[Minecraft] Master Hardcore Mode
Today, we introduce you to a new gamemode-in-a-box for Minecraft: Master Hardcore Mode.
Master Hardcore mode adds three additional game rules:
- It’s always nighttime (after the first bit of day)
- You don’t get food from animals
- You can’t craft normal chests
You can download the schematic for MCEdit here and the world in the video above with the box preset here.
Be sure to tune in every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for new episodes.
[Teaser] PaddleSpace Unlimited & Demo Download
PaddleSpace is Mikeware’s Magnum Opus, which unfortunately has been laying dormant for too many years… Originally created in 2007 it evolved to a point beyond its creator’s control. That is planning to change in 2014.
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Space Battle Arena Materials
You may have seen our ‘Ships in Space‘ videos before. We’re happy to finally release the materials for Space Battle Arena v0.9.
Space Battle Arena is a ‘Programming Game‘ where students must write code (in Java) to control a space ship to accomplish specified tasks. We have performed this project and its challenge two years running now with great success. Students have been enthusiastic, excited, and engaged with learning to control a ship in a physical environment and comparing strategies against their fellow students in a fun competition.
[Let’s Play] Gamius Type IV
Check out the Let’s Play video of Gamius Type IV we found:
We want to thank SnoodLounge for making their great Let’s Play video of our game!
Space Battle 2: Bauble Hunt SCV
You may remember our video from last year Ships in Space. We continued our foray in space this year and upped the ante.
Once again students were tasked with creating their own autonomous space ships which could navigate the harsh physics of space on their own without their programmer’s interaction. However, unlike last year where they simply had to collect Baubles to score points, this year, they had to bring the Baubles back to their home base before points would be scored.
We also had the opportunity to add weapons and shields to the mix, which created a whole other set of strategies as destroyed ships would drop their Bauble payload.
Above is a video of a final round of one of the classes which came down to a matter of seconds. It was quite exciting!
Battle Box: Online!
The original intent for Battle Box was to be a cloud based game you could play against other people (at random). That dream is now a reality.
You can play Battle Box Online here!
I have a bit of clean-up for mobile browser fitting and hooking up the two versions so you can switch between them on the title screen, but other than that, it’s done! Enjoy!
Note: Due to restrictions on the Parse framework, Battle Box online won’t work in IE, try playing in FireFox, Chrome, or Safari. Thanks!
Mikeware Enters ‘Battle Box’ into Ludum Dare #26
For those of you who may not know, Ludum Dare is a 48 Hour game making competition. A game must be made from start-to-finish in the 48 hour period. Entries are then played and voted on by the other participants in the three weeks following.
Originally, I wasn’t going to enter, but had a brainstorm for a simple game yesterday morning. That turned into the ‘Battle Box’.
You can see my Ludum Dare posts and entry here.
You can play Battle Box here.
There’s still some more work on it to come, but the two-player hot-seat version was ready to go, so seemed like a good announcement.
Update 4/30: Online version is now live.
‘Pellet-Man’ in GridWorld Materials
As mentioned previously, we recreated a classic arcade game in the Advanced Placement Computer Science case study GridWorld.
GridWorld involves programming ‘Actors’ within a grid system. This was a natural fit for ‘Pellet-Man’ and is a good exercise for students to work on something exciting and challenging while reinforcing their new knowledge of inheritance and practice using the system found on their AP exam.
[Release] Gamius Type IV (v2) ships on OUYA
Mikeware is happy to announce that “Gamius Type IV” will launch exclusively on the OUYA as it ships this coming weekend. The ONLYOUYA game will be available, in full, for free during the launch period.
Gamius Type IV is a unique, retro styled, truly one button/one switch shmup (no analog sticks here). It is primarily meant as a multiplayer game and includes both co-op and asymmetric play. Players must navigate their ship using only the single button to avoid terrain and enemies as they try accumulate the highest score. Those of you familiar with Mikeware previously, may remember the Gamius Type IV prototype (available in our old project section). The game has been significantly revamped with bug fixes and added features for the OUYA.
If you’re unfamiliar with the term or genre of ‘Shmup’, then checkout Gamasutra’s or Racketboy’s great articles on their history and evolution.
Gamius Type IV was developed in C# using XNA and ported to OUYA using the Xamarin tools and MonoGame. Want to thank ‘slygamer’ from the MonoGame team for his quick replies and assistance in using the framework on Android.
‘Pellet-Man’ in GridWorld
GridWorld is the Advanced Placement Computer Science case study acting as a project culminating the knowledge students learn over the course of a school year before taking the AP exam.
In this year’s class, we’re providing a ‘Pellet-Man’ framework to aid student’s learning about inheritance in computer science. If you are an educator and this is of interest to you in your class, please contact us for more information.
questions at mikeware dot com
