Dev Links: Nothing To Hide

Confessions, lessons, feedback, and more on today’s extremely share-y version of Dev Links.

Stuck in a world of legacy code (Cliffski’s Blog)
“I use the odd bit of code that has char* in it. There I’ve said it. It feels like a big confession. I bet some programmers just sprayed their coffee everywhere. I’m sorry. They say the first step is admitting that you have a problem.”

Indie Tools: Game Blocks (IndieGames.com)
“Built with BYOB by Sheldon Pacotti, Game Blocks was developed as a teaching aid for a course on narrative design and writing for video games. It has thus been designed with a focus on ease of use, but also as a tool to inspire confidence in up and starting game designers. Game Blocks, you see, is both simple to play with and excellently documented, while allowing “novice game designers to experiment with storytelling, animation, physics, interaction and standard game types like adventure games, platformers, and arcade shooters”.”

Lessons from Europe (#AltDevBlogADay)
“Often posts from a personal perspective are a contrite, self-promotion exercise of polishing the trumpets. They can also be an honest expression sometimes lost in the NDA red tape culture. It is important to know why you do things, what drives and motivates you, bringing happiness and a sense of satisfaction. Though most importantly to admit when you made a gigantic cock-up and own up to being an idiot.”

Driftmoon Beta – The Fortress of Loom! (Instant Kingdom)
“I am proud to present the first official Driftmoon beta version, the Fortress of Loom! Download it right here. This is now the first version that contains the full story, from its humble beginning to the fiery end, which is certainly the best part of the whole game.”

NS2 balance and feedback process (Unknown Worlds)
“We believe one of the most important things for us to do is take feedback from players constantly. This feedback decides which features, fixes, and balance changes should go into the next version of the game we release.”

2012 the year of Loren (Winter Wolves)
“As usual I’m doing the end of the year blog post, in which I talk how it was the year that is about to end for me. Looking back at the post I wrote in 2011, lots of things went better.”

The Video Game Kickstarter Report – Week of December 28 (Zeboyd Games)
“It was a slow week as you might imagine given the holidays however there was one kickstarter that really stood out.”

Mew-Genics Teaser week 10 (Team Meat)
“Are you ready to win your 1st kitty tiara? Do you think you have what it takes to take home the boon county crown? how rare is your cat?”