NewStarForums - Blogs - New Star Blog by siread http://www.newstargames.com/newstarforum/blog.php?u=1 This is a discussion forum powered by vBulletin. To find out about vBulletin, go to http://www.vbulletin.com/ . en Sun, 01 Aug 2010 08:31:14 GMT vBulletin 60 http://www.newstargames.com/newstarforum/images/footyfever/misc/rss.jpg NewStarForums - Blogs - New Star Blog by siread http://www.newstargames.com/newstarforum/blog.php?u=1 Sensational World Cup http://www.newstargames.com/newstarforum/blog.php?b=70 Sun, 02 May 2010 08:42:08 GMT As you may have read in the latest newsletter, I am working on a new game for the World Cup. If you missed the newsletter, then get over to... As you may have read in the latest newsletter, I am working on a new game for the World Cup. If you missed the newsletter, then get over to www.newstargames.com and sign up! You can read the excerpt from the newsletter here...

Quote:
So what is this new football game that I hope to release before the worlds greatest players fly out to South Africa? It's only a flippin' World Cup themed, 2D, top-down, all new follow-up to the awesome Sensational Soccer, that's what! Yes, I'm going back to my roots with the sole aim of creating the best sprite-based football game ever made. Development has been very smooth so far with the match engine coming together at an alarming pace and is now approximately 80% complete. The main areas that still need work are the goalkeeping AI and the tournament system, but with 42 days until the show kicks off (and the tons of re-usable programming code from my previous footy games) I'm confident that it can be done. The game will be quite light in terms of features, but rest assured that there will be a full World Cup campaign mode, along with your basic 1 or 2 player quick matches. I'll hopefully have time to squeeze a tactics editor and a few other goodies in there before release, but the bite-sized nature of the game will be reflected in it's price (quite unlike the official FIFA World Cup game then!)

What I can tell you is that I have decided to simplify the controls and in a throw-back to those classics of the 8-bit era, all actions will be performed with just one button. Now before you panic let me just say that the new system falls somewhere between Sensible Soccer and Sensational Soccer, and you can pretty much do all that you could in my previous football games only with a layer of complexity removed. In my opinion it gives the game a refreshing, instant appeal (and will be especially welcomed by keyboard players I'm sure.) Screenshots will be appearing via my blog and Twitter, but here's a small one to whet your appetite...

http://twitpic.com/1jdxp5

Note that you can zoom the camera in or out to your preferred distance and that the new sprites look great up close! So that's what is taking up my every waking moment and it really does feel good to be making a 2D football game again.
]]> siread http://www.newstargames.com/newstarforum/blog.php?b=70 <![CDATA[Where's My NSGP2?]]> http://www.newstargames.com/newstarforum/blog.php?b=69 Thu, 29 Apr 2010 18:29:30 GMT I'm afraid to say that development of New Star GP 2 is currently on hold. I know this will disappoint a lot of F1 fans out there but several factors conspired against its progress. Initially I intended to make NSGP2 a 3D game, but then decided it wasn't the right route. There were problems with the 3D engine and graphically it was below par. Going back to square one meant that I had wasted a lot of time and suddenly it was mid-March. Now this being a World Cup year it was vital that I started work on some kind of football project that could be completed by early June. That may be of no consolation to the NSGP fans out there, but essentially it is the success of the New Star Soccer series that allows me to continue working as an independent developer. To not release a football game this year would be a very big opportunity missed. Check my twitter to see out exactly what I'm working on. So where next for NSGP? Well, I want to re-write the track designer so that we can have more realistic tracks with smooth curves. That in itself is a lot of work, and then there are the heaps of feature requests that have been posted in the forum that I need to filter through. So right now it is impossible for me to say when the game will be ready. I will be working on it at some point this year but it may not be out until the next F1 season. I sincerely apologise to those who are waiting patiently but hopefully it will be worth it in the end. In the meantime, for those that didn't know, there are some excellent mods in the forum garage to ease your frustration. ]]> siread http://www.newstargames.com/newstarforum/blog.php?b=69 2D or not 2D http://www.newstargames.com/newstarforum/blog.php?b=56 Tue, 23 Mar 2010 11:34:25 GMT I'm struggling with the idea of ditching the 3D version of New Star GP. It's taking far too much time to re-do the editor, create all of the 3D models and so on, and after a week away from it I'm looking at what I have so far with fresh eyes and I really don't think it looks that great. My original plan for NSGP2 was to add some new features, update the racing rules and update the teams and drivers. That in itself would take a few weeks to implement, and now with the added complexity of switching to 3D I suddenly feel like I'm driving up a blind alley and I don't know when the exit is.

Most annoying is that I've had webhost problems which coincided with my trip to the Alps and has left a lot of customers unable to register their license keys. This is simply not acceptable on my part. When someone has parted with their cash the process of accessing and playing the full game should be simple and pain free. This was pretty much the case until my webhost decided to move me off of one server and onto another (just as Super Laser Racer launched on Steam I might add). Needless to say I am working hard to resolve the issue and have even changed webhosts but for some reason the problem remains for some people.

I have considered removing the license key system completely from NSS, NST and NSGP but that causes more hassles. Firstly people could simply pass the unlocked exe around making piracy a bigger problem. That doesn't bother me so much, since my games get cracked anyway, but having a license key system means that I can combine both the demo and full version of the game in the same executable. Going down the separate demo/full version route means building 2 versions of the game file on both Mac and PC, so that's 4 builds of 1 game. Then if I decide to update the game I have to build them all over again, and somehow make sure that paying customers have access to the new full version. Changing that whole process could take weeks and it's time I just don't have right now.

Not only do I want to get NSGP2 out soon, but I have a pressing desire to start work on a new football game. Not New Star Soccer but something completely new. Ideally I would have some sort of demo, or free web-game version of this out in time for the World Cup, but time is now running out for that to happen. I won't go into any more detail just yet because at the moment it's still just a sketchy idea in my mind, but it is nothing like anything I have done before and I think it could be a completely unique and original style of football game.

Well, this has been a pretty negative blog, perhaps because I have just come back from a holiday with a rotten cold and have lots of issues to resolve. I promise to be a bit more upbeat next time. :) ]]> siread http://www.newstargames.com/newstarforum/blog.php?b=56 NSGP2 editing http://www.newstargames.com/newstarforum/blog.php?b=55 Sat, 20 Feb 2010 11:43:10 GMT I thought I'd post a little info on the upcoming New Star GP 2. As you may have seen in the latest newsletter I have decided to move the game into the third dimension. Yes, it will be 3D and look quite different but essentially it is built on the same game engine and will feel very familiar to NSGP1 players, albeit with a few improvements. You can put the camera above the track for the original top-down view if you wish but what I like most about the early version of the game is playing it with the camera positioned to give the game an slightly angled view. It just makes the whole thing feel more real and exciting in my opinion.

I can understand concerns amongst the modding crew who like being able to edit the simple 2D sprites of the original game but I hope that I can make things easy for them in the new version. The track editor is virtually the same, so placing track tiles, trees, building etc is just as easy as it ever was. Track tiles are virtually identical to those in NSGP1, although I have tidied them up a bit. Things like trees and billboards are 2D sprites so you wont need to create 3D models to add new ones, in fact you will just need to drop the new image into the sprite folder and it will appear in the editor. Buildings and stadiums will generally be a simple 3D block with a texture on it so creating new variations should be pretty easy. Editing the car colours will be simple too, the only issue will be creating new car models but there are a wealth of these on the net and anyone can pick up the basic modelling skills if they really want to.

The editor is almost complete, so another weeks work should be enough. Hopefully then I can get some help designing the tracks for the new season. :D ]]> siread http://www.newstargames.com/newstarforum/blog.php?b=55 New Star Tennis and the future http://www.newstargames.com/newstarforum/blog.php?b=54 Fri, 05 Feb 2010 15:50:34 GMT New Star Tennis has been out for two weeks now and I am a little surprised at the lack of sales. It started so well over the launch weekend but... New Star Tennis has been out for two weeks now and I am a little surprised at the lack of sales. It started so well over the launch weekend but tailed off very quickly. As often happens I rushed the release to coincide with a real life event and to be honest the game could have done with a lot more testing and refinement. However, I am now very happy with the game and think it fits nicely into the New Star catalogue.

The other problem is that there wasn't time to get any promotion done before the release date and reviews are pretty thin on the ground. I guess most reviewers aren't too interested in tennis games until May/June when Roland Garros and Wimbledon are on the horizon. That said, the game will get a big update in time for those events and hopefully we can fill some column inches then. The update will likely feature the women's tour and some other new features (such as an umpire!)

I will continue to tweak the tennis over the next few weeks but now my attention turns to the next project, New Star GP 2! Yes, I have already been tinkering with the old engine and some very interesting things are happening. I won't divulge too much information until the time is right, but let's just say that the game will have a very different look whilst remaining true to it's roots. I will also be vastly improving the off-track action and reusing some of the ideas in New Star Tennis. I would like to include driver skills which you must train up, but I haven't given it too much thought yet. If you have any ideas then please throw them up for discussion in the NSGP forum. I'm aiming for an early March release which should then give me enough time to test the game properly and get some reviews BEFORE the season kicks off. :) ]]> siread http://www.newstargames.com/newstarforum/blog.php?b=54 A quickie... http://www.newstargames.com/newstarforum/blog.php?b=53 Sun, 17 Jan 2010 10:15:12 GMT Just a quick blog to let you know that New Star Tennis is imminent. Here's a screen shot...



I just need to finalise a few areas today and then I will release a beta version, probably tomorrow. I want to get the full game on sale by the end of the week at the latest since the Melbourne Grand Slam starts tomorrow. :) ]]> siread http://www.newstargames.com/newstarforum/blog.php?b=53 Current Projects http://www.newstargames.com/newstarforum/blog.php?b=51 Sun, 06 Dec 2009 13:19:29 GMT Things are ticking along at a steady pace here at New Star Games. NSS2010 and NSGP are selling just enough to keep a roof over my head and there are... Things are ticking along at a steady pace here at New Star Games. NSS2010 and NSGP are selling just enough to keep a roof over my head and there are a couple things in the pipeline that I'm quite excited about. Firstly the people at Valve (they of Half-Life/Left4Dead fame) are interested in putting Super Laser Racer on Steam. This was a game that I adapted from the New Star GP code in a matter of weeks, without any need for artists or musicians, and is a game that I am actually quite proud of. It hasn't sold very well but then I never put much effort into marketing it at all and was happy to just let it fade into obscurity until now. Quite how well it will do on Steam I don't know, but it will get exposure to many thousands of gamers so it will be very interesting. Before Valve accept it though I have had to include some Achievements which has been quite good fun. Now you can get awards for things like eliminating opponents, or driving a lap without taking any damage and so on. I will also need to tie the online leaderboards to Steam's system but hopefully everything will be working soon. Current SLR customers will be able to upgrade for free and take advantage of the new Achievements. I may also include some new tracks (courtesy of Vurogj and Paranhos) and the difficulty levels should be slightly more balanced.

The other project that I'm very excited about is New Star Tennis. As I have mentioned before, I am creating a New Star Framework upon which I will build different sports titles, the first of which will be tennis. The framework itself is coming together and will probably require no more than a week or two to get everything in place. By that I mean the shop, the sponsorships, all the mini-games and so on. In addition to the horse racing and casino mini-games are darts and karting which should add to the fun factor. In fact the whole process of spending time in New Star Tennis is being revolutionised by having a simple diary. This will show you the upcoming tournaments on the tennis tour detailing the number of entrants and the prize money available and allows you to pick and choose which tournaments you wish to enter. If you decide not to enter a tournament for a particular week you can fill the blank spaces in your diary by spending time with friends, relaxing in one of your homes (if you have purchased any!) or training in the gym or on the tennis court. The whole process of organising your life and finding a balance between happiness in your personal life with success in your career will be much more streamlined and intuitive than ever before. The only area of New Star Tennis that still requires significant work is of course the tennis action itself. I have a 3D player that can perform all the shots and movements needed so work will start on the game engine very soon. Look out for screenshots in the next few weeks! ]]> siread http://www.newstargames.com/newstarforum/blog.php?b=51 New match camera http://www.newstargames.com/newstarforum/blog.php?b=44 Sat, 26 Sep 2009 16:35:07 GMT I was curious as to why the camera view in games like PES and FIFA looked so different to NSS4. They have a much lower, flatter view of the game but... I was curious as to why the camera view in games like PES and FIFA looked so different to NSS4. They have a much lower, flatter view of the game but when you set the camera low in NSS4 you can't see much of the match action. After a bit of tinkering with the camera settings I realised that the 'field of view' setting was set at 64 degrees. This is apparently the standard setting for an FPS game (and I have in fact left the setting alone in the player cam view) but by bringing it right down to 20 degrees the game suddenly looks VERY different. Take a look at this screen shot...



As you can see, it allows you bring the camera down and look up or across the pitch with a much flatter angle and still have a good view of all the action. It also means that the pitch lines look more straight no matter how high you set the cam. You can still place the camera very high or even overhead so you can set it to your tastes, and if anyone prefers the old style camera you can change the field of view in the Engine.ini. This image is a bit like the 'Wide Cam' from Pro Evo...



After giving the replay camera the same treatment but with the added option of being able to rotate it around the ball I saw just how good the game looked from a 45 degree angle. If anyone remembers the original 2D FIFA games on the Megadrive and SNES then these images might give you a warm flashback...





The angled view is now a new option for the match camera. I have also been ripping out components from the match engine and fiddling with the tactics settings to make the gameplay more solid and the match action less hectic. It was Statto that pointed out to me that ALL the players where moving ALL the time and it was just too much movement. I think I got too concerned with trying to make NSS a simulation of real football when actually fun gameplay is more important.

I hope everyone will agree that the changes are for the better but again things can be made to feel like they used to with the Engine.ini. Expect a new beta in the next few days to find out why I am excited about NSS again. :D
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]]> siread http://www.newstargames.com/newstarforum/blog.php?b=44 <![CDATA[Let's hear ya!]]> http://www.newstargames.com/newstarforum/blog.php?b=43 Tue, 22 Sep 2009 09:54:38 GMT Wow, it's been a month since my last post. Very lazy of me. I guess that's because there's not a lot to report. I'm currently trying to finish version 4.08 of NSS4 and I also need to fix the Mac online racing problem in NSGP. These were going fine until my MacBook decided to die (again) taking umpteen hours of code with it. The code should be safe on the harddrive but it will take a few days to repair so work has come to a halt for now. In the meantime I am catching up on a few other areas of New Star Games that need attention. For instance, I updated the forum yesterday and I have given the iMac a bit of an overhaul, uninstalling loads of unwanted software and clearing out all the old unnecessary emails, doing Windows updates, defrag and all that. Now I'm twiddling my thumbs a bit wondering what to do next. Oh yeah, Goal of the Month needs doing... :wall:

New Star Tennis is still very much in the pipeline and I am working with a new 3D artist so things may start progressing quite quickly. I am also making plans for NSS5 and there may well be some radical changes due to the fact that we no longer have a database manager (farewell JJU!) but nothing is set in stone yet. One of the biggest priorities for NSS5 is making the matches more fun to play, so I'd like to hear your comments on that and whatever else you would like to see in the next version. Check out the NSS5 thread and be sure to make your opinions heard! ]]> siread http://www.newstargames.com/newstarforum/blog.php?b=43 The way forward http://www.newstargames.com/newstarforum/blog.php?b=42 Tue, 18 Aug 2009 22:29:59 GMT If you read the latest newsletter you will have caught up on what my plans are for New Star Games. (Just in case you didn't I have pasted the section below.) Well, there's a slight change to this plan. After getting fairly good reviews for Super Laser Racer but with almost all saying it needs an online multiplayer mode I decided to look into a bit of network programming. Things were progressing nicely when I realised that it would be a lot easier to add multiplayer to New Star GP initially due to the fact that it is a simple racing game without any weapons to worry about.

So far I have managed to get some online action taking place between two machines on a LAN but the plan is to allow up to 20 players race over the net. I have the lobby system in place and aside from a bit of optimization of the networking code it's mainly just a case of getting races to end smoothly for all players and keeping track of points between rounds. I have no idea how smooth the racing will be once it's online but I will start testing soon so keep an eye on the NSGP forum for more info.

The rest of the plans that I laid out in the newsletter are still in place only they have been put back a few weeks. See you in the New Star Online Lobby soon!

Quote:
I am currently working on a programming framework from which I can build future New Star sports games more easily. Once complete the framework should help me cut down development time of a new title by having the various common aspects of the games already in place. That means the features such as gambling, sponsorship and relationships will be improved and set up in a framework so that I can literally build and bolt on a new sport without messing around with the foundations of the game. I hope to put this to the test with tennis and golf games in the not too distant future. The framework is around 70% complete already (after borrowing lots of code from NSS4 and NSGP) so work on a new sport will begin in the next few weeks, the first of which will be a 2D tennis game. "What about New Star Soccer?" I hear you cry. Well there will be a major update around the close of the transfer window which will hopefully put to bed all of the existing manager AI issues, and of course there will be a database update to reflect this seasons transfers. Beyond that I will be concentrating on New Star GP 2 and New Star Soccer 5, both of which I expect to release next year. Hopefully NSS5 will coincide with the world cup or failing that the new football season. New features are yet to be confirmed but you can expect faster database processing, improved gameplay and graphics, and maybe even a player-manager mode. This will all be built on the New Star Framework of course!
]]> siread http://www.newstargames.com/newstarforum/blog.php?b=42 SLR Post Mortem http://www.newstargames.com/newstarforum/blog.php?b=39 Thu, 06 Aug 2009 18:32:11 GMT I was recently asked to do a post-mortem of Super Laser Racer for iDevGames.com. I thought I should share it here too as I haven't written anything on the blog for a while...

Overview
After completing my previous game New Star GP I was considering replacing the racing cars with space ships and putting weapons in the game. It seemed like a fairly simple way to reuse the code that I’d spent the previous 3 months working on and quickly create an entirely new game. Meanwhile I had been playing PuppyGames’ Gravitron which I’d purchased through Steam and was mulling over the prospect of making a similar retro style game. It suddenly hit me that I could create the combat racing game with a neon vector look. Throw in some cool explosions and a techno sound-track and hey-presto, I’d have Geometry Wars meets Wipeout.
Like most of my projects, SLR was already perfectly formed in my head the moment I conceived it and required little in the way of design documents or planning. This is perhaps my biggest fault as a designer as occasionally I have to rethink a certain aspect of the game and waste time re-coding it. However, this doesn’t happen too often, if at all with SLR, and it never deters me from ploughing on with the creation of the game with never a thought for planning. (Oh the joy of being an indie!) I don’t deny that preparation is key for some projects but I find that the sheer joy of programming is what keeps me going each day and if I make some mistakes along the way, so be it. I find the journey much more enjoyable than actually reaching the destination anyway.
Unlike my existing sports games I decided to stay away from a detailed career mode in Super Laser Racer and keep it strictly arcade. One reason for this was to keep the development time down, the other being that contracts, sponsorships, shops and casinos don’t really suit an abstract vector game. I also wanted to strip the game right down to the basics and concentrate on the gameplay, trying to achieve that elusive fun factor without the distraction of statistics or management.

Tools
SLR was created in BlitzMax. I love Blitz because it encapsulates everything that I love about programming. Put simply, it gets results fast. I don’t mean the speed of the actual code, I mean the time it takes to get stuff on the screen and to get it flying about. When it comes to programming code I don’t really care how it works, so long as it does what I want it to do. If it’s inefficient but runs ok, that will do for me and it’s on to the next milestone. With that in mind it won’t surprise you to learn that I’m all for using 3rd party modules if they help me get to the finish line quicker and this project was no different. I used several BlitzMax modules, the main ones being Liam McGuigan’s FryGUI (which simplifies the task of creating the interface) and a bunch of Bruce Henderson’s fine mods for backend stuff like localisation and net connections.
The graphics were all done by myself using my ever trusty Paint Shop Pro X. The great thing about this project was that I didn’t have to outsource any artwork. The simple neon style was all done with a few coloured lines and a bit of Gaussian blur. The sound effects were mostly from Freesound.org and the music came from a Shockwave-Sound.com collection which at $99 was an absolute bargain.

What went right
In terms of development, everything went perfectly. Being built on existing game code meant that there were very few bugs to track down and I could do most of the playtesting myself. It also kept the development time down and in the end it only took around 4-5 weeks.
The fact that I created the graphics and used royalty free sounds and music mean that the cost of developing the game was purely in man-hours.

What went wrong
The main missing feature from the game is an online multi-player mode. Network coding is not a strong point for me so I felt that it might be time wasted if the game doesn’t prove popular. On the other hand, the game might be more popular if it included a multi-player mode! Its absence though does mean that I have something to include in a future update or sequel.
So far sales have been a little slow but at the moment it is only available through www.newstargames.com which very much draws in soccer and racing game fans. My mailing list is largely built on the success of New Star Soccer and as such they aren’t too interested in a retro style combat racing game set in outer space! For a project with such a short development time though it is definitely paying its way.

Conclusion
This was always an experimental project for me, breaking away from traditional sports games and reaching out to a different audience. In that sense it is doing well as there is interest from some of the larger gaming portals which hasn’t happened with my sports games in the past. I hope to release new content in the form of new tracks and tournaments and the inbuilt editor is allowing players to share their creations via my forum which is great to see. The initial reviews have been very favourable at around the 70-80% mark so I obviously got something right. All in all it was a fun project with a quick turnaround that reminded me of the importance of creating clean re-usable code. It was also great to get back to basics and concentrate on the fun factor. ]]> siread http://www.newstargames.com/newstarforum/blog.php?b=39 The New Game! http://www.newstargames.com/newstarforum/blog.php?b=28 Thu, 11 Jun 2009 18:53:56 GMT I didn't think I'd be revealing this quite so soon but the new game is really starting to come together. It is still a side project at the moment and my main focus is updating NSS4 but I thought I'd show you how it is progressing.

Remember I hinted that it is inspired by two games in my last blog post? Those games are Geometry Wars and WipeOut. So how did the idea come about? Well, I initially thought of reskinning NSGP and putting guns on the cars for some kind of MadMax style apocalypse racer and then it hit me... I'd always wanted to do an old-school vector style shooter so why not combine the two? Neon style graphics have the added bonus of being dead simple to draw whereas detailed artwork takes time and costs money, so in the end it was a no-brainer. Geometric shapes are go!

The racing is already pretty exciting but I'm still working out some of the basic features like, how many racers should there be? What are the best places to put boost pads and weapons? Are long sweeping tracks more fun than tight turnie ones? Anyway, you guys can help me with all that as there will be a beta version in the not too distant future. :)

I'm having difficulty coming up with a name for the game though. I was thinking Grid Racer but a) a game of that title already exists on mobile phones and b) if you type Grid Racer into Google you get a lot of results for the Codemasters game Race Driver: Grid and my little game would be buried down on page 50 or something.. So if you have any suggestions let me know.

Enough waffling, check out the screenies...





]]> siread http://www.newstargames.com/newstarforum/blog.php?b=28 Welcome to the 21st century, FIFA! http://www.newstargames.com/newstarforum/blog.php?b=26 Wed, 03 Jun 2009 07:11:33 GMT You may recall from my last post that I find it bewildering that FIFA and PES still don't have full 360 degree control. Well, according to EDGE magazine (203) this is all about to change in FIFA 10. This is great news and I'm really looking forward to this version. It should be the best football experience of all time! By the way, the EDGE article is about 10 pages long and a very interesting read, so get out there and buy the mag. It's the only gaming mag I buy and I dream of one day seeing a New Star game reviewed in there. Whether that will happen with my new project I don't know but I can tell you that it is a bit of a departure from my normal games.

Firstly it's not a traditional sports game and it will not have "New Star" in the title. It is inspired by 2 games, one in terms of style which is distinctly retro, and the other in terms of gameplay which is a classic Playstation series. The game is using a lot of my existing code so it is progressing fairly quickly despite only working on it for a few hours a day (the rest being spent on updating NSS4 and NSGP). I hope to have some solid gameplay and possibly a demo within a few weeks.

In other news, I am now a married man after Lucy and I tied the knot on May 23rd. It was a great day and despite being very nervous about my speech it was actually a lot easier than I thought and went down very well (laughter and tears). Last week we drove to Ireland (via the ferry) for our honeymoon which is why I haven't been on the forum much. We had a great week travelling from Dublin to Glendalough to Rosslare and the weather was superb. After so many weeks of planning and stress everything is back to normal now which feels a bit strange but at least it's full steam ahead again for New Star Games. ]]> siread http://www.newstargames.com/newstarforum/blog.php?b=26 NSS4 Gameplay http://www.newstargames.com/newstarforum/blog.php?b=17 Wed, 13 May 2009 12:01:25 GMT I've been thinking about the NSS4 gameplay recently. After a few months of not playing the game due to working on NSGP and various other things it has enabled me to look at the game with fresh eyes. And to be honest, I'm not happy with it. It feels a bit glitchy and slippery in places so I'm currently looking for inspiration from playing some classic footie games like Sensible World Of Soccer (on Xbox) and International Superstar Soccer (Snes9x).

SWOS is trememdous fun but I always found the variation of gameplay a bit limiting. Maybe it was my style of play but the speed of the game doesn't allow for complex build up play. It's end to end stuff and that's what makes the game great, but it's not a style suited for NSS with the more detailed player data that needs to be apparent during games.

ISS is another of my old favourites. This game blew me away when I first played it and it's still a good kick about today. It's a good solid game but it doesn't flow very well. Every time a player controls the ball there is a pause for a second or two while he controls it. This makes for a very tactical game, looking for the killer pass but it doesn't allow for much one-touch passing, and mazy runs are non-existent.

A game that is pretty close to NSS4 in terms of realism and graphical style is Sensible Soccer 2006. NSS4 is a long way behind the excellent cel-shaded graphics but from a distance there are similarities. However, I didn't enjoy playing SS2006 much. It tried desperately to capture the charm of SWOS and while it was graphically very nice it was simply not much fun. Why they felt the need for a close restrictive game view and cheating goalies I'll never know. I did manage to mess up the game speed once whilst running FRAPS and it played in slow motion. I can't tell you how much better it was than the normal speed!

I'm trying not to compare NSS4 to FIFA or PES because they are miles (nay light years) ahead in terms of realism. I can't compete with them so I need to ensure that NSS4 is more of a fun kick-about than a realistic simulation. One thing that always baffles me about these giants of football gaming though is that they still only allow 8 running directions. I guess that they have tried the game in full analogue mode and decided that it didn't feel right or maybe it causes problems pulling off tricks and making tackles. Whatever, I always assumed that NSS4 being fully analogue was a bonus, but maybe your average Joe doesn't care. I've had to delete the occasional comment from the NSS4 Youtube vids. Things like "WTF? This looks rubbish - try FIFA!" Morons that haven't even played the game, but what can you do?

Anyway, I'm gonna keep tweaking the Engine.ini and game code to see if I can make the gameplay better! Laters! ]]> siread http://www.newstargames.com/newstarforum/blog.php?b=17 Tell a friend! http://www.newstargames.com/newstarforum/blog.php?b=12 Wed, 06 May 2009 12:54:56 GMT You may have noticed the "tell a friend" buttons dotted around the main website. This is part of my ongoing efforts to improve the New Star Games online profile and reach new customers. I'd really appreciate it if a few of you could test the feature out and let me know what you think. It's a simple widget from a company called Te!! that allows you to quickly log in to your favourite community site or email provider and fire off a message to your friends. It looks pretty neat and I look forward to seeing some usage statistics in the coming weeks. I'll be sure to keep you informed on how it's going. The only annoying this is, I can't seem to post the button into my blogs! You'll have to view them on the main site:
www.newstargames.com

Cheers! :) ]]> siread http://www.newstargames.com/newstarforum/blog.php?b=12