Why downloadables aren't more accessible than physical media
Recently, friend and colleague David Edery wrote a nice feature on Gamasutra about how to make trial versions of downloadable software sell more games. He has some good points, including observations about how a trial shouldn’t just be the beginning of the game nor should it give away enough that a purchase is unnecessary. But there’s something missing from Edery’s… read more
Small, cute, insidious
Note: Chumby representative Andrew “Bunnie” Huang has replied to this thread, and I have in turn replied to his response with more questions. I encourage you to read through all the comments for more detail. Finally, I should point out that I am not an attorney and nothing herein should be considered legal advice. Chumby is a WiFi-connected microcomputer that… read more
Built-in DVD players forbid screen captures with software constraint
Recently, I had the need to capture a still from a DVD a Persuasive Games client had sent over as guidelines for some game assets. I didn’t want to rip the whole DVD, so I went to use the built-in screen capture facility in Apple OS X: the old standby Command-Shift-3. I was surprised to see the following result. The… read more
Musings after several months of use, as I prepare to start the semester
This spring, I created an account on Facebook. I’m a web 2.0 cynic (and a cynic in general), so this surprised some of my friends and colleagues. But I was encouraged by so many of them, I wanted to give it a try. For example, Ian McCarthy just wanted an easier way to share pictures with me without having to… read more
Reflections on making books that work more like software
What I have in mind is not much different from Raymond Queneau’s Cent mille milliards de poèmes, a configurative sonnet of 1014 possible configurations. Queneau’s composition is a bit too configurative for my purposes, but the principle is instructive. What if we could take core principles of an argument like the one I make in Unit Operations and offer different… read more
The openness of web applications demonstrates the real treachery of the iPhone's closed platform
This is the first in a series of short editorials on the iPhone, which I’ll be writing occasionally. Now that the geekqueues of iDay have come and gone, perhaps we can start talking more seriously about the device without all the fanboy ardor. For some of us who have not (yet) adopted the iPhone, one major disappointment is its status… read more
The Expressive Power of Videogames
This book is available in digital or physical format. Buy from Amazon A book about how videogames make arguments: rhetoric, computing, politics, advertising, learning. Videogames are both an expressive medium and a persuasive medium; they represent how real and imagined systems work, and they invite players to interact with those systems and form judgments about them. In this innovative analysis,… read more
Software that makes it easier to make Atari games on your Mac
Download forMac OS X Leopard, Xcode 3.1 60 kb – Mac OS X 10.5 Download forMac OS X Leopard, Xcode 3.0 56 kb – Mac OS X 10.5 Download forMac OS X Tiger 69 kb – Mac OS X 10.4 Don’t you wish programming Atari VCS games on OS X was easier? I’m sure it’s a question that keeps you… read more
Free software to make Aperture understand your M8, and to automate imports
Download for Mac OS X 152 kb – Mac OS X 10.4+ Apple Aperture is a digital photography post-production tool for Mac. Apple bills it as a professional-grade product on par with Final Cut for video or Logic Pro for audio. Digital camera technology advances quickly, espeically at the high end of the market where Aperture is supposed to complete.… read more
A performance of Wandering Rocks on Twitter, and a commentary on both. Created with Ian McCarthy.
I do not like Twitter, the micro-blogging service that allows users to send short (SMS-sized) text-based updates that are displayed publicly and shared with friends social-network style.