Maniacle Plans for World Conquest

It all began with a smartphone...

Code Monkey: Jailbreak

Quiver before your Master!!
-Jack D.

Understanding the Enemy

Competitors are important and necessary to a free market capitalist system. I am not a capitalist; I am an Evil Overlord. In my line of work competitors simply distract me from my main task, taking over the world. There is an easy way to do this, dispose of them. Simple. Only they to will try to dispose of me, therefore I must engage in more cunning tactics. In the interest of showing the citizens of my soon to be Empire the truth about my competitors, I have had my minions compile a list of their pros and cons.

Title: Assassins Creed III
Genre: Storyline RPG
Likes: People who like to master gameplay, creating combination attacks for optimal kills and achievements. The game targets young men (as it seems most games do) through use of character class - Assassin; character skills - parkour and fighting; and Character setting - 'ancient' or 'rustic' cities, non-traditional (from an American point of view) cultures and values, and mercenary storyline.
Dislikes: Casual gamers who find the mastery of techniques tedious. Also the amount of cinematic material may discourage some players who are more interested in action than plot.
My Likes: I enjoy the gameplay, the engine they use allows for a wide variety of movement, though in this version of the game it seems to be somewhat 'sticky' at times. Its almost too easy to stay on platforms and climb walls making the gameplay less emersive as you must play around to get off of something. The world seems to be well built without many invisible barriers keeping you within the game world. The storyline is also interesting.
Dislikes: There is only so much cinematic material I can take before I will put the controller down and go eat ice cream. This game definitely surpassed that limit. If I hadn't been in class I would have made me a nice bowl of chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream with Magic Shell and sprinkles on top. It was that bad. As I noted above I think the earlier games boasted a better physics engine than this version. Those are really my main peeves with this game as the set up of the series has been very well done.
Interaction: The player has rather good control over the character. The character will walk or run, climb, jump, and attack all at the whim of the player. There is also an almost unlimited combination of these commands allowing for a wide variety of actions to be carried out. Along with these base actions other special occasion commands are available in certain situations.
Story:

Techniques of an OverLord

   True Overlords know they are not immortal (yet anyways) and make plans for their eventual demise.  The most important of these is the training up an apprentice to one day fill their shoes.  Therefore I have set forth a series of techniques which any apprentice of mine, present or future, must master.
   Success means you are indeed learned in the Overlord ways and in position to one day take my place, therefore I must dispose of you before you dispose of me.  Failure means, well... failure.  Overlords do not tolerate failure and all who fail must be disposed before they bring to ruin the total work of the Overlord.
   Have you the discipline to master the techniques of the Overlord?  the cunning to outwit him her if you fail?  The raw luck to take the thrown disposing of you master and teacher before you yourself are fed to the wolves?!  Then read on brave apprentice, you fame awaits!

Technique	Description	Example
Game Description	A short description of the game that states the player objectives, object states, challenges, and other necessary details.	You play the role of Code Monkey: A programming chimp who has been sent to work on the new space station. While there the AI takes over the ship and kidnaps your beloved Pretty Girl. While everyone else escapes you stay behind to rescue her. You must survive multiple levels, fighting off Wandering Managers, Zombie Code, and Sentient Computers. Health can be regained by eating Fritos and you can get an energy boost from cans of TaB and Mountain Dew. You will be able to stand, slide, walk, climb, kick, fall, die, jump, hang rom platforms, and shoot a variety of weapons. To win you must rescue the pretty girl, defeat the AI and then escape before running out of air.
State Diagram	A diagram showing the different states (standing, walking, dying, etc,)that an object has in one game and how the object transitions between them
Parenting	Parenting is where you define the attributes of one object and use it as a 'parent' for other objects so that they (the 'children') inheret the attributes of their parents. Extremely useful as it takes less time than individualing programing every object and as it keeps the code neat.
Bracketing	Brackets group information. They can contain lists, commands, strings, tables, other brackets, or mostly anything. In GameMaker bracketing is done using Start and End Blocks and is useful for ordering commands after a Test Variable.	image of brackets in GameMaker

Until I am no longer sleep deprived,
~Jack D.

World Conquest Through Geeks and Monkeys

   What better way to take over the world?  On one hand there are the Geeks who already secretly run the world using there ninja programming skills, and on the other are swarms of simple-minded Monkeys.  Better yet, why not combine them into a Nerdy Ninja Monkey.  I'll call him Code Monkey.

I can picture it now...

Code Monkey must rescue the Pretty Girl from the clutches of evil Manager Rob!  He will kick, spin, and punch his way to his fair maiden.  On the way he must collect Fritos, Tab, and Mountain Dew to keep up his strength while battling... I don't know what he will have to battle yet.  Maybe I'll send him to space to fight aliens.

No matter what Code Monkey does he thanks Jonathan Coulton for an amazing song that inspired his game world creation.

Until I have better trained Ninja Geek Monkeys,
Your soon to be dictator,
Jacqueline

A New Toy

Welcome, Welcome to my not so humble abode. There is surely but one reason you have come to see me. You have heard about my new toy. I am right? Then come, let me show you this marvelous creation of geek-kind. Behold Game Maker!

I finally got this downloaded on tuesday, didn't have a chance to play with it till today (still haven't really messed around with it). Yes, this is my fabulous new toy. It has difficult to restrain my excitement and actually get some schoolwork done. But everyone needs a break, right? So in my "downtime" I checked out a few videos about GameMaker. The one featured below talks about how to program a pacman game. I've already covered how to make sprites, and objects and whatnot, but I know that barely scratches the surface. So I thought, PacMan, simple enough. Well I was not right (the All Powerful ect.. Jack D. is never wrong, just occasionally not right). Obviously there is a lot more in even a simple game than you would expect. Yet it seems that these are still basic functions, ones I'm going to use over and over again as I work with this tool. As soon as I get a real chance to play with GameMaker you can bet I'll be right back watching this tutorial. So, if you too are looking to learn some basic aspects of GameMaker, or just in the mood to watch a random tutorial, enjoy:

Seems I still have a long way to go before I subdue the Nerds from their Parents Basements and take over the world.
Until then,

Jack D.

The Epic History of Jack D.

   This is the much better Gaming History of Me. 

   I most definitely fall into the category of casual gamer, if even that.  While my brother, father, and even mother, are rather into gaming of different sorts, I generally prefer hobbies and activities that don't involve looking at a screen.  That being said, I have and still do play the occasional video game. 

   Looking back most of my gaming experience (and, in consequence, my favorite games) has been on the PC.  I remember playing EverQuest sitting in my mother's lap and to this day have an illogical preference for it over other mmorpgs.  Actually I think my preference is due to its more classic fantasy aesthetic. 

   Around the age of seven my family bought a PS2, like any little girl (who so happens to play video games) the first game I played on it was the PowerPuff Girls:Chemical X-traction game.  That is when I discovered that I was not very good at video combat.  My console experience continued into Barbie:Explore and some obscure game where you had to build dams, none of which I had any skill in.  Meanwhile on the PC, I was introduced to the Oregon Trail, Veggie Tales: Mystery Island, and strategy games such as Mother of All Battles and Minesweep.

Mother of All Battles

   As a PC gamer I don't have the joy of reminicing over different consoles and controls, though I did use my brothers Gameboy until I eventually recieved my own Gameboy Advanced which in turn was upgraded to Nintendo DS.  Personal preference is in favor the Gameboy Advanced due to the fact that I can play it with one hand whereas the wider layout of the DS requires two hands.

While I didn't anticpate the newest console coming out, I did have the joy of picking from a far deeper array of genres and games than any (single) console can boast.  I've played games as simple (and casual) as Don't Shoot the Puppy, as classic as NetHack (and no, not the "3D" Version), and as Intense as...well I really don't play intense games. 

Im the type of person who enjoy's a wide variety of games (I have been tempted to try both Half-life and Portal just round out my meager repitour).  Trying to decide what kinds of people like the same sorts of games as I do is difficult.  Definitely not hard-core gamers, I don't have the patience to master or even surive the sorts of games they play. 

 

  I think there are two types of people who play the same sorts of games I do: those who fall along the lines of fantasy geeks and those with a programmers mindset.  I say fantasy geeks because I myself have a deep affection for the genre which shows in my mmorpg choices as well as my enjoyment of NetHack and text based rpgs.  On the other hand, my dad is a programmer and I was raised with that mindset.  I enjoy problem solving and strategy games such a Sim City 2000 and Escape the Room games. 

 

  While I may not be an intense gamer with a long and deep history of conquered games, I do have a well rounded experience and indeed enjoy casually gaming my free time away.

 

Until Further Plans to Conquer the World are Agreed Upon,Jacqueline 

Hello World

In true programmer's style I'll start with a simple Hello World, or in other words, a short, sweet introduction.

As my true name is unutterable in the mortal tongue, you may refer to me as the All Powerful, Legend...(wait for it), Champion of Everything, Omniscient, ...Dary, Jack D. (if that is too much for your mere mortal mind to manage you may call me simply Jacqueline).  I have come, in my All Powerful wisdom, to seek out and conquer the far reaching lands of Video Games and Programming Magic.  From there I shall bring together all the Nerds from their Parents Basements and form them into an unbeatable army of programming sorcerers!  (For little did you know that in this age of Technology it is the very geeks you once scorned, the Nerds from their Parents Basements, who secretly run the world using their ninja programming skills).  These Programming Ninjas will do my bidding, hailing me as the Indisputable, All Powerful, Legend...(wait for it), Champion of Everything, Omniscient, ...Dary, Jack D. allowing me to easily take over the world and subdue all man-kind! Muhahahaha!

Of course you didn't hear any of that, did you?

So to sum up, I, Jacqueline, (in my All Powerful wisdom) am taking a video game design course and will be posting all sorts of awesome stuff over the next three odd months.  I would advise you stay tuned.

Until Further Plans to Conquer the World are Agreed Upon,
Jacqueline