jdodson | Cheerful Ghost

New Site Design Live

As you can now see, the new site design is now live! I have been at it for the last few weeks working on getting things just so and I am happy with the results.

I am going to look for a replacement color for the notification menu purple in the upper right for when you have outstanding notifications. There may be a few other things I fix over the next few days as well.

I hope you like the new design and let me know what you think of it!

AdamPFarnsworth wrote on 11/25/2012 at 10:52pm

Looks great on my Samsung Galaxy!

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 11/25/2012 at 10:57pm

Great. I tested it a lot on Mobile! Well the iPhone I do t have an Android.

Travis Admin wrote on 11/26/2012 at 03:56am

Dig it. With the design conforming to screen size, I have HUUUUGE youtube videos, but that's kinda cool.

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 11/26/2012 at 04:14am

Yep they take up the maximum width they can :D

If It is distracting I can dial it down some.

BR Supporter wrote on 11/26/2012 at 04:36am

Mobile version works great. I love the new design. I'm using a galaxy s2 by the way.

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 11/26/2012 at 05:12am

Awesome, good to know thanks!

Jacob_Richardson wrote on 11/27/2012 at 03:35am

I love it as well. As I am using a laptop I don't normally use when browsing the site I can't determine if this is a new change or if this is this particular computers fault. I will confirm when I go home in a few days.

The issue is that the box you type in is incredibly small I can't read what i'm writing or what it looks like. Very hard to scroll as well.

Keep up the awesome work on the site though.

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 11/27/2012 at 03:48am

The comment box was quite small. I just increased it to a good height for mobile and desktop just now :D

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 11/27/2012 at 03:50am

I also make the Ghost in the header a bit larger as well as a few other tweaks here and there.

Jacob_Richardson wrote on 11/27/2012 at 08:53am

It's perfect thanks for fixing it.

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 11/27/2012 at 03:44pm

No problem.

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StarCrafts Episode 15: Attention Seeker

The hits keep rolling from the guys over at CarbotAnimations. If you dig what they are making, they are now selling TSHIRTS and also have a video showcasing how an episode evolves over time.

TShirts:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cs3AUOITKn0&list=SP0QrZvg7QIgpoLdNFnEePRrU-YJfr9Be7&index=14&feature=plcp

StarCrafts Speed Animation 1:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lt9_P8jalig&feature=youtube_gdata

Anúna Choir Perform Diablo 3 Soundtrack

"In July 2012 at Dublin's National Concert Hall, Anúna performed two pieces, "Black Soulstone" and "Incantation" written by US composer Russell Brower from the soundtrack Diablo III. Soloists are Lucy Champion, Miriam Blennerhassett, Rory Musgrave and Michael McGlynn."

This is a very good performance version of Russel Browder's great soundtrack. The Diablo 3 Soundtrack tops my list of great video game soundtracks to come out over the last few years and this choir sings these songs well.

It takes a bit to get started so skip ahead 35 seconds if you so desire.

One Seriously Under Appreciated King pt. 1

Since I have some time this holiday I decided to do a few Let's Play videos to share with you all. One game that tops my list of sweet Super Nintendo Games I feel needs WAY more attention than it does is King Arthurs World. King Arthurs World is a lemmings clone that takes the formula and creates a great war strategy game for the console. The game is so well done I am somewhat surprised this war game formula wasn't copied and recycled.

I make my way through 7 of the training missions and get back into the groove. The fun and creativity of this game shines through and I had a blast playing it. I will continue to do Let's Plays of this game and will do each one of only one stage from here on. If memory serves I went as far as the Goblin levels so hopefully, with enough Let's Plays I will beat the game :D

Did you ever play King Arthurs World and if so what did you think of it? If you haven't tried it, I recommend giving it a shot!

Let's Play: Steam Big Picture Mode

With all the Steam on Linux news Valve is pushing pretty hard into to break into your living room. I know most of us have heard of the new Steam Big Picture Mode but we might not have all seen it in action. Recently it showed up on my Mac Steam client so I took a few minutes to make a video showing off what it looks like.

Overall, Steam Big Picture Mode is beautifully usable. Its so well designed for a first effort it really showcases the huge difference between Valve and the traditional console makers: Nintendo, Microsoft and Sony. Sony just pushed a pretty large update to the Sony Online Marketplace and its better, but doesn't come close to the first version of Steam's Big Picture Mode.

What do you think of Steam Big Picture Mode? Does this seem like something you might find pretty easy to use or do you prefer the current console offerings?

Regardless, Steam's Big Picture Mode doesn't throw as many ads at your as XBox Live. Something I find pretty interesting considering you have to pay for XBox Live and have advertising thrown at you so prominently.

Even Cheaper Games

Just wanted to let yall know about a few great deals happening in video games this Thanksgiving holiday and the blackest Friday of the year. If you have anything to add, post it in the comments and ill keep this post updated with the goods as I find new ones.

Starcraft 2 digital is marked down to $20 on battle.net: http://us.blizzard.com/store/details.xml?id=1100001122

Diablo 3 digital is $40 marked down from $60: http://us.blizzard.com/store/details.xml?id=1100002016

Inflatable Personality Cores over at Think Geek. Not really on sale, but pretty awesome at $20. http://www.thinkgeek.com/product/f128/

The Steam Autumn Sale is in effect. Check back every so often for new flash deals. http://store.steampowered.com/

Gamestop has some PS3 games marked down to $20 for Black Friday: Max Payne 3, Doom 3 BFG Edition, Fallout New Vegas & Batman Arkham City. http://www.theblackfriday.com/ads/gamestop/gamestop-black-friday-ad8.shtml

GoG has a 5-games-for-$10 deal going on. Check it out: http://www.gog.com/pick_5_pay_10

Those are the most interesting bits I found. What are you guys getting?

Updated: @jaelte commented about the GoG sale.

Portal 2 PC Gets Splitscreen in Big Picture

Recently an update to Portal 2 included these updates:

Big Picture Support
- Added 2 controller splitscreen support for Standard Co-Op. Press X on the second controller inside the first Co-op menu to activate it.
- Fixed controller's ‘quick ping’ button causing the player’s movement to stop.
- Fixed not being able to exit Robot Enrichment or Create Test Chambers menus with the controller.

This is awesome news for people wanting to run Steam in the living room as adding the same console features to the PC version helps this. Recently Big Picture mode came to my Steam and my first thoughts of it were good. Over the next few days I plan on doing a bender of Lets Plays, showcasing the new Steam Big Picture mode is on my list!

http://store.steampowered.com/news/9423/

New Episode of Game Shop: "Pokemon is for Babies"

The episode sort of ups the writing ante and the results are good. I am one of those gamers that doesn't ingest every shooter that comes out so I think there is some truth to certain kinds of gamer stereotypes.

Plus its fun to laugh at game culture.

Developer Bits. Why Free to Play?

Recently I read a Google+ post from one of the Triple Town developers on why they didn't just make the game 99 cents on the App Store. He seems to think that buying games for a fixed price is a bad model and goes into detail on why. Ultimately because he doesn't see many indies survive in this way.

"Imagine free-to-play games as practiced by a private company that makes games with long term retention for passionate players in a tightly knit community. That fits my personal goals substantially better. So I'm experimenting. I'm learning. Spry Fox may not figure it all out this time, but at least we are driving in the right direction.

So why you don't see Triple Town being slapped with 99 cent price tag and being sold like any other disposable wannabe hit? Been there. Done that. This time around, I'd much rather work towards having a lot fewer customers that see my games as a lifetime hobby. So I can continue to make great games for them for the rest of my life."

What do you think?

https://plus.google.com/105363132599081141035/posts/Lce7wEJApEr

Double Fine Amnesia Fortnight

A new Humble Thingy was dropped today in "Double Fine Amnesia Fortnight." Clipped from the site:

"Tim Schafer is revealing Double Fine’s never-before-seen game jam process!
Contribute and vote for your favorite game ideas to be prototyped (week 1).

Then, Double Fine will create prototypes of the top four ideas and live stream the process (weeks 2-3).

Contributors get to download the finished prototypes for Windows (Steam keys too!) Plus, you get two protoypes from past jams right away."

Sounds like a cool way to contribute to the next steps of Double Fine's internal demo process. If you want to vote on any of the games they could prototype, head over donate and vote!

http://www.humblebundle.com/double-fine

jdodson1

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