1]: *** [freeglut/CMakeFiles/freeglut_static.dir/all] Error 2
make: *** [all] Error 2


/usr/include/X11/extensions/XInput.h is present in Ubuntu 10.04 as /usr/include/X11/extensions/XI.h. So just go to Box2D_v2.2.1/freeglut/freeglut_internal.h. Inside check the the line where error occurred : include X11/extensions/XInput.h . Just rename it to include X11/extensions/XI.h.

Try to "make" again. And when you see the below lines :

Linking CXX executable Testbed
[100%] Built target Testbed

Congratulations. The Box2D build is complete successfully.

I'm Playing: Limbo

Two colors: Black and White and One Word: Monochromatic. That is all you can see on the screen when you start playing the "Limbo". Right from the first untill the 25 chilling, challenging chapters complete (if you could... :) ).

Limbo is an example that proves how a video game can be beautiful,innovative yet fun and entertaining. In addition to this, games like Limbo proves that video game making is an "Art". Said that I want to write especially about the art of Limbo in this post.

Imagine you are a video game designer and you have have been asked or you think to use only two colors : black and white in your game. What possibly you can do. I bet your imagination will not reach at the level Limbo is. The first thing that gets your attention in Limbo is the "Environment" of the game itself. The darkness in the environment of the game is its USP. There is nothing special about the mechanics of the gameplay if you ask. You control small boy with tiny white eyes blinking on his black boy. The boy moves forward and backward and can take small jumps and move objects. That's it. These are the only mechanics of the game. If i put the gameplay in one line then it will be like... move forward,move backward, jump,push and pull. It is the "other" game elements that makes this game unique.

Being a 2D side scrolling game, Limbo adds the game environment with puzzles, those are created using the elements present in the environment itself. The boxes, the saw blades,water,plants,trees, the light, the electricity each and every element talks to you tries to tell to something about the game.
 And as the game progress it is the environment the tells you the story of the game. No narration, no tips, no help guides, nothing.And when such thing happens it is nothing but a piece of "Art".

So did this game gave me a JawDropping experience ?? It surely did. And here it is...

UNCHARTED 3: Drake's Deception™ - Patch 1.11 Notes Video

I have added this link way back in May this year. But it was just when the patch was released. Now that i have experienced the Multiplayer mode of the Uncharted i have got mixed feelings. First thing is the the good thing, and it it that the various types of games that you can play is in awesome. Also the maps are good. The leveling up and the money making part of the multiplayer gameplay keeps you hooked to the PS3 and makes you play for long hours. Now the bad thing (yes only one thing) that i dont like about the gameplay is the speed at which the character moves the aim when holding the gun in first person mode. I know this is the part of single player mode, but  it is fine in that mode. But in multiplayer mode you expect the actions to be much faster and more robust. That's the only lacking part.

Im Playing: Super Meatboy

I cannot imagine in wildest of my dreams that a platformer which looks like a 8bit game I used to play in my school days can be so addictive and fun. This boy made up of meat, that small blood soaked, cube shaped which I have to control can be so difficult yet extremely entertaining. Difficult because the gameplay is constructed so well that it can make anyone from a school boy to a old man crazy. And extremely entertaining  because of the innovative levels,visual style and music in the game.



I'm particularly impressed with the intelligence this platform game has been made. The designers Edmund McMillen and Tommy Refenes  have kept the objective of the game very simple: "To rescue the Bandage Girl from evil Dr.Fetus". And what the Meatboy has to do is jump around all the obstacles, slide beneath walls, avoid saw blades etc. in all varied 300 levels divided across various chapters. Too good for aplatformer, isn't it?
Well as of me, I never thought that I would find a platform game so difficult to crack. Still struggling with the levels that keeps my heart pounding.

I'm playing: Call of Duty MoD3

So today I have completed this most entertaining and thrilling installment of Call of Duty and my impression was "Hey,was I into a action movie or what?". Yes having played this game in Campaign mode for almost 9 hrs made me feel as if I was in a movie playing the role of a Action Hero. The cinematic sequences in the missions, the spectacular visuals, the engrossing story and the way it is portrayed in the game is something that can happen only in CoD. Infinity Ward and Sledgehammer have definitely raised the bar by polishing the gameplay experience. And I must say I'm thrilled.

 This is because I really play very selective First Person Shooters and those fps's should meet the following criteria:

• The game must have an extremely good gameplay from the very start of the game.Believe me there is nothing big turn off than a boring start with a pesky mission. MoD3 holds you to the game play from the very first level when you have to barge into the Stock Exchange Building to blow off the tower. Now this kind of gameplay ignites the urge to play further.
• The graphics must have to be engrossing. Like when you are busy shooting the bad guys it is not just that you are shooting and the guys are dying around you. It is the environment around the player that builds up the engrossing nature because of the visual content. In MoD3 you will find that the elements around you even the tiniest one like the effects of the frag grenade, the responsiveness and AI of the bots, the movements of things around you, the details of the environment, fire,wind,explosions, climatic conditions everything is so lively and feels so real. And more so ever the visual details of the equipments you carry and the expressions of the AI counterparts just make you feel Wow!!!
• Third and not the least the Story. Yes, nothing can build to a great gameplay and graphics than the well scripted and well crafted story line. A story to the level, mission and to overall game is the sole element which emotionally connects you to the game. This emotional touch makes your heart feel  each aspect of the game. Because the story includes the Characters in it, the pretext of the game, the base on which the whole game starts and ends with. Mod3 takes from the where it is left in Mod2. And completes with the killing of the Makarov. The blending of all characters namely Yuri,Price,Frost etc. into the story is truly emotional.

So all in all when I wanted to rate this game on IGN.com I divided my rating into these three parameters and it turns out that this game is a definite 9 pointer on a 10 point scale. I'm satisfied with this installment though i found the campaign mode very small compared to other fps games in the market but the multiplayer feature filled that gap for me. Cheers!

I'm playing: Portal 2

"Intelligent, Innovative and Massively Entertaining " - Game Informer


Recently this game Portal 2 have made me crazy. I mean, the day I have started this title I'm not able to think about any other game. I'm completely mesmerized by this awesome FPS rather FPP (First Person Puzzle) game. Yes this is one kind of game where you don't have any variety of weapons or guns or armors or accessories nothing. All that you will be having is a PORTAL making device, which shoots nothing but one Blue and one Orange colored Portal. Portals which can take to from one place to other in a blink of an eye.

Sounds boring you say? now let add some detailed review of this game and then make your decision.

New Laptop??... Time for new games now :)

After few unlucky and bad days I have my new laptop with me. Now time to start with the games again. After a long gap from my gaming days, Im back. This time started the the download with Portal 2.

Its a complete 7 GB download. And will have to burn my laptop for that. But the game is worth it. after playing the initial version of this game, which included around 12 test chambers and showcased basic touch of the game, i am a total fan. And puzzle games are my favorites. I remember plyaing puzzel games like Lupin the Third and Da vinci code on the PS2. Those were a different breed of games in all. Portal2 joins there league. Infact Portal creates its own league which is going the change, actually have changed the way people will play games.

right now im badly waiting for download to get over. Have to the collection again. Bad days... tata bye bye.

My Java Applets

I have started developing video games using java applets. Ironically i have tried to start with the high end tools like Unreal Engine, Unity, Torque game builder but finally im finding java applet game development a good learning source for game development. I know there is lot to be done to make a mark but it is good to start with the basics right?

Also java applets are not so bad. If some security features are ignored then its the best tool for any rookie java developer to get into gaming. Here is why, the java applet life cycle is easy to understand and implement. Also when the multi threading capability of java is available then it is quite interesting to work on game development.

What actually im doing is learning step by step the essentials of game programming. The essentials include:

• Game Lifecycle.
• User Interface.
• Painting.
• Navigations.
• Artificial Intelligence.(chasing algos, pathfinding algos etc)
• Collision Detection and other physics elements.

The initial game i have developed has a "simple chasing algorithm" implemented where the an animated red demon (a sphere ) is chasing a animated blue man(another sphere). A Collision detection logic is implemented where if the demon catches the man(one sphere touching another sphere) the game is over. Points are awarded in the form of Seconds(time) ie for how long can the man survive the chasing demon. To add some spice i have made the demon to grow like a blob overtime.

The title link, of this blog will take you to my Technical Blog on my website(http://www.gauravnavgire.co.cc/).

Please feel free to add comment, criticize, like.

In search of India

In search of INDIA
GAMASUTRA is the leading website devoted to the Art and Business of making games. It offers everything, from latest breaking news from the gaming industry around the world to the detailed features of the industry to the biggest job board of the gaming industry.
Now what I did? Being an avid video gamer and software programmer by profession longing for the very art of game programming and development, what I wanted to do on the Gamasutra website? It was simple: Search for any minuscule information about game industry in India. And what did I found?
NOTHING!! Absolutely nothing. Apart from some of the instance of INDIA with some other Asian provinces there was nothing that I would say useful to talk about india’s hand in the gold mine rush of video game industry.
Next I went to a more probable website from where I thought could get a glimpse of India. And that site was GAMESPOT and IGN. Now imagine what I might have found out?
Yes! It was nothing with respect to game development in india. Of course you will find user accounts of the video gamers who take part in the forums, polls blah blah blah!! But nothing about the game development.
Well but searching on The GOOGLE wont fail rite? So with dejected feeling and an utter disappointment from the so called famous and lively game content and game development websites , I finally turned to Google. And yes google was my last option to search for India.

I'm playing... Batman:Arkham Asylum

First of all... BATMAN is the awesomely awesome super hero of all the dozens of superheroes out there. And when you have an intelligently developed Batman to control in an equally intelligent gameplay which is delivered by Eidos's Arkham Asylum, it is surely a hardcore gamer's delight. Batman:Arkham Asylum gives you the superhero with his unique and best Technology, where you have a Gel explosion, grapple,Batarangs etc.