True Valhalla : The Deep Sky

weeeeeeeeeee

A brief not so brief history: As far as fame goes with Game Maker users, True Valhalla is definitely one of the most prominent members, participating in a variety of other events outside the Game Maker Community. He's done Ludum Dare's, where one designs a game from scratch in 48 hours, and runs the tongue-in-cheek HowToMakeAnMMORPG.com (which, by the way, isn't a joke; it actually has some very good advice. Go check it out). His minimal style is what really makes him stand out; there are no complex shapes or designs. A number of his games (including my favorite of his creations, Volatile) feature circles or hexagons, and the atmospheres speak for themselves. But this is getting wordy, so without further ado...

orange + Bret Hudson : Saga Of The Ugly 2

Blood-curling for such a simple style.

GMC Topic Link

As a fellow Zerosoft and GMC member, I've seen a great majority of orange's games, but this one likely tops the list.  Made for the Scary 4 Digits competition over at the 64Digits community, SOTU 2 is a collab between orange and Bret Hudson.

Checklist

I've promised a lot of people reviews here so just a quick run-down of the ones to come. This is just here mostly to say that I haven't forgotten about you guys, it's just I've been caught up with school and online classes and hosting RDC and everything that it's been hard to do much.

High Priority Reviews:
Bred Hudson & orange: Saga Of The Ugly 2
True Valhalla: The Deep Sky
makerofthegames: Gaming 101

People:
Vince Emerson (notably his film, Windigo)

Low Priority Reviews:
Aski: Tower Of Heaven
Blendo Games: Atom Zombie Smasher
Lexaloffle: Voxatron

Likely in that order.  I'd do True Valhalla's and makerofthegames's games first because they're long overdue but I'd rather post those up when the video reviews are done and at the moment I'm still fixing those up.

This post is really just to apologize for not having gotten to you people's games yet, and as a reassurance that I haven't forgotten about it and I'll get to them when I can which is hopefully today or tomorrow.

Jams and Things

Greetings From Liverpool! placed like 18th or something in the jam, didn't expect too much.  I offered a prize of reviewing the 5th place games via blog post and video and two games tied for 5th there, so:

If you are True Valhalla or makerofthegames, I'll be getting to that shortly.  Might take some time for the videos, I already recorded them but the review was horrible so I'm going to redo those and get back to you.  Sorry for the delay.
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Run down of the past few days:

Skyrim by Bethesda came out, the last of the Elder Scrolls series.  It looks and sounds overrated.  Don't shoot me.

Wow this looks like every other fantasy RPG ever made.

Partisan Religion

Here's something that may or may not be controversial.


BEFORE I START: The best satire I've seen on religion was actually done by My Little Pony (Friendship is Magic).  Despite the total lack of subtlety, it's genius in its execution and clear in its message.  If you'd rather watch a nice cartoon than a ranty blog post then that's the way to go.

One thing I've never really understood about people is why they're so reasonable until the topic of religion comes up.  And then, suddenly, any gray area goes monochrome.  Fervent defenders of their beliefs collide with aggressive atheists, and occasionally the other way around; moderate voices are drowned out and generally we find a clusterfsk of logical fallacies, heated words, and Godwin's Law.

Here's my stance on the issue; take it or leave it.