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I think they are setting their price a bit high if they want to compete with some of the other indies. I do think that some of them do undercharge sometimes, but having the full price at thirty bucks?

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How about a game called Invasion of the *Binary* Blobs? :p

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Please do! it is a great add on making MC even more fun.

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We do currently use bukkit on our server, i will have a look into mcMMO.

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Question: Will you guys use the bukkit server and use mcMMO? It is a very nice :)

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And there I was hoping for an exclusive ;)
He also sent me the news and the full version to review (about an hour ago), but you beat me to it.
Guess I'll *might* publish in-depth review if you won't do it first :D

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This one looks like my kind of game. I like puzzle games like this.

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Thanks Edward, I hope you enjoy it!

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Thanks updated the post with the demo link :)

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A demo version for Linux is now available on http://www.monster-rpg.com!

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Yeah the left side will be populated:
"Re-create the current websites left and right side blocks (the ones I want anyway)."

:)

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Sadly, the webpage doesn't look well on my 1024x600 netbook screen... There's just too much empty space on the left side of the page (about one third of the screen is empty)... But beside that, it looks really great!

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I thought it was a bit low actually. I'd have paid at least $5 without batting an eye.

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You may want to check your links after posting bud! It was directing to the wiki page of Steel. :oops:

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Overhauled the Steel Storm Wikipedia article in response:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steel_Storm (*edited link Rustybolts)

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The game is on sale now for 99¢, and you can now pay with paypal. Just thought some of you might like to know :).

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Hi Brandon,

Possibly. The thing is they would have to be willing to work for free, since I can't afford to pay them. I don't know of any decent artists who are willing to work for free, to follow the art style that I want, and to turnaround art in a relatively quick time-frame.

Finding level designers who would be willing to work for free might be a more likely possibility, but I don't have a level editor they can use per se - they'd have to be willing to work with XML. Plus some of the elements in the level can be pretty fiddly to build.

A few years ago, I talked with Erik Hermansen from Caravel Games over e-mail, and we discussed some of pros and cons of working with a volunteer community. I had heard an interview with him in a podcast where he talked about this topic, and I wanted more information. He had a lot of good experience to share. Apparently, managing a volunteer community is a lot of work, and what he said made sense to me. Depending on the game, you might find lots of volunteers who would be willing to help. But it can take a lot of time to train people and help them learn what to do. And identifying people with genuine talent who can produce the quality of levels or art that you need can take time. Inevitably you're going to pick up well-meaning volunteers who love the game and want to help, but just can't produce anything of a decent quality - and then you have to deal with them as best you can without hurting their feelings when you ask for lots of revisions or have to outright reject their work. Plus, there are volunteers who can't churn things out in a timely manner, for whatever reason (work, school, family, outright laziness, etc). I would need to a full-time person just to manage such a community, and I can't afford such a person. At least not yet.

Thanks for the suggestion, though, Brandon. I appreciate your response.

Eventually, I'm hoping to be able to grow the business to the point where I can afford to hire people to help more. I can afford a little right now, but I have to manage that wisely. I've budgeted for a musician, and I subcontract out certain key art pieces to an artist I know in the Philippines (the same guy who did the bulk of the artwork for my Rick Rocket game). Also, I have a good core of volunteer testers made up not only of family and friends but also some customers who are very supportive of my games and some fellow indie developers that I work with (we all test each other's games and help each other out when we run into difficult technical issues). So I do team up with some people in certain capacities.

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Thanks added it in :D

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Well your game is very polished Troy, and it sticks to what it does well.

Just curious though, why not team up with others? I'm sure there are level designer and artists out there that would love to work on a published game?

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Well it took a bit longer than expected. But here liam, you can use this video if you'd like showing a few new things. I just tried to put a few of Rusty's new cave levels in.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=El4WQ5x9nEs

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At first I thought you were angry that people were playing games under WINE at all, but now I see you just don't want it considered on par with playing the game natively. I agree with that. WINE is impressive, but it's not the same as a native build.

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Well let me see if I can at least create a new youtube video for you, so there's something new to show. Stand by....

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I am not actually against your view entirely, as GOG is a wonderful service in many ways, and if the games are old enough to be on GOG they are not really commercially viable. I personally would still hesitate to buy for them at the moment though, but I do consider what you are doing to just be an acceptable compromise.

What I was many referring to is people who will spend their time buying Windows games developed in the last five to eight years and play them through Wine, and they turn around and say "it is all right, it works on Linux!". Majesty 2 would count as that, so I put that clearly in the "no" checkbox. But if you really want to play the original Baldurs Gate or Tomb Raider through Dosbox or Wine or whatever, I am not really that upset.

And sorry if my post was little spirited, I am just a little grumpy and irritated because it is May 8th and my pipes are still frozen meaning I do not have running water. :mad:

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Hah no problem :), besides the more people that know about your game the better.

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Well looks like only another couple months until the engine is in a more finished state and then i think they will be working on an actual game :)

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Ah well, in that case thank you!

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I thought the auto updater was newsworthy :)

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Err.., I'm honored you posted the game again! We don't want to spam about it though right?
It's your call of course though, your site :)

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@Hamish
Sure, I understand your view as I used to think the same.
I would never have bought a non Linux native game - but now my line is drawn elsewhere.
For me if it's cheap and old enough (gog.com) and runs on Wine - then I'll consider paying for it.
Because once the games get this old - the developers usually do not care so much about them.

Some people will only play free source games.

It's all a matter where you draw the line.

But my line still says "No Wine games on LGN" ;)

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Hey, well, I appreciated Majesty. It is not my most favourite game in the world but it can be fun, and it is Michael Simms favourite game FYI. Although I do not know how good the second game was, I would not mind trying it out, but would only be willing to do that if it has a native port. I do not "care" if it runs in Wine; for me the game does not exist unless it goes native.

I also disagree with your comment that porting games that work in Wine is necessarily a waste. Saying that something does not need to be ported because it works in Wine is giving the project too much legitimacy. Wine should be respected as a amazing technical feat, but it should not be treated as being equivalent to native applications. This is based on the fact we have to make the Linux ecosystem respected under its own merits, and the fact that I have only rarely had a game which ran flawlessly in Wine, and then when you are lucky enough to have one it gets screwed up in the next Wine release. Wine can never be trusted as providing official support for applications.

As for porting games that "do not run on Linux", if it has to be ran through Wine it does not run on Linux. It runs on virtual Windows, that is all Wine is. So Majesty 2 is just as much fair game as Gothic 3, 4 , Risen, and all of these other games I have never heard of. That is another thing, once I switched to Linux full time, I basically came to the conclusion that a game (well, at least any modern still commercially viable game) only really exists if it has a native port. If it does not, then it is not real. It is just some Windows fantasy.

Call it a bit of a twisted reasoning if you like, but it is that kind of stubroness that has gotten us this far, where you can game only on Linux and still play more games than you ever would want to. But until we are treated with respect, we must continue not to give them any. They must earn our respect, and our acceptance, by giving us the consideration of a port. And we in return, must be grateful. So I will be grateful to LGP for whatever they give us in the next few months (years?).

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