Category: blog

It’s no secret that I’m a huge fan of anything game or game-like. I’m especially fanatical about independent (indie) games. They are games that are usually developed by a very small team (often just one person) and that are self published. These games are generally more experimental and innovative than commercial ones — this is because they cater to a smaller niche and can afford to try something new. So without further ado, here’s some of my favourite indie games of the past couple of years. I’m sure I’ve missed some, but it’s a start.

Samorost 2. A classic point&click adventure set in a strange, organic, beautiful world. Also check out the developer’s latest game: Machinarium.

Captain Forever. A combinatorial design abstract space shooter.

Iji: A classic platformer+rpg developed by one guy over a number of years. Amazing stuff!

Windosill: A short puzzle game with beautiful and imaginative objects.

Facade: You arrive at your friends’ place while they are arguing. Interesting concept and execution.

Passage: A short, poignant statement about life, with a retro aesthetic.

Knytt Stories: An adventure game with an excellent minimalist aesthetic.

Gravity Bone: Very amusing spy game. Definitely worth a play, will only take a few minutes of your time.

Eufloria: This game is in my list because of its minimal aesthetic. Used to be called Dyson, a reference to Freeman Dyson’s idea of what life might be out in the asteroid belt.

Today I Die: I read that someone described this game as visual poetry, and I guess I agree. Melancholic.

Dwarf Fortress, Linley’s Dungeon Crawl: Some more excellent games, but definitely for the more hardcore RPG/hack fans.

Hotel: A story of several people visiting a hotel. Very surreal.

Psychosomnium: This stands out for me amongst all of Cactus’s games. A crazy mess of code and programmer art. Poses some questions about our expectation of games.

I’ve provided links for some of the games, the others should be easy to find by googling. For more games, try TIGdb, or check out last years winners of the IGF.

I’ve been busy since I got back from Europe: diving back into my research, attending semi-permanent, and doing some life drawing every week.

My research is going well, heavily refactoring my code so I can implement some much needed algorithms. Hopefully I’ll have some results up here soon — it’s been a while since I’ve had to make any pretty pictures. I’ll be presenting some of my work at ACAL ’09 in Melbourne in December and I’d really like to have something new to show … but we’ll see.

Semi-Permanent is a graphics/illustration/3d conference, which was held (for the first time?) in Melbourne. It was awesome seeing illustrators/artists like Tara McPherson and Jeff Soto talking about the genesis of their careers and showing the evolution of their work. It’s quite inspiring to see that just be doing what you love you can “end up” happy and successful. But, I guess this applies only to a only a few talented individuals. Alex Yaeger, from Industrial Light and Magic, was also very interesting, showing us his work on various movies such as Transformers and Star Trek.

Steph and I have been attending a life-drawing session in St Kilda every week. It’s quite interesting and I love setting aside the time just to do some drawing. I just use those black ArtLine pens, there’s something quite satisfying about a black line on paper. :) Below is one of my favourite drawings so far.

An animation I created was recently shown as part of a CEMA exhibition called bi0t0pe (previously blogged about here). It had been playing down at Cube37 in the Frankston cultural arts district for the last month or so. The different works were cycled daily, and my animationwas shown for the last time today. I’m sorry for not notifying anyone of the specific dates it was on — I didn’t have access to that info, and I’m also across the other side of the world.

Anyway, here’s a photo (courtesy of Jon McCormack) of the exhibition site with my animation playing on the wall.

I’m in Budapest, the birthplace of John von Neumann. I found a statue at Budapest Technical University!

From eurotrip 1b

I’m off to Europe in 3 days! You can follow my adventures here.

I will be summarising the Dagstuhl workshop here hopefully shortly after it finishes. Besides that this blog will be quiet for the next 2 months.

If you’re interested in the methods I used to make the starfish animation, I have recently published a technical report describing the system: A Developmental System for Organic Form Synthesis. Enjoy! Or not!

…but do all echinoderms have only five arms? Here is a video that is work in progress for an upcoming CEMA exhibition. The exhibition will be running from mid July through August at Cube37 in the Frankston Arts centre. The exhibition presents several computer-generated animations or interactive works over the exhibition period, including work from Jon McCormack, Alan Dorin, Gordon Monro, Ollie Bown, Troy Innocent, Mark Guglielmetti, Alice Eldridge, Taras Kowaliw and myself. It is my understanding that the works will be shown in the evening and through the night, with the exception of Ollie Bown’s sound installation which will be running during the day. The works are loosely based around the concept of “ecosystems”, though mine is obviously based on “organism” rather than systems of organisms.

To my friends and family, this might explain my behaviour at social events.

In other news, I fly to Frankfurt next Friday!