Urgent Update: Playpower White House Invite
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Derek Lomas
Apr 16, 2010, 10:45:39 AM4/16/10
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Hi everyone,
We've got some great news. We just received an invitation to present Playpower at the White House, as part of the MacArthur Foundation Showcase event!
The only hard part is that this event date is May 12, less than one month away. So we could really use your help!
Short Term Goal
It's my belief that the best presentation would be a demo of new games on the actual $10 computer.
Improved Graphics
As you know, Kishan and the Indian student team have made great progress on two games, Hanuman Typing Warrior and Hanuman Quiz Adventure. We are working hard to improve the graphics of these games and improve the overall gameplay. If you are interested in helping with the graphics, do let me know.
Playtesting
We could also use feedback on the games. Have you tried them out?
Malaria Game
We are also trying to develop graphics for the Malaria public health game, as we feel that this would be especially appreciated by the Washington crowd. The graphics will consist of small mosquitos flying around a village scene, landing on family members. While the core dynamic of this game has been programmed, even if this game only exists as a storyboard, we can still display it.
Cartridge Creation
Beyond graphics, we are looking for someone who has the capacity to test the games on actual hardware and then burn cartridges. As we only plan to demo the first levels, the games are small enough to fit on an NROM cartridge. While we'd like to use a 60-pin sized famicom cartridge, we can always use a 72-60 pin converter if necessary.
Music
While music may be overly ambitious, it would definitely add to the depth of the demo--and it is certainly required for the final game. If anyone is interested in working on Indian-style 8-bit music, this would also be appreciated.
Props for Open Source
Part of the presentation of Playpower will be a representation of our open-source community. So we will really try to give credit to everyone who has participated or contributed over the past year.
Medium Term Goals
What comes after this May 12 presentation? We are gearing up to finish 3-5 complete games over the summer. By the end of the summer, we plan to make a substantial order of devices from a Chinese manufacturer, with our games bundled with the devices. We believe that this process will enable our games to become a viable packaging option for many manufacturers. We hope, therefore, that within a year or so, our games will be bundled with thousands of devices that sold throughout India.
Long Term Goals
As for Playpower, we are trying to organize ourselves into a 501c3 org that could raise prize money for an annual learning game design competition, starting with the 8-bit computer and then perhaps moving onto other platforms. We believe that this model would enable us to continue to promote open-source learning games developed for radically affordable computers.
Do you have any questions or comments? I'd love to get your feedback, ideas, recommendations, etc.
Thanks a billion,
Derek
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We've got some great news. We just received an invitation to present Playpower at the White House, as part of the MacArthur Foundation Showcase event!
The only hard part is that this event date is May 12, less than one month away. So we could really use your help!
Short Term Goal
It's my belief that the best presentation would be a demo of new games on the actual $10 computer.
Improved Graphics
As you know, Kishan and the Indian student team have made great progress on two games, Hanuman Typing Warrior and Hanuman Quiz Adventure. We are working hard to improve the graphics of these games and improve the overall gameplay. If you are interested in helping with the graphics, do let me know.
Playtesting
We could also use feedback on the games. Have you tried them out?
Malaria Game
We are also trying to develop graphics for the Malaria public health game, as we feel that this would be especially appreciated by the Washington crowd. The graphics will consist of small mosquitos flying around a village scene, landing on family members. While the core dynamic of this game has been programmed, even if this game only exists as a storyboard, we can still display it.
Cartridge Creation
Beyond graphics, we are looking for someone who has the capacity to test the games on actual hardware and then burn cartridges. As we only plan to demo the first levels, the games are small enough to fit on an NROM cartridge. While we'd like to use a 60-pin sized famicom cartridge, we can always use a 72-60 pin converter if necessary.
Music
While music may be overly ambitious, it would definitely add to the depth of the demo--and it is certainly required for the final game. If anyone is interested in working on Indian-style 8-bit music, this would also be appreciated.
Props for Open Source
Part of the presentation of Playpower will be a representation of our open-source community. So we will really try to give credit to everyone who has participated or contributed over the past year.
Medium Term Goals
What comes after this May 12 presentation? We are gearing up to finish 3-5 complete games over the summer. By the end of the summer, we plan to make a substantial order of devices from a Chinese manufacturer, with our games bundled with the devices. We believe that this process will enable our games to become a viable packaging option for many manufacturers. We hope, therefore, that within a year or so, our games will be bundled with thousands of devices that sold throughout India.
Long Term Goals
As for Playpower, we are trying to organize ourselves into a 501c3 org that could raise prize money for an annual learning game design competition, starting with the 8-bit computer and then perhaps moving onto other platforms. We believe that this model would enable us to continue to promote open-source learning games developed for radically affordable computers.
Do you have any questions or comments? I'd love to get your feedback, ideas, recommendations, etc.
Thanks a billion,
Derek
--
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Noah Vawter
Apr 16, 2010, 11:46:39 AM4/16/10
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Hello Derek!
At the moment, I think we only have two people/programmers capable of writing to the flash chip. I think they are mine and techt's. Can anyone else speak up if you have the capability of reprogramming a cart?
My expertise is not in NES stuff, so I would like to offer my reprogramming setup to someone who can use it. I will work as closely as necessary for tech support on using it. Probably the best use of time would be to get the two games listed ported to the SUBOR?
-Noah
Dereklomas
Apr 16, 2010, 12:26:55 PM4/16/10
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Brian Parker at retrozone.com has agreed to make the cartridges for us. This is great news. But everything needs to be finalized by may 3.
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