As you can see Coke and Code has a new look, but really thats it. Nothing's changing. I felt like having an arty night so I spent a while (with a lot of help! you know who you are) fiddling around with the theme and CSS. The terrible logo was of course created by me.

There have been a lot of Slick fixes and extensions over the last few days so I may let that soak for a while and get back to the Putty Puzzle.

In other news my Wife has finally had the injection in her foot to relieve the pain, and is currently suffering. Meg is running around the garden every night and generally having a great old time - isn't speaking much yet though, anyone got any tips for encouraging young'uns?

Oh, and BBQ at the weekend at the Kev Homstead. Woo.

Some days it's just all nonsense. All of it. Every minute of the day, nonsense. From the moment I get Meg up in the morning, through the working day, through the evening, through the early hours on forums and coding, all the way until I get into bed and wait for it to start again.

Today, has been one of those days.

- No, driving like a mad thing just because the sun is shining doesn't make sense.
- No, I can't just let her wander around without worrying, its my job to worry.
- No, providing a crap solution that looks to the unenlightened like it matches the current requirements but doesn't give us any room to move later isn't a good idea.
- No, documenting two features that look identical as identical on the same page, when they're not isn't useful.
- No, I don't care that you haven't done your homework and you'd like me to do it for you, sending me email with the assignment in won't help.
- No, writing 3D games doesn't take you to the "next level" of game programming, unless of course you started from no games at all. Thinking so does say a lot about you though.
- No, my internet connection isn't any good and I can't play the game, hell I can't even upload my stuff most of the time.

Irksome irritations from beyond the ether, be gone! For tomorrow is another day!

Off on holiday next week, to the sea side. I'm really looking forward to it and believe it or not, no laptop, no internet, no code!

So, next week, might be a bit quiet.

She's still ill, or at least sad. There doesn't seem to be anything we can do to cheer her up and the throat is still keeping her up. I haven't slept properly for a week now. She's generally better, but still not eating.

The last two days have been long work days, around 11 hours a day. Finally work is coming back up, I'm starting to get somewhere - but the lack of sleep is starting to make it hard to focus. Understand that I spend a lot of the night coding anyway, so it's not that unusual for me to get 4 hours sleep and be fine. Right now, it's just not even reaching that stage. Still, at least I've made some progress this week.

Now, home stuff is really suffering. I've done no game stuff since the weekend, apart from update the spec for the *big* game. Now I check the Slick forums, and while people seem to be using it theres a definite trend away - I guess thats to be expected given how long it's been going.

What I need is a little game to write now, tonight, to get me awake and alive again, but the lack of sleep just isn't letting me think of anything. Time to hack..

Felt like a hack last night. Hacking is good for motivation, though sometimes not good for focus ;). Theres a few things I'm running in parallel at the moment:

1) Slick - updates and fixes.
2) Networking Library - this is taking a long time. Hopefully be worth it
3) New Applet Game Idea - this is outside of Slick, it's good old Java2D - but it's a winning idea, so heh.

As part of 1) I'm trying to produce a few demos to show how different game types might be started. I'm not planning to write full games but simple tech demos that hopefully give people somewhere to start. As normal I'm trying to make the code useful and readable over making it particually clever.

So, back to this hack, I'd been meaning to take a look at Platformers. Chman had asked how to use Phys2D to make a platformer (though quite a few others had asked before). I realised I hadn't tried it, so all I could do was point him at SlickSet (I know Jon has achieved some cool platformer related stuff).

Anyway, so last night I hacked at some platformer code using phys2d. This is what came out:

You can try it via Webstart and the source available. The code and implementation is expected to develop a bit over the next few days to provide a decent sample, right now it's still buggy - doesn't have good performance - just about trying stuff out.

So why is this hard? It comes down to what I guess is pretty obvious. Generic platformers (think Mario, Sonic, Zool) don't use physics engines, infact they're not even following the rules. When you try and use a physics engine you have to fudge stuff to make it feel more like a traditional platformer while leaving enough of the physics engine intact to allow the rest of the world to make use of the engine (that is of course what we want, a mashup between real physics and platformer dynamics).

Hat's off to Jon, this isn't some tiny task that you can just do. It takes a lot of fiddling. Getting the physics engine to act like a platformer is pretty simple, getting it to allow you to interact with other objects while maintaining the platformer nature - thats a git.

Still, last night I did start from nothing and got the tile combination stuff working, a simple renderer, a tiny engine (named Penguin) and a silly little demo that shows up a lot of the issues. Initial indications are that it's totally possible to mix the two worlds and end up with something uniquely fun.

Hopefully one of the enterprsing folks will take it futher.

Now.. which demo next?

Work is a bit busy at the moment, I have the happy task of refactoring the platform in the hope that it'll be more flexible for the future. I'm a little worried this particular task is:

a) Critical to the future
b) Something I don't have the background knowledge to achieve
c) About as interesting as a Emo Kids.

The real downside is that it's zapping up what little brain power I have in the day, so the evening projects really arn't getting the attention they deserve, though the new networking stuff is coming on nicely now.

As a side effect of working on this new project, I've moved over to the other side of the office. It's an interesting place with new interesting people. I was talking to a collegue in the rec. room the other day remarking on the technical competence and diversity of the populace of my work place. We both agree the standard of engineers here is by far the highest we've seen. By luck (or hopefully judgement) the company has managed to only employ people that are capable of doing the job - which having worked around the IT industry for 10 years now (a fact that scared the hell out of me last week) is extremely rare. Normally there are at least some people that are carried by everyone else most of the time.

The really intersting bit to me was his next comment though:

"there arn't too many geeks either"

Now I'm sure he didn't mean anything by this but given the context it was extremely strange. It could have been understood as "and at least there arn't too many geeks" - or at least a positive spin on that fact. Now whats interesting to me is:

1) How terrible that sentiment is if it was indeed the case.
2) How much that fits in with what I was beginning to think was a paranoid delusion about the "culture" here
3) How ridiculous that would have been to say to me.

As the few who read this blog probably already know (or have guessed), I'm pretty much the geek. I don't like sport, I like computers - alot. I see the world in black and white (binary if you want to get dramatic). I tend to over react to situations, making an easy target. I like sci-fi. I find socialising hard. I'm a geek.

And frankly, to look at me, it's obvious.

So, I have to assume the comment wasn't meant like that, something that as a geek I'm not very good at doing. Even so, it was an interesting interaction.

And more importantly, it gave me something to blog about this morning.

So, I've spent a few years now learning how to produce games. I've learnt an awful lot and finished a few along the way. Great stuff. The latest one is the best so far, Mootox.

What now? How do I get to the "next level"? Is there a secret exit round here somewhere that I rushed past?

Had a few games related job opportunities, can't take them for various reasons.

Had a few opportunities to sell my games outright, don't want to do that without it being my profession.

Had a bunch of nice comments from random sources about the games and libraries, plumps my ego but doesn't move me forward.

Introspection time?

Or maybe just write a half baked over arty arena shooter, eco the dolphin rip, SF2 clone or quirky platformer with tonnes of "character" and get hailed as the next big thing?

Cath, Meg and I are feeling better. Meg has decided to catch up on sleep so I've had five, yes count them, five full night sleeps. Amazing the difference actually having some rest makes to your mental state.

I've been so tired, ill or busy for the last three weeks I really haven't had a chance to sit down and code anything. So I've come back with a clear mind and clean slate to try again. Up tools and we're off. The current project is random and isn't going anywhere but I figure it's good to get back in to things slowly :)

On the road again...

'Go Crazy?' - 'Don't mind if I do!!!'

Life is a bit on the lame side at the moment. At least 2 of the three members of my household have been ill for the past month an a half. Work wise I've been sat on the same low priority but critical work for the last 3 months - not really going anywhere fast. No code involved at work and no energy to code at home.

Haven't been out in a while, no pub, no trips, not much fun. Don't have time to play games even though I've had Wii Paper Mario sat on the shelf for the past month. Christmas is coming and I can't begin to get excited. This time last year we were preparing to come home which could have been the worst mistake we've made. Coming back was great from a family perspective but pretty much everything else has been a bit of a read through.

What's more the idiocy of the world at large is begining to annoy me again. Road users - why oh why - just because something is legal doesn't mean it's sensible. Just because something is temporary doesn't mean it's automatically ok. No, there arn't double yellow lines - but parking there will still block the road. Bike users - weaving in and out of traffic is legal, but if it's cold, wet and early it's still dangerous as hell. And as to the woman that parked on the roundabout so she could "just pop in" to McDonalds to get her breakfast - I mean seriously, what sort of brain dead moran are you?

Recieved a phone at work yesterday. This might not seem like a big deal worth blogging about but consider that I've been working for a telecommunications company for 3 years and this is the first time I've had a phone on my deak. It's pretty big news. Now, if it only actually worked it'd almost be a positive aspect of my day.

Meg is still coughing alot, she can't shake this bleady cold any more than anyone of us. However, she is still giggling and trying to walk and falling on her butt alot. Some how she's really into drawing now - she's just over 1, so it seems a bit bizarre - but she loves her crayons that she now takes everywhere with her in a little red handbag. There has to be a game concept in there somewhere.

Talking of which, I've decided to write 4 games in parrallel, the logic being that even if I give up one or two I should still get futher with some. So, the run down seems to be two that have been around for a while, Scorched Turf and Mootox and two new ones currently called Samson and Dumb Bots. Should I ever make it back to the computer at home I'll be pushing on with the golf game first since it's core engine is shared between all 4.

Finally, I've blogged again. Almost feels like normal if a bit random and tangenty. Anyone know of anything gamedev related in the Cardiff area let me know, I need to get motivated again!

I'm ill yet again, over the last few weeks I think I've spent more time at home than at work, what with holidays, Meg being ill, Cath being ill and now me. Seems like every little cold I get can't be ignored like it used to be, I don't get much sleep these days due to a certain little screamer - so I'm guessing that I'm not recovering from bugs over night.

I can't help but feel guilty about work, I know if you're ill you're not meant to go in, but this is getting a bit much. As much as I'm not enjoying work the same as I used to it, it's still a good job with a fun atmosphere. Being off so much is just embarrassing. I console myself with the idea that no one is heavily dependent on the work I'm doing at the moment, but still it doesn't feel good.

Got a doctors appointment today, hopefully they dole me out some antibiotics, my chest will calm down, temperature will get under control and I can stop taking so many pain killers. Back to work Monday with luck.

I even removed the last post through guilt, how sad is that?