Starting out: Commodore 64 BASIC

I think the Commodore 64 (or just C64) was my first computer. I was probably about 12 years old. My parents bought it for 'the family', but it was mostly my (5 years older) brother and especially me and my friends who played on it.

I remember Blue Max, River Raid, Who Dares Wins II, Fernandez Must Die, Maniac Mansion (which started a long love of LucasArts games), Bubble Bobble, International Karate, Yie Ar Kung-Fu II. One of my favorites was the management game Rockstar Ate My Hamster. With my friends I mostly played dual player sports games like Summer Games, Winter Games, California Games, Skate Or Die, Ski Or Die and Decathlon. We wrecked a lot of joysticks, got a lot of warnings from my mom and we were such fanatics that we ended up with cramps in our upper arms.

The C64 was also where I did my first "coding". Yes, the word is supposed to be in quotation marks, because it was mostly typing over BASIC code from magazines and books. It did have some room for my blossoming creativity, but I'm afraid those examples have been long since lost

10 print "End of blog"
20 goto 10

Comments

Sirens - the next step

In the last few days, I made a ton of progress. I'm still working on the same screen, the artist profiles, but I've added a bunch of new features, like getting the profile data loading smoothly from the JSON arrays. All in all, I'm probably only at about 1 or 2 percent of what I ultimately want to make, but I'm really happy with how it's shaping up. Of course, it wouldn't be indie dev life without a setback. Over the weekend (Sunday), I completely screwed up and lost a massive chunk of progress. By the end of the day, I was almost back to where I was on Saturday. Almost. The silver lining? Forced to redo it, I completely restructured how the data handles the modular character profiles. That refactoring actually makes it way cleaner and easier to build out the game further down the line. Then, yesterday and today, I knocked out some smaller additions that somehow feel huge now that the foundation is solid. Check out the video below to see how it's looking ...

AI is killing creativity!

I'm currently experimenting with AI, using Gemini and ChatGPT to create images as inspiration for new characters. For a game idea that I have in my head, which is a long way from any shape or form, so I won't get further into that yet. I fed Gemini and ChatGPT some of my earlier characters (actually my only set of characters that I published thusfar): the Cleopatra-zombie character set . And I'm using that to create better looking characters. So I might come out with a Cleopatra v2 set in the near future. Cleopatra Here's the first version of Cleoptra, dressed in white (part of a jump-animation) and the version AI made from it (with a spaceship background - which gives a hint about what kind of game I want to make), as well as a face portrait. The full-body image was created by ChatGPT. The headshot was created by Gemini, as you can see by the 'sparkle icon' watermark in the lower right corner. Gold Cleopatra I also made another 'skin' for Cleopatra, w...

Sirens Devlog: New UI, Character Makeover, Band Stats, and More!

Hey everyone! Welcome back to another update on Sirens. It’s been a busy development cycle, and I’m excited to share what I’ve been working on behind the scenes since the last update. Check out the progress in the video below: Here is a rundown of the latest additions and improvements: In-Game News Feature I’ve kicked off development on a brand-new news feed feature. This will be used to keep players immersed in the game world, reacting to the band's rising popularity, world events, and industry gossip. It's still in its early stages, but it's going to add a lot of life to the game loop! New Character Art Style The characters got a fresh visual overhaul! I’ve transitioned to a brand-new art style. It gives the band a sharper, more polished look that better fits the vibe of the game. Let me know what you think of the new look! New Management Dashboard Managing your band just got a whole lot easier. I've implemented a brand-new dashboard that tracks all the essential metr...

MaxxHoorn

Search This Blog