http://www.bigkid.com.au Games news & reviews, Australian game developers Sat, 05 Jul 2008 05:23:33 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en While discussing the UE3 editor, some friends and I wondered where the term “brush” came from to describe the pieces of 3D geometry that make up the base mesh of a level. So on a whim, I emailed ex-idSoftware (Doom, Quake etc.) founder John Romero for insight. He replied almost ... http://www.bigkid.com.au/2008/01/13/romero-on-3d-nomenclature/ A colleague of mine is working on a remake of the original Unreal Tournament map favourite DM-Rankin for UT3. He’s already sunk 150 hours into it, and it’s only one third complete, but it’s looking pretty good. The complete level will be available in about two months for both PC ... http://www.bigkid.com.au/2008/01/11/dm-rankin-remake/ There is something missing from most modern games. I have written a lot about this, and spent a long time trying to understand it. The last time I visited a computer games store I was struck by the fact that the shelves were filled with hundreds of titles, but only ... http://www.bigkid.com.au/2008/01/06/pre-fab-game-design/ From developmag.com:- The Game Developers Association of Australia has written to the Government’s arts minster and opposition minister demanding that the state extend its generous film tax credits scheme to include games studios. A letter sent last week and forwarded to Develop follows up from a previous call by the GDAA and ... http://www.bigkid.com.au/2007/08/02/gdaa-lobbies-australian-government-for-tax-breaks/ Ex-Blizzarder Bill Roper talks to Gamasutra about upcoming Diablo-esque FPS Hellgate: London and sister title Mythos. http://www.bigkid.com.au/2007/06/30/flagship-qa/ If you are having trouble with IE 7 throwing up the Internet Explorer cannot display the webpage page anytime it encounters a website that does a USER_AGENT check to find out what sort of browser you are using, head here to get a nice easy workaround. Or stick to Firefox ... http://www.bigkid.com.au/2007/06/29/ie-7-workaround/ Sometime MMO designer Damion Schubert recently spoke to a team member on the Shadowrun Demo about the decision to make it an FPS. It turns out some of the demo’s more novel mechanics were inspired by common FPS exploits: That’s right. Shadowrun is, for lack of a better term, a game ... http://www.bigkid.com.au/2007/06/29/designing-with-exploits/ After six years working in the Australian games industry, I decided to cast my net overseas. For several years I had been following a vague game plan to get OS. I wasn’t always sure that I wanted to make the move, but I figured I should keep the option open, ... http://www.bigkid.com.au/2007/06/26/getting-to-the-us/ Byron Scaf wrote: Australia’s largest electronic games and digital entertainment expo, the eGames & Entertainment Expo, is coming to the Melbourne Exhibition Centre from the 17th – 19th of November this year. Showcasing the latest and yet to be released games, this years expo will be remembered for the chance to ... http://www.bigkid.com.au/2006/11/08/egames-entertainment-expo/ SMH.com.au/blogs have provided a gloomy update on the future of Atari Melbourne House… The future of one of Australia’s oldest and best-known development studios looks grim as its troubled parent company continues to offload its assets… Atari has been searching for a buyer for development studio Melbourne House for at least six ... http://www.bigkid.com.au/2006/07/17/melbourne-house-future-in-doubt/ This 2 minute (!) video of the line-up at E3 to play with the Nintendo Wii says something about the interest out there. Meantime, Kutaragi is defending the high PS3 pricing by comparing it to “dinner at a fine restaurant”… which doesn’t really answer questions about HD support and WiFi in ... http://www.bigkid.com.au/2006/05/12/console-wars-hits-e3/ Seeing Machines and the Academy of Interactive Entertainment (AIE) are hosting a competition to develop ideas into working examples of how head tracking technology can be used to enhance interaction in games. The competition aims to encourage new game interface control methods that incorporate 6-degree-of-freedom video-based head tracking. The games ... http://www.bigkid.com.au/2006/03/15/head-tracking-game-dev-competition/