Now your games are due on Tuesday, October 19. That's two more weeks! Make it count!

Same deal as last time, pretty much: Work on games with your team, join a team if you haven't already.

BUT: New time and place!

You mean we don't have to stay at school until 10:30 any more? :O

That's right! Henceforth, meetings will take place at 7pm – 9pm, in the Boccardo Business Center, room 124.

Wow!

I know! So yeah, see you tomorrow. This is the last meeting before our games are due.

When: Tuesday, September 28, 2010; 7pm – 9pm
Where: Boccardo Business Center, room 124, San José State University

We have another meeting on Tuesday! That's like less than 48 hours from now oh geez. All we'll be doing is working on our games more, it'll be like last week! Also like last week, don't worry if you haven't been to a meeting before or anything, we'll fit you in.

(Also, we will go BOWLING AFTER.)

Say that again, but with more numbers and less sentence structure

When: 9:00pm-10:30pm; Tuesday, September 21, 2010
Where: Ohlone Room, Student Union building, San Jose State University
(Bring: $2 and your Student ID card, if you want to go bowling after)

You should be aware that we're meeting up at 3:50pm in MacQuarrie Hall, room 227. Not 2pm!

The CS Club (MacQuarrie Hall, room 227) will be hosting a fighting game tournament on October 2nd, from 10am to midnight.

Games to be played include BlazBlue, Guilty Gear, and Melty Blood.

If you've heard of any of those, you're encouraged to participate! Entry in the tournament is $6, attendance is free. If you haven't, you're encouraged to come anyway; the event is deliberately newbie-friendly.

If the prospect of seeing videogames in a museum entices you, you might want to check out Learn to Play, an art show put on by former Game Dev Club faculty advisor John Bruneau and current advisor James Morgan.

If you want to check it out but don't know how to get there, you can carpool with us!

Come to MacQuarrie Hall, room 227, at 3:50pm this Friday, and we'll stick you in a group, either as a rider or a driver.

That was neat!

According to plan, teams met up and got to brainstorming/planning their games. I dunno about your group, but our group got along famously. Folks in this club are seriously friendly, word up.

If you still haven't joined a team, you're not even close to being too late; give a shout on the Google Group and we'll hook you up. It doesn't matter if you have no applicable skills; giving you some is half the reason this club exists in the first place!

If you weren't aware, we have a Steam group. Because sometimes we play games, too! (Mostly Left 4 Dead 2 and Team Fortress 2, it seems.)

We’ve wanted T-shirts for a long time, so we’re putting a hard deadline on it: October 5th. Whoever submits the coolest T-shirt design to [email protected] by then will be the designer for the shirt that club members will wear! We’ve only got one design so far so GO GO GO.

Wait, What?

Okay I'll give you a bit more detail.

At events like GDC, it would be nice to show our unity by all wearing the exact same thing. The Associated Students at SJSU is willing to pay for such exact same things, which basically means free T-shirts for us! But we have no idea what to put on them.

You should probably keep it down to one or two or three colors, for cheaper printing.

Since the deadline is awfully close, you don't have to make a finalized design; just the best design. Then you can finish it after.

It doesn't have to be a blank shirt with a logo in the middle; it could be any kind of rad design, as long as it's unique to us.

Anyway but yeah it's due October 5th. GO GO GO!

If you didn't come to the last meeting, you can catch up by reading the last few posts on this website you're reading; you basically didn't miss anything at all, and you can get on a team by just coming to this next one.

Here's the important bits

Where: Costanoan Room, Student Union, San José State University

When: 9:00pm – 10:30pm

Here's the whatever

Our next meeting is on Tuesday! This Tuesday!!

This meeting, we'll be meeting up with our teams and maybe swapping people around a bit, and kinda planning what we'll be making. You know, brainstorming, making sure everything works out, figuring out who will do what. It will be social and thereby interesting.

It will also be at 9pm, not 9:30pm! Rad!

Update: The deadline has been extended! Your games are now due on Tuesday, October 19.

The theme of the first game challenge of the semester is "photos"!

Theme

What does this mean for you, the aspiring gamesmith? It means that you must make a game tangentially related to photos in some form. It could use photographs for graphics. It could use a game mechanic somehow related to photography. It could involve a physical camera. Remember, it doesn't have to be a video game—it could be a board game or a variant on tag! Basically, if you can BS us into thinking that it's related to photos, you're in. And we know you can. You're a college student.

Team

This time around, we decided to prod the introverts a little by putting people into teams. You can still form your own teams, if you want, but it might be fun to work with someone random.

If you signed up at the meeting, you should have received an email telling you who your teammates are. We took care to put an experienced member in every team; if you need help, Marek, Cindy, Alex Kerr, David Do, Kelsey, Euclid, Kristopher, or Patrick would be a good first person to ask.

If you didn't sign up, or haven't been put in a team for some other reason, you can ask on the mailing list and we'll help you out. Don't worry, you needn't have attended the meeting or anything; you can just pop in out of the blue and you'll be more than welcome.

Official Rules

this part is so boring

• You may work in teams of up to 5 people.
• You may use existing assets for this challenge, provided you have the right to use them. Try Creative Commons-licensed photos on Flickr!
• Your game must be related somehow, anyhow, to photos.
• Your game is due on October 5th October 19th!

Have fun and make games!

It was a rad start to what is sure to be a rad semester!

We Met Each Other

We've got some computer science people, some art people, some SXM (formerly DMA) ((it's a really obscure major, you probably haven't heard of it)) people, some totally other people. Yay diversity!

We Showed Off Some Games

It was mostly repeats of stuff you can watch in the Games section. If you're unfamiliar with the club, you should check it out! It's a good introduction.

T-Shirt Contest

We've wanted T-shirts for a long time, so we're putting a hard deadline on it: October 5th. Whoever designs the coolest design by then will be the designer for the shirt that club members will wear! We've only got one design so far so GO GO GO. More details here!

The First Challenge

The first game challenge of the semester was announced, with the theme of "photos". More details here!

Some Events

We will be hosting more Glorious Trainwrecks physical meetups because they are totally rad. They're basically three hour events; during the first hour, we teach you to make games. During the next two hours, you make a game. More information to come!

Learn to Play is a videogame art exhibit that will be opening next weekend. You should attend! More information to come.

TIGJam is a three-day event during which you masochistically make several games per day. It's like a sweatshop, but with videogames. A bunch of us will probably be attending. I know I am a broken record but more information to come.

We hope to attend GDC again next year! That will be neat more information to come.

Now you know what happened at the meeting

Isn't the Internet great?

It's right up there. î It's labeled "Mailing List".

More information to follow! First though it is sleeptime.

Are you new here? THAT IS RAD AND YOU ARE RAD.

If you want to make games but have no idea how, there are some pretty simple steps we can provide.

• Come to meetings! People will showcase games they've made, and you can meet people to collaborate with. Meetings tend to be every two weeks; look down a bit to see when our first one is.
• Come to events wherein we will be teaching people to make games! A bunch of people have made their very first videogames at such events. These tend to happen on the third Saturday of every month.

To learn about such meetings and events, you'll have to keep an ear out. There are way too many ways to do this:

• Sign up for our RSS feed (if you know what that means)
• Like us on Facebook (if you're into that kind of thing)
• Follow us on Twitter (if you're one of those people)
• Join our Google Group (if you were born in like the sixties)

Meanwhile, to get an idea of what the club is about, check out some of the things we've made, and watch some of the speakers we've hosted.

Have a nice school year!

Time and Location

Tuesday, September 7, 2010
9:30pm – 10:30pm
Almaden Room in the Student Union, San José State University

Everything Else

If you're new to the club, welcome, and if you've been here before, welcome back! This semester will be an exciting semester, I can feel it. Here's what will happen at our first meeting:

• Hella introductions will go down. You'll learn what the club is all about, and we'll all learn each other's names, so that we all feel bad when we forget them by the next meeting.
• If you've made a game before, bring it on your laptop or USB drive! You'll get a few minutes to show off anything you've made before, and especially anything you've made over the summer.
• The first game challenge of the semester will be announced! We'll help you get into groups so that you can make a game like a team. If you haven't worked on a game before, don't worry, that's what we're here for to begin with!

We look forward to seeing you there!

Thanks to Brian Urbanek (of Cryptic Studios (of Champions Online)) for giving us an idea of the things he thinks about while he's designing! It was super fascinating and super informative.

Edit: Sorry, Action's video won't actually be posted, since he requested that no video be taken. I didn't realize!

Things that happened

Brian gave an awesome presentation. Seriously, it was so great! Speaking personally, it enabled me to solve like ten design problems in one game alone, and it gave me a lot of food for thought for future and past games. Speaking impersonally, everyone I talked to loved it too, so you don't have to take my word for it.

Also, Kristopher's "Stability" won! A poll was conducted on our Facebook page and his entry got the most votes.

Things that will happen

Videos of Brian's and Action's presentations will be posted. Stay tuned!
Edit: Sorry, there won't actually be a video of Action's presentation.

Kristopher will get a yoyo with a Microsoft logo on it for winning, and all the participants of the budget crisis challenge will get an Xbox 360 game. We figured there'd be enough participants for there to be both winners and losers…

I'm sorry

This post is awfully short in proportion to how long I procrastinated writing it. :O

There's no corresponding post with the rules for this competition, because I am a terrible person who hasn't been updating the website, but here is what the rules were, quoted directly from the PowerPoint shown at the meeting:

• Make a game about the budget crisis!
• Work on teams of up to 5 people to make a new game
• Any artwork used must be made by members of the club
• Any sound / music must be original or in the public domain
• Each member can only be on one team
• Games are due at the next meeting, on April 27th

GovernmentRipsoff, by Andrey Andreev

Here's a direct link to the download for the .zip.

Stability, by Kristopher Windsor

Here's a direct link to the download for the .zip.

Budget Crisis 9000, by Chris Nelson

Here's a link to a page with the download.

Budget Game, by Marek Kapolka

Here's a direct link to the .swf, which will open in your browser.

[Note: Due to incredibly stupid planning on the part of the Game Dev Club's board, Brian wasn't able to make it to our April 6th meeting. It was our fault, not his! Do not think of less of him, think less of us. We're sorry. But: He will make it to this one!]

*swoon*

Brian Urbanek of Cryptic Studios will be speaking at our May 11th meeting! I already talked about him on the post that announced our poorly planned meeting, but I can reveal new tidbits:

His talk will be titled Matching Theme and Mechanics in Game Design, it will be 30-40 minutes, and it will have a Q&A at the end. This is something I have been thinking about in the back of my mind, so I'm looking forward to it! Are you?

I want to go, tell me how to go

Tuesday, May 11th, 2010
7:30pm - 9:30pm
Guadalupe Room in the Student Union, San José State University
RSVP on Facebook, if you like

(Kelsey note: Sorry, there wasn't an announcement post for this meeting. If you missed it, there will be a video posted, so all is not lost!)
(Second Kelsey note: Oh, I guess there won't be a video, because Action requested that one not be taken. Sorry, I didn't realize.)

Announcements:

• May 11th is our last meeting of the semester
• The next Glorious Trainwrecks Klik of the Month is May 15th
  • We won't be meeting in person, but you can participate online
• If you have not yet received your reimbursement for GDC, please see Cindy

We presented the Klik of the Month games that members of the game development club during our Glorious Trainwrecks events, which were made within 2 hours

Action of Choma Coders on Chromacoders.org gave the members of the Game Development Club insight in how to build and manage their own game studio.

The game dev resources that Action provided are

The free book on social games...
http://www.chromacoders.org/book.pdf

The php code base for making your own social game in a few days...
http://www.chromacoders.org/BookCode.zip
http://www.chromacoders.org/fun-social-mmo-generator.doc

Here is a link to the interview in the presentation...
http://www.chromacoders.org/super-rewards-podcast.mp3

Here is a link on making money off iPhone games...
http://www.chromacoders.org/super-rewards-iphone-podcast.mp3

Also board members of the new semester were announced during the meeting.

and the winners are...

Here we go again!

On Tuesday, April 20th at 7pm the second grand master tournament of Mortal Kombat Dance Dance Revolution will take place. This is a double elimination tournament. Come early to get in on some practice rounds. The fighting will take place in Room 241 of the Art building on the San Jose State Campus. The art building is underneath the word 'State' on this Map

Sweet videos I made of the last event.
Mortal Kombat Dance Dance to the Death!

Glorious Trainwrecks is an online community celebrating the spontaneous creativity that comes from making games using children's gamemaking tools under severe time constraints.

The third Saturday of every month, they host Klik of the Month, an event where participants are encouraged to use the simplest tools and the lowest standards possible to make a game in two hours.

We, the Game Dev Club at SJSU, have discovered that it's a lot more fun if you meet up in person to do these together! So we're doing that.

The last time we did this was possibly the best day ever, so we're doing it again! Like I said last time, no experience of any kind is necessary. If you haven't made a game before, we will teach you how! Just ask the six people so far who have made their first game at one of these things.

But When, Internet Guy, and Where?

Room 227 (on the second floor) of MacQuarrie Hall, San Jose State University
Saturday, April 17th, 3:00pm – 6:00pm
RSVP on Facebook, if you're one of those social networking types
Sign up on Glorious Trainwrecks, if you want a cryptic email reminder

Oh and by the way: There's a good chance that we'll be filmed.

[A historical note, for future-people: Brian wasn't able to make it to this meeting due to stupid planning on the part of the Game Dev Club's board. Think less of us, not of him! He is awesome and we are unreliable.]

Sorry for the late notice, but we have a meeting this Tuesday! We will have a guest speaker, Brian Urbanek from Cryptic Studios, talking about game design, probably. We must have a contact at Cryptic or something, this is the second time we've had someone from there to present.

Brian has been working on MMO design for over ten years! He most recently worked on the design of superpowers and combat in Champions Online, the "subscription-based, superhero-themed massively multiplayer online role-playing game by former City of Heroes/Villains developer Cryptic Studios based on the Champions license." ((Wikipedia is the best.))

Okay here's some interesting links

• Champions Online's website has an interview with him that should give you an idea of what it is he does for a living (or did in September 2008, anyways). Recommended!
• He wrote two articles (one two) about balancing systems in Champions, both of which are fascinating, seriously!
• He was one of four developers interviewed for an article about balancing classes in MMOs. I think I am seeing a pattern here.
• He was interviewed in three parts (one two three) about combat dynamics and powers and balancing and math.

I haven't read all of these, but you should! Do as I say, not as I do. And then come to the meeting, which I will be doing.

The Deets ((That's short for "details"!))

Tuesday, April 6, 2010
7:30pm - 9:30pm
Ohlone Room in the Student Union, San José State University
RSVP on Facebook, if you're one of those people

There's another Glorious Trainwrecks event wherein you make not a game, but a level for an existing (wonderful) game! It's a perfect opportunity to apply what we have learned recently. As with all Glorious Trainwrecks events, the idea is just to make something stupid without caring about the quality, so don't be afraid to participate!

Since it's such short notice, we won't have a physical meetup, but I thought you'd want to know about it anyway. There's a link to a chat, and people will be talking, so you can still get your camaraderie fix.

We had like fifteen people come to the gamesmash and like ten of them were making games! Like five of them were making games for the first time! That's awesome.

Here are some of the games made for it, in no particular order! Because never actually asked what anyone's name was (oops), they are attributed to usernames.

I Love You But You Kiss Like a Girl, by mkapolk

mkapolk is the one who originally came up with the idea of physically hosting Glorious Trainwrecks events, starting with when we made like 35 games in what we called an Intergalacticollabogamesmash! PROPS TO HIM. He's somewhere in the process of changing majors from Computer Science to Digital Media Arts.

Invasion of the Spiders and the Bee in the Middle, by trimon

I'm pretty sure that this was trimon's first game! Nice. He's some kind of Art major, I think.

Cave Shooter, by Kitaru

Kitaru doesn't look like a nerd, even when he tried on my glasses! I'm not sure how he does it. I'm almost certain that he's a Computer Science major.

Duck Hunt remake, by gregsqueeb
[SCREENSHOT]

I'm almost certain that a) this was gregsqueeb's first game and that b) he's some kind of Art major! Sweet!

Jumps, by KristopherWindsor

Kristopher couldn't make it in person, but he was with us on the Internet! He's a Computer Science major.

UFO, by GingeRage

GingeRage made his first game, and he's an Art major! There is a pattern here which can be explained by natural phenomena.

THIS IS NOT AN ART GAME, by Cavalcadeofcats

Cavalcadeofcats is actually a University of California, San Diego student! He was visiting because he is home for spring break. He is an HONORARY TEMPORARY member of the Club, or something.

FAKE GAME, by Fake Person
[FAKE SCREENSHOT]

I know there are at least four games that didn't get uploaded! This is unfortunate, it means that not all of our games can be seen. To upload a game, go to the Klik of the Month Klub #33 page and click on upload it here (it's in the post). ((If you were using Game Maker, you'll want to compile an executable--that's a fancy way of saying that you'll want to save the Game Maker file as a .exe. To do that, go to File > Create Executable... or click the equivalent toolbar button. Then right-click on the .exe file and do Send to > Compressed (zipped) folder, so that it's smaller.)) ((If you were using Klik & Play, I can't actually remember the instructions, but I know that only one person was using Klik & Play and that he's smart enough to figure it out. Remember to include the .DLLs in the .zip, Joe! The game won't run without them.))

It's best to include a screenshot--it just is!--and to tag your game with "sjsu", so that we can more easily find the games made at these physical events. Click to see the games we have made at these physical events! If you haven't uploaded a screenshot or you haven't tagged your game with "sjsu", you can find your game and click "Edit" at the top of it to do those.

If you upload your game or add a screenshot, tell me on Facebook (I'm Kelsey Higham) and I'll update this post!

Thanks to Anna Anthropy for presenting about the design of one room (and then of other things) in REDDER! There were like 50 attendees and we were all at the edge™ of our seats.

Glorious Trainwrecks is an online community celebrating the spontaneous creativity that comes from making games using children's gamemaking tools under severe time constraints.

The third Saturday of every month, they host Klik of the Month, an event where participants are encouraged to use the simplest tools and the lowest standards possible to make a game in two hours.

The last time we tried to organize a physical event around a similar thing, it was a total blast. So we're doing it again!

I should note that no experience of any kind is necessary. If you have not made a game before, we will teach you how! Last time, a guy (Andrey) who had never made a game before not only learned to make his first game, but he made another game that was mentioned on Bytejacker. From not knowing anything, that's a time-to-fame of like eight days! This could be you.

Details details

MacQuarrie Hall Room 227
3:00pm - 6:00pm
RSVP on Facebook, if you like
Sign up on Glorious Trainwrecks, though it's not necessary

It is cool to have more artists, we are like 90% programmers here usually! Look at our games, they are generally ugly, we need y'all. (If you're not an artist, of course, you already fit right in!)

If you're new to the Game Dev Club and you want to collaborate on/participate in the current challenge, you should join the mailing list.

If you want to become a member of the Game Dev Club, here's how:

1. spin around three times
2. clap three times
3. hop on one foot three times

Congratulations, you're a member! You didn't even have to pay a fee or anything.

If you haven't implemented a game before, this weekend is Klik of the Month on www.glorioustrainwrecks.com. Participate in that for practice, there are people who can help you!

Part II of the challenge has begun! In this part, you will be tasked with implementing a game using Part I's designs and assets. The designs and assets are here! But don't you start downloading them yet. This is a challenge, we have constraints to make it challenging.

Here are some rules

There's no "I" in "COLLABORATION"

Part of the fun of this challenge is that it forces people to team up with each other. But that doesn't work unless we force people to team up with each other! So you're not allowed to use your own design or assets. You have to use someone else's if you want to be eligible for prizes.

If we didn't do it this way, there wouldn't have been much point to Part I!

i made a picture

If the design you choose has assets to go along with it, you have to use the assets provided before using your own. This doesn't mean that you can't create assets, just that you can't replace existing assets for new ones. If something is in the design but isn't provided as an asset, you're free to make it yourself!

Lol, Internet

You're not allowed to use assets beyond those provided and those you create yourself; no pulling a sweet sprite or jammin' soundtrack off the Internet.

Team Size

In Part II, you can work with only one other person, because we only have enough prizes for teams of that size. Human assets from Part I don't count towards that, because technically they're in Part I.

The best game will net prizes for both the team that made the design and assets and the team that implemented it!

Deadline

The competition ends on April 6. It started two weeks ago, and there are three weeks remaining!

Here are some summarizing bullet points

• Members select one game design from the previous challenge, and implement it, in teams of 1 - 2 people
• Members cannot develop their own designs
• There will be one prize per team member for the best implemented game (the implementing team and design team will both win prizes)
• The challenge ends at the meeting on April 6th
• If the game design includes art, the art must be used, but additional art can be added (same for sound)
• All code and assets must be made by team members

Here are some designs and assets

Designs and Assets

click to get at them

Perhaps the flyer which brought you here in the first place??

Anna Anthropy will be presenting at our next meeting on Tuesday, March 16! You should come, even if you're not a part of the club. (Even if you're not a student here! (Even if you're from the Internet.)) I don't know what she'll be talking about, so I'll tell you a few miscellaneous things about her. Or you could just skip this post and play her games.

As a general introduction, Anna is a game designer and critic who excels at telling stories through the medium of games. Rather than relying on the embedded media of text or movies, like most story-based games out there today, she embeds her stories in the gameplay interactions. Literally, she has told a video game love story where the only action you can take, as the player, is to shoot. More abstractly, she's told countless smaller stories in her various games' level designs. She has written extensively about game design and storytelling on her blog, where she has, among other things, dissected the level designs in Super Mario Bros. and Star Guard to find out some of the reasons they're so good.

Since it's right after transgendered awareness week, I feel it's worth mentioning that she's transgendered. Historically, this has been a problem for people in the game industry; the story of Dani Bunten, lead designer of MULE (you should play the online multiplayer version) is a tragic one. Anna's story is more inspiring—it's a testament to the meritocratic nature of the Internet that she became known and respected first, and when people finally figured out that she was biologically male, few really seemed to care. Ultimately, people are more grateful than anything, because she has created some of the few games with non-immature lesbian stories.

She's a judge in the Independent Games Festival, and she's been influential in making the judging process suck less for those whose games were are getting judged.

Also at this meeting

People will show their progress on the current challenge, if they've got anything to show! (I still need to post the rules and the design docs for that thing, sorry. •_•)

We'll probably share anything interesting that happened at GDC this weekend. I'm sure that something interesting will happen at GDC this weekend. (EDIT: Interesting things happened at GDC this weekend!)

People will also make new friends and get along with each other!

Here's the where and the when

Guadalupe room (second floor), Student Union building, San José State University
Tuesday, March 16
7:15pm - 9:15pm

RSVP on Facebook, if you like.