Anybody who started tinkering with GNU/Linux just for fun in their teens should initiate smug mode immediately, unless like myself your smug mode is stuck in the on position.
One of the practical consequences of using proprietary software is that your right to use that software can be revoked at any time. Recent conflict between Ebay/Skype and the founders of Skype is an illustration of this. Ebay themselves, and millions of Skype users who rely on Skype for their day to day communications with family, business associates, and friends, have put themselves at risk by choosing proprietary software and protocols. Another illustration of this was the music software Logic Pro which alienated its Microsoft Windows user base when Apple bought the product in July 2002, and discontinued the Windows version. Quite apart from events like that, companies often close down, get bought out, go bankrupt, or discontinue a former line of software. This is as true for modern "cloud based" companies like Google as it has always been for companies like Apple and Microsoft. When you invest your time and energy in proprietary software, and software with closed formats, you are disempowering yourself. Free and Open Source Software is, practically speaking, a much safer bet.
"You understand and agree that Apple may, in its sole discretion, [...] reject Your Application for distribution for any reason, even if Your Application meets the Documentation and Program Requirements".
-- Apple developer documentation
"The certificate does not need to be signed by a certificate authority: it is perfectly allowable, and typical, for Android applications to use self-signed certificates. The certificate is used only to establish trust relationships between applications, not for wholesale control over whether an application can be installed."
-- Android developer documentation
I was having a really dull time trying to port my GameJam0509 entry to anything other than the development platform, Debian GNU/Linux. I managed to get it running under Mac OSX 10.5, but Windows was giving me a really hard time, so I've done is what any self-respecting internet slacker would do and made a game trailer instead. This is all ingame footage (sorry about the low framerate but the game is heartily unoptimised).
The Infinite 8-Bit Platformer concept is an idea I had ages ago, and the basic game design is this:
So basically I was hoping that if enough people used the game enough we'd end up with a massive, social, network connected platformer which you could explore for hours and hours, always finding new and interesting things, places, and people. Maybe I'll finish it one day, we'll see. In the meantime, all there is is this trailer and blog post. :)
Anyway, one things that GameJam0509 taught me is that the old way of making games kind of bites, and the web based entries kicked butt. From now on I think I'm going to try and do game development in the open, on the web.
I've been doing a lot of really boring, but neccessary work on the documentation for jsGameSoup, the Free Software library/framework I've been writing so that I can make web based games without using Flash. So here it is (click on the image below). Enjoy!
