How indie are you?

Maybe only indie game developers will really get it, but it jokes about how much indie people tend to think they are.

How much indie is does need to be not get beat?

Am I qualified? =-P

Nokia Ovi store – Maemo left out

** update: with N900 coming fast now, It is most likely that Maemo5 will be supported in Ovi Store very soon…

 

Nokia Mosh was a great distribution channel for me. It had a great Maemo support and was a great hub for making my games available. Now I just logged in to Ovi to fill my registration. Its not that the 770 is old…Its Maemo that is not persona-non-grata in Ovi. There’s no sign of N800 and N810 in the device matrix.  This is quite annoying, since even mom’s crappy phone is in there…

Maybe the finns are about something here…

The Tags: I filled it under “defective-by-design” and “phallacy”, but I hope they have something better up their sleeves for us. Lets pray that I filled the tags wrong.

WillItStand – Macintosh

welcome again to the next match of Will It Stand, this time bringing you Apple Macintosh computers versus McIntosh apples.

The Contenders:

Origin:

Apple Macintosh: Palo Alto, California, although some sources say that it is a Xerox Alto rippoff

McIntosh apples: Dundas, ON, Canada – A single half-burn’t  apple tree gave birth to a whole lineage of apples and every apple of this kind you get today is a direct descentant of this tree.

winner:  a draw - there’s no clear winner on this round.

Size:

Apple Macintosh: It can vary to a big desktop unit to a slim iPod Touch device slightly bigger than a opened hand.

McIntosh apples: Somewhat bigger than a closed fist in average. The size can vary.

winner: Apple Macintosh - you cant carry a McIntosh in your pocket very easily…Something you can easily do with the newest portable Apple handhelds.

Color:

Apple Macintosh: They were produced in the in lots of colors but usually bland and translucent colors.

McIntosh apples: A bright and colourful red. One of the most beautiful apples you will ever see in your life.

winner: McIntosh apples – c’mon guys! I would be ashamed to bring home some Macintosh models

Taste:

Apple Macintosh: Dont know it, never tasted it.But judging from the toxic wisp that came out of the Will It Blend: iPhone episoide,I will never taste it.

McIntosh apples: A tart but sweet taste. Crunchy skin adds to the experience. (words of a McIntosh lover. I ate the legit Ontario McIntosh!)

winner: McIntosh apples – easy to pick this one. ’nuff said.

Availability:

Apple Macintosh: Almost everywere, but it costs a little fortune, with the cheapiest model , the iPod Touch being very limited.

McIntosh apples:  Not very easy to pick outside Ontario, I guess. But they are not that expensive.

winner: Apple Macintosh – won from a very narrow lead. I cant find McIntosh apples in Rio.

Develop for Apple’s Application Store:

Apple Macintosh: The only option to develop for Apple’s Application Store.

McIntosh apples: Great snack while compiling, but you still need the Macintosh.

winner: Apple Macintosh – That’s where the money is, baby!

Good for salad:

Apple Macintosh: the olive oil would make your keyboard very greasy…

McIntosh: Great with some mayo, raisings and nuts  – tasty and healthy!

winner: McIntosh apples – Ma and Pa would be very angry if you mistake them in kitchen…

Ladies and Gentlemen , we have a draw! Again! Oh boy…I have to say that I dont personally like Apple’s UI, but this is no parameter of comparission..so I have to concede…I will probably buy both one day…

Thanks for Cindy Dalfovo for the support!

Next week: Bungie’s Marathon vs running a marathon!

Angstron 2: Droid Hunter finished-almost

UPDATE: ITS FINISHED!!! http://corporatedrones.wordpress.com/2009/07/22/angstron-2-released/

Hello folks.

I guess I’ve finished all the ingame  assets for Angstron 2: droid hunter. Sure the render is not ready for prime time (but it does perform decently in most cases), but this is a matter of time.  In any case, I’ve got a OpenGL version of it fully working and a OpenGL ES version is on the way.

My previous decision of scrapping level 2 was aborted (hence you will see the horde of morcegos in all its glory), but almost all the levels need some better POV-BSP-prunning during rendering before shipping. There are several points with some minor visible artifacts , some culling errors here and there and a few slowdown spots. While for a freeware game where there’s no compromise, I cant simply allow this to be released.

The game play remained unchanged from the previous beta releases, with some adjustiments still to be made.

The 2D artwork is seriously faulty and in need to be re-drawn. This is going to be a looong paper-and-pencil-than-flatbed-scanner-then-inkscape process. Dont hold your breath.

The game was somewhat delayed due to my lack of luck with UNIX this last weekend (http://corporatedrones.wordpress.com/2009/04/14/solaris-ubuntu-xandros-eeepc-problemas-meu-dia-de-azar-com-unix/)

The release will reach both Maemo 2.2 and the upcoming Maemo 5 (“fremantle”, powered by hardware acelerated OpenGL ES!), EZX , EeePC (this time, with a better packaging system, from the official SDK!)  and desktop linux.

Solaris + Ubuntu = Xandros – EeePC = problemas (meu dia de azar com UNIX)

Não instalem OpenSolaris com Ubuntu Linux. Os dois não se dão bem.

Tive sérios problemas durante essa pascoa por causa disso.

O OpenSolaris não apenas não tinha o driver da minha placa de rede, como também ignorou a presença do Ubuntu. Tentei de restaurar de forma gentil de tudo quanto é forma. Por fim desisti e instalei outra versão do ubuntu por cima. E o problema sumiu…para aparecer outro…

Cerca de duas horas depois, meu EeePC começou a se desligar sozinho assim  que o X iniciava. Tentei formatar – nada. Tentei retirar a bateria e re-colocar – nada. Por fim, tirei a bateria e deixei apenas na tomada e ele funcionou. Devia ser algum sensor com problemas. Assim como meu cerebro nesse meio tempo. Explico:

Durante as diversas tentativas de resolução de problema, peguei o CD de recuperação que veio com o note e botei no drive (isso porque, me lembro de ter lido em algum lugar que colocando esse CD no drive, ele gravava o sistema nalgum dispositivo flash que depois poderia bootar e regravar a imagem squashFS do sistema básico do Xandros) , mas este começou a gravar o Xandros em meu HD! Até eu notar que a luz do pendrive na USB não estava piscando, ja tinha feito todo o estrago. Nem o PartED deu jeito… Nisso , eu perdi:

- A ultima versão da BZK (sorte que tinha uma versão de 3 dias antes no mesmo pendrive)

- A ultima versão do MonoBED: essa eu perdi mesmo

- “fatsource” – é como apelidei a versão original de onde eu fiz o fork pra “leansource” da BZK na qual estou usando com base no momento. Com backups bem antigos, mas creio que com backups no SVN

- Originais dos assets do Riddler e do Angstron2: droid hunter.

- It came from the cave mobile (um demo simples)

E muito mais coisas. Repito: façam backups o tempo todo!

Não preciso nem dizer que o lançamento de Riddler esta agora ainda mais atrasado e que eu estou tentando agilizar Angstron2 pra evitar perder mais.

WillItStand? MyPassport

Welcome friends to our newest atraction: “Will it stand?”
For this first match, lets pit my external hard-drive “MyPassport“,from Western Digital against my passport (a brazillian pre-mercosul passport):

The contenders:

Their physical features:

MyPassport: Sleek, black case with a single light , a WD logo and a USB port. What else could you ask?
My passport: Green with golden details at the cover. Inside there is some old pictures of me and data. a Canadian Visa and nothing else.

Who’s got this round? MyPassport is sleek , thin and silent, but my passport is thinner , noiseless, lightless and doesnt even need the usb connection for data retrieval

Their habilities
MyPassport: fast startup and a nice amount of volatile cache grants a great performance. I can even play UT2004-linux from it without a single hit in the performance. I can carry 160GB of data with no sweat.

my passport: ~10 pages of small fairly good quality paper. I could probably visit ~7 countries without a ressuie. But theres nothing much else about it.

who’s got this round: MyPassport is certainly a winner here. It can even carry ultrahigh resolution scans of my passport inside it!

without it:
MyPassport: All my media, my important documents and my past projects are stored inside it. Without it, Im screwed. I need to get dozens of old unreliable backup DVDs and re-sort them. It would basicly throw me back to 2002.

my passport: Inside my country, no problem at all. Somewhere else, Im illegal.

this round:A draw. Either way, Im screwed.

The winner? A draw. Both are very important to me.

Next week:
Apple Macintosh vs Macintosh apples