Tuesday, April 15, 2008

Advertise Here

If you want to create buzz about your website / product / service now you have a chance to do this with advertisement on this blog. You can check statistics here and also you can check page rank.

Contact me via email flanture [at] gmail [dt] com or leave comment here with your info and I’ll get back to you with prices.

Thank you.
Posted by flanture at 16:02:27 | Permanent Link | Comments (0) |

Tuesday, April 22, 2008

Free Flash Games Tutorials


Best recourse I came across lately is the list of 20 free tutorials which can help you start with your Flash games development. Sometimes it’s hard to find even few tutorials and this list is definitely worth reading.

1. Flash Racing Game Tutorial
2. Balloon Shooter
3. Guess Next
4. Space Shooter
5. Platform Game Tutorial Redux: All The Basics
6. Make a dynamic hangman game with XML and ActionScript
7. Snake Game Tutorial
8. Create a survival horror game in Flash tutorial
9. Creating a Flash Lite Game Tutorial (Flash game for Mobile Devices)
10. Flash dodge ball game
11. Create a flash artillery game
12. Creating a Sniper Game in Flash
13. Chicken and Eggs Game
14. Mini Car Race Game
15. Flash ball game with visual effects
16. Flash Fighting Game tutorial
17. Simple Jigsaw Puzzle Tutorial
18. Basic Flash Hit Game Tutorial (Video Tutorial for Beginners)
19. Create a flash game like Security 2
20. Complete Flash pool game with high scores

Big Thanks to Aravind A and DezinerFolio .
If you know for any good tutorial out there or you have one, post it here.

Posted by flanture at 12:30:58 | Permanent Link | Comments (2) |

Saturday, April 19, 2008

Credit Cards

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Next post is written by guest blogger Charles
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You go to your mail, open it and to your belief you see a credit card. It seems that today credit cards are flashing up everywhere. You have credit cards for bad credit, credit cards with zero percent APR, you even have credit card scams. The question that many people ask is who would give a person a credit card with a bad credit history? The answer is, a lot of places.

There are credit card companies out there that actually believe people make mistakes. Yes, you have a repossessed car on your credit but what’s the reason? It is only human to make mistakes, especially when it involves money and credit card companies have a tendency to look past all those negatives and bad credit that you may have on your credit report.

Now we have pre-paid credit cards. Pre-paid credit cards are basically like a bank but all on a card with no checks. Pre-paid credit cards are basically substitutes for your own cash. With a pre-paid credit card no one is lending you cash of any sort, it is your own money that you will be putting on a pre-paid credit card.

As you’re reading about credit cards you probably see a lot of talk about APR. Standard APR, Balance Transfer APR, Default APR and Cash Advance APR are only a few of them to list. Now, are you wondering what the difference with these APR’s is? The difference between the listed APR’s can seem confusing to you when you first hear it but once you begin to understand it you will see that it really is pretty simple.

Standard APR is talking about the interest rate that the credit card will be going up to AFTER the introductory APR period is over. Cash Advance APR is the interest rate you will be receiving for those cash advances. Balance Transfer APR is that interest rate that you will be getting for any of your credit card balances that you transfer over to your newly created credit card. Last we have Default APR and that is the interest rate that your card will be going up to if you are ever late on your payments or even go over your credit limit.

Credit cards can lead to a world of debt so you will need to make sure that you do not get too greedy with that “extra” money. Yes, the truth is that you can use credit cards in order to build up your credit but you will need to actually show some paid off credit cards before places begin to look at that as positive. When you have active credit cards that have not been paid off yet then places may look at you as if you were in debt. So play it safe before you get fifty thousand dollars in debt because credit cards can do that to you THEN you will wish that you never opened that first credit card that came in the mail. In other words, credit cards can help you as long as you don’t go getting too greedy on them.

Posted by flanture at 22:36:46 | Permanent Link | Comments (0) |

Monday, March 10, 2008

Tracking like a pro


I was surprised with this simple but incredible piece of technology, GPS Tracking Key which recently helped police to solve murder case when George Ford was arrested in Chenango County for the death of a 12-year-old girl. Read entire article how his wife suspected he was having an affair and she placed GPS Tracking Key in his truck.

This small, pocket sized device that receives signals from the twenty-four Department of Defense satellites orbiting the earth. The internal computer accurately determines the GPS location of the device within 2.5 meters and records detailed travel activities every second. Data logged includes route traveled, velocity, direction/orientation and duration of device remains stationary. Cheap price for something with enormous number of uses. Device have strong magnet and it is water resistant. GPS Tracking Key is powered by just 2 AAA batteries.


What is really amazing is that this device is fully compatible with Google Earth Software and maps the GPS coordinates of the person or vehicle accurately. You only have to plug it in nearest computer and read valuable data. I already see how teenagers all over the world are helpless in explaining why they took a car without permission. How about people on dangerous missions in distant areas? This is a life saving piece of equipment for some professions. With such accuracy of 2.5 meters, GPS Tracking Key can play significant role in mapping.

Check also cool demos like Tibet vehicle tracking, hike vehicle tracking and Las Vegas strip vehicle tracking with Google Earth available on their website.

Posted by flanture at 20:37:10 | Permanent Link | Comments (0) |

Sunday, March 09, 2008

Team vs Solo Project


Newcomers in games development have first major dilemma about whether to work with someone else or to try to do everything alone.

Solo project is suitable for smaller projects, for simple game play games and for not so demanding graphic games. It is all about what you want to achieve. Perfect solo project games in ActionScript are logic / puzzle games. They usually include small number of graphic symbols with repetitive usage and few interesting sound effects. Game play and controls are easy to implement in all ActionScript versions. This is also great test for future development and self assessment.

Teams are great for gaining experience, one of most important skill in game development. Splitting all work needed among designers (sounds and graphics), programmers and marketing dudes is dream come true for right people and road to success, but this is often very hard to do.

Good starting point in looking to join some team or to create one with right people are game dev forums like:

IDevGames
GameDev
GameDevForum
DevMaster

Good luck!
Posted by flanture at 21:35:09 | Permanent Link | Comments (0) |

Monday, March 03, 2008

Where to start with development


There are many things to consider when starting with flash games development. Basic one is to be sure that programming skills are good enough for the job whether it is AS3, AS2 or even AS1. Experience is very important which means that fresh start can tolerate lack of knowledge to some extent. Creating strategy for first project is another big milestone. Simple jumping into coding won't give expected success. Careful planning is essential.

What kind of project will it be? What kind of game genre? Some games cover more genres at once, some don't. Popular genre is first person shooter where main character moves around and shoots stuff and where the world is seen through character's eyes. Role playing game is similar, but in this case character is exploring some environment collecting power ups in interaction with enemies and other characters.

Other popular genres are strategy, sports, action and adventure. Maybe one of the best genres for newbie in flash games development are puzzle / logic games where graphic is not most important but game play is. Another important and popular genre is casino games like roulette, poker and black jack. Industry of casino games is very strong and need for new games is daily rising. Just check online job boards and you will find how making good casino games brings cash. A lot of cash.

After carefully chosen game genre some other questions have to be answered. If project is small with simple graphic and sound effects and just few levels, this can be one man show, but if project is bigger, consider making a team. Splitting responsibility between graphics, sound, programming and marketing is more productive and results are much better, but gathering a good team is skill for itself. And that is great subject for next article.

Posted by flanture at 11:48:50 | Permanent Link | Comments (0) |

Wednesday, February 20, 2008

Call of the Pharaoh - MWC 2008 winner



Mobile World Congress 2008 is over and winners are announced. Winner in best mobile game category are Call of the Pharaoh by Cellufun and My Hangman by Glu Mobile. Here is description of Call of the Pharaoh.

"Call of the Pharaoh is modelled after viral pyramid schemes, so the game was designed using a pyramid scheme algorithm and, in an effort to follow the pattern, was then made about being a pharaoh and building a pyramid. By requiring recruitment and cooperation, the game drives viral exposure and traffic. Call of the Pharaoh is compelling and innovative because it engages the entire community of Cellufun users and requires participation and communication from all parties in order for any one gamer to advance to a next level. The community aspect and pyramid scheme design of this game help it stand out from the rest."

 
Posted by flanture at 21:49:13 | Permanent Link | Comments (2) |

Tuesday, February 05, 2008

Learning Flash Cartoon Animations

Beside highly popular flash games, smaller amount of flash platform cake goes to flash cartoons. They exploit funny, bizzare and popular themes like thisBritney Spears flash cartoon from FlashCartoons.org and many others. Authors of flash cartoons are very often flash dev beginners and enhusiastics, but this doesn't always have to be the case.

Some learning help comes from huge number of blogs out there, but also as traditional learning tool from books (yes, real books!). One of those books is Flash Cartoon Animation by Tim Jones, Barry J Kelly, Allan S Rosson and David Wolfe. With this book you can learn how to effectively plan an animation project, how to put together storyboards, how to create elegant character libraries, how to set up your .fla file, ready for animation to commence, how to make more efficient use of your time with plugins, where to find good plugins, and how to create your own, how to animate, frame by frame, or using tweens, why After Effects can be better than Flash for some tasks, effective After Effects
Techniques, such as camera mechanics and how to make Flash not look like Flash.

 


 Here is Contents of the book:

Chapter 1 The Project Plan
Chapter 2 Character Libraries
Chapter 3 StoryBoards and Animatics
Chapter 4 Setting Up Your FLA
Chapter 5 Plug-ins and Extensions
Chapter 6 Frame by Frame Animations
Chapter 7 Animating With Tweens
Chapter 8 Animation Special Effects
Chapter 9 Why Use After Effects?
Chapter 10 After Effects and Camera Mechanics
Chapter 11 Making Flash Not Look Like Flash
Chapter 12 Tips and Tricks

book details...


Posted by flanture at 15:05:23 | Permanent Link | Comments (0) |

Wednesday, January 30, 2008

Flash Game Design Competition 5


It's not too late to sign up and participate in Flash Game Design Competition 5 sponsored by Gimme5games and MochiMedia. Send your game right now or create a new one, but before deadline on Monday, March 3rd 2008.

Great prizes are waiting for winners:

1 - $3,500 Flash CS3 licence
2 - $1,750 Flash CS3 licence
3 - $1,000 Flash CS3 licence
4 - $1,000 for best use of competition theme
5 - $1,000 viral award
6 - $500 audience award



You can read more about prizes and specifications on their website. If you have plans to join or you need someone for your game dev team, comment here about it.

Flash games competitions are great way to improve your programming skills not only because of prizes but also participation itself brings very valuable thing - experience. Good prizes are motive enough just to try to make good game, but only with experience comes organization, planning, strategy as important pillars of success.

Flash games development competitions pop-up often all over the web and rivalry is huge issue. Often it's very hard for one-man-machine to win. Instead team of developers is better solution.


Posted by flanture at 20:57:58 | Permanent Link | Comments (0) |

Saturday, January 12, 2008

First Birthday


Today is Flanture's first birthday. Before exactly one year this blog has started. More on my experience later, but now I just wanted to express my regret that noone has won Flanture Birthday Contest, because there was 0 entries.  It's all the same to me, but you just missed your chance to win free sitewide graphic banner spot on page rank 4 blog. Well, nevermind, more birthdays to come.

Posted by flanture at 17:25:36 | Permanent Link | Comments (0) |