FortisVenaliter's Dev Blog
Archives 

Show All

  • 2010
    • January
      • The forest
        11/01/10
        So I had one of those all nighter things. I just kept working on this idea in my head. So, I made a ground. Then I put a stream next to it. Then I made the sky and made the stream pretty and reflective. Then I modelled a tree (Maya is so awesome, albeit intimidating). Then I made leaves and bus

      • Been away...
        09/01/10
        I've been away doing other things for a while, so there hasn't been a lot of progress on the projects you have seen. But check out this screenshot of a project I just got swept up in. I'm not gonna explain it, but isn't it pretty? Make sure to click the image to see it in all

  • 2009
    • December
      • Unsigned Lighting Engine
        03/12/09
        The new Unsigned Lighting Engine supports 10 flashing strobing lights (of multiple types) in real time. Here is an ugly example of it, and this is only 7 lights! You can see the range this will provide for Arena artists... I'll divulge more about arena the updated arena creation tools later.<

    • November
      • ASCII FPS is finished!
        11/11/09
        Here is a screen of the final game!
        This game was developed for Nick Gravelyn's XNA7Day contest. Details found on his site: http://xna7day.com/
        I will add an upload to it on Sunday, when the contest is over.
        Also, I may have a download for an XNA Component that converts any game

      • Another Screenshot
        10/11/09
        Just another Screenshot of the ASCII 3D engine. I really like the way this is heading!

      • ASCII 3D
        09/11/09
        As part of Nick Gravelyn's XNA7Day competition, the challenge was to create a game with only text. Here is a preview of my real-time ASCII art 3D engine.

    • October
      • Booty Hunt
        12/10/09
        From a Studio I've been a part of for a few months, Crazy Tater Games, is a game possibly coming to XBLIG: Booty Hunt. It is a free-roaming 3D Pirate platformer. Check out the screen:

    • September
      • Love for the IList<>
        14/09/09
        I have discovered a newfound love for the IList<> interface. I use arrays and Lists pretty extensively and the List's ToArray function can be pretty memory inefficient, especially when using structs. Now I can store a list or array in an IList<> and treat them the same! Yay! I ha

    • July
    • June
      • Arlington Pub
        28/06/09
        Here is a little preview of Arlington Pub. A collection of Pub/Bar minigames set in a social environment with Xbox LIVE Avatars.

      • Wave format recognition
        16/06/09
        So, for Unsigned vocals, I am trying to come up with a solution in C# with DirectSound that can read microphone input and extract frequency and amplitude. Apparently this is a big subject. No wonder Rock Band isn't perfect. If I can get it to work though, I'll be sure to release the cod

      • Unsigned 2.0
        14/06/09

        Unsigned 2.0 has been released!

        Please visit the Unsigned Site for download links!

      • Character Customization
        13/06/09
        A bit of Character Customization!

      • Unsigned 2.0
        08/06/09
        Yes, ladies and gentlemen, we are gearing up towards


        Here are just a few of the many new features:
        XNA 3.0 with reduced dependancies
        Solos
        Big Rock Endings
        Custom Animated Avatars
        Crowds
        Better Venue detail
        Dynamic Lighting cues

        Cool,

      • Yay Animation!
        08/06/09
        You programmers out there... you know those features you work on for a few weeks before you can even think about getting them into the game engine? You have to write the framework, build the tools, build the content.... etc. etc. etc. Then you finally get it in... and it is glorious? It is a feat

    • May
      • Sorry
        29/05/09
        For those of you who do comment on my postings, thanks! I do read them, and I love to hear from you guys. If you find your post deleted, chances are, I didn't want to. But you may have noticed that I seem to get spam for gold in a certain prolific mmorpg. And there also seems to be a bug in

      • Unsigned
        29/05/09


        What... what the?!? what the hell is that? Is that a solo? And what the hell is that electricity on the sides of the board? Does that mean Rock Power is engaged? And damn those notes actually look good! Jeez I suck at drums... what are those extra stars on the side of the first sh

    • April
      • Enigma Screenshots
        28/04/09
        A couple new screenshots!

        Invisibility:


        Visor:

      • Enigma
        26/04/09
        Next from FV Productions is the tentatively titled "Enigma." Here is an early screenshot:

      • First Person Shooter? ...On XNA?
        20/04/09
        Yea, its gonna happen. And sooner than you may think. We are currently working on a retro FPS. And something cool too: It will probably be shipping with the level editor!

    • March
      • Rhythmos?
        23/03/09
        So some of you may have heard that I have a new Rhythm Game for Xbox360 coming, right? Well, here is an (EARLY ALPHA-BUILD) screenshot for you.

    • February
      • Beast of a PC
        17/02/09
        So, I am working on my new project, right? I am working on Pool (billiards, not swimming). And I am writing the code that generates the ball model. And just for the hell of it, I decided to see how much my beast of a PC can handle. So I up the ball sphere model to 1024 stacks and 1024 slices, wh

    • January
      • Mineage and more
        31/01/09
        So, Mineage died. Not only did I have a horrible slowdown issue, but it was also decided that Minesweeper in 3D wasnt that much fun. Oh, and someone else made a minesweeper game first. And I think theres another one coming. Oh well.

        However, I do have a new game in the works. It is ac

  • 2008
    • December
      • Unsigned again
        10/12/08
        So for those of you not paying attention, the Unsigned boards have been dying. And it is your fault, you need to pay more attention.
        For those of you who are paying attention, I'm sure you are tearing your hair out and can't stop crying.

        But now I'm back! I have star

      • Mineage! Big Fields!
        03/12/08
        So wow! I just took a few hours to write a batching system and... Wow!!!

        That is a 48x48 field! Over 2300 spaces in there! It used to be 32x32 grids dropped the framerate to an unplayable place, but now you can be playing mine sweeper for hours based on how hard this is...!

      • Archor
        01/12/08
        Well, it has been a while since I've posted, so I figured I oughta let you 4 people who actually read this know that I am still alive. I guess I will just rant on some XNA/CG subjects.

        The first of which is ECHS BACHS a.k.a. Archor Games. This particular member of XNA seems to thin

    • November
      • Mineage
        06/11/08
        And so comes the next game in my "Arcadage" series!

      • NXE
        03/11/08
        Thanks to The ZMan, we now get a sneak peek of Cubage (see the FV Productions Logo?) on the NXE!

      • Cubage has been Approved!
        03/11/08
        Well, ladies and gentlmen (were there any ledies reading this blog), Cubage has officially been accepted for distribution in Xbox Live Community Games! As far as I know, it will be available for purchase for 200 Microsoft Points as a Launch Title with the NXE. Of course, that is all subject to cha

    • October
      • Cubage!
        31/10/08
        Well, I just submitted "Cubage" to Xbox Live Community Games. We'll see how that goes! If I can pull off a couple of decently selling games, I can quit my job and have more time to work on Unsigned! Bwahahaha. Or not. Who knows?

      • XNA 3.0 is out!
        30/10/08
        Woo! XNA 3.0 is out! I hope to have the first of my Xbox Live Community Games titles submitted by tomorrow night. XNA 3.0 also supports some new Audio stuff (with MP3s and Oggs mebe?) so I will probably upgrade Unsigned. Maybe it will help fix a lot of syncing/lag issues because it will be an off

      • Bug Reports
        22/10/08
        Right now, the best thing that can happen is getting bug reports. I will try to fix them as I see them, but I am making two new games for the upcoming Xbox Live Community Games. These games will be free from FortisVenaliter Productions. I intend to have at least one of them available as a launch

      • Sloooooow...
        19/10/08
        So... I am at 59% upload. At this rate, you guys will never see Unsigned again. It takes longer to upload it than it does to develop it...

      • Almost there
        18/10/08
        The new version is almost ready. It comes with a new chart2unsigned too. VocalEditor isn't quite done yet, but if I can get the release out tomorrow (Sunday) night, I can finish up the VocalEditor at school on Monday and post it Monday night.

        So the new features:
        Options Menu<

      • Graphics Upgrade
        15/10/08
        So, while I was fixing the shaders (getting 1.1 compatibility, etc.), I basically started upgrading the entire menu system... And now I am going through and optimizing the rendering code for the main game. Those of you with slow computers will notice a boost, and those of you with fast computers wi

      • No release :(
        11/10/08
        Sorry, guys no release. I am just not happy with it in its current state.

        Good news is that I just played 4 songs in a row.

      • Instrument and Peripheral Plugins
        10/10/08
        I just released the SDKs (on the Forums->Modding->Plugins). So start making plugins! Who needs keymapping anyway?

      • Planet Pachinko
        10/10/08
        I'll make an official announcement on the forums/website when the press releases have been sent out, but I thought you guys might want to know. I have been working at Allied Kingdoms for some time now developing a WiiWare title called "Planet Pachinko" coming out soon.

        Whi

      • Fixed drums
        09/10/08
        Wow there were a lot of issues with drums since the rewrite. I think I have most of them fixed, and drums are very playable.

        A couple things I noticed though. It seems that Garbage Collector is rearing its ugly head again. It hit me 2 or 3 times during "Sweating Bullets." I&

      • SM1.1
        07/10/08
        Yes, it will happen!
        Contrary to what I have said before, I will support 3D in SM1.1!

        And no lower!

        It won't be pretty though. No lighting. But those of you who have lower-end graphics cards should hopefully notice significant boosts in framerate.

      • Shaders
        07/10/08
        So, as some of you may have noticed, if you have the FV Productions news RSS feed, I made a benchmarking program to test shaders. With everything turned on on the old and new shaders (meaning specular point lights with falloff values and normal mapping) I am getting about 20 frames per second on my

      • Fixed problem with website
        03/10/08
        Okay, sorry. There was an issue with Firefox not recognizing the difference between a forward and back slash. I usually use Opera and I figured if it ran on the craptastic IE, Firefox should work. But it appears I was mistaken. Oh well, problem solved.

      • Shaders
        03/10/08
        So, I think we can all agree. For the performance most people get on their graphics card, Unsigned looks pretty ugly. I have discovered that this is because I did not properly understand the GPU processor style and pipeline. And, of course, it doesn't help that XNA is so reliant on the DX9+

      • VocalEditor
        01/10/08
        Well, it is coming along. The VocalEditor is pretty much done except for loading the new version of songdata and editing phrases. But with the next version of Unsigned, I don't think I will support Feedback Charts in the vocal editor. You will have to convert it first. And I also won't

    • September
      • Vox Editor
        29/09/08
        So, I had a crazy weekend. Like, nuts. As in, I was more or less out of commision for two whole days. But the good news is that I just did something I have been putting off for months. Yes. I rewrote the Vocals Editor Undo.cs. For those of you not code savvy, this means I have fixed a problem

      • Some more improvements
        25/09/08
        I got the rock meter working today! So the boards arent always red.

        Also, I started working on the drums. They work now, which is good. but they might be out of order... im not sure.

        And finally, I've got the particle system back online!

      • New Blog!
        22/09/08
        So I got my new blog up! Yay! Some of you will notice that I got my website up, too. Happy times!

      • Waves Vid
        22/09/08
        So here are the crazy waves I was talking about.  I might just leave them in there but only use them when the phrase "hendrix" is in the author of the song or when the genre contains the phrase "acid"

      • Crazy Tasty
        20/09/08
        Woah!  My waves look crazy awesome and wierd.  I think I might just keep em this way.  I'll try to post a youtube vid later on

      • Getting there
        19/09/08
        So the waves are almost done now.  They look good and everything.  Just a few kinks to work out.  Like, for example, how you get nearly ONE MILLION POINTS PER SECOND!!! and thats when you AREN'T whammying!

        I'll try to post a pic later tonight.

        The good news is that th

      • Wiggles!
        17/09/08
        So, I have the lines wiggly. Well, line wiggly. All I need to do now is add its complement line and make it grow and shrink according to user input. So, the "complete rewrite" is coming along faster than I had expected!

      • New PC and Straight lines
        17/09/08
        So, pertaining to the waves, I did manage to get straight lines where they are supposed to be. Now I just need to make them wiggle.
        Although, I will admit. I just put my new PC together... and it kicks Crysis's ass. So that is hindering progress considerably.

      • Wave Roadblock
        16/09/08
        So, I ran into a roadblock today. Apparently the wave code is... pretty severely broken. It happened during the big restructuring, and it seems salvaging the old code is looking just as expensive as rewriting it. So it looks like I will rewrite it in an attempt to optimize the process and get a f