After a long time, Sapphire Blood Studio now has a new team. All of us are in the same city (Bangkok, Thailand) and are majoring in the Bachelor's Degree in Computer Science.

Here's the small team:

Joewoof (Dawit Thepchatree) - Graphic Artist

ParadoxEquation (Akaraphan Janetheerapong) - Programmer

APCLdx (Apiwit Rojvanich) - Music Artist

Paradox just recently joined 64Digits. If you haven't already, you should go check out his user page HERE. He's fiercely working on a fangame for a flying shooter, Ojamajo Shoot. He actually emailed the maker of that original game and obtained the permission to use all his graphics. This new fangame is titled Ojamajo Shoot 2: Vindictive Spirits. I think the name sounds a little weird, but whatever. :P

APCLdx is a master lurker. Unlike me and Paradox, he isn't interested in game development as a career, but he does have some skill in MIDI composing and is willing to share that talent with us. :)

Anyway, our main project right now is titled, "The Chained Sky". It is a mish-mash of old works that Paradox and I kept for a long time. The story will be a medieval adaptation of a modern story by Paradox, called "Limited Sovereignty". It's going to be polished and re-woven with a plot, along with more refined themes.

For its graphics and gameplay, there is already quite a bit of work done. As I just said, we're reusing many old works for this game. The main tilesets are already completed. The battle interface is also almost done. The battle system engine itself is half-completed. These assets were originally intended for Sapphire Blood Studios Parody, which is a comedy based on the melodramatic conflicts within the old team.

If you remember my first blog entry, I already mentioned that we may create a new game on top of these old materials.

"The Chained Sky" will be a traditional RPG with not-so-traditional innovations. The battle system draws its inspiration from certain elements within the wrongfully-infamous Unlimited Saga. The story, however, is all based on Paradox's original ideas.

Despite having so much work done already, we're going to follow our motto of "Diligent Patience". The design process is going to take AT LEAST 3 months. Creating the game itself will take about as long. This isn't an ambitious project, but we want to create something that is decent and passable. You can think of "The Chained Sky" as a practice project for other planned masterpieces, including revisiting "VouSei Tactics" and the divine, tarot-like, fate-based card game, "Seraphic Secant".

However, who knows? That may change. If we're good enough, we may turn "The Chained Sky" into a full-fledged RPG.

We're using BaseCamp as our online organizer. It's a powerful, free service that I personally reccomend to any team. Check it out at www.basecamphq.com.

As we're designing "The Chained Sky", we'll still be working on our personal projects. I don't think I can finish "VouSei Advent" within these 3 months, but I should hopefully be able to get a beta demo out.

"VouSei Advent" is getting scary. So far, this thing have taken 2.5 years, since I started the project. Of course, I only really spent 4 solid-months on it in all that time, since I had to deal with VouSei Tactics (the failed project of the old team) for one and a half years.

I hope to completely finish "One" though. College work is getting nasty though. I have about 4 papers to write up and numerous other research assignments to do. I'm barely keeping track of them all, so I've postponed the planned release of "One" back a full month (I originally planned to finish it by the end of this month).

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About "Tolerance"

I'm really surprised that a number of people enjoyed playing Tolerance. I wasn't expecting much, because it is the fruit of my frustration with not finishing a game in 2.5 years with GameMaker. Yeah, I made it within just 4-hours.

My productivity should hopefully pick up though. "One" should take 2-months maximum to produce. I was unrealistically optimistic when I said that it's going to take only 2 weeks. Programming a card game is incredibly harder than it seems. Add an AI system into that, and I'm starting to choke before even doing it already.

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Rant

I believe that the reason why many people rely on expensive software instead of using freeware is because of the lack of publicity, ignorance and greed.

Developers of freeware obviously can't advertise. The reason is that advertising needs money and they are not earning any profit to begin with, in most cases.

Many people also cast aside freeware, with the groundless belief that must suck, since they're free. For YEARS, computer magazines are unanimous in their voices, saying that freeware programs are just as good. Regardless, people still ignore these words of wisdom.

Finally, since commercialware are indeed funded, they often are 10-20% better, but cost infinitely higher. The funny thing is… most of those 10-20% are beyond what is truly needed. Still, many people are too greedy to settle with what is most practical, but instead want the best of the best, without good consideration.

And for those that illegally use commercialware on the grounds that they are rebelling against big companies, why not do something positive and support the Open Source movement instead, since it achieves the same goal in a better, more constructive way?

Freeware

+ completely free

+ less filesize

+ all easily downloadable off the Internet (less filesize)

+ generally more user-friendly due to simplicity

+ some perform better than commercial counterparts

+ negates any justification for illegally downloading and using commercialware

- legal restrictions, often limited only to home/personal use ("open source" freeware are exceptions)

- not advertised (less publicity = less acceptance, despite superior quality or usability)

- for one great freeware, there are several poor ones

Commercialware

+ more features

- unneeded features that perform less effectively than specialistic freeware programs

- incredibly high price

- excessively large filesize - takes up more memory and HD space

= reliability is equal - They just want you to believe that commercialware are more stable, through marketing schemes. It can be argued that money = higher quality. However, open source software has the compensation of having communities of several dedicated people helping to improve the software (the source is publicly available anyway).

= functionality is equal - There is a freeware for everything, including antivirus (www.avast.com), firewall (www.zonealarm.com) and photoshop (www.gimp.org). These freeware are just about as good as their commercial counterparts.

- - -

My Reccomended Freeware

OS - http://www.linux.com/

Antivirus - http://www.avast.com/

Antispyware - http://www.lavasoftusa.com/software/adaware/

Firewall - http://www.zonealarm.com/

Photoshop - http://www.gimp.org/

Image Viewer & Screenshot Taker - http://www.irfanview.com/

Sound Editor & MP3 Convertor - http://audacity.sourceforge.net/

Icon Creator - http://www.conware-pro.com/products/ia/about.php

Office Suite - http://www.openoffice.org/

Webmaking Software - http://www.nvu.com/index.html

FTP Software - http://www.smartftp.com/

C++ IDE/Compiler - http://sourceforge.net/projects/dev-cpp/

Web Browser - http://www.mozilla.com/firefox/

RSS/XML Reader - http://www.feedreader.com/

Media Player - http://www.winamp.com/

Download Accelerator & Manager - http://www.flashget.com/

CD Burner - http://www.videohelp.com/tools?tool=CDBurnerXP_Pro

IM Integrator - http://gaim.sourceforge.net/

Music Creator - http://sourceforge.net/projects/psycle/ (haven't tried this one yet, but they say that it's good)

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About Card Games

Do you like a good, original card game? These are very few in GameMaker. In fact, the only one completed game I know of is "Pyramid".

I'm just wondering if there are eager players wanting to try one.

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About the 64Digits MMORPG

I'm glad that the craze is silenced. It sure was annoying when people posted pointless blogs about it.

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About Tarot Cards

I'm talking about the ones that tell you about your fortune. I used to be a skeptic, but after I actually had a friend tell about my future, I was extremely shaken… and well… shocked.

For all you skeptics out there, I must say that you are ignorant unless you actually tried it out with a decent practitioner.

I was actually a little frightened, because although I was nonchalant about the whole process, the cards are, as much as I know, perfectly correct.

It tells of my recent past, my present situation and my near future. Although I really can't say much about the future part, the past and present are not just convincing, but they nailed the point.

I don't reccomend anyone to try it, because it is not easy to learn that although fate is in your control, it is indeed an extremely strong force. For example, if I never decided to try the tarot cards, I may continue to be ignorant that 100% of my fate is in my hands. It's probably about 50%, as half of who you are is already determined by your DNA. A fourth is determined by your society. Only the last fourth is determined by your decisions, but indeed, a fourth is a large slice of you.

I'm still not fully certain about this deal with fate, but after this experience, I believe that denying accurate horoscopes and tarot cards, without actually ever taking them seriously, is being ignorant.

That spiritual message in The Matrix is actually not all fictional. Remember what the Oracle said? "You've already made the choice; you only have to understand it." It is a positive message for those that firmly believe that their future is not in their control.

Of course, IF those cards are indeed true, learning about your fortunes is one thing, but dependence on them is foolish. When you come down to it, it's all about making the right choices, or understanding why you made them. In other words, no matter what the case may be, it's all about you.