Most creative use of a Game Boy in here! It controls a bunch of self-made strange hardware devices that build something like a “Pocket Disco”. Don’t mind the slightly boring made video, because the project is awesome.
The Game Boy controls the evidently self-made hardware-stuff. There is a camera, a light and some rotating stuff, that is controlled by a sequencer and where you can put own objects on it. Watch till the end to get the idea. The approach and style is very unique and let your Mad Max dreams come true. Besides the Game Boy project, there’s also a Sega Sequencer. This is the kind of homebrew I want to see more!
Blog - Date published: October 12, 2007 | Comments Off
The Rozzbox is a very interesting music device. Not only because of the device itself, but mainly for the story behind it. The Rozzbox is manufactured by L.L. Electronics, an one-man-company that does everything from research to design and constructing. The approach is very personal and you can pre-order upcoming devices now.
Isn’t this a beauty?
L.L. Electronics is based in a small German city, far away from the buzz of the metropolitan cities. Doing this kind of work from the middle of nowhere makes this company even more likable for me. I think the Rozzbox (in German you speak like Rotz-Box, something like “Snot-Box”) will find many warm places in homes of people who from time to time fall in love with their electronic music devices. Manufacturing, design, the open and friendly approach… a very web 2.0 way of working.
Today I present two music shooters – Otocky from 1987 and Le Fonque Vol from 2005. The first game was made by Toshio Iwai, meanwhile well known for his Tenori-On and Electroplankton, the second was made by *ähm* me.
Otocky
Otocky is Toshio Iwai first game-music mixture made in 1987. It’s a side-scrolling shooter, very rare, that was released on the Famicom Disk System which I am even not sure if is is the same as the NES or also something also very rare. (Noticed? We’re in very rare-land.) But thanks to Google, YouTube and the “wisdom of the crowds” there is a gameplay video available. In Otocky you play a spaceship-lookalike rocketman, that shoots on.. hmm.. shapes to get score and change the sounds. On every shoot a new tone is made, shot objects change the tones or the scale the tones are triggered on. The tones are quantized to the beat, shooting is trying to get nice melodies.
The game is an experimental instrument or an instrument for generative music in shape of a game. Whatever it is, it was a very early work on generative music at the experimental edges of videogames. (On the other side all games from the 70ies and 80ies had a somehow experimental touch.) Like all music-toys from Toshio Iwai this game is somehow cool, but also has this unfinished, or let’s call it open, touch that is very unique to all works from him.
This is a list for people who start out making games searching for tools and also meant as an extended list for people that already make games and want to enhance the work flow with cool and clever tools that are somehow different from the mainstream. Let’s add flavor to software development!
Fritzing is a new initiative that wants to bring us a step closer to do-it-yourself made wonderland, like for example Processing did some years ago for creative coding. This projects wants to shorten the development cycle between concept, protoype and realisation of electronic devices and bring people together. The focus is on Electronic Design Automation and I bet some people now cross fingers, because they had equal ideas.
“Fritzing is an open-source initiative to support designers and artists to take the step from physical prototyping to actual product.”
Who makes the most weird and crazy games on this planet? It’s Cactus, and finally he has a more structured website where you can conveniently browse and download all of his games. Cactus not only follows a very innovative approach on making his games in fresh visual styles, but also tries to innovate gameplay and storytelling at the same level. Visit the Cactus Soft Website or directly browse the games.
There was a panel on innovation on indie games at the Independent Games Summit in March this year. The panelists were some of the more interesting people of the moment at indigames: Kyle Gabler who also was on of the guys behind the Experimental Gameplay Project, Jenova Chen, Jon Mak and Jon Blow. Nothing more to say at this point, just have some enjoyable sixty minutes.
