Voxatron Alpha

Voxatron is a block-based platform shooter by Lexaloffle Games, where you navigate a small robot around a destructible world made of tiny cubes, with a variety of enemies to kill.  The game is still in alpha, but there are a number of levels included in the game, as well as a level editor and browser so you can check out other people’s creations..

I love the graphics.. the cute little block-enemies, the bright colours, the way everything starts to break up as you shoot it.. I even loved being killed the first time, because of the little cube explosion!

However, I really don’t enjoy the controls.  It’s not the movement.. I spent a great deal of my childhood playing Spectrum games which used cursors or “w”, “s”, “o” and “p” to move, with the spacebar or some other random button for jumping or shooting.  The movement is fine..

What I don’t like about Voxatron is the shooting, because of having to stop running and face the enemy before I can shoot.  I just found this frustrating.. especially when new enemies appeared up-close and I’d have to run away first, to make room to turn and fire.  It’s a shame, but it tipped the balance enough that I found myself not enjoying the game.. and well, I have more than enough games that I would rather play!

If I’m honest, I probably wouldn’t have given the game more than a quick look if it hadn’t been part of the recent Humble Bundle.. I wouldn’t have bought it without playing and loving a demo, certainly.  However, I love the idea of the Humble Bundle.. and I enjoyed the other games in this pack, so I don’t regret the purchase 🙂

Blender and Painted Models 2

I finished my cobblestone skin and sent it over to be mapped onto a cube..

I preferred the look of the cube with sunlight, though I could really see where I’d not painted the grooves enough.

Apparently the next steps are bump and normal mapping.. *blink*.. I also really want to file those corners off 🙂

Blender and Painted Models

A friend is learning to use Blender, and has now come to the part of his tutorial which requires him to use painted models.  Now, I think his two cubes are quite cute and serve the purpose well enough, but he asked me to paint a mesh for him..

This gave me a needed kick towards learning to use GIMP, which I’ve been meaning to look at for a while, as well as digging out my tablet from underneath the clutter on my desk.

I decided to attempt to make a cobblestone-type cube..

I don’t know if this is the best way to go about drawing it, and this may not turn out to be any more useful than the two existing cubes, but I’m rather interested in seeing how it looks in 3d 🙂