Tag: blog

Back To School

Hey Guys,
Steve here.
Well I found out something very interesting yesterday! Apparently, it’s actually possible to carry out a Skype conversation with a… cat!
I was in a Skype call with Danny, trying to record an episode of my Podcast. However, Danny had to take a break in the middle to eat dinner. While he was gone, his cat started meowing for no apparent reason, so I meowed back at her to see if she’d answer. Guess what? She did! And since I still had the recording configuration used for my podcast set up, I was able to record a little ten second clip of it.

Maybe, just maybe, she was meowing for a totally different reason, but I’m humorous. So I say she was chatting with me. And it’s not like she can deny that… or can she?
Anyways, besides chatting with cats, life has been pretty good over the last month, even though school started back up last week. Most of my classes this year aren’t bad, well not really, although some of them are a real pain to get to, which is why I got lost twice so far.
Besides getting lost, I’m already getting homework. In fact, that started the second freaking day I attended geometry! However, the teacher seems nice and helpful, so I don’t think there will be any trouble there.
In addition to the homework, I’ve been having some technological issues in a few of my classes, and am afraid I’ll have to leave one of them for that reason. I don’t know what it is with Microsoft Office products, but they just keep going down hill in terms of accessibility. Worse still, they are practically a necessity in college and the work force these days, so I’m not really sure what I’m going to do once I get to that stage of my life unless something can be done.
That said, Microsoft Office is practically the back bone of the class in which I’m struggling. So unless they manage to fix their accessibility issues, I’m not quite sure how I’m going to pass that class.
On a more positive note, development with S Quad Racing, sluggish as it is, is going quite well. I had to fix some annoying bugs this evening, bugs that of course didn’t pop up until I tried to record the audio demo (figures). But rather than make sure all current bugs are patched up, I’ll just go ahead and throw together a demo recording, because in the next couple days I want to code in surfaces, but before I make such a big change to game play I really think I should get a recording of the game in its current state. Besides, that demo is pretty much 2 months over due, so yeah.
That concludes the posting for tonight. Be sure to stop by and listen to podcast episode 38, which demonstrates RS Games, and is as usual packed with mine and Danny’s twisted sense of humor. Please, listen to it. It took us 3 attempts to record that thing!
Thanks for reading,
type you later,
Steve.

A Horrid Mess of Code

Hey Guys,
Steve here.
Some of you might be wondering what is with the strange title of this post. Perhaps, if I was to inform you that I had a hard time coming up with a way to write this post in common English, not to mention the many attempts to write this post that were deleted because they appeared way too technical and over the heads of the majority of my blog’s readers.
Anyways, I’ve decided to organize this one by level of complexity. That said, I have some news regarding the Steven D Podcast.
I recorded it last week, on Audio Quake as I previously said I wood. Unfortunately, I was unable to post it on Sunday because I was traveling to camp. However, I’ll try and get it posted at some point this week, so stay tuned.
Also, due to the above mentioned camp, there will be no podcast episodes next week or the week after. But when I do record another podcast, I think I’m going to start a series on the game Awesome Homer, found at Jim Kitchen’s website.
In other news, I have a little release for today’s blog post. Unlike the games I released over the last two months or so, this will not be of much use to anyone, except programmers of audio games in pure basic. However, since it is my blog and I know of a few said programmers, I’ll go ahead and release it here.
download this small set of includes that make some audio game tasks a bit easier
This includes a way to create audio game menus, as well as audio forms. Included are documentation, examples, and the Tolk library which enables screen reader output.
Moving on, though the change log doesn’t say it yet, I’ve made some significant changes to S Quad Racing. For now, I’ve deleted out all of the menus, and have begun replacing them with menus generated with my dynamic_menu class. This might seem like more of a waste of time than anything, but it helps me as the developer because it shortens my code and takes about 5 or 6 minutes out of the time it takes to code a full menu. That being said, I now have some awesome main-menu music, and cannot wait to show it to you in my next audio demo, which won’t be for a while since currently the “regular race” option doesn’t go where it’s supposed to go. Perhaps, though, I’ll be able to scrap something together next Wednesday.
More importantly, I’m slowly realizing a gear system for this game. And before I end up forgetting it, I’ll go ahead and explain my ideas here:
There will be a minimum and maximum speed for each gear, as is the normal. If one exceeds the maximum speed for the gear they are on, the car will explode after 10 to 15 seconds. Each time the driver shifts one gear up, their speed will stay the same as before. However, gearing down will not work unless the user slows to a speed that is less than the maximum speed of the gear they are switching to.
As for acceleration, and that good old gear switching affect we’re always used to hearing in most racing games, I have a complicated system for that, but I’ll not go into detail until I try it out since it hasn’t been proven to work. However, if this all goes well, I guess you’ll have something else to look forward to in the audio demo. And, I’ll be looking into getting that dreaded bug preventing multi-lap races. Stay in tuned to the s quad racing updates page.
Well, that about wraps up this post. I’ll blog you later.
Thanks for reading,
type you later,
Steve.

Another Small Release and a Few Updates

Hey guys,
Steve here.
I said I’d have a surprise for you all, and that was not an empty promise.
Over the last week, I’ve been sporadically coding on a little game, one which is similar to the classic Pong, but with quite a few twists. And not only did I create this game, but I included the source code, which is heavily commented, so that anyone interested could have a look at how games are actually coded in Pure Basic.
Similar to flamity flame, you are placed upon a side scrolling grid that is twenty squares wide. Your goal in this game, however, is to run after the ball and hit it to prevent it from hitting the ground.
To accomplish this task, you are given a paddle, which you will swing once you are beneath the ball and it is low enough to hit because, after all, you can only reach so far.
Since the ball can go just about anywhere when you hit it, it is impossible to develop much of a strategy. Plus, the game gets difficult, rather quickly. So quickly, in fact, that the likelihood of you lasting over two minutes is nearly zero.
Fortunately, though, there is help. Firstly, you don’t really have to worry about centering yourself exactly beneath the ball; you will hear a beep when you are centered. Secondly, there are platforms. If you are not near the ball when it is coming down, and it happens to be above a platform, it will bounce off of it rather than making the journey to the ground.
Initially, you start out with three platforms, spaced out evenly in intervals of five. However, as you play, additional platforms will spawn, though considering the level of difficulty in the game it’s likely you’ll only get one, if any, platform spawns before the end of the game.
While the fact that more platforms will spawn might enspire you to work your hardest, there is one thing to bear in mind about platforms–they are not the nutral, happy-to-help objects you might think of them to be. When the ball bounces off of a platform, it will rebound faster, and you must work a lot faster to get to, and hit the ball. This affect is called catapult, and only lasts 3 to 10 seconds after the ball bounces off of a platform. So while it is true that platforms can be a life saver, you might want to avoid letting the ball hit them as much as possible, otherwise you’re going to lose more than you gain.
Well, if you’re interested, you can Click here to download it.
Also, I have recorded an audio demonstration, which you can listen to below.

There are a few things I might change, such as how quickly the game gets hard, and the interval between platform spawns.
In other news, I haven’t worked much on S Quad racing, in fact I’ll confess I didn’t work on it at all this week. I was mainly focused on coding the game released in this post, which I named “Bouncy Ball” because I was too bored to name it anything else, to code something as complex as S Quad Racing. I probably won’t open it up tonight either, as I’m rather tired, but hopefully tomorroww I’ll get back to work. I think that before I implement dynamic weather, ambiance, and cheering into the creation of tracks, I’ll go ahead and see what I can do about implementing gears, as that is a task that I’ve put off for several weeks now but needs to be done.
Well, that’s about all I have to report. I’ll blog again later this week. As far as pod casting goes, I’m not quite sure. I want to do an episode tomorrow, but we all know me. So who actually knows–but hopefully tomorrow.
Thanks for reading,
type you later,
Steve.

A brief update on my past and future life

Hey guys,
Steve here.

I’ve already made it through over half the school week. I often wonder how such a stressful, strenuous-on-the-brain activity as school can go by so fast. But either way, as I lie hear, suffering from both the lazy bug and a severe case of “I don’t feel like doing anything idis,” I really don’t care about how quick school was today; the fact that I get to chill right now is what matters.
The last two days, I’ve continued to hold myself accountable for that goal I set on Stranded. I have yet to work on it tonight though. Also, speaking of projects and the like, I have a national history day project that I have to do by the 13th of next month. “and I present to you… the world’s worst procrastinator, *drum roll*… Steven D!” That being said because I haven’t started on it. Also to proove that I’m a procrastinator, I have 10 service hours for NJHS due by December 11, and only have 1 down.
Although I dread doing the history project as much as I dread the math STAAR test, I still have to do it anyway because it’s “mandatory” for all pre-AP students in my school district to do it.
Moving on, I had that NJHS thing I told you I would be attending this afternoon. I had to help two of my friends sweep, but it was fun because I knew a lot of people that stayed after school for that and got to talk to them. The only bad thing is that I didn’t get home until around 4:40. Also while on the subject of school (even though this isn’t necessarily about school itself), my sister and I won a poem/drawing contest for my dad’s work. In this contest, children of the people who work for his company would enter a drawing or poem or something like that into the contest to go on a fitness calender. Whoever won would receive a $50 visa gift card and a flash light. Both my sister and I won this contest, but I don’t have the poems we wrote to put on the blog. Sorry about that.
As far as future life goes, I can’t say anything concerning what will happen tomorrow, but hopefully the carpet upstairs will be put in on Friday. I’m ready for things to return to normal. On Saturday and Sunday, since I don’t have goal ball, I honestly have no clue what I will do. Next week will only bring two days of school; both expected to be very cold. We get out for Thanksgiving break Tuesday, with our first full day off Wednesday. The week after the break, I have an orchestra concert on December 3rd. My sister also has one the same time on the same day but at different schools, so we’ll have to work something out. If I am right, I think I have a choir concert the week after the orchestra concert, and my national history day project is due that same week. Also, Christmas break starts the next week (on December 20), and Christmas is the week after that. So, to make things short, I have something going on every week for the rest of 2013.
I guess that about sums up life, and this blog post for that matter.

Thanks for reading,
type you later,
Steve.

P.s. I’m still addicted to Hogwarts Live. Tell me, is it a problem that I have jumped up 11 levels since I posted the last update?

Beta Testing, Podcast Delays, and Life Updates

Hey guys,
Steve here.

It has been a good long week (weekend really) since I last blogged for you guys. I can’t say I haven’t had the time, because though I’ve been gone for a week now I have had plenty of time. First of all I have to tell you about the podcast.

Devin Gutierrez has been away from his computer. I don’t know what he’s been doing (he tried to call me last night but I was unavailable at the time), but has been offline all day today. So until further notice, there is no podcast.

As far as for what I’ve been beta testing, it’s a game developed and maintained by my friend Danny Standley, and is called Death Match. I have set up a website for the game (I can’t take all the credit because Danny helped), so here it is:
http://dmweb.usa.cc. By the way dm is short for Death match. Visit that site to learn more, listen to demos, discuss, and learn about Death Match. Note the story page is not up though.

—————-
My life, if you really want to know :).

Last week was a pretty good one. Monday of course went Okay… but I think September 30th’s post covered that. Tuesday was a pretty normal Day, along with Wednesday Thursday and Friday. Basicly to sum up the week days there was homework, games (I took a break from scm coding), podcast planning, The daily annoyance ritual of school, and stuff like that. (I chose the word annoyance because school annoys me).
The weekend was the most eventful part of my last week. On saturday, we had goalball practice (being me, my sister, and our parents). As you know by now, our practices are 4 or 5 hours long, so that’s how long it lasted. After that, we came outside to weather that proved the following statement:
“If you don’t like the weather in Texas, wait 5 minutes.”
When we went to goalball Saturday morning, it was humid and 80 degrees. I war basketball shorts and a t-shirt and it felt good out there. When we got out of goalball practice, the weather was cold so that when we went to the state fair (I’ll talk about that in a second), I wore jeans and a heavy sweater and it still felt pretty cold. If you’re wondering, the temperature at 8 or 9 (when we left for practice) was what I said it was (80 or so), and at 2:00 it was 54 degrees. Can you say “Texas is bipolar?”
Well, on to the state fair. We went around 4:30 or so, and I can honestly say I had a great time. My sister and I rode this really spinny ride where you lie on your stomach and the thing goes up and spins you around kinda fast and then you stop (it lasts about 3 minutes or so), and our family walked around and tried some pumpkin pie coffee sample, a fried cake ball (oh my gosh it was great), and a fried snicker bar (that was also very tasty as well).
Around 7:00 or so, we had to leave the fair because it started to rain on us. My mom was adamant upon spending all our coupons, so we did some fun house. In there, there was a thing where you walked across some rather slippery bords and tried not to let your feet fall in the wholes, a moving walkway, a walkway that moved back and forth, one that went up and down, one that vibrated, and even one that went side to side. Also there were punch bags to walk through, sudden noises, and a spinning tunnle that you had to go through. (It spun around and you had to walk forward and to the right to get out). After that was done, we had a nice old shower in the rain storm, and went to eat at On the Border.
Basicly, the funnest part of Saturday was getting to spend the whole day with the family.

Yesterday wasn’t as eventful. I just basicly hung out, (my parents’ friends came over to help us fix our AC which broke on Thursday and left the second floor of our house at 90 degrees in the afternoon that day).
Today has been full of Beta testing for Death Match (Danny finally put me on the team and everything and I’m feeling honored :)).

Well I guess that about wraps up today’s post. I’ll do the podcast when I can, and be watching the dm site for new releases.

Thanks for reading,
Type you later,
Steve.
P.S. It’s the 900th day of the blog! Keep viewing and I’ll keep posting!

A 3 day weekend looming ahead

Hey you guys,
Steve is back with a vengeance.

Below is another epic post of awesomeness written by the world’s best writer…
Yeah, as if.
Well let’s get on with it.
My week was a pretty good one; not a lot of stress; not much in the way of homework. It was mainly filled with school, zombie smashin’, screechy violin practice, and rain.

Nothing huge has happened since the last post I made on Saturday. After posting that, my week went relatively normal. If you’re wondering if anything bad happened to me on Friday the 13, I can’t say it did. The only thing bad about Friday the 13 is the inevitable realization that no matter what you do, what you say, whether or not you manage to make your way out of Earth’s atmosphere and send it careening backwards a few days (I don’t think that’s possible but who cares), there will always be a Monday the 16th. Sure enough, that day has come and passed, along with Tuesday the 17, Wednesday the 18, and Thursday the 19. Alas, a good portion of Friday the 20th has also passed, and I can now look forward to a fantastic 3 day weekend. One during which I can look forward to at least 2 days of sleeping in, late nights filled with programming and Skyping friends, and just being chill.
Well anyway, since I got side tracked and decided to talk about the future, let’s do that thing I said about sending the earth back a few days, and recap on my week.

Sunday was a chill day. Unfortunately, although I skyped Devin, I didn’t do the podcast, so I’ll have to do both episodes tomorrow. But hey, at least they’re getting done, so I guess it really doesn’t matter much if you think about it.
On Monday, I of course went to school. That day, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday were almost identical in my routine. Going to school, knocking out homework if there was any to be done, and then programming and skyping or whatever. I have been doing far less programming than the passed two weeks, because I’m now at the stage of the scm where there are only 1 or 2 bugs here and there, and even then those bugs are few and far between. It took Devin 5 to 10 minutes of playing with the software to find one, and I fixed that. I also added the ability to add allies, computer controled players that can kill zombies and be killed as the player can.

Well I guess that about wraps up tonight’s post.

Thanks for reading,
type you later,
Steve.
P.S. We got 2 or 3 inches of rain from last night to this afternoon. Astounding, right?

My Last Week of Freedom

Hey you guys,
Steve here.
I’ve had a good last week of summer. I just pretty much got to hang out while my mom and sister did all the back to school shopping Monday and Wednesday, the 3 of us and my of&m (orientation and mobility) teacher went over my new school schedule, and me and my dad went on a bike ride yesterday and today. We completed the 9.23 mile ride in 35 minutes and 13 seconds yesterday, and 35 minutes and 1 seconds today. I don’t know about our average speed for yesterday, but it was 15.9 miles per hour today.
If you’re wondering what I’m going to do the next 2 days, I can’t tell you. Probably the same thing I’ve been doing… hanging out and messing around the computer.
Speaking of computer, I’ve done some awesome things to the site, and also found a new game to be addicted to. I’ll first start with the site change.
Instead of having a links widget on my side bar, I now have a “My Favorite Sites” page. If you go there, you will see my links organized into the following categories:
games
friends’ websites
audio and podcasts
other useful stuff
development tools
sites that caught my unseeing eye(misc).
Now I bet you’re wondering, “What game could he possible be addicted to now?”
I’ve got an answer to that. There’s this online; multiplayer game room with the following card and board games/features:

  • 1000 miles
  • Uno
  • dominoes
  • connect 4
  • La Scopa
  • Jass
  • chess
  • monopoly
  • Poker Texas Holdem
  • Bouillabaisse
  • Rummy
  • Battleship
  • Reversi
  • Yahtzee
  • The Little Exam
  • Farkle
  • six picks
  • black jack
  • spades
  • and, the ability to create free chat tables
  • pretty much fully customizable
  • you can chat any ware

I think you should check it out.
Well, I guess that’s about it for this post. See the bottom of it to see my school schedule.
Thanks for reading,
type you later,
Steve.
school schedule:
1. choir
2. math
3. pre-ap social studies
4. pre-ap English
5. Spanish–yep, the two language classes are right next to each other.
6. Orchestra–yep, I’ll have a lot of concerts this year…
7. Science–I have a good teacher (It’s better to have classes your big sister has been already).

your average blog update

Hello guys,
Steve here.

I am posting this update because:
1. I haven’t updated in a week and a day (I talked about what was going to happen with the podcast, but that doesn’t count, as it wasn’t a life update).
2. I’m bored.

My life hasn’t been bad the last week. There wasn’t much to say about it, but I guess I’ll tell you what I did those days:
Sunday of last week: nothing at all.
Monday: worked on my project, skyped friends, helped my mom bathe the dogs, and spin class as usual.
Tuesday: went swimming, and skyped friends.
Wednesday: pretty much the same as monday– working on my projects and skyping friends etc etc.
Thursday: I went on a bike ride with Dad, then did a whole lot of nothing.
Friday: Nothing much besides going to a pool party with my mom and dad and there friends, and skyping my friends.
Saturday: that was a lazy day–not much to it.
Today: I had to do some cleaning, learning more programming etc.

That about sums up my last several days. Now regarding what I said a second ago about the programming thing, that’s still going well. I am still in the dark about… non-technical people can just scroll down a bit…
arays, handles to functions and objects, along with http and internet functions.
Here we go non technical people, you can start reading again.
So yeah, as I said, learning the language has been going well. On another note, I should probably tell you about my near future plans. As we all know, I’m not a psychic, and don’t know what exactly will happen, but I’ll tell you what I do know:
Today, Tomorrow, and Tuesday and Wednesday, I honestly don’t know. Thursday, packing for broken bow(I’ll be going on vacation out there with my dad’s side of the family), and releasing the podcast episode 8. I don’t know, but there might be another person joining the cast (we’ll have to see).
Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, we’ll be at broken bow. I’ll have to blog monday when we are home, because I think we are coming home Sunday evening.
Basicly, I won’t have a lot of time to do anything, because monday we will be repacking and washing clothes, so we can go to Maine on tuesday. That will last another week, and we’ll come home on tuesday August 14, and spend the rest of summer getting ready for school and trying to fit in a few more fun things before the August 26 doomsday.

Well, I hope you enjoyed this little update, and I’ll hopefully post a sneak peek of my next podcast release when I get the arrangements and technical stuff that none of you guys have to mess with out of the way.

Thanks for reading,
type you later,
Steve.