Category: Uncategorized

  • Flash Game Development Inter-web mash up: Feb 9, 2009

    Flash Game Development Inter-web mash up: Feb 9, 2009 The latest in Blog entries and articles that might interest Flash game developers. This time we cover: The 4K Game Competition; New games from Photon Storm, Gaming Your Way, and The Bedroom Labs; Many tutorials from Emanuele and Freeactionscript.com; Mochi Contest…

  • Silverlight Game Development Interweb Mash-Up: Feb 9th, 2009

    Silverlight Interweb Mash-Up Feb.9, 2009 Last week I had several people email me and ask to get their sites added to the weekly round-up. I say “GLADLY I Will add them! ” The only way to get a bead on the Silverlight Game Development Community is to know that it…

  • Zamboozal Silverlight Featured In Microsoft Silverlight Showcase

    It must have been a slow week for Microsoft’s Silverlight.net editorial team, because our 2-week test project, Zamboozal Silverlight was featured today in Microsoft’s Silverlight.net Showcase.  Even though we are pretty sure that nearly every entry Silverlight.net receives gets featured,  we are still happy to see it there, and it…

  • Music to Code By: The Gaslight Anthem

    Music to code by: The Gaslight Anthem I don’t read record reviews, or music magazines, or music web sites. I rarely watch music videos, and when I am in the car I usually listen to my own cds. It’s rare that I will ever be drawn into the hype around…

  • Flash Game Development Inter-web mash up: Jan 31, 2009

    Flash Game Development Inter-web mash up: Jan 31, 2009 The latest in Blog entries and articles that might interest Flash game developers. This time we cover: The biggest browser based  game sites; A selection of general game design topics (applicable to Flash, Flex and other dev systems); Tutorials on AS3…

  • Silverlight Game Development Interweb Mash-Up Jan. 30th, 2009

    It is still very quiet on the Silverlight game development front this week. However, we will forge through as we believe this platform is going to be very significant very soon. Microsoft has not added any more games to their Silverlight.net Showcase this week, but the silverlight.net community gallery has…

  • New Star Soccer Trials added to the 8bitrocket Retro Arcade

    New Star Soccer Trials added to the 8bitrocket Retro Arcade What a treat to stumble upon Simon Read’s first viral Flash game. Created as an advertisement for his incredible New Star Soccer 4, New Star Soccer Trials pits you in the role of squad trainee, competing for a place on…

  • Read full chapters from the new Atari VCS book, Racing The beam

    Read full chapters from the new Atari VCS  book,  Racing The beam Steve and I have been following the progress of this book for the last few months. We don’t know the authors or have any vested interest in the title. We do though think the idea of taking a…

  • Building A Generalized Flex Game Control Part 4 – TileSheet class

    Building A Generalized Flex Game Control Part 4 – TileSheet class In part 1, I discussed and mused over what parts of the MVC pattern (if any) to implement in my Flex game control. In part 2, I dug down into my thoughts on the rendering engine and how I…

  • Play Retro DOS Games Easily on your Mac (or PC, but not as easily)

    Play Retro DOS Games Easily on your Mac (or PC, but not as easily) The ultra cool DOSBox software has been available for the Mac (as well as Windows and Linux platforms for a while now), but I always had a little trouble getting some of my favorite games to…

  • Flash Game Development Inter-web mash up: Jan 23, 2009

    Flash Game Development Inter-web mash up: Jan 23, 2009 The latest in Blog entries and articles that might interest Flash game developers. This time we cover: Flashgamedistribution.com in beta; New PixelBlitz features and demos; A new Mochi contest; tips for protecting your high scores; How to get Flex FP10 and…

  • Zamboozal Silverlight 1.0 Launches : Plus Hosting Silverlight Games with .ASP.NET 2.0 MasterPages

    Excuse me for being a bit nostalgic, but tomorrow is my birthday. Actually, since my brother Jeff and I are twins, it is both our birthday’s. Anyhow, nearly 20 years ago Jeff and I created our first real "finished" and compiled object code game (we had made many games in…

  • Silverlight Game Development Interweb Mash-Up : Jan 21st, 2009

    Silverlight Game Development Interweb Mash-Up : Jan 21st, 2009 Things are still a bit slow on the Silverlight game development side, but we plan to help liven things up with this weekly column devoted to all things tagged GAME in the world of Microsoft’s Silverlight 2 platform. The first is…

  • Five Chuck Arellano Classics added the the 8bitrocket Retro Arcade

    Five Chuck Arellano Classics added the the 8bitrocket Retro Arcade One of the rewards for spending my free time working on this site is finding a gem of a developer like Chuck Arellano. Not only did he use some of my tutorials in making the 5 games we are about…

  • Flash To Silverlight Game Development #2: Random Numbers For Multiple Class Objects

    This might seem like a very simple topic, but it is something that confounded me for a few hours while translating a Flash AS2 game to Silverlight 2: Random Numbers. For many games, the concept of random numbers is essential. Nearly all programming languages have a function to create a…

  • Flash Game Development Inter-web mash up: Jan 14, 2009

    Flash Game Development Inter-web mash up: Jan 14, 2009 The latest in Blog entries and articles that might interest Flash game developers. This time we cover: Sound Classes and Api for As3; The New Flash Developer magazine; A Flash Joystick; Mochi / Facebook integration; Many game design articles and tutorials;…

  • Awesome Retro Flash Game, Jump!

    I was just trolling around the various portals this morning and I came across an absolutely fantastic retro Flash game called Jump. I have looked around and I can’t actually find the real authors name, so I cannot give true credit where it is due. On the game it says…

  • Musical Interlude: Optimus Base Primera By We Are Monsters

    Musical Interlude: Optimus Base Primera By We Are Monsters If you are in the mood for some electronica styled 8-bit music, check out the We Are Monsters blog to download their free 5 track album entitled “Disco Knights”.  My favorite track is Optimus Base Primera, and really, how could you…

  • Silverlight Game Development Interweb Mash-Up, Jan. 11 2009

    Silverlight Game Development Interweb Mash-Up, Jan. 11 2009 Now that we are expanding 8bitrocket.com to more indie game dev technologies, we will also expand our world famous “interweb mash-ups” to those technologies. Don’t worry Flash fans though, Jeff’s regular Flash interweb mash-up will remain unchanged, we are simply adding a…

  • Flash Game Development Inter-web mash up: Jan 7, 2009

    Flash Game Development Inter-web mash up: Jan 7, 2009 The latest in Blog entries and articles that might interest Flash game developers. This time we cover: New Mochi features; Squize’s X++ as the Zarjaz; The importance of using focus groups; What to do with all the ideas in your head;…

  • IGN Running Multi-Part Version Of “Once Upon Atari” Video Series

     http://videomedia.ign.com/ev/ev.swf IGN  is running a series of  short videos from Howard Scott Warshaw’s “Once Upon Atari” DVD series.   If you ever wanted any insight into how it was to develop video games for Atari in the “golden Age” this is NOT TO BE MISSED. Take A look, but don’t blame…

  • Flash To Silverlight : Guess The Number Game Part 1: Flash Version

    Flash To Silverlight : Guess The Number Game Part 1 : Flash For my first foray into Flash->Silverlight Game development, I will create a very simple “Guess The Number” game in Flash and then discuss how to do nearly the exact same thing with Silverlight.  In Part 1 we cover…

  • Flash To Silverlight : Guess The Number Game: Part 2 – Silverlight

    Flash To Silverlight : Guess The Number Game: Part 2 – Silverlight For my first foray into Flash->Silverlight Game development, I will create a very simple “Guess The Number” game in Flash and then discuss how to do nearly the exact same thing with Silverlight.  In Part 2 we cover…

  • Fun action RPG Whiflash added to the 8bitrocket Retro Arcade Showcase

    Whiflash has been added to the 8bitrocket Retro Arcade Showcase. Whiflash is a nice combination of traditional console / computer action rpg combined with s few new, very unique elements. In the developer’s own words (Lauri Hosio):Description: In Whiflash you play as a golem who joins the Stone Guard to…

  • Flash To Silverlight 2 Game Development #1: 26 Hour Install WTF?

    What Do I Need? So I’m working on moving some of my Flash skills to Microsoft Silverlight. Why? Because it’s there and you can make games with it. End of story. The first thing you need to do to create Silverlight Games is to install the proper software to get…

  • Classic Bomb Blitz added to the 8bitrocket Retro Arcade Showcase

    Classic Bomb Blitz added to the 8bitrocket Retro Arcade Showcase Bomb Blitz is based on an a classic Vic 20 game called Blitz 16 combined with Canyon Bomber (VCS 2600) and the classic keep the helicopter in the air Flash Game. In developer Mitomane’s words: Description: A fast higly addicting…

  • Everybody’s doing it, so why not do it too…

    Everybody’s doing it, so why not do it too… Getting an Xbox 360 that is. I have been on a “vacation” for the last 2 weeks from my day job. This “vacation” hasn’t equated into much game programming time (although I have started work on a Mac game using TntBasic).…

  • Blast Force added to the 8bitrocket Retro Arcade Showcase

    Blast Force, a 16-bit era Bomberman style game with some unique features and a whole lot of retro atmosphere has been added to the 8bitrocket Retro Arcade Showcase. Developer Description (By Zir0):Description:Blast your way through 11 levels of action. Battle with drones, tanks, and choppers as you prove your the…

  • Flash Game Development Inter-web mash up: Dec 29, 2008

    Flash Game Development Inter-web mash up: Dec 29, 2008 The latest in Blog entries and articles that might interest Flash game developers. This time we have: A new version of Flash Develop; More dev diary and playable demos from Squize; A very informative Zobieland game postmortem; Creating games with Papervision…

  • 8bitrocket.com Launches Retro Flash Game Hall Of Fame

    8bitrocket.com Launches Retro Flash Game Hall Of Fame Today we launch our newest feature: The 8bitrocket.com The Retro Flash Game Hall Of Fame. We here at 8bitrocket.com love to find and play great retro-inspired Flash games. As we build-out our “Next Generation Retro Game Portal” we wanted to make sure…

  • Diatribe: I’m a crappy drummer and other Christmas revelations

    Diatribe: I’m a crappy drummer and other Christmas revelations Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! Two years ago I tried Steve’s Guitar Hero 1 on the PS2 and was hooked. Steve was an actual pioneer with this game, having purchased in a full year (2005) before it became any kind…

  • Xbox 360 Adventures #1: Netflix

    A few months ago I wrote a prediction that the Xbox 360 would soon die an untimely death. Since then the machine has systematically proved me wrong. It has outsold the PS3, and has done very well against the Wii. Microsoft has cut the price and added features that have…

  • Merry Christmas: A Stocking full of guilt free and legal retro game roms

    Merry Christmas: A Stocking full of guilt free and legal retro game roms While I am fully aware of all the places you can obtain nefarious copies of all the best retro games in digitized disk or rom format, but I also know of a great big stocking full of free…

  • Flashkit Game Challenge #8: Game Reviews

    Flashkit Game Challenge #8: Game Reviews Well, this weekend’s game challenge is complete and the brave and talented game developers have submitted entries. The challenge was to make a shoot-em-up style game (in the theme of apocalypse) and all five accomplish this with varying degrees of success. There are a…

  • New Star Soccer 4 Chronicles #3

    New Star Soccer 4 Chronicles #3 Note: New Star Soccer 4 is a great combination of sports simulation and role-playing game. I have some time off from my day job, so instead of actually working on any of my own games, I am feeding my addiction to Simon Read’s indie…

  • Flashkit Game Challenge #8 Has Started!

    Flashkit Game Challenge #8 Has Started! The theme this time is SHOOT ‘EM UP!!!! Now, that is right up my alley, but unfortunately, I never have more than a few hours a day (at the most) to code or work on the site, so would never be able to compete…

  • New Site 2.0 Beta Launch

    OK, I just “finished” uploading the new version of the web site.  I’m sure there are some critical/horrible bugs some place, but I have not located any yet.  If  you get any server error messages from the site, please email them to us here: info@8bitrocket.com Thanks, Steve Fulton

  • Well crafted Law Of The West Pinball added to the 8bitrocket Retro Arcade

    The particularly well  crafted retro pinball game, Law of the West, has been added to the 8bitrocket Retro Arcade. This game was created by the artisan professionals at Gamingyourway.com in the tradition of 70’s and 80’s arcade to pinball cross conversions. Atari and Bally Midway did a number of Pinball…

  • Flash Game Development Inter-web mash up: Dec 17, 2008

    Flash Game Development Inter-web mash up: Dec 17, 2008 The latest in Blog entries and articles that might interest Flash game developers. This time we have: How to create heat seeking missiles in AS2; more on the Whiflash game beta; How to make a game in Flex; New games in…

  • Top 10 Most Played Mochi Flash Games of 2008

    Top 10 Most Played Mochi Flash Games of 2008gigaom.com is reporting today a list of the 10 most popular games on the Mochi ad network. All 10 are very well done, addictive games. The list includes 3 of my favorite games of all time:Bloons Cube Crush And Fancy Pants Adventure…