Ciaran Laval

March 4, 2015March 4, 2015

MadPea Games History Trail Shows That Games Can Be Developed Within Second Life

Fans of computer games are seeing a lot of news coming out of the Game Developers Conference 2015 this week. Linden Lab aren’t there, as far as I know. They have been there before. However Second Life isn’t widely known for games of the interactive sort. Having said that, there are games within Second Life and MadPea Games are one of the best known developers of games within Second Life.

MadPea Games have also moved into a new home, on the Consignment sim which they share with Wavie Haller’s Consignment brand. This is a sensible arrangement as the two brands have been collaborating on recent projects such as Buried and Blood Letters.

However one very fascinating aspect of this collaboration is the introduction of a history trail on the sim. The trail contains signposts of previous MadPea Games productions, which when touched, give you a brief glimpse of a moment of MadPea Games history in local chat along with links to youTube videos of their work and a real sense that games can be developed within the virtual world of Second Life.

For a start there are a lot of signs. They are extremely informative and inform the trailblazing explorer of such matters as :

Before MadPea we were known as Beyond Imagination and brought our first game out in February 2008 called Where the Hell is Harvey Wayne? It was one of the rare grid-wide hunts back in the day, leading to a full sim with puzzles and ciphers to solve.

Since 2008 MadPea have introduced plenty more games and interactive experiences. They have also moved to different places and collaborated with plenty of other brands.

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March 3, 2015

More Good News For Indie Game Devs – Unity 5 Personal Edition Is Free

Following on from yesterday’s good news for indie game developers that Unreal Engine is now free, with 5% royalties if you reach over$3,000 in sales per quarter, Unity have now announced that Unity 5 is out and the personal edition is free and there are no royalties. Although if your game or app reaches a sales figure of over $100,000 you are expected to upgrade to pro, and to be fair, you should be able to afford to do that if your sales are in that region!

Now for those who are thinking that there has long been a free version of Unity, that’s true, but with Unity 5 a lot of those old restrictions have been removed to make this the most powerful free release of Unity to date :

UNITY 5 PERSONAL EDITION: ALL ENGINE FEATURES & ALL PLATFORMS

Aspiring developers everywhere: Get ready for Unity 5 Personal Edition, the new free version of the best development platform for creating multiplatform 2D/3D games and interactive experiences.

Unity 5 Personal Edition includes all engine features: everything that’s new in Unity 5, all the top-tier features from previous releases that are loved by the pros, and deployment to all platforms (with the new Personal Edition splash screen).

The pro version, which still costs $75.00 a month (based on a 12 month contract) or $1,500 for a perpetual licence still has more features, but they are now with regards to cloud options, analytics, prioritised bug reporting etc. rather than extra game development features. I’m not suggesting the pro features aren’t worthwhile, but the free version is now a very powerful choice.

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March 2, 2015

Chris Marker’s Work Lives On In Ouvroir

Chris Marker was a French photographer and film director. One of Chris’ more famous films was the 1962 film La Jetée, constructed almost entirely from black & white photographs and telling the story of a man sent back in time to research past events to help the future. The story is set in a post nuclear war environment. The film is the inspiration for both the film and TV series, Twelve Monkeys.

Chris was rarely interviewed and was often happy to be represented as a cat. More on that shortly. In his later years Chris turned some of his attention to Second Life. Chris passed away in July 2012 at the age of 91, but his work lives on in Second Life on the sim of Ouvroir.

The sim of Ouvroir opened in 2008 and was timed to open simultaneously with Chris’ real life exhibition at the Museum für Gestaltung in Zürich.

The sim was created with the assistance of MosMax Hax aka Max Moswitzer. Then there’s the cat, the real cat was known as Guillaume-en-Egypte, who also became a furry entity in Second Life.

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March 2, 2015

Great News For Indie Game Developers – Unreal Engine 4 Now Free To Use

Unreal Engine 4, the powerful game development suite has opened up a whole lot of new avenues for developers, especially for indie developers. This is because Unreal Engine 4 is now free to use, with a 5% royalty payment due if your game or app reaches a sales figure of $3,000 a quarter.

This is quite an impressive development and really does put creative tools in the hands of pretty much anyone who wants to give them a whirl. Bear in mind that there are still plenty of skills required to actually develop something with Unreal Engine 4.

Unreal Engine 4 can be used to develop apps across a range of platforms. For example you may want to develop a 2D game for mobile, or you may choose to develop a 3D blockbuster for a PC or console.

The website informs us :

USE FOR FREE

We give you everything so you can build anything. You get all tools, all features, all platforms, all source code, complete projects, sample content, regular updates and bug fixes.

I can’t see any obvious traps, this does indeed look like the real deal.

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February 28, 2015

A Visit To The Star Trek Museum In Second Life

The Star Trek Museum has been in Second Life for quite some time. However the recent sad news regarding Leonard Nimoy has led to Second Life residents deciding now is a good time to visit and it is worth a visit.

This isn’t just a place where you play Star Trek, it’s a place with some very well researched Star Trek exhibits and information. The Star Trek museum teaches science in Star Trek format :

Teaching Real Science in a Star Trek Format since 2006. Beam up to 10-Forward. Explore exhibits on Astrometrics, Engineering, Warp Theory, Starship Design, bridge recreations, TWO working Holodecks & more.

This is also a place where you can learn about the history, philosophy, eating and mating habits of Andorian, Borg, Cardassian, Klingon, Orion, Romulan and Vulcan.

There’s a full size Enterprise NCC-1701 floating in the sky. For those older folk, this is the ship from the original series! The ship has the bridge, sickbay, captain’s quarters etc.

On my visit I went to the T’Karath Sanctuary caves where there’s a memorial to Leonard Nimoy. A time traveller was paying her respects.

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