Comments on: Game Analysis: Elemental http://www.heimburg.com/blog/2007/03/21/game-analysis-elemental/ A developer's perspective on development Tue, 08 Jan 2008 18:10:04 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.1 hourly 1 By: admin http://www.heimburg.com/blog/2007/03/21/game-analysis-elemental/comment-page-1/#comment-126 admin Tue, 22 May 2007 20:03:27 +0000 http://www.heimburg.com/blog/?p=11#comment-126 Jake, thanks for the info! I'll update the analysis page shortly. I noticed that Elemental spent some time in the "top ten sales" charts on some Oberon portals -- hopefully that's translated into lots of money for the company and a nice Ferrari for you. :) Okay, probably not, but I do hope Gastronaut sees enough success to keep exploring the casual game scene, as you obviously have a knack for it. Jake, thanks for the info! I’ll update the analysis page shortly.

I noticed that Elemental spent some time in the “top ten sales” charts on some Oberon portals — hopefully that’s translated into lots of money for the company and a nice Ferrari for you. :) Okay, probably not, but I do hope Gastronaut sees enough success to keep exploring the casual game scene, as you obviously have a knack for it.

]]> By: Jake http://www.heimburg.com/blog/2007/03/21/game-analysis-elemental/comment-page-1/#comment-125 Jake Tue, 22 May 2007 19:39:46 +0000 http://www.heimburg.com/blog/?p=11#comment-125 I'm one of the developers of this game. I got linked to your analysis from my artist. You've done a very nice job on the writeup. I can fill in some of the technical details for you. As you guesed, those hardware specs are incorrect. The game requires a P3 (should work on a P2, but very slowly) and DirectX7. It's entirely software rendered. This is one of the main reasons why it is 640x480. We do lots of full screen effects for a software rendered game, and keeping the framerate high at 800x600 would have not been possible on older machines. We use FMOD for sound (statically linked). The engine is custom otherwise, in fact it is the same engine we use for our Xbox games, just with everything ripped out except for the sprites. This was pretty much our only work on a casual game, so I'm glad you liked it. I’m one of the developers of this game. I got linked to your analysis from my artist. You’ve done a very nice job on the writeup.
I can fill in some of the technical details for you. As you guesed, those hardware specs are incorrect. The game requires a P3 (should work on a P2, but very slowly) and DirectX7. It’s entirely software rendered. This is one of the main reasons why it is 640×480. We do lots of full screen effects for a software rendered game, and keeping the framerate high at 800×600 would have not been possible on older machines. We use FMOD for sound (statically linked). The engine is custom otherwise, in fact it is the same engine we use for our Xbox games, just with everything ripped out except for the sprites. This was pretty much our only work on a casual game, so I’m glad you liked it.

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