Later Play This

Terry Apr 12, 2017 8 Comments

Gosh, it’s been busy here recently. Two weeks ago Ruari and I showed State Machine at the Leftfield Collection at EGX Rezzed. The week after that, I showed my other game, Constellation, at Now Play This, a festival of experimental game design here in London.

Both festivals and both games went down really well, but I am now extremely sleepy. I think in future I will try to avoid debuting two new games at two different festivals on consecutive weekends.

(photo taken by Ben Peter Catchpole)

So, what’s next for Constellation? Hopefully a release, and any day now!

Constellation is basically a game where you type in anything you can think of and the game tries to respond to you, so in theory I could work on it forever – but after seeing people play it last weekend, I feel like it works better as a game with a tangible size, one that lets you play with a set of elements that you get to know well rather than one that tries to let you explore infinity.

Coming soon!

Circuits and Secrets

Terry Feb 26, 2017 4 Comments

So! State Machine, then!

Ruari and I haven’t really said anything about State Machine since revealing it two weeks ago. Honestly, it’s hard to know where to start. We’ve been working on it for more than a year in secrecy – not talking about has sorta become a habit!

Anyway, I figure it’s best not to overthink it and just jump right in, so here’s some screenshots of a new system we’ve been working on recently – Electricity!

Electricity is cool because it ties a bunch of other systems in the game together. We’ll probably end up keeping it!

In the early part of the game it helps to illustrate how components interact (we used to use matching colours), and lets us make simple puzzles that introduce basic concepts.

In the later game, it turns into something more creatively expressive, as you (hopefully) start wiring things together yourself, and getting your robots to create circuits!

Oh, by the way, this week I’m at GDC! If you’re a journalist and you’re interested in checking the game out, get in touch! More than happy to demo the game for anyone interested while I’m in town!

State Machine

Terry Feb 6, 2017 9 Comments

Phew, ok, here goes! The EGX Rezzed Leftfield lineup is out, and I’m very proud to announce that my new game is part of it!

The game’s called State Machine, and I’ve been working on it for a little over a year with Ruari O’Sullivan. You might remember a few blog posts about it at the start of last year – State Machine started as a tiny jam game for Ludum Dare at the end of 2015, and then never stopped.

From here on out I plan to post about the game quite a lot! We don’t know exactly when the game’s going to be finished yet, but we are aiming to release it this year! If you like, you can keep track of our development here. Or come play the game at EGX Rezzed in London at the end of March!

alpha++

Terry Mar 9, 2016 13 Comments

I’ve been quiet lately, but only because I’ve had my head down working on this new thing! Ruari and I have now been working on this robot programming game for a little over two months – we had a round of testing a few weeks back that prompted a bunch of new ideas, and once we’ve worked through them we’re going to have another round.

I’m pretty excited! The game’s already feeling really solid, but we still have loads of new ideas we wanna try. Looks like this is gonna be a big one!

equip(hammer);

Terry Jan 17, 2016 6 Comments

Still working on this! Recently, it became a collaboration – Ruari O’Sullivan has been working with me to help turn this game from a hacky mess of ideas into something solid and playable.

The two of us are aiming to do a small alpha sometime in the next week. (If you’re interested in checking it out early and giving us some feedback, let me know!)

Screenshot Thursday

Terry Jan 7, 2016 10 Comments

Maybe I’ll actually finish this one

Terry Dec 31, 2015 8 Comments

Happy new year!

Here’s a little thing I started for Ludum Dare which turned into a bigger thing and… well, you’ve heard this before. It’s a survival game about programming robots to help you colonise a planet. (Er, maybe I need to start thinking smaller for Ludum Dare.)

Was hoping to get it finished this side of 2015, but that’s not going happen. Ah well – it’s looking like it should be ready early next year!

Saturation++

Terry Dec 21, 2015 2 Comments

This has been a weird year for finishing games for me – I’ve mostly spent it working on tools, a lot of them still unreleased. My weird distractable process usually works out – Super Hexagon and VVVVVV were both break games from bigger projects – but recently, it hasn’t gone so well.

Anyway, I’m still working on this thing I started for Ludum Dare. Thanks to Ruari O’Sullivan, I’ve got the elaborate tech side of what I want to do working. Should be done before the new year.

Ludum Dare #34

Terry Dec 13, 2015 6 Comments

So I guess I’m making something for Ludum Dare! Probably the Jam rather than the Compo at this point.

My plan is to make essentially a survival game with a twist. Haven’t gotten to the twist yet. Hope it works out!