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Patch: Incognito Episodes 1.96 Changelog

Thursday, January 07, 2010
*. Added new sounds from Prowler to ships exploding that sound very distance and filled with bass.

*. Replaced default explosion sound.

*. Replaced end map ExodusFinal with FMV cut-scene

*. Rearranged the way Credits are drawn on-screen moving the class functionality to Quests.dll, this allows for more customization with further episodes.

*. Removed Credits button from main menu, honestly who would really click on that? You see the credits at the end of each episode.

*. Fixed a bug in RTS game when you clicked "Menu" button and press Escape to close it would open another menu on top of the existing one.

*. Added built in bug reporting screen that can be launched from main menu in place of old credits button, also can be launched from in-game menu while playing.

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Patch: Incognito Episodes 1.95 Changelog

Friday, December 25, 2009
*. Added a new music track by Ben Serwa! Thanks Ben!

*. Added ability for automatic updating of game and view changelog information from game main menu. There is a new icon on the desktop when an update is available "Mail" despite it's name only looks like a email program.

*. Added minigames from FPS section to main menu desktop to give users whom are downloading a patch something to do if they choose to do so. Most patches in the future will be smaller in size (under 10mb) and released more frequently.

*. Removed old method that would reposition mouse cursor when loading interface files, this has since been deprecated with a much nicer system.

*. Television in main menu now is Episode Guide fully realized. Depending on what Episode of Incognito the user has installed. User is presented with list of buttons with text of Episode name and registration status for each one. Example: Episode 1 - [Ready] (registered version, installed), Episode 2 - [Not Found] (not installed), or if installed unregistered demo Episode 2 - [Demo Ready].

*. Using the Episode Guide will automatically close the game and load up the other episode for you.

*. Game automatically checks for latest patch on startup if there is an available internet connection. HEIDI tells the user if there is a patch available by announcing they have new mail when going to desktop computer in main menu.

*. Mini games now available on the main menu desktop computer, they are played on the monitor on the left as opposed to the monitor on the right to allow the user to play games and mess with other parts of the menu while possibly downloading a patch. Games are same from FPS: Menial Task, TicTacToe, and Total Recall memory game!

*. Added a clock to the main menu desktop. Just cause' what kinda desktop doesn't have a clock? It blinks too! :)

*. Main menu music will no longer play when entering multiplayer games.

*. All patches will now be named "Incognito_Patch.exe" rather than having an incremental number afterwards, this will save space as the same one will be constantly overwritten.

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Patch: Incognito Episodes 1.94 Changelog

Sunday, December 20, 2009
*. PirateRobots health has been increased slightly to make things a little harder when invading the Kri Ruresh Moonbase. Some of the robots also walk faster or slower depending on what type of weapon they are using.

*. When approaching invisible walls the player is given a warning from HEIDI herself to turn the other direction before they actually are physically prevented by the master herself from continuing along in the wrong direction when in your tank or in FPS maps.

*. There was a bug if you died whatever weapon you currently had equipped would have it's ammo removed when loading up a saved game.

*. Players now have god mode enabled during cut scenes to prevent deaths that can happen by 'accident' for example a dust bunny chases you and a cut scene triggers you are unable to defend yourself and will no longer loose any health or resources during cut scenes.

*. Closing the main menu would cause mouse relative mode to activate, the player would still ha`wve mouse cursor open after closing menu and moving directionally or view with mouse would correct this but the false positive trigger has been fixed.

*. There was a old item from pre-beta and alpha testing "Dynamite" inside one of the crates on Platform 42 storage room. These have not been removed from the game but only from this map.

*. Saving your game has been disabled while on Warrlei tank assault map. This would cause many problems when loading a saved game from this locations including but not limited to complete game crashes. The reason you cannot save on certain maps is because state information in the map or the geometry in the map itself may be changed at random during game play.

*. Improved AI and navigation of enemies on maps. Before enemies relied on basic line-of-site A* path-finding that was a hybrid of the grid based path finding system we use on height maps and RTS games. This has been upgraded with a new system for FPS games that tells enemies where they can and cannot go and also includes basic detection of enemies getting stuck on corners and snapping them to the nearest way point if this indeed happens.

*. Several maps have been modified and have had way point navigation systems integrated into them to allow for the use of the updated AI and way-point enemies that can better handle indoor FPS environments. Kri Ruresh Moonbase and Platform 42 are prime examples of where this greatly helps improve game play.

*. Non playable characters won't display the "Press Use" blinking text if they are on the opposite faction of you, or if their set conversational table is null or empty.

*. Fixed a bug that would crash the game if ships that fly around in galaxy mode would attempt to find the closest way-point while also looking for new way-points could cause a index out of bounds error. This has been resolved.

*. TPS planet finder buddy now highlights and draws lines to desired planetoids and space stations in green to separate it from the white highlights that indicate you have been to a specific world.

*. Increased the draw distance in Sector 42 Hyperspace to accommodate all visible galaxies.

*. When other ships are destroyed in TPS space flight mode they will not leave behind any trace "fire" particles and the sound of things burning since this made absolutely no sense!

*. Fixed a bug where players total kills during the course of the game would be reset to 0 when entering new game types.

*. Decreased the volume of footstep sounds by half their normal volume.

*. Added commander status and element browser screens to Kri Ruresh and Platform42 FPS maps.

*. Added another track for RTS maps by Ben Serwa. Thanks Ben!

*. Removed the ability to look at multiplayer player stats in single player.

*. Added ram to the front of all hover tanks so that if you smash into enemies they will be instantly incapacitated but will not negate the effects if the enemy explodes.

*. Removed inventory items from computer consoles in first virtual reality map that had video terminals in front of them. It displays the "Press Use" text and can be mis-leading while watching the videos.

*. Added some more props in the engine room to make it look more technical, also on all exodus interior maps the crates that existed in the outro map don't exist in the other versions so they have been added for consistency.

*. Fixed a bug that had every planet scanner give notes about a planet saying it was currently experiencing "extreme boredom" even though this was not the case and it was not correctly being reported. This has been fixed.

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Valve/Steam Rejection Letter

Wednesday, December 16, 2009
It started off pretty typical, you have a flyer/elevator pitch about your game and you send it to various publishers and distributors in a hopes to hear back from them if you may host our game on their platform. This is normal in the gaming industry and happens all the time... it's normal to wait for a couple weeks for your reply and you normally get a simple Yes! or a No! with a explanation as to why and you go about your business.

These conventions stop when you approach companies so monolithic from their own success that they can make a games distribution platform for their game and be the only game on it at launch and force you to use it if you want to play (*cough* Half Life 2). Don't get me wrong, Steam is a great service and I have grown to like it over the years and enjoy playing games with it so it was an obvious choice in the list of companies to try and get a hold of when we had Incognito Episode 1 ready to ship.

After waiting and trying to get ahold of the folks over at Valve software for OVER A YEAR, yeah I said it almost 13 months... sending my emails every 2 months and wondering if anyone there actually reads email until one day I sent this fateful message just for kicks to see if anyone really does work the inbox there:

--

Dear Jason,

I have sent you several emails over the past year and a half, but have not heard back from you yet. Is this the right email to contact Steam Publishing?
We have a game we have developed and would like to be able to publish/distribute it with Steam.

Could you please contact me to confirm your are the correct individual to direct this inquiry to?

Sincerely,


--

Then a day later we get a nice reply from not Jason:

--

Hi Ron -

Jason Holtman forwarded me your email regarding publishing on Steam. You can check our publishing FAQ here: http://www.steampowered.com/steamworks/FAQ.php

Anna


--

Oh my look at that a reply! Well the guy they list on their website (Jason Holtman) never replied to me but now I am talking to a nice lady named Anna it appears. OK, well I review the FAQ link they give that I already looked at (it's where Jason's email came from in the first place) and resubmitted the EXACT SAME information to her on Nov 19th 2009 and 19 days later....nothing...so maybe they are playing hard to get, I fire off another email:

--

Hello,

I submitted the information a little over a week ago to try and get our game on Steam following the required FAQ. It's been a little over a week not and no word back so I am just sending this along to see if there is anything I can do or did I miss something?

Hope to hear from you soon,


--

Another 8 days goes by and I hear nothing. It's snowing now, 8 days away from Christmas December 16th 2009 I get a reply from them! Oh wow! This might be it! Our game might get on steam! The excitement builds:

--

Hi Ron -

Thank you for submitting your game to Steam. Unfortunately, I don't think it's a good fit for our service. Please feel free to send me future titles for consideration.

Anna


--

Good fit? The heck is she talking about? I write up a quick reply since it might be 2010 before I hear back from them at the rate things have progressed so far.

--

Anna,

I am confused. How could it not be a good fit for your service? I am not sure what that means. It's a game, you sell games. I am left to assume you don't like it or it encroaches on something of your [Valves] personal interests.

I don't want to get into an argument if it's a good game or not but for all intensive purposes Steam is for selling games I don't see how I have come to the wrong place.

Hope to hear back from you,


--

This time I must have hit the nail on the head. Less than 35 minutes after my reply I amazingly get another one. Holly crap two emails from Valve in a single day special me...

--

Hi Ron -

Unfortunately, we don't comment on our decision making process.

Anna


--

So there you have it, our experience with trying to get on Steam. It has us all down here and it really sucks that we could not even get a simple "Hey, screw you and your game guy!" that would at least be resolving and I move onto the next company. I have never encountered this kind of lip service from a companies approval process before. (*cough* App Store)

This is unprofessional in my opinion and represents the current state of PC gaming and video games as a whole. In these times you have to know someone in the industry, have a ton of money or be backed by equally massive publishers and binding contracts.

It's simply not enough to make a game as they say... creating and programming your game means absolutely nothing if the people who sell them constantly look the other way until you say some secret pass phrase I am to this day unaware of.

[END OF LINE]

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Patch: Incognito Episode 1.93

Wednesday, December 09, 2009
-----------------
Incognito Episodes 1.93 Changelog
-----------------


*. Removed Words directory from Data folder and embedded these text files directly into the games executable to make access times faster and to clean up the games directory by not having text files laying around for no reason at all.

*. Added mini games in random locations around Episode 1. These are game pad looking devices that when picked up into your inventory when used will attach a full screen game you can play while in an FPS map. Games list include: Tic-Tac-Toe, Memory Game, and a card based guessing game.

*. Re-factored and optimized lots of the code in FPS and TPS game modes.

*. Removed music from network death match map Platform 42.

*. New music added from Mike Ryan a new version of the French Lullaby and a new single Silent Night that is put into the galaxy travel music mix. We have also uploaded these tracks to our YouTube account.

*. Fixed a minor bug in galaxy TPS maps that would cause the ships to all race to one edge of the map for no reason at all, normally this would happen when loading from a saved game and has been corrected.

*. Fixed another bug in some galaxy maps that had Dynamic Collision bounds on all four corners from a previous design scheme that these days causes you to stop promptly when hitting it. These have been removed and the universe is at ease once more ;)

*. At the request of players we have made all the ships in the Hoiga Alpha Star enemy ships that attempt to attack the player from every direction and they must defend themselves while they try to land on a specific planet there. This is after you get weapons on your ship, the request was to give players something more to destroy with their lasers ;)

*. Removed hard-coded F8 key from Simulation pause to by default "Pause" button but now can be configured correctly from Configurator key-binds setup.

*. Fixed a bug when updating keybinds file add/removing keys in the game via patches this can cause issues with previous versions when they start up and the keys it expects to find are non-existent. This was in response to some users who said they had to manually delete their "Keybinds.config" from the UserSettings\Config folder.

*. Updated EngineAppOptimizer to only show current file name it is processing and not the full directory path. It has also been updated to uninstall native images before recompiling and installing them. This doubles the work load but the un-installation process is very quick and even faster if there is nothing to uninstall.

*. Made the music on Kri Ruresh tank assault map (TPS) loop rather than just play once, this has also been corrected on several other maps where in the beginning and big genre changing maps we will loop the original scores we have selected for them.

*. Warrlei map has been redone into a tank assault map in which the player must clear a path for HEIDI so she may land on Platform 42 without hundreds of turrets firing at her like the map was designed in the first place. There have been many revisions to this map and this is the latest to try and improve this last stretch of the game.

*. Fixed some debugging console commands (cheats) that could cause the game to crash if users ran them on the main menu it would cause a crash. This was because there is no player to apply the settings to, this properly checks for existence of the player before trying to run something that can modify him!

*. Increased the size of the turrets to accommodate the new tank mission on Warrlei.

*. Made the robot warriors a little tougher to kill, and also faster moving. They will also begin firing from a much closer range.

*. Corrected a graphical error with energy based weapons in the game. Their hit particles had artifacts which have been removed and are now working the way they should at all times.

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