Hidden Sanctum Newsletter

[HiddenSanctum]

Well, right now there's some trash talking going on as everyone is competing against each other with the online highscores, LOL.

...gotta love it!

[Vlad]

   

[hlalex]

Danyboy I have a haunted house for sale if you want one. I told some one about it they thought I had been playing to many games...
It comes with even bottle ratting, foot stepping, Scratching, and a lot of needed major repairs. From leaky roof to broke stairs. Window are in place though...
Ok now back to Hidden Sanctum I didn't get mine so I'm guessing My change of address didn't make the trip. I'll see of it is changed and if not I'll resub.

[danyboy]

Hi guys,

Thanks hlalex, that would be nice but I'm a little low on cash right now, maybe when I will retired I will buy your haunted house, please keep it creapy and old during that time.

hlalex, the newsletter isn't sent yet, I didn't received it either.

CU

danyboy

[HiddenSanctum]

Ok, so here's where we stand at the moment.

We have finished up the beta testing phase of game 1, and are already into the beta testing phase of game 2.  Our hopes were that the new games (and new web design) would go live this week.  Unfortunately, one little bug in the library we are using for sound playback has us twiddling our thumbs waiting for an update, which looks like it won't happen until next Monday at the earliest.

Well, twiddling our thumbs is not a good way to put it. We are twiddling our thumbs on the games that are just about ready to go, while we get ready to kick off beta testing on a 3rd game. I've been playing it, it's just not ready for release (some menus and stuff like that).  Those shouldn't take too long to do anyway.  We are also cooking up something special for Halloween (fingers crossed that it will be ready), and if the main menu screen of that one is any indication, this one looks to be a fun little creep-fest.

Sorry for the delays, but we don't want to release anything too soon until we are sure it's the best it can be.

[GreyFuss]

Ahem.......You must be very busy Eric as your post has some missing elements. Please fill in the following...

Game #1's Title is ____________
Game #2's Title is ____________
Game #3's Title is ____________

Thank you
You are excused 

[HiddenSanctum]

Truth be told, while it may seem quiet on the surface, behind the scenes we've been busting our butts. Lot's of things we are trying to coordinate over here. From the new web design (well, it might not LOOK that different, but behind the scenes it's been completely redone with lots of automating), to making sure the games are ready to go, to setting up the sales end, and last but not least - and with our fingers crossed - also having MAC versions of the games.  The only area I am concerned about is the MAC side. That's unknown territory, but I've been assured by the person who does it that it is not a big deal as long as the games themselves don't have any bugs...

The first 2 games are rather lite and appropriately priced with online high scores to compete with each other. Oh, and just to be fair, the high scores lists will be purged on a regular basis, although we will be maintaining an all-time Hall of Fame list.

WARNING: Bethany has ridiculously obscene high scores!

The 3rd game is for those who like to solved word puzzles.  Sort of... I am terrible at word games, but this one does not require you to have a huge vocabulary in your head.

Game titles will be forthcoming... when they are released! 

[Lady Kestrel]

You mentioned my favorite 3-letter word starting with an M.  Have you made any Mac ports for any of your games?  If you build them, I will buy. 

[HiddenSanctum]

My fault entirely, LadyK.   The games are all OpenGL and port easily to Macs.  I don't have a Mac though, so I need to send the code to the individual who wrote the library and he will do the converting.  That be where I dropped the ball.  Truth be told, you are the only one who has asked about Mac ports so I never put much effort into getting those out as there didn't seem like much interest.  Yes, not a very smart thing for me to slip on.

I'll see what I can do to get these all converted - which might be sooner than you think. 

For the curious, we use the PTK library over here. It contains all the functions for displaying graphics, playing sounds, user input. It allows us to not have to reinvent the wheel by handling all the generic aspects of game writing which allows us to focus on writing the games themselves in C/C++.  The nice part of it is that if we want to write the game using DirectX or OpenGL we simply tell use one or the other. It's literally changing a single word.  Even if the game is done, we can switch it from one to the other. 

There are a number of games using this library that you *might* have heard of - Azada, Fish Tycoon, Mystic Inn, Virtual Villagers... and dozens more.