Gladiator is a lot of fun and it’s nice to play an updated throwback to the classic MS-DOS days. However, the video game market is not quite so nice!
The OUYA represents a change to the way games are discovered by players. The traditional method of finding games in the local brick & mortar shop or even the recent way that Google Play and the iOS App Store interface with the user are not proper solutions to the modern problem of finding the right game/app for you.
I’d love to say that the OUYA has the answer, but it’s not there yet. There’s promise though. One promising feature is the Sandbox. The Sandbox is where all new games go on OUYA. It prevents the store from being overrun by tons of junk, which is great. The issue is that the games that stay in the Sandbox for a little while end up having their own discoverability problems. That’s where Gladiator is now.
Considering that, we’re making Gladiator available for free now on the OUYA, the best place to play this kind of 4-player co-op game. If all we get out of this is that more people get to play this game, then that’s a job well done! We hope you’ll help us spread the word so that the community of this great gaming classic will continue to grow.
I totally pressed that publish button!
Seriously though, it’s a big deal. Gladiator is now officially on the OUYA! If you happen to have one of these nice $99 microconsoles, you can find our latest game in the Sandbox.
Now the trouble is getting out of the Sandbox! We’re working on spreading the word about this great classic game so it will be more discoverable in the storefront.
Tomorrow is the release day for Gladiator! Woo! A lot has gone into the code to get it ready, but it’s finally there.
I’m looking through the changelog and it’s pretty crazy. I spent a lot of time making a whole new level editor, but in order to do that, I had to refactor a ton of data structures to hold character, level, and campaign info. New features came in that changed the feel of the game in several positive ways. The player is given much more information both in and out of combat so they can control their team more effectively and track and enjoy the team’s progress. And of course, real controller integration on OUYA is sweet. Overall, at least a hundred bugs were squashed, and I think I only made 80% of them! 😀
So, it’s nice to bring the Openglad project to this point. I love playing it on OUYA with my kids and I really hope it catches on with a significant audience. I’m just waiting for another approval of this latest version to be put into the OUYA market (Discover), then we should be seeing it live tomorrow!
Lately, as I’ve gotten the time, I’ve been pounding away at Gladiator (Openglad), a cool retro action RPG that I loved as a kid. It’s amazing that after all these years (um, 18 since the original release?), I can pick up the code and improve the game I played so much so long ago.
I released a version on Google Play, the Amazon Appstore, and the NOOK Store. I have been working on a new level editor for a bit. It’s incredibly improved from the old one; it feels much better to use and has more features. Best of all, it is now integrated into the game itself. I’ll be releasing an update to the Android version that includes the level editor. Also, there are plans to include a sharing system so you can create and share your own levels and campaigns as well as download and rate ones that other people make.
Another bit of news is that I bought an OUYA! Incidentally, that also means I’m working on the OUYA port of Gladiator… Yeah, it’s pretty awesome with 4 players smashing around on a big TV. The downside to mobile Android really is the lack of local multiplayer, so I’m really pleased to have the OUYA as an outlet for the PvP and cooperative multiplayer experiences that I love. OUYA porting is mostly controller integration work, which can get hairy when it comes to menus, but it’s already working well. I have a few more details to smooth out, then it’ll be go time.
Tags: action, co-op, games, Gladiator, multiplayer, Openglad, OUYA, RPG