Refactoring
I've finally decided to try updating this thing again. I don't know if anyone even looks for updates here anymore, but what the heck.
Pet Projects
In an effort to do something with my idle time, I've been working on implementing a more complete version of one of Jamie's Crap-u-Hack mini-games from the 2006 Intern Game. Specifically, I'm trying to make a 'full' implementation of Fourtris (which feels a little silly since this just came out on XBLA).
Lately I've been noticing that I'm falling into the same trap I encountered in my last game development project; which is, I keep working on it at somewhat random intervals and never really keep track of a grand design in my head. As such, things seem to reach a critical mass where I can no longer stand to look at the code and feel too frustrated to work on it.
Thankfully, as of late I've come to enjoy this. I don't think that I've got things quite where I want them, but work as of late has been building up one or two little things I want, and then tearing down a lot of code that was just temporary crap to get things working. It's not perfect (since I'm terrified of deleting a lot of things and instead just comment it out; I really should get source control set up, but I'm very lazy), but I like to think I'm learning from the experience.
Anyhow, a screenshot of how things look right now can be found here. It still needs a lot of polish, but the core mechanics are there. I think at this point I just need to get a bunch of friends over so that I don't have to try and control two players with a controller in each hand. Maybe I should brew another batch of beer to help out with that...
Too Much to Do
Despite my best efforts, I seem to be very good at developing a huge pile of things to do and not actually getting around to any of them. On the one hand, I'm looking into buying a new camera (a DSLR), but I fear that it's far too big an investment when it'll probably collect dust like so many other things. The big motivating factor for wanting a camera upgrade is my plan to visit Lyle around New Years and wanting to get decent pictures of Japan.
Of course, I still have a handful of Germany pictures I haven't really sorted through. I've also really got to get off my rear and start working on my Japanese again; I haven't really looked at the language since Freshman year of college, though recently I've been listening to podcasts from JapanesePod101.com, which seem decent, all things considered. To really make them worthwhile though, I need to be spending more time than I've been looking through their kanji lessons.
I've got a handful of other pet projects to deal with plus a messy apartment. On the bright side, the latter situation is still way better than it ever was in college.
Pet Projects
In an effort to do something with my idle time, I've been working on implementing a more complete version of one of Jamie's Crap-u-Hack mini-games from the 2006 Intern Game. Specifically, I'm trying to make a 'full' implementation of Fourtris (which feels a little silly since this just came out on XBLA).
Lately I've been noticing that I'm falling into the same trap I encountered in my last game development project; which is, I keep working on it at somewhat random intervals and never really keep track of a grand design in my head. As such, things seem to reach a critical mass where I can no longer stand to look at the code and feel too frustrated to work on it.
Thankfully, as of late I've come to enjoy this. I don't think that I've got things quite where I want them, but work as of late has been building up one or two little things I want, and then tearing down a lot of code that was just temporary crap to get things working. It's not perfect (since I'm terrified of deleting a lot of things and instead just comment it out; I really should get source control set up, but I'm very lazy), but I like to think I'm learning from the experience.
Anyhow, a screenshot of how things look right now can be found here. It still needs a lot of polish, but the core mechanics are there. I think at this point I just need to get a bunch of friends over so that I don't have to try and control two players with a controller in each hand. Maybe I should brew another batch of beer to help out with that...
Too Much to Do
Despite my best efforts, I seem to be very good at developing a huge pile of things to do and not actually getting around to any of them. On the one hand, I'm looking into buying a new camera (a DSLR), but I fear that it's far too big an investment when it'll probably collect dust like so many other things. The big motivating factor for wanting a camera upgrade is my plan to visit Lyle around New Years and wanting to get decent pictures of Japan.
Of course, I still have a handful of Germany pictures I haven't really sorted through. I've also really got to get off my rear and start working on my Japanese again; I haven't really looked at the language since Freshman year of college, though recently I've been listening to podcasts from JapanesePod101.com, which seem decent, all things considered. To really make them worthwhile though, I need to be spending more time than I've been looking through their kanji lessons.
I've got a handful of other pet projects to deal with plus a messy apartment. On the bright side, the latter situation is still way better than it ever was in college.
posted by Shane at 10:14 PM
1 comments
