K, here is Podcast #4.  This time we discuss two thrilling game ideas, and then we get into our Top-10 Predictions For The Midcore/Casual/Retro Game Industry.

Also, this podcast marks the first time we bumper the podcast with music from our vast library of songs created for games and other online projects.  This week's featured song is "Salty Fries".

Download The Podcast Now!: http://www.8bitrocket.com/podcasts/gamestorm4.mp3

have been working on a few new projects that require speed and blit operations. This has given me the opportunity t to research and re-fine my methods. At one time I used arrays of bitmapData objects, pre-cached from movieClips. Those were especially needed when I was working with designers who were not savvy with tile sheets. The array is fast and efficient, but it uses a lot of memory and is redundant when you also have a sprite sheet in memory. Also, since arrays are passed by reference, I ran into some problems accidentally writing over the original array of data when I wanted to run matrix transformations in-line while the games were running. Sometimes I would corrupt the original sprite data and I couldn't figure out why. So, after quite a while using arrays, I switched to mostly blitting directly from sprite sheets to the canvas. The sprite sheet pngs acted pretty much like arrays, the only draw back being that I had to do all of the work to pre-render my rotations, scale and other transformations in Fireworks and then bring them into Flash manually...

ack in May 1977 my dad told my brother and I that we were going to see a "sleeper" film at the theater. Star Wars was out the same week, but we would have to wait months to see that movie. Instead of an adventure filled with Rebels, Imperials, droids, and Stormtroopers, we were thrust instead into the C.B./10-4/Trucker/"F-The-County Mounties" world of Smokey And The Bandit. Sure Burt Reynolds and Sally Field were great in the movie, but for some reason, as 7-year old, I related to Snowman, played by Jerry Reed. He was the guy who drove the truck filled with Coors beer that Burt Reynolds was so eagerly trying to blaze a trail for in his black Trans-Am. For some reason, I saw a lot of myself in Reed's character. Even at that age, I knew I would never lead the pack or get the girl like Burt Reynolds. Instead, I had the sneaking suspicion that I would be a "right hand man" kind of guy, who would get beat-up in bars of life, but still remain loyal to the cause...just like Snowman. Jerry Reed also wrote the theme song, "East Bound And Down" , one of the greatest theme songs ever recorded. Just last Saturday, out of the blue, I found myself singing this theme song to myself and thinking "man, wasn't this song just f*ckin' great." Yes it was, and so was Jerry Reed. You can hear both below.

selection blogs, articles, tutorials, games, and more that might be on interest to Flash game developers (or any other game developers).

This week the Pixel Blitz Engine EXPLODES!; A new Multi-player classic from Lorenzgames; Common game development mistakes to avoid; A Flash Game License First Impressions Review; A Hand Held Flash Game Player; A Unique Collision Detection Idea; A Tutorial on making a game like Snow Flakes; How do you know your game is fun?; A new basic blitting tutorial; Some fresh retro gaming articles and 5 cool Game Jacket games that are keeping me from my work...

10. Mac gaming will rise to new heights. Publishers will convert PC games to the Mac using next-generation Intel hardware conversion utilities. They will find that testing games for the relatively small number of Mac hardware variations makes their job much easier. IGN will re-launch mac.ign.com. Also, bucking the recent trends, a Mac-gaming-centric print magazine will launch...and the initial issues will sell very well.

9. FMAME (the Flash version of MAME) will be embraced by many unscrupulous game portals. Other Flash-based emulators will follow. Small Flash game developers will have their games squeezed out of portals and will have to work much harder to make games that will get published. At the same time, an I.P. incident similar to the Facebook "Scrabulous" issue will rock the viral, Flash game world. It will force many domestic U.S./Europe portals to screen games more closely, and start licensing classic game ROMs for use on their sites, further squeezing indie game developers.

Download The Podcast Now!: http://www.8bitrocket.com/podcasts/gamestorm3.mp3

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