Gaming, Software &
General Blogging

Exit Games, most commonly known for their Photon series of multiplayer game engines, have recently made their new Quantum deterministic physics engine available to the general…

The code for this game is now available on GitHub under the GNU Public Licence v3.0. All paid-for assets have been removed but the code is fully functional. You can download it…

I've added some pitch boundaries to the game so when the ball leaves the pitch either behind the goal, in the goal or out beyond one of the side lines it will be detected. At the…

I encountered multiple issues with the dribbling animation shown in the previous version so I removed it. I've created a new simpler one which at least moves the ball as if it's…

Something I wanted to try and add to this new multiplayer version of the game was more accurate dribbling. The original Football Superstars had quite nice dribbling animations…

After a lot of trial and error (and plenty of pain and suffering), I managed to get the two clients to share the server-controlled ball whilst looking and feeling lag free. In…

I have finally decided to revisit this game with the intention of making it multiplayer. I will be using the fairly new Photon Fusion multiplayer add-on for Unity as it is the…

I wanted to add some match notifications, similar in style to the ones in Football Superstars. Now, when it's a goal, goal kick, kick-in etc, a message will flash on to the screen…

For this release I have added some sound effects which I got for free from Videvo. There's applause for when the players enter the pitch followed by a general looping crowd sound…

I wanted to add an animation to pass the ball backwards using a back-heel. Unfortunately, there was no animation for this on the Mixamo website so I had to create my own. I don't…

For this version I have begun giving the other players some AI, however it's very basic for now. For the AI player, if he detects that the ball is available he will run towards…

For this version I have added something that was in the original Football Superstars game - Space Passing. This allowed you to target a team mate and use the spacebar to pass the…

For this version, I loaded the Mixamo football character into Blender and created some new football kit textures for him using Gimp. I also created a goalkeeper version and gave…

Football Superstars was a third-person football MMO which largely flew under the radar, which is a shame for such an excellent and unique football game. It ran continuously from…

I thought I'd lost this diary forever, but thanks to the Web Archive I've managed to recover most of it. Some of the images and files are gone, but I've put back what I managed to…

Another blog I thought I'd lost forever but managed to recover using the Wayback Machine Web Archive. I built this arcade machine from scratch back in 2003. Unfortunately, I no…

I finally finished my MAME cabinet in summer 2005; two and a half years in total! Actually, it was great fun building it and I would recommend anyone who enjoys MAME to have a go!…

My Marquee retainer arrived from Happ Controls. I'm not quite sure how to fix it on yet, but until I get my marquee sign made I'm not going to worry about it too much. I also…

I bought some Plexiglass the other day from B&Q. After making some careful measurements I marked out the required shapes on the Plexiglass using a felt-tip pen. I knew that…

After much web searching and thinking about what to use as a bezel I eventually decided to make my own. I based my design on the tutorial from Dens Gameroom. However, since I…

Oh my god! Was it August 2003 when I last posted on my MAME Cab? Where does time go? Well, it has to be said I haven't too done much with it since. However, I have now bought…

I bought a glue gun and had a go at gluing the T-Molding in place. A fairly slow process but a satisfactory result. The hot glue sticks the T-Molding to the wod very well. I also…

I've finished painting my cabinet! It takes great patience waiting for each coat of the primer to dry and then for each coat of the paint. However, it's worth it in the end and…

I made a start on spray painting parts of my cabinet. I quickly discoverd that spraying directly onto the MDF was not going to work very well. So, I took yet another trip to B&Q…

Found the edible ghost sound! Checked everything was running smoothly and provided a download. 18 months in the making and Wobman is finally complete! Go play!

I've managed to resolve all the issues I had and Wobman is running like a dream now. I've made the latest version (v1.13) available for download which includes the executable. I…

In an attempt to keep some progress going on my MAME cabinet, I decided to take a trip to B&Q (hardware store) yesterday to buy some parts I knew I was going to need: - a piano…

I did some more work on Wobman last night. Odd things still seem to occur with the sound even with the latest version of Blitz (v1.35). However, I've managed to overcome what I…

Errr...this diary is waaaayyyy behind. A year and half since I last posted here? Where does time go? Anyway, since my last post I've rewritten the whole shebang in Blitz3D, and…

I'm in a bit of a dilemma at the moment. I can't really move on until I decide on a display for my cabinet. Ideally, I would probably like to have a large arcade monitor as it…

I tested the control panel out at the weekend and....it works perfectly! I have to say, I didn't expect it to. The i-Pac worked at treat and it appears it is as easy to set up as…

The control panel is now complete and all the wiring is done - that was fun.....I think! Anyway, here's some nice pics of my spaghetti wiring and finished panel complete with…

Okay, my control panel is pretty much finished! Just need to apply some T-Molding to the edge - I didn't have time this weekend. Anyway, the panel looks pretty cool, at least I…

Well, the missing coin door was sent to me within a couple of days of my pointing out it's absence to Happ Controls - so they've redeemed themselves a bit on that one. I've…

I've started work on my control panel. Managed to cut the groove (1/16th" router bit) for the T-Molding (after first having a practice on a spare piece of MDF, of course!). Not…

I've given up on getting MAME to work in pure DOS. I've installed Windows 98 and I've settled for running Advance MAME in DOS mode under Windows 98. Not ideal, but hey...at least…

Having a nightmare trying to get my MAME computer to work on the TV. DOS works fine. Windows works fine. Anything MAME related? Nope. Doesn't want to know. I've tried ArcadeOS -…

Well, all my parts from trusty Dabs turned up for the weekend but still nothing from Happ (grrrrr.....). Therefore, I set to putting the new MAME-dedicated computer together. I…

I placed my order yesterday with Dabs for the parts mentioned earlier. No sign of my stuff from Happ Controls yet though. I'm also having trouble finding a 1/16" Router Bit to do…

Still no parcel from Happ Controls, but my I-Pac turned up very quickly. Nice one Ultimarc! I stripped down an old telephone extension cable I had lying around and took out the…

I've placed my order with Happ Controls for two 4/8 way joysticks, 12 coloured buttons, a 1 Player button and a 2 Player button, a coin door and T-Molding. Oooh, can't wait until…

Moving on, I installed the top back section and the top itself. The angled back section was going to require cutting the edges at a 45 degree angle. Since I hadn't figure out how…

Once you've cut all the parts you can start screwing it all together. I started by putting the base together. Having previously built the model helped here as from the pictures…

Finally, I got around to starting work on the actual cabinet. Once you get going on this it is very hard to stop! However, it is important to take a step back and look at how you…

Before I started working on real full size sheets of MDF, I thought I'd cut all the parts out using cardboard first. I cut 3 8x4 sections from an old cardboard box and proceeded…

I did quite a lot of research into what other people did before embarking on my own project. In the end, I chose to follow the plans provided by LuSid as the design appealed to me…

I've been playing with M.A.M.E. arcade emulator for quite a few years now. It's an amazing piece of software that lets you play all the arcade games you used to play as a kid…

I extend the 'eating ghosts' code so that when you eat them a sound plays and the amount you've scored for eating it is displayed. I want it look just like the arcade version. The…

Well, tomorrow is here. Changed quite a few things cosmetically! There's now a picture surrounding the maze on a dark blue background. The only black area now is in the game area…

I decide to rewrite a lot of the code to do with moving the ghosts. It's just getting too messy. I've now included more arrays so I can configure each individual ghost more…

Oh my, and I thought last night was bad. Things start off okay, I manage to implement the ghosts changing into just eyes when you eat them. Simple enough, just hide the…

I would like to get the Power Pills working tonight. They have have a different code from standard pills in the array so I know when one has been eaten. Changing the ghost sprites…

My main task for this evening is to add some Artificial Intelligence (AI) to the ghosts. At the moment they're just picking random directions and they're not even doing that very…

Pills, pills...I need some pills! Well, at least for my game anyway. As I discovered earlier, the best method is to have the pills in the with the maze bitmap. I edit it in paint…

Found a problem with the maze collision. Pac-Man...err...I mean Wobman is able to turn a corner when he isn't fully in the corridor. After some investigation I discover this is…

I spend some time screen dumping from M.A.M.E. to capture all the animations for Pac-Man and the ghosts. Pac-Man has 15 different poses. At first I'm fooled into thinking the…

Today is collision detection day. Mmmm...my favourite. I use the term 'day' loosely, as it's actually 10pm. I have to go to work you see, and this takes up all my day when I could…

I'm not sure why, but I've decided to keep a diary of my development of a clone of Namco's original Pac-Man using DarkBasic (this later changed to BlitzPlus - CG). Who knows,…