Unreal Development Kit

The Unreal Development Kit (UDK) can be downloaded and used to make games using the Unreal Engine 3. However, there is a licensing fee if you release the games for profit which is supposed to be affordable even for independent developers.

November 5, 2009 - "Epic Games, Inc. announces the launch of the Unreal Development Kit (UDK), a free edition of Unreal Engine 3 that provides community access to the award-winning toolset like never before. This software release is available to anyone interested in using 3D game engine technology, including game developers, students, hobbyists, researchers, creators of 3D visualizations and simulations, and digital filmmakers. Anyone can start working with the industry-leading Unreal Engine 3 toolset by downloading UDK at www.udk.com, where detailed product features, technical documentation, commercial licensing terms, support resources and more are also available.

An unprecedented milestone in game development, the release of UDK awards free access to the same world-class tools and technology used by many of the world’s best video game developers and publishers. Unreal Engine 3 is a constantly evolving game engine, and UDK contains all the most recently added features and technological enhancements, including many that have yet to be seen in an Unreal Engine game. Furthermore, Epic Games will release ongoing, upgraded builds of UDK for free.

There is no charge for noncommercial or educational use of UDK. Over 100 academic campuses currently use Unreal Technology as part of teaching game development-related courses, and colleges with plans to incorporate UDK into their curricula include the University of Pennsylvania, North Carolina State University, The Art Institute system of schools, Drexel University, Westwood College, DeVry University and Atlantic College, with many others to be announced.

Individuals and companies wishing to develop software for commercial purposes should refer to licensing terms at www.udk.com/licensing. Commercial terms have been structured to make it easy for independent developers, start-up firms and seasoned professionals to use UDK with minimal financial barrier from concept to deployment. UDK is currently for PC use only, although console support is under consideration. Developers approved to make games for Xbox 360® and PLAYSTATION®3 may inquire for more information by emailing udklicensing@epicgames.com."

[Source: udk.com]

They even have a 74 page PDF document on how they created a simple game called Whizzle (vertical scrolling puzzle game) using only the UDK.

[Event] 'Doing Business in Singapore' @ Tampines Regional Library

Going indie means you will need to probably consider setting up a company.

Well, I have no idea. Hopefully I will know more after November 7. *sigh* It's a Saturday.

"

'Doing Business in Singapore' at Tampines Regional Library on 7 November 2009
		12 October 2009 Thinking of starting a business? Planning to be an entrepreneur? Here is an opportunity to know more about being your own boss at an upcoming talk of the popular ACRA@Heartlands series. Jointly organised by the Accounting and Corporate Regulatory Authority (ACRA) and National Library Board (NLB), the talk on ‘Doing Business in Singapore’ will provide you with information and useful tips on starting a business. To register, please log on to http://golibrary.nlb.gov.sg/Event.aspx?EventID=30320 Date : Saturday, 7 November 2009 Time : 1.30pm to 4.30pm Venue : Auditorium, Tampines Regional Library Jointly organised by ACRA and NLB

" - [Source: acra.gov.sg]

Registration is absolutely free.

Review: Battleships Forever

Battleships Forever is a game in development by 22 year old Singaporean poly grad and indie game developer, Sean "th15" Chan. It was a IGF 2008 Finalist where it received a "Design Innovation Award".

"I like games that have depth and strategy to them and as such I try to make intelligent games. As far as possible, my design philosophy is to keep the player engaged all the time and to have a good reason for everything that exists in the game. Every gimmick, every unit, every mechanic is there to encourage a particular play style. When I make games, I think about specific scenarios that I think would be exciting." - Sean

During an interview by GameDev.net, Sean mentions that he initially started making custom maps for Warcraft 3 and then progressed to using Game Maker.

Battleships Forever is a 2D real-time strategy (although it is more tactical, with no resource gathering or diplomacy) where you control multiple spaceships and fight other spaceships. The main feature of it is that each spaceship is built from multiple modules like: turrets with fixed firing arcs, deflector shields, linking structure, etc and each can be individually destroyed. Thus, positioning is very important and you will have to decide between facing your offensive modules or protective modules towards the enemy.

There are currently 17 pre-designed spaceships that you can control and over 50 enemy designs, each with their own weakness and strength. Also, you can create your own custom designs. [Download: wyrdysm.com]





Sean has said that Battleships Forever is inspired by and loosely based on Warning Forever by Hikoza.T.Ohkubo, where the each round had only one boss which evolved based on how you killed it the previous round. [Download: cnet.com]






If you like the concept where spaceships are modularized, then you may wish to also check out another indie game, Captain Forever (US$15) which puts you in control of a single ship that you need to upgrade in battle using part from destroyed enemy spaceships.

Games Convention Asia

Last week end, the Games Convention Asia was held here in sunny Singapore at Suntec.

While no where as big as E3, the main Leipzig Games Convention or the Tokyo Game Show, it still attracted 102,500 attendees.

I am not the kind of person who takes photos, so here are a few from Kotaku's write up of it:

[Pictures: Kotaku.com]

Review: Red Bull Soap Racer

A while back I got demoralized when I saw how Papervision3D slowed down when building complex scenes. After taking a look at this racing game, I realized that's any slowness I noticed previously in other games is due to unoptimized/inefficient use of Papervision3D.

The game is a cartoon-ish kart racer where you can fully customize your kart and then race with other friends online. Even race tracks can be customized too. While the game concept is not new, this may be the first time that it has been done using flash.

Our friends at Less Rain have set once again the benchmark for 3D games in Flash, using the powerful combination of Papervision3D and Box2D. Check out their blog for more info.

[Source: papervision3d.org]

FYI, they used Box2D for physics as Papervision3D does not include physics.


Another thing worth mentioning is that it is brought to us by Red Bull. This is what I call a good advertisement (and something that I will "watch" repeatedly).

Tool: PasteBin (collaborative debugging tool)

Every wanted to share a short snippet of code online with others and still preserve the native language formatting?

I have. I been annoyed with how all the nice coloring, indentation and italics got lost when I copied a piece of code from my editor to a web "rich text box".

A friend of mine shared a small function using PasteBin a while back; and now I can't imagine sharing code any other way.

When you paste a snippet of code, you select the language you want to format it in and there is a wide selection to chose from including AS3, etc.

It then generates a link for you that you can send to your friends, e.g. http://flash.pastebin.com/mc95f230.

You can post anonymously or log in so all your posts are linked. Also, anyone can add their changes as a comment.

Pretty pictures

When making a game, it is always nice to have inspiration to draw on.

One of my interests has always been space ships; and one good site that frequently have new concept art is Concept Ships.

Here's a few to show you what you can find there:

[Artist: Andrew Lee]


[Artist: Mike Doscher]


[Artist: Alfredo Dosztal]