Coding Hello!

The past two weeks have gone by in a flash of coding. That's what game programmers do I guess. Code.

We set to build a playable build of Hoodo after Slush. People we met there were only interested to see the finished game and player feedback and stuff before they would discuss any funding. Now That is really helpful. Rule number one, please have a hit game that is making lotsa greenback, then you'll get funded. Right on!

We've had a few alphas for testers this year but the complaint has been the same, unless you actually get to play the game, it's hard to understand what it's all about. Mission: complete the game!

Under the hood, Hoodownr poses a few technically difficult problems. Unlike a mmorpg where you shard and instance groups of players, we don't shard and most certainly don't instance. Everybody who plays the game plays on the same global map. All 10 million of them. Or more. This is where things get a bit tricky.

I've been hacking away on the server side to make the magic happen. The existing code had to be completely rewritten and tested for all kinds of deadly situations that might arise. And on a game like ours, lot's of stuff will arise.

After a few weeks of hard work, everything looks pretty much the same as it did 2 months ago. Well there's the new player status and achievement screens but beside that, things look very alpha. Most discouraging but adding eye candy is the easiest thing.

There's a few bits and pieces still missing but it's close to playable now. We plan to have a few group tests with our friends who are getting new handsets for christmas and see how they feel about the Hoodownr experience.

Still an insane amount of stuff on the bucket list but things do get done one by one. Bugs fixed, issues resolved. Things are moving along.

Looks like the blog entry turned into a progress review and nothing interesting. Hmm. Maybe because it's about the work that goes into a game. Can get very tedious at times but that's how she goes.

One fun thing to write is: Parallella is almost ready. Take a look. They will be shipping boards in the next few days, can't wait to get mine!

Your boringly and uninspiringly and workingly

Sami
Hastur