Homebrew Game Development and The Extra Lives of Consoles
Homebrew Game Development and The Extra Lives of Consoles

Author: Robin Wilde

Publisher: White Owl

Published: 2023-05-04

Total Pages: 337

ISBN-13: 139907265X

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The games industry moves fast, with release schedules flying by in a blur and hardware constantly changing and updating. But outside the official world of licences and publishing deals, hundreds of games every year find a new home on consoles which have since been abandoned by their manufacturers. This is the hobbyist’s playground of homebrew gaming. The first book by freelance journalist and game developer Robin Wilde, Homebrew Game Development and The Extra Lives of Consoles is the first comprehensive history of the unlicensed and unofficial world of homebrew video games. It explores the methods, enthusiasm and motivations behind the developers who are defying technical limitations and turning nostalgia into brand new gaming experiences for retro consoles. Featuring exclusive interviews with developers behind homebrew hits and Kickstarter successes, as well as others working in the industry, the book dives into what makes the homebrew world tick, and explores some of the best, most innovative, and strangest titles gracing long-retired consoles. As well as providing unique insight into obscure titles, Homebrew Game Development and The Extra Lives of Consoles explores the ongoing developments in this cottage industry, which are opening it up to more and more aspiring developers. Homebrew is an exciting new frontier for game development, and this book opens the door both for readers who were already interested but didn’t know where to start, and gamers who never knew this world existed.

Homebrew Game Development and The Extra Lives of Consoles
Homebrew Game Development and The Extra Lives of Consoles

Author: Robin Wilde

Publisher: White Owl

Published: 2023-05-04

Total Pages: 170

ISBN-13: 1399072676

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The games industry moves fast, with release schedules flying by in a blur and hardware constantly changing and updating. But outside the official world of licences and publishing deals, hundreds of games every year find a new home on consoles which have since been abandoned by their manufacturers. This is the hobbyist’s playground of homebrew gaming. The first book by freelance journalist and game developer Robin Wilde, Homebrew Game Development and The Extra Lives of Consoles is the first comprehensive history of the unlicensed and unofficial world of homebrew video games. It explores the methods, enthusiasm and motivations behind the developers who are defying technical limitations and turning nostalgia into brand new gaming experiences for retro consoles. Featuring exclusive interviews with developers behind homebrew hits and Kickstarter successes, as well as others working in the industry, the book dives into what makes the homebrew world tick, and explores some of the best, most innovative, and strangest titles gracing long-retired consoles. As well as providing unique insight into obscure titles, Homebrew Game Development and The Extra Lives of Consoles explores the ongoing developments in this cottage industry, which are opening it up to more and more aspiring developers. Homebrew is an exciting new frontier for game development, and this book opens the door both for readers who were already interested but didn’t know where to start, and gamers who never knew this world existed.

The Art of Far Cry 6
The Art of Far Cry 6

Author: Ubisoft

Publisher: Dark Horse Comics

Published: 2021-11-16

Total Pages: 224

ISBN-13: 1506724353

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Explore the vibrant island of Yara, a nation trapped in time. Dark Horse Books and Ubisoft have joined forces to create The Art of Far Cry 6, a beautiful volume that is perfect for any fan of the Far Cry adventures. Welcome to Yara. Viva Libertad!

Hacking the Xbox
Hacking the Xbox

Author: Andrew Huang

Publisher: Penguin Random House LLC (No Starch)

Published: 2003

Total Pages: 292

ISBN-13: 9781593270292

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Provides step-by-step instructions on basic hacking techniques and reverse engineering skills along with information on Xbox security, hardware, and software.

Future Gaming
Future Gaming

Author: Paolo Ruffino

Publisher: MIT Press

Published: 2018-05-04

Total Pages: 162

ISBN-13: 1906897557

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A sophisticated critical take on contemporary game culture that reconsiders the boundaries between gamers and games. This book is not about the future of video games. It is not an attempt to predict the moods of the market, the changing profile of gamers, the benevolence or malevolence of the medium. This book is about those predictions. It is about the ways in which the past, present, and future notions of games are narrated and negotiated by a small group of producers, journalists, and gamers, and about how invested these narrators are in telling the story of tomorrow. This new title from Goldsmiths Press by Paolo Ruffino suggests the story could be told another way. Considering game culture, from the gamification of self-improvement to GamerGate's sexism and violence, Ruffino lays out an alternative, creative mode of thinking about the medium: a sophisticated critical take that blurs the distinctions among studying, playing, making, and living with video games. Offering a series of stories that provide alternative narratives of digital gaming, Ruffino aims to encourage all of us who study and play (with) games to raise ethical questions, both about our own role in shaping the objects of research, and about our involvement in the discourses we produce as gamers and scholars. For researchers and students seeking a fresh approach to game studies, and for anyone with an interest in breaking open the current locked-box discourse, Future Gaming offers a radical lens with which to view the future.

Life is Strange: Welcome to Blackwell Academy
Life is Strange: Welcome to Blackwell Academy

Author: Matt Forbeck

Publisher: National Geographic Books

Published: 2018-10-09

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 1785659359

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An atmospheric and characterful look at the world of the hugely successful video game Life is Strange, through the eyes of Max and Chloe. Welcome to Blackwell Academy is an in-universe book from the Life is Strange video game franchise from Dontnod Entertainment and Square Enix. This detailed book takes the form of a student guide to Blackwell Academy and the town of Arcadia Bay. Overlaid onto the pages is graffiti: notes, doodles, sketches and photographs from the Blackwell students themselves, including contributions from the beloved protagonists Max and Chloe. Welcome to Blackwell Academy includes information on the staff and facilities of Blackwell Academy, the people and locations of Arcadia Bay, overlaid with funny, irreverent and poignant comments from the students.

Playing with Videogames
Playing with Videogames

Author: James Newman

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2008-08-18

Total Pages: 225

ISBN-13: 1134173016

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Playing with Videogames documents the richly productive, playful and social cultures of videogaming that support, surround and sustain this most important of digital media forms and yet which remain largely invisible within existing studies. James Newman details the rich array of activities that surround game-playing, charting the vibrant and productive practices of the vast number of videogame players and the extensive 'shadow' economy of walkthroughs, FAQs, art, narratives, online discussion boards and fan games, as well as the cultures of cheating, copying and piracy that have emerged. Playing with Videogames offers the reader a comprehensive understanding of the meanings of videogames and videogaming within the contemporary media environment.

Gaming Rhythms
Gaming Rhythms

Author: Tom Apperley

Publisher: Lulu.com

Published: 2011-06-16

Total Pages: 169

ISBN-13: 908160211X

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"Global gaming networks are heterogenous collectives of localized practices, not unified commercial products. Shifting the analysis of digital games to local specificities that build and perform the global and general, Gaming Rhythms employs ethnographic work conducted in Venezuela and Australia to account for the material experiences of actual game players. This book explores the materiality of digital play across diverse locations and argues that the dynamic relation between the everyday life of the player and the experience of digital game play can only be understood by examining play-practices in their specific situations." -- Website.

I Am Error
I Am Error

Author: Nathan Altice

Publisher: MIT Press

Published: 2017-09-08

Total Pages: 439

ISBN-13: 0262534541

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The complex material histories of the Nintendo Entertainment System platform, from code to silicon, focusing on its technical constraints and its expressive affordances. In the 1987 Nintendo Entertainment System videogame Zelda II: The Adventure of Link, a character famously declared: I AM ERROR. Puzzled players assumed that this cryptic mesage was a programming flaw, but it was actually a clumsy Japanese-English translation of “My Name is Error,” a benign programmer's joke. In I AM ERROR Nathan Altice explores the complex material histories of the Nintendo Entertainment System (and its Japanese predecessor, the Family Computer), offering a detailed analysis of its programming and engineering, its expressive affordances, and its cultural significance. Nintendo games were rife with mistranslated texts, but, as Altice explains, Nintendo's translation challenges were not just linguistic but also material, with consequences beyond simple misinterpretation. Emphasizing the technical and material evolution of Nintendo's first cartridge-based platform, Altice describes the development of the Family Computer (or Famicom) and its computational architecture; the “translation” problems faced while adapting the Famicom for the U.S. videogame market as the redesigned Entertainment System; Nintendo's breakthrough console title Super Mario Bros. and its remarkable software innovations; the introduction of Nintendo's short-lived proprietary disk format and the design repercussions on The Legend of Zelda; Nintendo's efforts to extend their console's lifespan through cartridge augmentations; the Famicom's Audio Processing Unit (APU) and its importance for the chiptunes genre; and the emergence of software emulators and the new kinds of play they enabled.