Evan Walsh

A strange voicemail

Evan Walsh — Sun, 19 May 2013 03:49:41 +0000

I have a Google Voice account that I haven't used in a meaningful way since 2009 or so. Here's a weird voicemail I got on it today.

I went to the beach

Evan Walsh — Sat, 18 May 2013 18:22:37 +0000

It was a pretty good time. A+++ Would Beach Again.

Devlog 07: I'll go back to black

Evan Walsh — Wed, 08 May 2013 17:18:42 +0000

So, I'm doing all the wrong things, but I don't care. I'm just writing my own engine. Because of reasons.

I'm actually learning more about games now then I was before, so that's exciting. I'll post a screenshot once I've actually got some more to show.

Get Hype 5: Attack of the Hype

Evan Walsh — Tue, 07 May 2013 20:30:15 +0000

It's that time again! Time to Get Hype! Here's my fifth playlist of pump-up jams to get your blood juicin' and your body thumpin'.

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Job Interviews: What's the craziest thing you ever said (or did) at an interview and still got the job? - Quora

Evan Walsh — Tue, 07 May 2013 15:38:16 +0000

I'm a sucker for awesome Quora threads. Here's one.

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Rdio Tuesdays

Evan Walsh — Tue, 30 Apr 2013 20:52:59 +0000

I run a blog with my friend Christopher called Rdio Tuesdays. We look at the latest Rdio releases and post their album art. We have a lot of fun.

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New Nero track: "Into The Past"

Evan Walsh — Tue, 23 Apr 2013 18:01:06 +0000

Nero just dropped this massive track from The Great Gatsby and I can't get enough of it. Treat yourself.

Devlog 06: I’m Not Standing Still

Evan Walsh — Mon, 15 Apr 2013 17:02:04 +0000

There have been a few changes in my little world.

The game, up until this point, was written in Lua using the wonderful LÖVE engine. This was great for getting a prototype going, but I felt I was limited by it. The performance just wasn’t there and I was spending a lot of time working around Lua’s restrictions. I come from a very OOP-heavy background, so not having true objects was driving me crazy.

That brings me to the latest TLE update: we’re changing engines! I say we as if there’s someone else working on this. Well, I’m changing engines. Which ones? Angel 2D, of course! You have probably not heard of it, but it’s a fantastic C++ (with Lua scripting) engine headed up by the talented Shane Liesegang. I spent a considerable amount of time thinking about the new direction for TLE and this just feels right. I’ve also been talking with Shane about making some changes to the framework and he’s been very friendly and helpful. This is in contrast to my experiences with a few other engines where I received absolutely zero help with my simple queries. Let’s not dwell on that, though.

I’m excited about the future of TLE. With these new changes, we’ll be able to more easily support features that would have been “nice-to-have, but probably won’t happen”, like controller support and an iOS port (!!!).

The goal is to have an alpha for people before summer is out. Let’s hope I don’t turn out to be a liar.

Devlog 05: I guess that makes me the lucky one

Evan Walsh — Fri, 05 Apr 2013 01:38:59 +0000

So, the big news is that I've purchased a much nicer, much faster computer to develop the game on. The downside is that I need to get the game working on retina displays now, since it looks like a load of feces on them. It's still very exciting, though.

Face front, true believer!

Devlog 04: Actions speak louder

Evan Walsh — Mon, 01 Apr 2013 14:42:14 +0000

Due to reasons beyond my control, I had to suspend development of The Last Error.

That is, until this week.

I'll post again on Thursday. <333

Devlog 03: Prisencolinensinainciusol

Evan Walsh — Sun, 10 Mar 2013 04:53:50 +0000

I wasn't able to work much on TLE this week, but I did do some fun stuff. I added random building outlines, random name generation, and creepy NPCs.

Buildings?

I need to look into more procedural generation techniques, but I've got some basic random building size generation. It takes the base tilesize (and maximum dimensions) and spits out a random building size that I'm currently drawing as a grey box. Fun!

Random names?

NPCs (or Actors, as I refer to them in the game) will be randomly generated. Thus, they need a random name. I've been building up a big ol' file of first and last names that I like. I need to do more work to make it more random and to have less collisions.

Creepy NPCs?

They look at you as you walk around. Why? Because of reasons.

Devlog 02: Love is in the air

Evan Walsh — Sun, 24 Feb 2013 04:16:16 +0000

I am writing the game using LÖVE and it's going quite swimmingly. I've implemented players, bullets, enemies, and I started on lights.

Here are two weird screenshots:

Devlog 01: Say a prayer

Evan Walsh — Sun, 17 Feb 2013 02:06:15 +0000

I've been oscilatting between "I CAN DO THIS" and "I WILL NEVER EVEN START DOING THIS"

Well guess what! I have made progress since I last wrote. Take that!

I've been working on the art style of the game, which shouldn't be such a problem. The main decision was "2D or 3D?" I considered the difficulty of both and what would best serve my vision. I decided upon 2D.

Now, what type of game will this be? I'LL TELL YOU, OK? GEEZ. It'll be a top-down shooter roguelike RPG. Doesn't that sound so totally exciting.

I'll tell you the name next week, yeah? Also, lore details! BOOM.

NEXT-GEN: Used Games, 4K, and Motion Gaming, OH MY! - Casual Friday

Evan Walsh — Mon, 11 Feb 2013 23:57:07 +0000

Here's some Rev3 discussion regarding the next generation of video game consoles. The 4k speculation was quite interesting. Also, the ol' "new consoles won't support used games" thing. This year's gonna be crazy.

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Simmer down now

Evan Walsh — Sun, 10 Feb 2013 02:08:53 +0000

I hinted at a project in my previous post that I'd start writing about and this is me starting to make good on that.

I'm making a video game.

Oh, so original

I know I'm not the first nerdy guy to make a video game and I'm certainly not the last, but this has been a long time coming. Before I wanted to make techs on the Web, I wanted to make video games. I just didn't know enough about programming and art to even begin accomplishing that. I am much older and wiser and stronger and nerdier now. "They are making me stronger and I'm much more stronger now."

About this game, yeah?

Right, the game. Well, I don't want to set any expectations that I will possibly violate in the future. However, I will say it will feature strong narrative elements and potential co-operative gameplay. I'm intensely fascinated by player-created narratives in games that don't explicitly force a story. We'll see how that goes, though.

When will I learn more about this?

I want to write a post every five days or so about this. By stating this in writing, I will undoubtedly not write every five days or so. That's life.

Flip you on the flipside.

I ain't afraid of no ghosts

Evan Walsh — Fri, 18 Jan 2013 18:35:46 +0000

In the past, I've shied away from writing about technical matters. I do write a lot of code at my job and in my off-hours, but I never really tell anyone about what I do. I can't reveal a lot of what I work on at Harvest, but I can write about things I learn that can be abstracted.

My side projects often don't come to fruition due to distraction and lack of motivation. I've started on a project that's very important to me, though. I want to see it to completion and I will do whatever is reasonable to accomplish that. I'll post soon with some starting details.

For now, here's another Rdio playlist: Get Hype 2: The Hype Strikes Back

Get Hype: the Rdio Playlist

Evan Walsh — Wed, 24 Oct 2012 17:57:48 +0000

I love getting hype, so I made a playlist. If you like dance music, dubstep, getting excited, or anything like that, treat yourself.

Minnesota Gives Coursera the Boot, Citing a Decades-Old Law

Evan Walsh — Thu, 18 Oct 2012 22:10:46 +0000

Coursera offers free, online courses to people around the world, but if you live in Minnesota, company officials are urging you to log off or head for the border.

The state’s Office of Higher Education has informed the popular provider of massive open online courses, or MOOC’s, that Coursera is unwelcome in the state because it never got permission to operate there.

Good idea!

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"I have special eyes"

Evan Walsh — Wed, 17 Oct 2012 00:59:04 +0000

I'm a sucker for absurd machinima.

Well then

Evan Walsh — Wed, 17 Oct 2012 00:52:41 +0000

I switched my blog from Jekyll to Squarespace. I was tired of fiddling around. So, here's my effort to get back to what's important. Also, I can link to way more stuff, because posting is less of a chore.

Hurray.