Hey, Mr. DJ...

It looks like E3 exhibitors are making a desparate attempt to single-handedly keep DJs employed in LA this week. NOS has DJs at each of their tents outside of E3... Bethesda has DJ Michael Basic right now... and the For Fiesta Social Club had DJ Shy today... there's more, but that's all I can think of at the moment...

No complaints, mind you, but now I REALLY want to break out DJ Hero 2...

More on 3D Gaming on the NGP...

So, I recently wrote an article on Game Vortex on Sony's patent on interactive occlusion based on head tracking and what effect this is likely to have on the NGP, but going into the minute details seemed a bit much for the average reader. So, if you missed that story, check it out first. If you want more information, continue on below.

How It Works...

The problem with typical stereoptic 3D imaging methods is that they are heavily reliant on binocular vision... and, for that matter, even position and alignment of one's eyes. If you tilt your head off of dead center ever so slightly, the effect suffers. Furthermore, the 3D images you see in these entertainment media are tied to a camera that is not directly tied to the viewer, so even though the 3D view has a sweet spot from which an observer should view it, the 3D image will be the same regardless of the position from which you view it. This can allow for the appropriate unique views for the left and right eye, but doesn't allow for interactive occlusion, the effect of changing your viewpoint a bit and seeing one object getting partially or completely hidden by a closer object. This occlusion is a natural part of how people determine the relative depth of objects.

Given a single viewer, however, there are ways to reproduce this interactive occlusion in an interactive entertainment product, such as a game. By capturing positional information about where the viewer is looking from, the in-game camera can be tied to the viewer's actual viewing position. Then, when you look left, right up or down, the image shifts so that you're peering around a close object to see an object that's further away. The result is that things can appear to be deep inside of a "box" whose glass top is the screen of the NGP.

The first time I saw this effect, it was done using a Wii-mote as a camera positioned on top of a monitor, pointing toward the viewer and a pair of glasses with two L.E.D.s, one mounted on either side, to provide positional information. This creates a very convincing effect, but required that the user wear glasses or a headband of something similar with mounted lights to provide tracking information. By replacing these position tracking elements with facial tracking, the system only requires the built-in camera; no external hardware is required. I would expect to see this used in several Sony first party titles, and, most likely, made into part of a developer toolkit library, to make it an easy-to-drop-in feature available to developers creating games and applications for the NGP.

Citations:

• Sony Patent: Method and Apparatus for Adjusting a View of a Scene Being Displayed According to Tracked Head Motion on Google Patents


• Head Tracking for Desktop VR Displays using the WiiRemote on YouTube (Effect Shown With Wii-mote) - by Johnny Chung Lee, Carnegie Mellon University

LittleBigPlanet: To Infinity and Beyond...

So, I just got done writing my review of LittleBigPlanet 2.

It is truly an amazing game...

LBP2 allows you to tweak gameplay enough that you can now make levels of a variety of types of genres. Want to make a side-scroller? Go ahead. An old school Space Invaders type game? It's not only possible, but part of one of the levels in "Cosmos" (in the main storyline) actually features this game mechanic at one point. You can ride on things, manipulate gravity, make set pieces invisible, make your own music... and make it interactive... all without having to know anything about programming.

The Community is coming out with some cool things. I am impressed with some of the things I'm seeing and hope to make some levels, myself, and do an article on the experience at some point in the future.

LittleBigPlanet 2 could really be a "game changer" (pardon the pun). How can a "tweaker" be satisfied with a typical tweaker game when a precedent has been made for a game that lets you make your own whole games with in-game editing tools without downloading anything extra... and all on a console? I won't be surprised to see the next wave of game designers referencing LittleBigPlanet 2 in some future interviews, when asked where they got their start.

There's a lot of creative power in LBP 2, and it's made as accessible as one could possibly hope. The game also allows you to use DLC from LittleBigPlanet. And, to top it all off, it includes Sackboy's Prehistoric Moves on the disc. All these, combined with the fact that I can't see anything wrong with the game at all... and the fact that LBP2 is a major improvement over LittleBigPlanet, which, itself, received a 100% has lead me to award LittleBigPlanet 2 an unprecedented 101%. I don't know if my editor will let that stay, or if it will get 'normalized' down to 100%, but, just in case, I wanted to state, for the record, that LittleBigPlanet 2 is nothing less than stellar and should be a must-buy for anyone with an Internet connection and a PS3 who thinks they might be interested in making games.

R2-GV is on the way...

Some of you may have noticed that we have an astromech on staff... R2-G5 (or R2-GV... the name may have been lost in translation...) Well, until now, he was actually a program running on some present day hardware, waiting until we rediscovered the needed technology to produce an appropriate body for him.

I'm happy to say that last night my COM-8B frame came in and, an hour or two later, I had a full-sized frame ready for me to build R2-G5's body around. I have included pictures here some pictures of the frame itself, as well as one with the dome and radar eye propped in place to give a better idea of what it will look like when it all comes together...

Modding Gratuitous Space Battles

I am a gamer, a tinkerer and a programmer. This led me to dabble in game development (I started my own game development company, but that hasn't gone anywhere... where does the time go?) and to try my hand at modding videogames. While some major videogame companies will create a game and then make editing tools available so players can make their own maps, scenarios or what-not, my favorite games to mod are often games by indie developers which don't have game editing tools, but do little to nothing to obscure their art assets and other interesting files. I enjoy spelunking through the files to find out what makes a game tick and then changing those files to customize the game.

I recently reviewed Gratuitous Space Battles: Collector's Edition, and enjoyed it quite a bit. In fact, I asked Psibabe to request it for me after seeing an banner ad for it and checking the game out. The idea of creating my own space ships and then pitting fleets of them against a rival fleet seemed like it would be fun, and the fact that you have to predetermine your tactics before the battle begins, by giving your units "Orders" only sweetened the deal, in my eyes. However, I was a little bit disappointed to find that I was only able to outfit my own ships from the included hulls; I couldn't design ships that looked like whatever I wanted.

This was quickly alleviated, however, when I poked around the files. I was quickly able to locate where backgrounds were kept, and just as quickly able to use Google to locate some amazing deep space photography I could use as backgrounds. I was able to find where the name randomizers were located and very quickly able to follow the format of the name choice list to make my own, adding in one for Star Wars names, Klingon Names, the elements, and US Battleships. The existing randomizers could be modified just as easily.

I also located the images for the ships. These came in three flavors: the ship itself, the ship with battle damage, and a burnt-out hull. A few minutes on Google and I had found a good top-down image of the Millennium Falcon. I cropped, rotated, cleaned up and scaled the image to match that of an existing Crusier (the Rebels' Minotaur) and created my own damaged and burnt-out hull versions. I then replaced the files for one of the ships with my own versions (and moved the original copies into a different folder structure for safe keeping) and voila! The Minotaur hull now looked uncannily like a Corellian freighter that any scruffy-lookin' nerf herder might own.

This was all well and good, but this ship simply putted around the battlefield. I expected a bit more speed from the Falcon, so I copied and edited one of the Cruiser engines. I started with the top notch engine and from there, added a zero to the end of the speed value, bumping it up a level of magnitude. I saved that with a new name (I christened it the "Infinity Drive") and loaded the game up to give it a test. It was there, it looked just like the engine I'd copied it from (I didn't change the icon), and... it was locked. Nice. The game keeps track of what you've gotten access to and if anything new shows up, it's locked until you buy it with "Honor" (a "currency" gained by winning battles decidedly). This wasn't a problem, as I had already cloned and modified a level, upping my budget but not modifying the enemy forces, resulting in a major victory and enough spending cash to finish unlocking whatever I had left to unlock at the time. So, after buying my engine, I swap it into my Millennium Falcon and give it a spin. It's faster. (Duh - about 10 times faster) But, somehow... it's still not quite got the "oomph" I wanted. No problem; I exit the game, add another zero at the end, save my engine and return for another shot. This time, the Falcons (betcha can't deploy just one) are out-pacing the fighters. I gave a few of them orders to "Keep Moving" and let them loose on a much larger opposing force and watched gleefully as everything that shot at them missed woefully. My fleet of Falcons were pretty much spinning like tops, but they were making swiss cheese (you know, the kind with holes) out of the enemy.

That's where I stopped. For now. I had finished my review, and as a game reviewer, I rarely get to revisit even my old favorites. However, I think I might look into creating an expansion pack for Gratuitous Space Battles... or, perhaps, an editor of some sort. It would be a nice game dev-ish programming project. Oh, and, no... don't expect to see me come out with a Star Wars expansion pack... I believe in licenses. What you roll up and mod for your own enjoyment is one thing, but selling - or even giving away - someone else's intellectual property is just wrong. I am sure that (if they decided to) Lucas Arts could make a much better Star Wars expansion pack for Gratuitous Space Battles than I could.

At any rate, it was really interesting to see how dynamically coded Gratuitous Space Battles is. Getting a level to show up in the level list is a matter of making a level configuration file and putting it in the correct folder. Adding a random name generator is as simple as duplicating the format with your own list and saving it in the right place - the name that shows in the game is the filename of the random name file. Simplicity itself. The backgrounds are easy to simply drop in. The ships images are easy to add, and, once in place, some animations (such as the particle effects on the damaged ships and the parts of the broken hull rotating aimlessly - and separately) are simply taken care of behind the scenes. The engine I made showing up to be bought is another example... this game has a lot of automation in putting gaming assets in to play. This makes it really easy to mod - for the player community or, for that matter, for the developers.

For the joy of playing and ease of modding Gratuitous Space Battles, I say "Kudos" to Positech Games!

A Collector's Dilemma...

I like TRON. I really, really like TRON. I loved the original movie, with its interesting visuals and its pioneering use of computer graphics. I like its original marketing ploy of releasing a videogame (arcade) and a movie simultaneously. I also enjoyed the game itself. I even played "TRON Discs" for "real" with friends back in high school, in a game I made up that involves a tennis court and Frisbee...

And, anyone who knows me knows that I'm a bit of a collector, as well. I was started early, with Hot Wheels, stamps and rocks. I then went on to collect comic books (primarily Spider-Man), up until the point in history where Marvel and DC had what I like to call "The Clone Wars" and the public was "blessed" with more versions of Spider-Man and Superman than, well, anyone wanted.

For all of these reasons and more, I was quite excited to review PDP's TRON Collector's Edition Wireless Controller when it came in for review. I had seen these controllers at E3 2010 and was anxiously awaiting a review unit. What I hadn't realized, at the time, was that these controllers are limited to 20,000 units per console... and that they bear a metal plate on the back which shows their number. This makes it that much more collectible. And, as collectors know, everything that's collectible is more valuable if it's unopened... and I have to review it.

I only paused for a brief moment, mind you, but I had to stare at the box for a bit before I opened it, considering the value that I would be instantly diminishing. It was, however, only after I opened it that I found out that it is actually numbered. Which is an interesting (and unfortunate) thing... if you actually want to add this to a collection, you can either have it in unopened condition... OR you can know what number you have.

My TRON Collector's Edition Wireless Controller is numbered 00111 of 20000... which I was especially tickled over, since 00111 could also be a valid binary number and it is TRON, after all. Which led me to an interesting realization: There are only 31 such units out there (well, possibly 32, if they zero-index the collection and stop at 19999).... which is pretty cool, in my opinion.

And to anyone out there who plans to pick one of these up purely as a still-in-the-box collector's item... I put mine through the paces to review it, so I just made yours slightly more valuable. You're welcome. Mine will probably come to rest in the GameVorplex display cases... lit-up, if I can manage it.