I've added a little video of the Blurp engine in action here.

It's just an engine demo with graphics borrowed from an old game of mine - eventually it will be more colourful and varied, but you can get the idea hopefully.

Originally, it was designed to be a fairly manic shooter with plenty of action, but I had to have a rethink when I found I was running out of time in a frame to update and draw everything. That said, I still have the capacity to do quite a bit each frame, so I'm playing about with alternative designs now.

If anyone would like to get involved on the graphics side, and provide some proper main character animations and some nice colourful Mode 2 background tiles, here's the place to make a noise!

(I couldn't resist adding the video after seeing the new revamped wiki page with a screenshot and everything - thanks Samwise - but really, until I have 'proper' graphics, only a video can properly do it justice )

Rich,

Can you stick it on YouTube, then we can embed it in the wiki and save ppl having to download it?

Sam.

Actually, I guess this is the ideal opportunity to make use of my "retrosoftware" youtube account ... so please allow me to sort out the YouTube upload ...

(Edit: wow, my first post here for nearly 4 months! Thanks to Samwise et al for manning the ship!)

Ok, this is the "embed" code that YouTube supplied ...



Samwise: how can we embed it on the forum and within the Wiki?

FAQ# 1.7 Can I embed a flash-based video from one of the popular video sharing services, into a wiki page?



Can't embed it in the forum atm, tho ... do we really need that? I think it might be preferable to encourage ppl to post more permanent stuff like that, to the wiki.

Sam.

Now on the Blurp and the Home pages of the wiki.

Sam.

Aaaargh! The artefacts!! My eyes!!!!

just kidding.... but really, is that the best quality we can get out of YouTube, or can it be tweaked to preserve the quality / frame rate a little better? (I've never uploaded a video to it, so I really have no idea...)

I know this kind of video (discrete pieces of colour) doesn't tend to encode very well as MPEG-4, so maybe there's nothing we can do... but I'll leave the original video on the site too as I think it represents the demo a little better

Hehe was thinking the same myself. Really lovely scrolling through... Top job that man!

Oh yes, the raw video you posted is the one to view. Looks so, so good.

I've asked YouTube to crank it up to maximum.

Any better?

Sam.

Yeah, that's made a big difference - thanks! Though the frame rate still looks a bit ...pants. Still, great to have it up there.

My first YouTube video *pops open champagne*

Hmm ...

That's the best I can get out of YouTube. There are other video sharing sites we can embed into the wiki you could try (dailymotion, funnyordie, googlevideo, sevenload, revver).

We could also host a separate video gallery of our own, but the disadvantages of that are that we won't attract any attention through YouTube itself (you can search through the videos on the site) and also all the videos will need converting to FLV by hand. They might all have to go on the same page too (i.e. not embedded in each game's page), unless I spent some time and effort trying to integrate a custom FLV player into the wiki, which might or might not be possible.

Sam.

Never done anything to do with YouTube but can you append a bit onto the videos or put in a note to say that a better quality clip is available at blah blah blah?

We have done, Paras - the YouTube videos for Mountain Panic and Blurp both have downloadable versions on their individual pages under Retro WIP.

Well, I guess there's no note on the wiki front page where the YouTube vids are also shown ... I can add a link there. I'll do that now, before I forget.

Sam.

good stuff... sorry there's no YouTube access from where I am else I'd have checked before suggesting... I like the look of Blurp - classic 'cute 80s gaming' look/feel.

Paras,

You don't need YouTube access to download - under all the Mountain Panic / Blurp embedded videos on this site (not YouTube), there is a link to download a full AVI. There already was on the individual pages - but I've also added the link to the embedded videos on the front page too, earlier today. The YouTube embedded videos are just for convenience.

You're right about Blurp, tho - and you can see from the videos that Rich's line by line vertical scrolling technique is very impressive ...

Sam.

Cheers for your comments Also looking forward to seeing how the new Repton games are!

It would be nice to have a 2 second splash screen at the start of the video with a link to the website and the full video, but I don't think I have the right software to edit it onto the beginning myself.

Ah - sorry - I didn't make myself very clear. What I meant is on YouTube's site it would be great to say "go to http://www.retrosoftware.co.uk/blurp for more information and higher quality footage of this game which is currently in development", as part of the vid itself. Just a little step beyond the standard link to http://www.retrosoftware.co.uk that's part of the profile anyway... and additionally (don't know if YouTube lets you add commentary with each upload too) to have a link directly to the Blurp page here. This site is, of course, just fine!

Just seen Rich's comments - yes, that's exactly what I meant. No idea what is involved to do this or anything else to do with YouTube though - I have a video somewhere of three friends from Japan dressed up as frogs and doing karaoke that I promised I would get onto YouTube for them but it's been 18 months and I just haven't got round to looking at it...

As I said, really like the look of Blurp - looking forward to seeing the little fella being animated and doing things!

Ahh, I see what you're saying. For people who find us via YouTube. Maybe something to look at, when I get a spare five mins.

From earlier in this thread, I've actually discovered it's already quite easy to embed YouTube and Google Videos into the forum. I've added details to the FAQ.

Sam.