It’s been a while since we posted an official ArmorGames.com update, so I thought I’d let everyone know the exciting stuff we having going on.

A couple months ago we launched our new AGI (Armor Games Interface) into BETA for developers. Currently our AGI offers the following.

1.) Hi-Score system

The Hi-Score’s are in game (No more ArmorBot) and lets you compete against your friends. It stores your score, rank, country and allows you to post your stats to Twitter or Facebook. Check out the games below to see it in action.

Obey the Game
Wake the Box
zOMGies

2.) Level Share System

Our second feature deals with games that have a level or stage editor. Our Share-System allows you to create a level, save it, browse other levels and even vote for your favorite ones. Check out Crush the Castle and click explore to experience it first hand.

This is just the beginning of what we have planned so make sure to check ArmorGames.com daily to see all the new features we continue to roll out.

2009 was a great year for Flash Games and 2010 should be even better. We continue to look for the very best games to sponsor and license so keep us in mind when developing your games.

We also have a new logo floating around in the wild that will be introduced on ArmorGames soon. Has anyone stumbled across it?

We’re anxious to get feedback on the Hi-Scores and Level-Sharing. Leave comments and let us know what you think.

Happy Gaming!
-The Armor Games Team

Dark Cut 3 is finally out, but I wanted to take some time to talk about what went into making this surgery simulator game.

First let’s talk about graphics.  The game’s subjects are usually pictures of myself using several different angled pictures.  I then doctor them to the point that they are relevant to the time period and subject.  For example, the picture above is the picture of me on the submarine with a metal pipe through my shoulder.

1. I first take the base image:
   
2. I then crop out my entire body very carefully and make sure I remove a lot of the excess junk in the background.  While I am at it, I change the hue of my shirt to be a bit more naval.
3. After this long and arduous process I move into creating a background and floor.  I do this by finding textures of these (free textures are available on the web for free) and building that old metal look.  I also draw a splat by using a splat stencil and drawing a splattered line by hand down the wall.
4. Next I add just a touch of lighting across the entire background.  To keep the character in focus I left him (myself) in the brighter light.
5. And finally, I add the minor details.  Notice the buttons are gold to bring out the colour, and that there is now a large metal object protruding from my shoulder.  This is done through drawing by hand around the wound area, and actually finding a piece of red meat from a cow to cut away at on the shirt.  Red meat is the best way to create that “exposed arm” look because it provides a really nice texture and colour variation.  So yes, in every Dark Cut surgery you are looking at raw animal meat where wounds are located.
6. Now that the image is done, we’re not quite done yet.  We have to recreate every step of the surgery as an image.  For example, the before and after of a stitched area of skin, or the before and after of a poll being removed.  This accounts for about 22-30 images per surgery, and careful planning must be made to ensure that continuity works.
7. After the art is all done, I have to make different splatters and textures for blood that hit the screen.   This is done using a combination of Photoshop filters, blends, and brushes.  Here is an example of one:
8. After I cut out the tools and other goods, I import all the art assets into Flash.  I think assemble each of the tasks into groups, and code away at making tools function against the artwork.

The artwork complete, the coding complete, the surgery is done.  Now for Dark Cut 3 I had 5 major surgeries and 3 mini surgeries (called treatments), which meant this process was repeated several times.  It takes about a week to complete a surgery from camera to Flash.

My composer, MaestroRage, is instructed before all this process takes place to compose tracks for this game.   For Dark Cut 3 he composed several beautiful tracks based on the theme of each surgery and the content.

Around all the surgeries there are additional tasks at hand.  Making the menus, preloaders, buttons, finding sound effects, and working with a musician is a lot of work and getting it all to come together within a couple of months is quite a lot of work.  But once it’s all put together it’s a photo-realistic experence and it’s (hopefully) a lot of fun!

We recently had a contest for Hedgehog Launch that had an interesting outcome, and I thought I might share it.  A few users discovered methods of “channelling” which is not only brilliant but totally needs to be explained, along with a breakdown of my game, which I thought might make an interesting article.

If you have never played Hedgehog Launch, it is a strategy/skill/luck game in which the objective is to shoot a hedgehog into space in as few days as possible.  Players can reach higher ground each game by buying upgrades, and you are awarded cash based on your ability to collect coins and hit springboards while in midair.  At the end of each level, players get an additional bonus based on the length of the time and the height of the launch.

How This Works

The game seems infinite in each direction, but because Flash can’t create infinity the game has to create a world as you go.

The game breaks up the world into 1,000 pixel areas (called Segments) horizontally in each direction.  Every Segment is an area where a number of coins and platforms are loaded.  Each time your player moves across a Segment, a new Segment will be added.

In order to keep Flash performing up-to-speed (it lags when too many coins and platforms are around), the game will only generate a new Segment only when you are traveling into a new one.  That Segment is generated after the one you are entering, so if you kept moving forward you would always hit more Segment.  In addition, it will destroy a Segment behind the one you are exiting, as it is far behind you and probably forgotten at this point.  This way the game won’t have millions of Segments loaded.

So to make things easy, there are a few Segments always active… the couple in front of you, the couple behind you, and the one that you are in.

Now players have figured out that this loading system can be manipulated to an advantage.  Even though the Segments are invisible and hard to distinguish in-game, they can be guessed and found.

So by running back and forth over the Segment boundry, they can easily manipulate the game to generate a ton of content in a Segment over and over again, essentially creating a wonderful wall of coins and platforms.

By default, the current values are assigned to a single Segment:

• 10 Blue Launchers
• 2 Green Launchers
• 2 Yellow Launchers

• 40 Bronze Coins
• 20 Silver Coins
• 5 Gold Coins

Which means that these players could generate nearly 100+ gold coins in an area quite easily, especially if they used the parachute.

So easily I could classify this as a bug, since I should have been destroying Segments far earlier (like after you leave one), but as this glitch is far too subtle for the common player to find I haven’t even recognized the problem until now.

Which brings me to my apology to DragonSoul and SP3000.

When these users presented videos of massive amounts of coins and platforms in very small areas, I asked, “How is this even possible!?”  I dismissed it as a “variable hack,” which is a method of hacking in which you take the Flash file and edit some variables (like how many coins and platforms are loaded) and then have a shopping spree.

But after watching the videos again, I noticed that the users indeed manipulate the Segment loading, which was completely in-bounds.  An additional email from DragonSoul confirmed the tactics used, and in the end, once again, DragonSoul and SP3000 took first and second place, respectively.

I’ll be sending the top three prizes, so I’ll be emailing you guys soon.

-John

We recently launched our Facebook page and we would LOVE you to be our fan/friend! Our Facebook page has also been programmed to keep up with our ArmorBlog and new games from Armor Games! You’ll also find featured games and other points of interest.

If you have trouble adding us just use the search box on Facebook and type in “Armor Games” and it should be the first link that appears.

I am so happy there is a relevant Lolcat for all situations!

Oh where has the time gone?  Just a few weeks ago I was posting the Obsessive Compulse Tournament blog post and now we are reaching the homestretch.  We currently have 200+ entries and a ton of fantastic scores.  The tournament ends tomorrow, but there is still time to enter if you haven’t gotten your game mastered!

So I am getting many scores today, but the deadline is May 7th, 11:59 PM Pacific Time… which means you have until the end of the day tomorrow (or today, if you are reading this a day late).  We will take NO late entries.  The email must be in my inbox by that time for the score to count.

We’ll judge the top entries after May 7th to determine if the scores are acceptable.  By May 14th we’ll post the final scoreboard of how everyone did, and announce the winners of the prize packs!

So get your stuff in.  If you want to check out the Obsessive Compulse Tournament, click here.  There’s still some time to enter.

Oh, and by the way… the average score in the tournament as of now is 86.89, and there are 64 entries under 80.

I’m happy to announce that ‘Armor Games’ broke the 1,000 Alexa Mark this past weekend.

I know Alexa isn’t the defining standard when it comes to web stats, but they recently made changes to improve their overall ranking accuracy.

So I wanted to extend a BIG thank-you to everyone who visits Armor Games!!

-Armor Games Team

In case you haven’t heard of our AWESOME contest, link here.  There’s still a ton of time to enter!

Wow, so we’ve been getting a LOT of entries… nearly 120 unique people have entered since last week!  It’s been awesome to see everyone submitting the most elaborate and exciting level designs we have ever seen in Compulse, and you guys certainly seem to be getting better… some scores have improved by nearly 10-20 points in a few days.  We haven’t OFFICIALLY checked any layouts, but I have to say that these scores I am getting are mind boggling.

We have several updates for you!

1. Many of you have caught a minor glitch in the teleports.  This is caused by the little circle going into the center of the teleports changing the teleport size, meaning the ball may or may not hit it as it pings.  This glitch is most apparent in level 15 and 23, and may cause different patterns.  The chance of these patterns differentiating is about 1 in 10, but it is still significant enough to warrant a warning.  We acknowledge the problem and if your level works part of the time we will know and count it as okay… but make sure to drop us a note if you notice that one of your levels works part of the time (many of you are doing this, thanks).  This problem is only on teleport levels.
2. Yes, we know you can hack/slash/edit/modify/glitch the file.  But it’s not going to make a difference since you are submitting your level designs to us.  Please do not send us bogus scores from your awesome cheat engines.
3. Some people are emailing us 10 times a day.  Please send it once at the end of the day :(.  Once or twice a day is fine but don’t spam my inbox!
4. We cannot reveal the top scores to you.  You have to use your better judgment (and listen to your rambling co-players in the main ArmorBlog thread) about what scores are floating out there.

So thanks for playing thus far!  I’ll give you a hint as to where you may or may not be at the moment: there are 40 entries that are at or below the score of 80!  A bit vague for you in the lead, but now you know at least where you are…. a tiny bit.

Remember you got until May 7th to get your best score!  The original contest page can be found here.

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Tournament Updates:

May 12 - Winners Announced!

May 6 - Update #2

April 28 - Update #1

=====================

You think you are good at Compulse? Well we want to see just how good you are in the official Obsessive Compulse Tournament! Play through each level of the new tournament edition game. The players with the best score will win some awesome prizes!

Play the NEW 30 level set released today (it’s really, really hard) and try to get the lowest score possible.

Compulse is a game where you drop directional tiles on the screen to direct a ball through the level. As you advance through the game the levels get trickier and it becomes a game of using the least amount of tiles to get through each level. With the release of the Obsessive Compulse Tournament Pack, there are 30 new levels to enjoy and we’re going to give away prizes to those who are the swiftest and the strongest.

The tournament begins NOW and rolls through May 7th at 11:59 PM Pacific Standard Time!

—————–

GRAND PRIZE

• 1 I-pod Shuffle (1GB)+ $25 Itunes Gift Card
• 2 Ball Revamped Squishy Balls
• 25 stickers
• A certificate to hang on the wall, indicating your elite skills
• Something random we find in the office that will fit in the envelope

First Place (Runner-Up)

• 1 I-pod Shuffle (1GB)
• 2 Ball Revamped Squishy Balls
• 25 stickers
• A certificate to hang on the wall, indicating your elite skills
• Something random we find in the office that will fit in the envelope

Second and Third Place

• 2 Ball Revamped Squishy Balls
• 25 Stickers

Fourth and Fifth Place

• 1 Ball Revamped Squishy Ball
• 10 stickers

—————–

HOW TO ENTER

1) Go play through the entire Obsessive Compulse Tournament Pack. Make sure you beat every level.

2) Go to the main menu and click “Generate Code.” Click the text box and hit CTRL-A to select all the text, and then CTRL-C to copy it.

3) Paste the text and your Armor Games user name into an email and send to john@armorgames.com by May 7th at 11:59 PM Pacific Standard Time. DO NOT PASTE IT INTO THIS BLOG POST.

PROTIP: You can enter as many times as you want but your best score will be the only score that counts. Please indicate if you are updating a score in your follow-up email. Please do not email me every day.

So there are some cool things we’ll be giving away, but of course you got to follow the rules:

—————–

Official Rules

1. You must play using the “Obsessive Compulse” game found on armorgames.com, unmodified and in it’s current working condition.

2. Your score will be posted to the Armor Blog (armorblog.com) a few days after the contest is over, so that you can see how you did.

3. Any indication of cheating will be detected. Don’t do it. We have ways of finding out. We reserve the right to take away a prize in the case that cheating has a occurred (ask us if you are unsure what cheating is). We can verify your level designs via your code!

4. The player with the lowest score with all levels completed will be the winner. In the case of a tie between multiple players the player who submitted their final best score first will be considered the winner.

5. We will test your levels to ensure that they are actually legitimate.

6. If you are outside the United States we will send you the cash equivalent.

7. When copying your code make sure you select all and copy the entire code. If we do not receive an entire code we will email you back asking for one. A complete code is necessary to be officially entered (you can tell it’s the whole code because it begins with “<BEGIN CODE>” and ends with “<END CODE>”. Do not send us the codes generated on individual levels… send us the codes generated on the main menu screen!

8. If there is an issue with the game file we may update it. Be aware that changes to the game file will be logged here. These changes will most likely not effect your current progress.
9. If you have any questions feel free to ask in this thread or email me at John@armorgames.com!

—————–

So like I said, contest ends May 7th at 11:59 PM PST. Go at it!

We just launched the brand new ‘Armor Games’ website. The new servers are currently being propagated so it could be several hours before you can access it. In the meantime, be sure to check our Mega64’s newest video as they highlight some of the new features of the website.

We got listed as ‘Cool Site of the Day’ on May 11, 2007!

Click Here to check it out.