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) |