Category Archives: indie game

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JoshProd’s 2018 Dreamcast Game Slate

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JoshProd has been a driving force for Dreamcast indie games for the past couple of years. They’re continuing that trend with a new slate of Dreamcast games shipping later this summer:

  • Flashback 2: Fade to Black: This is the sequel to Flashback, which JoshProd released on Dreamcast last year.Fade to Black is presented in first-person as opposed to the third-person presentation of the original.It originally released in 1995 on DOS, takes place 50 years after Flashback. An alien race named the Morphs have taken over Earth, and Conrad Hart must once again save Earth from the alien menace.
  • The Escapee: Originally known as onEscapee, this game is an action-adventure platformer along the lines of Another World or Flashback, which are both titles for which JoshProd is also the publisher on Dreamcast.When the first aliens landed on Earth, they ushered in new civilizations, however, able-bodied men disappeared around the same time. Now Daniel White has to traverse alien locations, fight alien creatures, and help the few other human escapees he discovered to survive.
  • Battle Crust: This game is a vertical scrolling shooting game by Picorinne Soft.The game is described as a vertical shooter in the vein of games from the 80’s and 90’s arcade era. As with many games in this genre, there are both normal shots and the high-powered charge-shots. In addition, charge-shots can also be used for defense.
  • Bang² Busters: Also known as Bang Bang Busters, this game was originally an unreleased platformer by Visco, until it became one of the first games published by JoshProd under their former name, Neo Conception International.The game is a platformer along the lines of Bubble Bobble or Snow Bros. Neo Conception International gained the rights to publish the game shortly after their formation in 2010. It was released for the Neo Geo AES in 2010, for the MVS in 2011, and for the Neo Geo CD in 2012. And now it will be coming to the Dreamcast.
  • Another World HD: This game is the high definition version of Another World, the action-adventure platformer that the original designer, Eric Chahi allowed myself and GPF to release for free in 2005.Another World, known as Out of this World in North America and Outer World in Japan, is an influential cinematic platforming adventure game. JoshProd’s commercial version for the Dreamcast will be optimized for high definition televisions.

All five games are available to pre-order now from RushOnGame.

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DreamCon 2007

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The 2007 DreamCon convention will be held by Curt Grymala of DC Evolution at Magfest 5 on January 4th, January 5th, January 6th and January 7th in Vienna, Virginia.

This time DreamCon will be integrated right into the convention, with several tournaments. Saturday’s tournament was Cool Herders, with the prize being copies of some of DC Evolution’s images, complete with labels and cover art. Sunday’s tournament was Feet of Fury, with the prize being a Dreamcast with all of the hookups, a Playstation controller adapter (so a Playstation dance mat could be hooked up), and a copy of Feet of Fury.

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3rd Annual Dream On Contest Results

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Seeing as it’s now 10PM GMT, I’m going to close the submissions for the contest. The entries are:

Professional Game:
1) Dynamite Dreams by patbier and poche
2) Feuer Frei by qatmix/Project Firestorm

Minigame:
1) RacerDC by Imerion
2) RACE Neo Geo Pocket Color emulator port by GPF

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DreamCon 2006 Part 2

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The second location of this year’s show will be at the Midwest Gaming Classic 2006, held from June 3rd to June 4th, 2006, returning after a year in hiatus. Exhibiting at the event will be DCSteve and Tommy Watson, who will be representing BOR Revolution, a site dedicated to showcasing games using the engines from Senile Team.

I will also once again be exhibiting at the event, representing Screamcast, Cydoca Entertainment, and Dreamcast-Scene. Dan Loosen from The GOAT Store is going to announce new games for the Dreamcast at the show. In addition, new information will be revealed about GOAT Games and DCastle.

Several games featuring the Beats of Rage engine were showcased, and a new video for Age of the Beast was shown. In addition, videos were shown for Blocks2, and screenshots were shown for Grizzlies: Forest Prelude and BurgerDC will once again be playable at the show. The Dream On contest winners, Dynamite Dreams and Feuer Frei, will also be shown for the first time.

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DreamCon 2006 Part 1

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This year, it’s been decided that the Dream On convention will be held at multiple locations.

The first stop of DreamCon 2006 will be held at Magfest 4 on January 13th, January 14th, and January 15th in Charlottesville, Virginia. As with the last DreamCon, a new playable GOAT Store Publishing game will be presented, only this time it was the first time the public will get a glimpse at the game. A demo of GOAT Games will be presented for the first time at the show.

Curt Grymala, representing DC Evolution and DCHelp will return with the “burning station” setup from the last year and will have new compilations to hand out to the convention attendees.

I will represent The GOAT Store, Dreamcast-Scene, and Cydoca Entertainment. Playable versions of Feet of Fury, Maqiupai, Inhabitants, Cool Herders, and the unlicensed Korean Dream Para Para will be available.

This year Screamcast will be represented at this convention by quzar. Screamcast will have Grizzlies: Forest Prelude and BurgerDC on show.

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Society of the Eternal Rulers

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Cyberdog Castle is 10 years old. It started in 1995 as the Cyberdog Castle BBS.

Society of the Eternal Rulers (SOTER) was released in 1997. It was a BBS Door Game. It was set up similarly to the classic door game Legend Of the Red Dragon (LORD) – you log in, choose a sex, then get transported to a menu with choices. The fighting was the same as LORD – you choose to fight – and a random battle or event occurs based on your skill level. The storyline of my game was that you are a young mortal, who stumbles upon an old cave. Inside you learn that the planet is really run by a group of immortals. After you learn of this, you are sentenced to death as no mortal is supposed to know the truth. You survive the attack, unscathed. The immortal elders decide to let you prove yourself in a series of tests, and if you are successful, you will be granted immortality. That’s where the differences come in. Each battle is among a mortal. As you advance, you fight stronger mortals. Your final battle is against an immortal. When you defeat the immortal, you are granted immortality, and you are allowed to govern the rules of the lesser players. Some things could be changed individually, others by a vote. You could also sneak past the great elder and perform terrible feats, such as giving yourself a huge amount of money, or killing a mortal player. These acts had grave consequences if you were caught – the elder would sentence you back to mortality. The immortals could also vote to send someone back to mortality. Once you proved yourself after that, you were free from vote until you were somehow turned mortal again. SOTER is currently being remade as a modern RPG.

To commemorate this occasion, I am going to remake the game that started it all. Society of the Eternal Rulers will be an RPG using many of the elements of the original door game. As with almost all of my games, this will be a co-collaboration with Screamcast.

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Feet of Fury Review

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In 2003, Cryptic Allusion Games made history by releasing the first commercial independent Dreamcast game written with free development libraries.

Release:6/7/03 | Developer:Cryptic Allusion | Publisher:GOAT Store

Feet of Fury is a dancing game that borrows many elements from Konami’s Dance Dance Revolution games. You have a set of arrows that you must follow while keeping your steps to the music. The main difference of Feet of Fury is that the game is focused more on strategy and beating your opponent.

There are power ups and power downs on the board. Hitting an arrow that contains an icon may cause the speed of the arrows to slow down or speed up, or it might cause the arrows to reverse direction. Because of this element, the multiplayer mode in Feet of Fury is awesome. Another addition is the health bar. At the end of the round, the person with the most health is the winner. It adds a lot more to this type of game when you have to worry about your opponent hitting you with power-downs, and throwing your feet around on the dance mat like an idiot, all while trying to keep your health bar full.

The single-player mode is no slouch either. There are a good number of songs to play and unlock. Each song has a good tempo to it and fits this type of game really well. There are a number of hidden characters and features to be unlocked, so the game will entertain for hours.
When you get sick of all that dancing, you can let your fingers do the dancing with what is in my opinion, the coolest thing to happen to dance games since their invention: The Typing of Fury mode. In this mode, letters fly up onscreen instead of arrows, and you use your Dreamcast keyboard to match the letters to the beat while spelling out words. This mode is very challenging, and surprisingly, very fun.

When you add multiple keyboards to the action for some multiplayer mayhem, you’ll see the pure hilarity that ensues. This is a top-notch addition and is a lot less of a gimmick than you might think. Take your underused keyboards from the attic, and set them up for some furious typing. You won’t regret it.

Summary: Good songs, multiplayer battle elements, unlockables, and Typing of Fury make this game a good investment, and an example for future independent developers to follow.

Final Rating: 8/10

Purchase it at http://www.goatstore.com

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DreamCon 2005

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This year, the Midwest Gaming Classic won’t be held, so last year’s Dream On at the Midwest Gaming Classic is now the DreamCon. The convention will be held at the East Coast Gaming Expo on July 25th, 2005 in Reading, Pennsylvania.

As the Midwest Gaming Classic is the usual place for new GOAT Store Publishing games to debut, DreamCon 2005 will feature a playable demo of Cool Herders.

It will also be host to many familiar names from the Dreamcast community. Sam Steele will be present with updated versions of DCSquares and DCBlap. Lawrence Sebald will have updated versions of his RPGs, ljsdcdev and DCRPG on hand. I.M Weasel will have his Macintosh burning tools available. Curt Grymala will represent DC Evolution and DCHelp with a “burning station” and several of DC Evolution’s compilations available on a high-quality CD-R with a laser printed label and booklet with a CD case. I will represent The GOAT Store, Dreamcast-Scene, Screamcast, and Cydoca Entertainment. Playable versions of Grizzlies: Forest Prelude and Feet of Fury will be available. Fackue’s Dreamcast Development discs will also available to anyone who wanted to get into Dreamcast developing.

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Chikugoyaku Will Be Included in GOAT Games Vol. 1

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It’s been a long time. First off, big thanks go to Nemesiscakewafer for the awesome site redesign of Cyberdog Castle’s website. He did an excellent job – much better than what I would have been capable of creating. 🙂

Second, on the status of Chikugoyaku: Chikugoyaku will be included in The Goat Store‘s GOAT (Games of All Types) Compilation Disc #1, which should be out sometime next year.

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2nd Annual Dream On Contest

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The Second Annual Dream On Contest has begun, and this year it’s even bigger than the last! And it’s even bigger than ever thanks to wraggster! The Dream Coding Grand Prix 2005 has merged with Dream On 2 to provide the biggest contest the Dreamcast community has seen so far! The general rules for each contest are as follows: a single entry can be entered into more than one category, if it meets the criteria for each category entered. However, a single entry will not win a prize in more than one category. Also, an existing program may be entered into any tier of the contest, provided that the contest version is significantly different from the last released version. Ports of programs are acceptable, provided the original author gives explicit permission for the program to be entered into the contest. This year, the contest is broken up into four categories:

1) Professional Game Creation – This is the category that was the sole contest last year. Create a polished game for the Dreamcast (multiple levels of play, title screen, music, high scores, etc.) to be released commercially. The full game can not be publically released for an entry to be considered in this category. A demo can be released at any time. However, the demo has to be significantly different from the contest entry.

2) Amateur Game Creation – This category is to appease the entrants who didn’t meet the criteria for last year’s competition. The entries in this category don’t have to be commercial quality, but they do have to be programmed in C, C++, or SH4 Assembly (SDL or another games library is fine). The game can be released at any time. However, the release must make reference to it being a Dream On Contest entry.

3) Emulator Creation – Create or port an emulator for any system for the Dreamcast. The program can be released at any time. However, the release must make reference to it being a Dream On Contest entry.

4) Anything Goes – This is the fun category. Create anything that isn’t included in the categories above (BOR Mods, Games Created in Fenix, Doom/Quake mods, emulators, ports of existing software (with author’s explicit permission that this be allowed to be entered into the contest), Applications, Multimedia Software, and anything that you can imagine that we hadn’t covered in the above. The program can be released at any time. However, the release must make reference to it being a Dream On Contest entry.

Prizes:

Contest 1:
1st place (and possibly 2nd and 3rd depending on quality)
Game Professionally Published on Pressed CD with color inserts and clear case
All games that aren’t published will be featured in an upcoming issue of Dream On Magazine, and the game(s) will be included on the demo disc.
Other Prizes to be determined

Contest 2:
1st place: Gamepark 32 BLU
2nd place: Game King 2 Console with 3 games
All games will be featured in an upcoming issue of Dream On Magazine, and the game(s) will be included on the demo disc.
Other Prizes to be determined

Contest 3:
1st place: Set of signed Bleem! products – all three Bleem for Dreamcast releases, plus the PC release, signed by Rand Linden.
2nd place: Set of unsigned Bleem! products – all three Bleem for Dreamcast releases, plus the PC release, unsigned.
Other Prizes to be determined

Contest 4:
1st place: Xrom 512MB flash linker kit
2nd place: Game King 2 Console with 3 games
Other Prizes to be determined

Special Prize Donation:
JMD, the author of Maqiupai, has donated a signed copy of Maqiupai to the entry he chooses to receive it.

The contest ends on 11:59PM PST on November 10, 2005.