Slipgate Jobs!

Hey hey hey, i'm starting to grow this monster again and i'm looking for some grade AAA talent to fill us out a little more. I have job postings on my company's website Slipgate Ironworks and also on Gamasutra's jobs section. They all point back to my email address.

Are you interested in joining our amazingly talented and highly motivated superstar game development team? Are you supercore enough to survive our hyperdimensional environment???!!

Beginning Game Programming

Just got an email about game programming books, a very popular question I get:

Hey John, I've mailed you before but I doubt you remember; with that said, I love your games! Always have, always will. I've done a bit of game programming with some beginner's languages like GML and many versions of BASIC, but I'd really like to learn C. I have one question: I've pretty much learned all there is to make console applications, which is all I can find tutorials for. Where can I get some info on basic graphics programming? Just drawing/manipulating bitmaps or pixels, something like that.
Thanks!
-Jake

Here's what I would recommend with just a quick search on Amazon: Beginning Game Programming by Michael Morrison.

Now, I haven't had to read a game programming book in about 22 years but this one seems pretty solid with good reviews. Sure, some of the reviews might be by the guy's mom and friends but how else can you tell if it's good unless you try it yourself?

I'm sure some of the readers here can recommend other great books - that's what this section is for!

Whose Side Am I On Anyway?

Many of you responded to my previous post with the same thoughts that I had when I first heard of the Hot Coffee mod for GTA, "Why should the game rating be changed because a third-party hack changed the game content? That's crap! Don't blame the modders!"

I totally agree with you 100%. In fact, I do not agree that a game's rating should change even if the game has shipped with a massive stack of hidden porn in it that the player would never see because the game has no code to show it in any form. To view the pornstack you would have to run a third-party mod which to me is a bit like voiding your warranty.

So I'm saying that I DO NOT AGREE WITH THE ESRB's RATING CHANGE for any game where a third-party mod alters the original presentation of the game. You run a mod, you throw the rating out the window. Simple, done.

BUT. The sad reality is that the ESRB is actually changing game ratings based on what third-party mods do to the game. I think this is superdumb but what it all comes down to is developers and publishers are getting jacked because of it. I think it's wrong but it's happening. So my previous post mainly dealt with the outcome of the current scenario we're in where the ESRB has the power to go back and re-rate games based on future findings which are logically ridiculous. IF THE GAME DIDN'T SHIP WITH VIEWABLE PORN THEN THE RATING SHOULD REMAIN - no matter what modders come up with and no matter what content is hidden in the game's data files already.

Think about it: when you run a mod you don't know if it's actually inserting those nude graphics files into your game or just unlocking them. WHO CARES? The net effect is the same - you'd STILL run that mod to get the 1337-7175 to show up whether they were provided with the mod or just unlocked in your game. YOU RAN THE MOD! After that point, the rating is worthless. That doesn't mean it should change.

But the rating IS changing post-release and that's the problem. If the ESRB doesn't change its policies then the result will be developers locking their content. I don't want to see that happen and neither does anyone else. Except maybe the ESRB.

Oblivion Re-Rated = Bad News

The ESRB just re-rated Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion from Teen to Mature. On the surface the bad news for Bethesda is that fewer units will be sold to an M audience and it's a little bit of a black eye as well because of the "nude content introduced into the game from a third party mod". Sure, it's only for the PC version but the news blurb will affect all SKUs regardless.

Ok, so the story is that there was no nude content in the game's data but some modder added it with a utility. In the case of GTA's Hot Coffee incident there was actually some hidden art assets and animations that were unlocked by modders and thus got that game jacked up by the ESRB as well - and it really affected ALL ratings in the industry past that point. It's now harder to get a lower rating because of these hacks.

What's the point of this all this? That modders are now screwing up the industry they're supposed to be helping. In 1993 we opened up all our data to the industrious and ambitious folks out there who want to see what it's like to be able to make their favorite game a little more like what they'd want.....and get a taste of being a semi-game designer in the process. The most awesome example of what this philosophy has brought is CounterStrike.

Now what's going to happen? You'll probably start seeing game data files becoming encrypted and the open door on assets getting slammed shut just to keep modders from financially screwing the company they should be helping. And the day a game company's file encryption is hacked to add porn and the case goes to the ESRB for review - that's when we'll see how well game companies are protected from these antics and what the courts will rule. Hopefully it'll be on the developer's side.