Jul022010

How not to use Twitter
to promote your business

Just an FYI, for all the businesses out there that are now trying to get on the “social media” bandwagon: spamming people on to your follow list is going to get you blocked. At least by me.

I got followed by some car repair place this morning. Obviously a new account, they had one tweet and were following 800 people. What value are you going to bring to me again? Oh, that’s right, none. At least send a mention saying something about your services… it might make me think that you care enough to at least spend 5 seconds thinking about each person you want to have follow you.

No comments · Written by Nathan at 7:52 am · Tags ,

Apr092010

Developing: iPhone vs. Nintendo DSi

Reggie Fils-Aime sez that the iPhone platform isn’t a serious competitor to Nintendo’s handhelds. As far as depth of games goes, I’d be inclined to agree with him. Nintendo does have 20 years of handheld console experience, and even the most basic Game Boy game usually has a lot more depth than the average iPhone OS title.

However, I think there’s a reason why gaming has exploded on iPhone: it allows casual game makers to easily develop and publish games on a handheld pseudo-console. Nintendo has DSiWare, which is a digital content distribution system similar to the App Store, but the speed bumps to publishing on each platform are remarkably different.

To develop for the DSi, you have to fill out an application which states why your company has the experience necessary to develop DS titles (a side note: your company has to have actual offices… can’t be a home office). Once you get approved, you can purchase your DS development kit (no idea how much it costs, but probably a substantial amount). Then you can actually make your game. After that, you have to get your game approved to be distributed as DSiWare.

To develop for iPhone OS, all you need is a Macintosh computer and an iPhone/iPod Touch/iPad. All the programming tools are free. To test your game on your actual hardware and distribute via the App Store, you pay $100/year to be an official developer.

The difference is astounding. I will probably never make a game on a Nintendo platform (although I’d love to some day), but publishing for iPhone OS is easily within my reach. All I’m saying, Nintendo, is that you might want to take a page from Apple’s playbook here.

No comments · Written by Nathan at 8:33 am · Tags , , ,

Jan062010

Nonogram Madness is effectively done

Seems like the last two projects I’ve done have had kind of lackluster ends. I’ve been sitting on this “mostly complete” project for a while, and while I’m still unsatisfied about certain areas (i.e. there’s no music), if I don’t push it out the door pretty soon it’ll just sit and stagnate. So, here we go: Nonogram Madness.

(If anyone cares, let me know what you think in the comments. The puzzles kinda progress in difficulty, but they haven’t been balanced at all, and some of them are pretty bad. There, you’ve been warned.)

3 comments · Written by Nathan at 8:13 pm · Tags , ,

Oct292009

Nonogram Madness title screen

Nonogram Madness

The “in progress” title screen of Nonogram Madness. Yeah, I decided on a name.

1 comment · Written by Nathan at 2:04 pm · Tags ,

Sep282009

Game Makin’: nonograms?

Nonogram game screenshot #1

Makin’ another game! It’s a nonogram game, inspired by Mario’s Picross (read more details about the whole genre at Game Set Watch).

Admittedly, nonograms aren’t for everyone. I enjoy them, however, because they’re simple logic puzzles that have a visual component… they’re more interesting to me than the straight-up numbers of sudoku. When I explained the concept to Chandra, she seemed interested! It’s my goal to make something that she’ll play through =]

1 comment · Written by Nathan at 9:19 am · Tags , , ,

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