Versus Replay

Just added a little tweak to Versus, you can now enter a game number to play a specific game of your choosing. This means that you can play exactly the same game over and over to hone a specific strategy or challenge your friends to a game to see who can score the most.

All you have to do is enter the game number into the box on the game menu or after the game is completed. You can pick a random game by clicking the 'random' button to the right of the game number.

To stop people from cheating the high scores you can only submit a score from randomly chosen games, if you entered a game number or you replay the same game again and again, you won't be able to submit your score.

The game numbering system is accomplished by using a seeded random number generator. The game number itself is the basic seed which is used to generate the seeds for all the levels. When each round starts it uses the generated level seed to randomly place the enemies and player. Because the level seeds are built from the game number, they will be the same every time that game number is used. This means that any two players playing the same game number will see exactly the same enemy placement, teleport placement, and so on. This way you can challenge your friends to specific games and see who is the best.

New Game: Versus

A new game based on the old 'Daleks' game, Versus pits you against ever increasing waves of enemies. You play the plucky little XKCD guy and you're on the run from a rampaging horde of Redditors. You take it in turns to move, as you run they will follow. If they crash into you the then it's game over. Your only defence is to make them crash into each other or into other piles of rubble.

You can teleport out of a tight spot, let off your one-time bomb, stand right where you are or go go 'last stand' if you think you're safe.

The primary design goal was to build a game quickly and simply, the secondary goal was to use little to no text anywhere in game, to see if I could put together a game that needed no written instructions. I think it kind of succeeds but it's all part of a larger learning process.

Play, win, lose, enjoy, let me know how you get on :)

http://versus.playr.co.uk/

Word Grid on Kongregate

Due to popular demand (and beacuse Jim Greer is such a lovely chap) I've added WordGrid to Kongregate so you can play it there an earn all the lovely awards and points that they will be offering very shortly :)

Zilch: e4 Multiplayer Winner

Woot! Zilch was the winner of the Multiplayer award on the e4 games website, which gives me complete permission to show this:

I never thought that Zilch would win an award like this but I'm chuffed to bits! Thanks to any and all who voted for me, I love every single one of you. Yes, even you.

Award Nomination for Zilch

Wow! Amazing news: Zilch has been nominated for an award on the e4 games site!

How awesome! Do yourself a favour and vote for Zilch!

Fancy a little post-game?

I've added a bunch of new tweaks and stuff to the current version of Zilch. I've started tentatively working on Facebook integration but the most prominent feature is now the post-game chatter:

Turns out it wasn't just me who didn't like being cut off in the middle of a sentence when the game ends. Now you can say goodbye to your chums at your leisure :)

G.

Aggravating Flash Issue Solved

I was having a hell of a time trying to make clips inside clips work without throwing an annoying error about type coercion. The solution is simple:

http://bugs.adobe.com/jira/browse/ASC-3537

Don't have any clips inside any other clips that contain static text fields. It's that simple.

I'm only really posting this so I have a reminder of what solves the problem, sorry it's not game related :)

How good are you?

Think you're a good Zilcher?  Any games that you finish will now count towards your Zilch rank.  The scoring is outlined on the page but you get points for playing against anybody, and win or lost points for playing against other Playr account holders.

So make sure you login to your account before you play, build your Zilch rank and let the gloating begin :)

G.

Updates

I've made a few tasty tweaks to the engine now, mainly fixing some bugs and adding a few new features to the client before I update the server.  Now I have added:

• Wings!  You'll only see them if you're playing against me
• Instant rematch option.  I was getting fed up of having to start new games every time so I added a "play again" button to just play the same person again.  Very handy
• Lobby happening in the background.  It was still making pops and noises and stuff whilst playing, that has been fixed
• Some menu improvements.  Tweaks made to the logic of the menu screens has improved them a little.
• Server enhancements.  Games are now handled more efficiently on the server.

I'm sure there's other stuff but that's the things I can remember, I'm sure there are more.

Today I have played against one Mexican, three Canadians, a Californian currently living in Italy and 2 people from London.  Oh, and one guy from Ireland too.

It Is Online

NetZilch is here!  Why not have a few games with a friend?

G.