Neon on an art exhibition in Spain - Giles

As the title says Neon is being exposed in the Playware art exhibition at Laboral Center of Art and Industrial Creation in Gijón ( Asturias ) Spain.

You can see and interact with it there, the exhibition is running from September 21th 2007 until March 21th 2008, we wish to thank Sara W. Jason E. and Carl G. and all the people at Laboral for giving us this beautyful opportunity and the really nice setup they created.

If you are interested to know more I’d highly reccomend you visit the following link Laboral to visit the main webpage, you can also see some interesting pictures of the exhibition Here.

Very nice work, hopefully we’ll have some time ourselves in the future to go and have a look there.

Jeff Interviewed by Major Nelson - Gaz

Great interview with Yak on Major Nelson’s blog and you can get it right here

The whole podcast is really good all in all and you can find Yak between 47 minutes and 1 hour 8 mins

Shameless whoring of LS merch - Yak

We thought it’d be fun to do some Llamasoft t-shirts and odds and sods. We’ve used Cafepress because it’s easy and no risk at all to us since they make stuff on demand.

Just LS logo stuff so far but I’ll soon add some SG ones too. I’m thinking of having two SG ones, one “I LOVE SG 10/10″ or somesuch and the other along the lines of “OMFG SG SUX 2/10″ }:-D.

I might even do a ZOMG OMG WTF MY EYES HEADACHE SEIZURE WARGLE BLARGH WHINGE MOAN one too }:-).

anyway keep an eye on here:

WAHEY! lots of Llamasoft tat! JOY!

}:-D

Space Giraffe compared to Ulysses - Yak

This piece illustrates very well a phenomenon that we have noticed with Space Giraffe, and that is that there is almost inevitably an elevation from “hey, that’s not bad” to “oh, man, that’s ace, that is” once people have had the chance to play a bit and really understand what’s going on. I think that’s in part because looking at first glance as if it is derived from T2K alone, players immediately expect a T2K-alike experience, and indeed one can play one’s first few games that way (if one wants to score badly and get no extra lives).

It’s only after a little while spent playing the game that the underlying complexity of the gameplay and the significance of the differences from T2K become apparent, and then one can fully appreciate SG for what it is.

It’s also interesting what that chap says about how a part of the game is “learning how to see”. That’s absolutely true. The game forces you to open wide your senses and as I’ve said before I think it’s that which makes it such an efficient “zone game”.

Starting to see some more review scores come in now, 7.5s and 8s seem about the norm (including an 8 from Edge with which I am most happy). Which is fair enough; most reviewers make the perfectly fair point that SG isn’t for everyone, but boy, if it is for you, then you’ll absolutely love it.

It’ll be interesting to see if the good reviews make anyone who’s previously dismissed the game out of hand take a second look.

It’s a valid point I think that some people have mentioned that maybe the tutorial mode could have been a bit more extensive. I think part of the problem isn’t so much that SG is overly complex - really, it isn’t - it’s more that the look of it leads people to expect one thing and in fact the tutorial needs not only to teach how the game works, but also lead people away from how they think it *ought* to work upon first glance.

Next time out we’ll put extra work into the tutorial mode. The underlying design of the next game is just as richly complex and rewarding as SG, and I wouldn’t want people to miss out on enjoying it due to an overly sparse tutorial mode.

(Although I still maintain that all you need to know to understand the giraffe is actually there in the tutorial, and that if someone doesn’t get it first time round, just play through the tutorial a few times until you do).

But if we can make the process easier next time around, then we will.

Message To Dissenters: Man Up and Grow a Pair - Yak

So pretty much as expected Space Giraffe has split public opinion pretty decisively. There doesn’t seem to be an awful lot of middle ground. Those who don’t like it really don’t like it (cue lots of whinging about the colours and headaches and seizures and what have you). I guess some people are oversensitive to colours and trippy visuals and such a game will never be for them.

Those who like the game are, as I’d hoped, pretty much universally absolutely loving it. They are finding out for themselves that underneath the trippy, Tempestuous exterior there lurks a game of surprising subtlety and complexity. There’s been a bit of discussion on the Llamasoft forums about this - apparently some people are put off by the fact that the game isn’t incredibly fluffy and easy right from the start, and that in fact a bit of effort is needed if one is to understand how things work and how to play properly. Back in the day discovering the nuances of an arcade game was part of the journey to mastery. You learned the basics from the label on the cabinet and the brief attract mode, but you learned the elite skills through exploration and experimentation, and also by watching and learning from other gamers.

Nowadays it seems that players expect every little detail spoon-fed to them in excruciating detail by enormous great handholding tutorial modes, and even though SG does contain a tutorial mode, a couple of goes of of which should be enough to teach any reasonably sentient individual the basics of the game, it seems that some people feel that the game requires altogether too much thinking, one website describing the experience of playing as being like trying to do sudoku under slightly unusual and stressful conditions.

This engendered the following rather eloquent retort from an experienced giraffeologist at the forum (warning: contains Language, do not read before 10pm and not at all on Sundays)

What is wrong with these fuckers? Has everyone suddenly turned into the kind of young fogeys who whine about the music being too loud and the colours being too bright and it’s all crash, crash, crash and you can’t hear the words/see what’s going on?

Boil down some of the criticism I’ve heard and it more or less translates as, “I don’t like this game because this game isn’t like the other games that I know and feel comfortable with.”

I like a bit of discomfort, a bit of brutality - something to push against, something that sets my adrenaline fizzing and gets me fighting - against the game/designers (for survival) and against myself (to see how far I dare push it for risk/reward).

Otherwise - yeah - it’s all fucking digital sudoku - settle into the medium-difficulty cosy-seat, follow the mission-cue arrows, tick off the achievements…

Sure, Space Giraffe isn’t an instant, easy pleasure that holds your ickle hand and guides you through, pointing out the pretty scenery and providing a wide range of demographically-catered refreshments. But neither is it wilfully obtuse. It just requires a bit of gall and guile.

It’s highly abstract and encourages an expressive, improvised approach - but that doesn’t mean there isn’t a clarity of thought and design thrumming away beneath the psychedelic surface.

As Giles implied, it’s a vision - not committee-designed. As such, it feels edgy and propulsive - like something that shouldn’t really be allowed to exist, like something that’s getting away with it.

And in a gaming culture of soulless, steady, sales-projected franchise-fodder, that’s got to be a good thing, right?

In other words, stop whining, sit down, shut up, pick up the controller, man up and GROW A PAIR!

Seriously though, I think we’re doing well so far. Critical response is actually pretty much what we’ve expected, ranging from the “ok this is a bit odd and I don’t think I get it” school (from which came the sudoku idea mentioned above) to the “oh wow this is the best game for years” type of thing that I shan’t belabour on account of it being my trumpet };-). What is certain is that everyone who does persevere with the tutorial mode and begins to get a feel for the gameplay then tends to become absolutely addicted to it. There’s quite a lot of happy gamers out there so far and I guess that’s the point really, and it’s made me grin to hear from them how much fun they are having.

Oh, and many thanks to everyone who’s messaged me on Xbox Live, for a while there last night we were getting incoming messages every few minutes and there is no way I could possibly respond to them all (especially using a joypad to compose the messages, I’d still be there now if I’d tried to do that). We appreciate the feedback and we are happy to hear that you are enjoying the game.

Elsewhere I’ve had one ex-games-journo castigating me for daring to put a hi-score on my own game’s hi-score table. When SG launched the first thing I did was download it and play a game to the best of my abilities to get onto the score table. As it turned out I posted a pretty good score, completing the game from start in a marathon session that took about three hours, in fact the first time I’d ever done that. It was a deeply flawed game, though, by no means a perfect run, and I lost many a Bonus Multiplier and just managed to limp over the finish line with my last life. It was a fair score, and hard-won, yet this guy chose to castigate me for posting it. I don’t even think it’ll stand for that long, I am sure other players will catch up before too long (when Tempest 2000 came out on the Jaguar my score was beaten inside a week, and in fact the guy who beat me on that occasion is even now climbing the Space Giraffe leaderboard). The truth is I made Space Giraffe not only to sell but also to *play*, and I’m not going to abstain from playing it. It’s not like I can fill the leaderboards with “me me me me me”, since however well you do you only take one slot.

Anyway I’m not going to be zealously defending my #1 position, it was set as an example and an encouragement for others really, and apart from aforementioned ex-journo nobody’s been upset about it. In the meanwhile I’ve been using Super Ox Mode to build up my early start bonuses. I have a level 12 restart bonus at 49.5 million now.

And if you haven’t done so yet, download Space Giraffe and give it a try. It’s like Marmite. You won’t know unless you try };-).

Thanks to everyone sending messages. - Giles

I wish to thank anyone sending messages on XBLA

It’s lovely to see so many people enjoying the game and that’s really all about to see that we have done something that people has FUN to play

I try to answer to all messages I can but please don’t feel offended/afraid if you won’t be answered immediately also, please DO NOT feel bad if I can’t add you to my friends list .. I simply can’t only because it’s already full and I can’t add more to it :/

I know some people are going to spank my arse pretty soon and bring my score down .. but well .. you need something to aim to huh ?

“Best suprise of the day” I can say I had it from Japan .. let’s say from someone that prefers to remain un-named

I hope to see some more Japanese people in the leaderboards .. “show us what you can do with the giraffe”

woohoo }:-D - Yak

well that was exceptionally fun }:-D.

Couldn’t really sleep that well last night, so got up early this morning, couple of hours before launch. Was there ready and waiting to download when it became available at 9am. Downloaded and played one game to make my mark on the leaderboard. It ended up being the first time I’ve ever managed to start at level 1 and play all the way through to finish at level 100. I *just* made it, limping over the finish line on my last life. And it’s hugely far from being a perfect game, i made many mistakes and lost many a multiplier on the way. I’m #1 for now but I don’t expect that to last more than a few days if I’m lucky. There’s some crazy awesome gamers out there…

Really pleased with the initial response. As expected not everyone’s liked it and there’s been the odd lukewarm review (but fairly so, unlike some others). But there’s been a hell of a lot more “hell yeah, that’s absolutely lovely” type feedback and I’m really happy to see that. Making a game like this is a bit like making a Vindaloo - not everyone likes a Vindaloo but if those that do are telling you it’s the nicest curry they’ve had then you’re happy }:-).

We launched at 9am and we now have just over 1100 registered users on the leaderboards by 3.30pm, pretty good for a midweek day I reckon! Really interesting watching the story unfold in realtime. Generally just really chuffed with today and how it’s all going so far }:-).

Looking forward to getting my @rse kicked in the leaderboards now, I just know it won’t be that long!

Many thanks to everyone who’s left us encouraging comments here and elsewhere - we are just happy that you are happy }:-). We hope you have many enjoyable hours’ giraffing ahead of you!

bit more giraffe before bedtime - Yak

See you on the leaderboards tomorrow }:-).

Bit more giraffeology

“Space Giraffe is an evolution of the tube shooter, but it’s a huge one – if Tempest 2000 represents the difference between a caveman and a caveman with fire, Space Giraffe is the difference between a caveman and Ben Affleck.” - Yak

HAHA. Awesome.

BRING IT }:-D.

Finally time to party and chill … - Giles

And there we are then

Can’t wait to download it myself into my xbox at 22th .. oh dear is going to be “one of those nights” *grin* SO waiting for that since so many months.

Enjoy the game, download the demo, try it and make your own minds