Category: 8bitrocket
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Using the Essential Flash Games Framework Hint #2: Mochi Ads and the IDE
In Chapter 12 we explore adding Mochi ads to the Essential Flash Games framework. In the IDE I have found a slight problem that has been fixed in the new code download, but it is an easy fix for you to make yourself. The Tunnel Panic game fla in chapter…
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Iterating Essential Guide To Flash Games Ch. 1 Games For A Weekend Easter Project
So I decided to take the two games from Ch. 1 of the Essential Guide to Flash Games, and iterate them into a couple new games. The idea here was to let my three daughters (ages 4-11) design some graphics, and then use them in games. They all made some…
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Essential Guide To Flash Games Code Supplement #3: New Source For Chapters 11 and 12
Essential Guide To Flash Games Code Supplement #3: New Source For Chapters 11 and 12 There were many changes made to the book chapter code and the framework package as we progressed through our revisions. It seems that the current code package downloads for chapters 11 and 12 contain import…
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The iPad Is Here and Guess What?: A Lot Of People Think It Sucks : Updated
You might have already read a bunch of balanced or semi-positive stories about the iPad on the internet. This is not one of those. I have chosen to find people who hate it, or at the very least, have had negative things to say, and have written about it. Sure,…
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Essential Guide To Flash Games Code Supplement #2: Chapter 10 Driving and Turning Supplement
Essential Guide To Flash Games Code Supplement #2: Chapter 10 Driving and Turning Supplement In chapter 10 we build an engine to handle an unlimited sized scrolling world with 32×32 sized tiles. On top of this scrolling engine we build a driving game. I had never completed a 360 degree…
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Essential Guide To Flash Games Code Supplement #1: Ch. 1 Games With The Flex SDK
In the book Essential Guide To Flash Games we make every attempt to give developers code that will work in both the Flex SDK and the Flash IDE. However, the three games in Chapter 1 are an exception. Because there were too many essential topics that we would need cover…
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Essential Flash Games Book Shilling Continues: Some Illustrations/Images/Figures
We wanted to show some sample pages and chapters from our book, but we don’t have approval yet. so, instead, I will continue our shameless shilling by showing you some random images and illustrations that we included with the text. This is only a small sample of all the images…
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Mochi Game Development Fund #4: First Contact, And Some Initial Advice
So, any illusions that we had about Mochi indiscriminately and freely distributing cash from the Mochi Game Developers Fund were crushed yesterday when Justin Wong responded to our ideas with a audible “thud”. It was not an outright rejection mind-you, but a request for more information and some more expanded…
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Updated: Do You Want A Free Copy Of Our Book? Review It On Your Web Site (closed).
Updated: Do You Want A Free Copy Of Our Book? Review It On Your Web Site (closed) Ok, the response was overwhelming and we have enough offers to review the book now. We are in talks with the pubisher about the number and type (PDF v. Paperback) of review copies…
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Mochi Game Development Fund #3: Extrinsic Awards: Are They What Social Games Are About?
(This is part #3 in our continuing series on topics related to the Mochi Game Development Fund). Almost every game portal, MMO, online console platform, and viral game service offers some kind of “award/reward” systems for game players. The idea is to give players a reason to play the game…
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New 8bitrocket Game Release: BlasterMines
New 8bitrocket Game Release: BlasterMines BlasterMines is the second game released as a demonstration of the Essential Flash Games Book. Unlike Tunnel Panic (from 2 weeks ago) very little was changed or added to this game from the book version. BlasterMines is an update of the game Mine-X 4K that…
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Haiku: The Genesis Of The Mochi Game Development Fund
Haiku: The The Genesis Of The Mochi Game Development Fund Mochi Media Their API seeds sprouted A new business Game Developers Flocked to their code empire Looking for freedom In-Flash ads promised Monetized free-to-play games Indie devs saw green They soon discovered The slavery of Flash games Was e. C.…
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Our book has already been pirated over 25,000 times in 2 days. Yea for the internet. (Update: Steve’s a noob)
So our book is out, which is cool. You can even “buy” it now. However, one look at the the “download” sites shows me how fruitless it is to write anything these days. Here is an image from one of those “download” aggregation sites: This was not any “secret”…
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Essential Flash Games Book Released!
Essential Flash Games Book Launched! So, the book is finally out. It contains 12 chapters and 13 games to create (some very small, some quite large). We developed our own moderate OOP framework that all of the games use as an outline. Each game can be compiled in both the…
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Mochi Game Developer fund Chronicles #1: Signing Up!
The Mochi Game Developer Fund (A $10,000,000 fund to help game developers implement Mochi services and make games that will conquer the world) went live this week. We are going to start Chronicling our experiences with this new opportunity for indie game developers. The story might be short-lived (if we…
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Steve Woita: An Original Atari 2600 Game Developer Tackles Flash Games, Speaks-Up About Flash And CGE 2010
“ I feel like I’ve got more ideas for new types of games to build now then I did back then because there are so many great games to get inspired from now” – Steve Woita, March 9, 2010 If you know 8bitrocket.com then you know we love Flash games.…
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Flash Gaming Summit Report #1: The Longest Day
(edit: I was so tired I smiised that the title for this story was “Flah Gaming Summit:” for the past 7 hours. Duh!) We just returned from our day in at the UCSF Mission Bay conference Center attending The Flash Gaming Summit 2010. I left my house at 4:00 A.M.…
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Yes Steve Job, SWF *IS* An open standard: Click Team’s Products Now Export Games in .SWf Format
Click Team, the company that has it’s roots in STOS, AMOS and Klik And Play, has recently released a new product that will export applications made in their popular development tools (Multimedia Fusion and The Games Factory) in a .SWF format. The Games Factory is a basic version of their…
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Flash Gaming Summit: Role Call?
The Flash Gaming Summit is now sold-out. Jeff and I were both going to go this year, but Jeff got called back home, so I have to hoof-it alone. Still, it looks to be a fun day. Most people going are also going to the GDC, but that is not…
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Some Troubling Tidbits On Flash And HTML 5…But Maybe Not For Flash Game Developers
Today a couple stories arose that, on the surface seem to point to some troubles for Flash, but maybe not yet for flash game developers. The first comes via PC World: Virgin America Ditches Flash on Its Site. It looks like the Virgin Airline site has decided to remove Flash…
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Tutorial: AS3: How to Blit an animation from a tile sheet embedded at compile time
Tutorial: AS3: How to Blit an animation from a tile sheet embedded at compile time Today we are going to look at how to use a tile sheet embedded into an AS3 project at compile time.We will cover the embedding, instantiation, and actual usage of the tile sheet to do…
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Still don’t Think Using someone Elses I.P., Even For a “Fan” Project, Is Not A Problem?
So, do you still think that using the intellectual property that belongs to someone else is not a problem? Do you think that if you are creating a “tribute” or “fan project” that you will be left alone? Think again. The guys over at The Silver Lining had been working…
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New 8bitrocket Game Release: Tunnel Panic
New 8bitrocket Game Release: Tunnel Panic Tunnel Panic is the first game from the Essential Flash Games book to be released into the wild in a viral fashion. It’s self sponsored (by the book of all things). The original version of this game is featured in chapter 12 of the…
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HTML 5 Canvas For Flash Developers #1: What The #@*! Is The HTML 5 Canvas?
In this set of tutorials, we will explore how the HTML Canvas relates to Flash developers. So, the first question to answer about the HTML 5 Canvas appears to be this: “What The #@*! Is The HTML 5 Canvas?“ The short answer is this: It is an area on a…
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Announcing: Ultimate Unscramble: HTML color Words
Have you ever wanted to learn some arcane HTML trivia while playing a mediocre word game? Well, do we have the answer for you! Ultimate Unscramble: HTML Color Words is the next game in our “reuse everything possible” series following the “World’s Worst Jigsaw Puzzles”. This game is based on…
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World’s Worst Jigsaw Puzzle Collection Launches
Today we announce the launch of a set of 20 games that took us less than 40 hours to complete: The World’s Worst Jigsaw Puzzle Collection We have noticed that many developers create very simple jigsaw puzzles and launch them with Mochi ads. While this is a legitimate way to…
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Tutorial (AS3): Using Fonts Embedded At Compile-Time
Tutorial (AS3): Using Fonts Embedded At Compile-Time I am continuing to explore the use of external assets embedded at compile time in AS3. Today we will look at how to embed and use a font in this manner. The Embed compile-time directive is available to users of the Flex SDK,…
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AS3 Tutorial: Controlling the Main Timeline of a SWF Embedded at Compile-Time
AS3 Tutorial: Controlling the Main Timeline of a SWF Embedded at Compile-Time Today I was working a a new piece of the Essential Flash Games framework that allows sponsor swf files to be embedded at compile time and displayed before a game reaches the title screen. I am using Flash…
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I Just Want To Say This: I Love Flash!
I’ve been spending the last year or so looking and/or forced to develop in other technologies thatare not Flash. I’ve seen Python, Google App Engine, Silverlight, HTML 5, PHP, Drupal, Joomla, C#, Coco, Android Java, and even Unity. While all of these technologies have their, there is one thing they…
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GamesChart’s Barry White Responds (redux)
GamesChart’s Barry White Responds (redux) Last week I did a some coverage of GamesChart and it sparked a little controversy. It seems that one of the principals behind the new venture is none other than Barry White from the now defunct GameJacket. You can’t forget Barry as he has the…
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Updated! GamesChart (Game Jacket Guys Get Back Into The System?) – Barry White Responds
Updated! – Barry White Responds. GamesChart (Game Jacket Guys Get Back Into The System?) Barry White left a message below with some very detailed information on GamesChart. “I do just want to point out that we are in very early Developer Beta, so there”s lots of things that haven”t been…
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Ill Advised CIO Magazine Article Asks: “Is it Time for the Web to Abandon Flash?”
Ill Advised CIO Magazine Article Asks: “Is it Time for the Web to Abandon Flash?” Bad information can be annoying, but bad information in the hands of decision makers can be downright dangerous. An article that was posted today by CIO magazine is just such a thing. The article is…
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Essential Flash Games Book: Flak Cannon Plus Game Play
Here is a short video of the “Plus” version of “Flak Cannon” from the “Essential Guide To Flah Games Book”. I have taken the game beyond the scope of the book. A free tutorial will be available later this year that describes how to take the game described in…
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Why Does Apple Hate Flash: The HTML 5 Canvas Might Be The Answer
Why Does Apple Hate Flash: The HTML 5 Canvas Might Be The Answer Many people on the web have been questioning why Apple “really” hates Flash and why it has not been included in the iPod Touch, iPhone, or new iPad. Everything from “Flash runs slow” to “Flash is not…
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Video: Mochi Media’s Jameson Hsu Answers Our Question About Shanda And Developer I.P.
<object name=movie width=425 height=344 > Millionaire Tycoon Jameson Hsu From Mochi Media removes his monacle for a bit to talk about the Shanda Buyout And Mochi game intellectual property. We asked Jameson a question about how Shanda will treat developer intellectual property in the Mochi system. This was his response.…
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iPad Flash Support For Web Sites? Apples Fumbles This One Badly
So it looks like the new iPad, the one that apple claims is the “Best Way To Surf The Web”, does not support Flash. That means that any full-form web site that uses Flash for ANYTHING will not work correctly. This is not just games or animations, but all sorts…
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Mochi Media Bought By (Alleged) Ex-Chinese Gold Farmers? (updated)
Update: Jameson Hsu of Mochi Media confirmed yesterday (1/27/2010) that Shanda does not intend to do anything with developer I.P. that would jeopardize Mochi’s standing in the development community. This is great news. We will continue to follow this story and report anything that might be of note. Original story: How did…
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Ever Wondered What Some “Reviewed” Book Pages Look Like? No? Too Bad.
Have you ever wondered what the pages of a book look like when they are in the middle of being reviewed by multiple people? No? Too bad. Here are some examples anyway. See all those different colored balloons to the right? Those are are the digital voices of people who know much…
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Flash Game Developer Jens Winterstein Digs Into Our Music Loops For “Running Blue”
We just recieved this nice email from Flash Game Developer Jens Winterstein. He recently dug into our library of free music loops to use in one of his games: Hello 8-bit rocket, my name is Jens Winterstein, I’m an independent flashgame developer from Germany.I was searching the net for…
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Tunnel Panic
Tunnel Panic is very simple game. As your ship flies through the retro, 8-bit tunnel, simply press the space bar to move it up. Dodge everything and stay alive for as long as you can. You get more points the longer you make it through the tunnel.
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