Thanks for supporting me for 8+ years Glorious Trainwrecks!!

About the Game

"Ruff & Ravi Defeat the Plutonian Vampires". A new adventure and narrative collection, coming straight to your computer screen!

Ruff the dog, boyfriend to the famous Binky of the Binky series, gets to star in his own digital game, for the first* time! In it, you will guide him and his new friend Ravi the rat to save Pluto from failed comedian Dracula! Can you make it through 12 levels of easy to moderately complicated puzzles?

Meanwhile, in real life, watch Ruff the dog and Ravi the rat star in their own cinematic series of cutscenes! In them, you will watch Ruff and Ravi try to unravel the mysteries of Pluto, the rat planet, to defeat Dracula! Can they learn the mysteries of the Cookie of Power, before it's too late?

Only you could possibly figure out these puzzles and plot resolutions, by playing Ruff & Ravi Defeat the Plutonian Vampires...

* it might not be the first time I'm not sure actually.

Getting Started

Launch "Ruff and Ravi.exe" to begin playing.

The game automatically saves any changes to your settings, but level/cutscene progress is not saved. However, every level and cutscene is available from the start, from the "Scene Select" option available from the main menu. Have fun!

Linux Support

Ruff & Ravi has been completely playtested on Ubuntu using WINE!

A couple known issues are detailed here:

If you are using 64-bit Linux, and the game starts without any sound, you might be missing 32-bit libraries for your default sound device. As a common example, if your setup is PulseAudio on 64-bit Debian/Ubuntu, you can install 32-bit libraries using the apt-get utility: apt-get install libpulse0:i386

During playtesting, cutscenes have been occasionally found unresponsive. If this happens, you'll have to close the application and re-open it. However, you can go straight back to the cutscene using the "Scene Select" page.

More Information

Further instructions can be found from the in-game hints, as well as "CONTROLS.txt" in the game download. You can also read "letter.txt" for my personal discussion of the game, and "credits.txt" to see what all made the game possible! You can check your current game version and what changes have been made in "changelog.txt".

I MADE GAMES!

You take a gander acrosz the ocean

Judging by the name, it looks like it is. Why was this put here, exactly?

YOU ARE A LONE TANKMAN.
YOU MUST NAVIGATE THROUGH THE MINEFIELD AND HOPE TO MAKE IT THROUGH.

ARE YOU UP FOR THE CHALLENGE?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HlybWrhW-48
inspired by this

You, the Golden Knight, must rescue the Pixel Princess from the clutches of the evil Red Guard. They have built a cunning maze to protect the princess from the grubby paws of Knights (of any color, for that matter). Will you succeed, with the help of magic Potions hidden in the maze...?

( The Red Guard's War Drums are CC BY-NC-ND 3.0, so be prepared oh valiant Knight! Lore says it was contrived by a wizard of sorts, http://producersnafu.bandcamp.com/ )

And Then, The Ghost Saw Hands: A Game I've Never Played is quite literally, a game ive never played. Basically, right now I'm up in the mountains with some friends nowhere near my computer. I thoight id miss out on kotm 50 but thanks to the marvels of modern technology and an app called LogMeIn, I can use my compiter remotely thru my phone! however, this is not an ideal solution. Everything is slow and painful and even typing is practically impossible. I put together this entire game thru my iphone and have not played it. Im banking on everything working properly, sorry if it doesnt work at all. I cant even hear sounds so i just plucked stuff put of the windows media folder, hope you like system sounds. Looking foreard to tryin the game for myself tonoght when i get home, and playin your games too!!! (can barel fucking typr sorry for typos)

So my son turned one year old yesterday! We got him a videogame console for babies.

Now I dare you to look at that thing and not immediately think "Baby Pop'n Music." It is obvious that the giggly Baby Einstein "smartridges" (Seriously! That's what they call them!) are only of limited interest. I'd originally thought that it might be interesting to write software directly for the unit, but it soon became clear that I would have to do a LOT of reverse engineering work -- something I don't have the time or experience to do properly before my son grows out of the thing.

Then I realized that the interesting thing is not the system itself, but the controller. The controller is a very simple IR transmitter, like a remote control. And you can pick up IR receivers for PCs for under $10 on eBay.

So if I pick one of these things up, and write a simple program to convert these IR signals to keystrokes, I could very well make videogames for my 1-year-old son in Klik & Play. For that matter, so could all of you! Kirk just DID!

You guys, you have no idea how exciting it is to think that you could make toys for your child that aren't obnoxious. Every toy on the market has a sound chip in it that talks to my son in a sing-song voice about how fun counting is, and about how fun the alphabet is, and about how fun opposites are, and about how fun manners are. They repeat themselves endlessly. They stunt the imagination. Some of them even tell my son they love him. I have inanimate objects in my house that tell my son they love him!

I can do better. This is my next project.

Some notes about how I decided to restrict (for the moment) the scope of my game to the point of view of USA in the 1980′s.

Historical data VS historical process

In his book about Balance of Power, Chris Crawford states that “data is not the main element in realism - process is. […] The actual amount of GNP of Ghana is less important, for the purposes of a game on geopolitics, than the manner in which GNP changes with time”. Crawford’s game is all about depicting the global mechanics of superpower competition in the cold war era. He mainly intends to make a point about the dangers of warmongering, taking a pacifist stance that he feels is needed in the context of the 80′s.

The opposition drawn by Crawford between data (historical facts at time T) and processes (dynamics applied to this data) is problematic when we come to terms with its practical applications in game design. Since he is not aware of the imminence of the USSR collapse, Crawford sets up a game running from 1985 (the then-present time) to 1997. He makes the statement that “the principles [of geopolitical interaction] have not changed fundamentally since the introduction of the nuclear-tipped ICBM”. This also leads him to claim that his game system could relevantly depict former periods of the cold war, for example the 60′s. According to him, to do this, only the data would need to be adapted, while the game’s processes would stay relevant.

Cautiously restricting my game’s historical scope

When I started developing Reagan Years, I intended to create a modern version of Balance of Power, introducing only minor changes in the game’s data and in the user interface. I immediately realized that the historical scope of the game would need to be redefined. It would be odd for a modern game to depict a USA-vs-USSR competition running till 1997. I therefore started to consider other relevant periods of the cold war. However, going through this preliminary process of selection has led me to question Crawford’s assumptions on the permanence of geopolitical principles through the entire 1945-1990 period.

Here are some of the questions I ask myself at this stage: isn’t Balance Of Power a reflection on the USA international policies during the 80′s, rather than a depiction of global dynamics for a near-50 years period ? Is it historically relevant to consider that USA and USSR geopolitical points of view were symetrically opposed, like those of two chess players? Had this game been designed in USSR during the 80′s, what kind of global dynamics would it have depicted? And if today’s mainstream depictions of this era are all about USSR-USA competition, is it because the accuracy of such a model, or merely because history is written by powerful dominant powers?

It will take a lot of research and thinking before I finally adopt a satisfying stance on these questions and find a way to reflect this stance in my game’s design. Meanwhile, it seems safer to restrict the scope on which the historical principles of my game apply. Therefore, I have decided that the game will only depict the years of Ronald Reagan presidency (1981-1989), and that it will only depict the point of view of the USA. This will apply until I have the safe feeling that my game’s dynamics can relevantly apply to other countries and eras.

Mystery Island is a small to medium level with flowers and dragonflies. Getting all the items is tricky, and the overall skill is hard.