Ska Studios

Good Morning Gato #2 – The Second Awakening

This second edition of Good Morning Gato is going to be light on those oh so important newsworthy bits. While that statement alone may have already sent a few readers away and back to their Facebook stalking, the remaining majority of Ska Studios fans who are reading this very sentence can still bite into a freshly baked blog of enlightenment. One that’s high in fat and comes with an extra smattering of marshmallow sauce that’s sure to expand your waistline. In a good way, of course.
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4 Comments February 5, 2010

Good Morning Gato #1 – Rise And Shine

Here it is, our inaugural Good Morning Gato blog post of somewhat epic proportions. This be an informative blog that is penned weekly by Ska Studios’ own developer extraordinaire Mr. James Silva or (in this unique instance) the company grunt, Sir Dustin of York. This space will focus on company news, project updates and other Ska randomness sprinkled with insightful commentary on life. We’re going as far as to claim that each and every Friday edition of Good Morning Gato will be the highlight of your week and will come with the added secondary benefit of flipping your frown into a happy face.
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6 Comments January 29, 2010

Charlie Murder set to take the Xbox Live Indie Games stage this March!

Here’s a rad release of press:

SKA STUDIOS TO PRODUCE CHARLIE MURDER VIDEO GAME
Indie Punk Band Sells Out to Indie Game Developer

Schenectady, N.Y., January 14, 2010 – In a move bound to shake up the music scene, punk rock super group Charlie Murder have agreed to license their names and story for an upcoming Xbox LIVE Indie Games title on the Xbox 360® video game and entertainment system from Microsoft.
Based on the band’s recent spat with rival metal rockers Gore Quaffer,

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8 Comments January 19, 2010

Z0MB1ES is IGN 2009 Xbox 360 Best Indie Game!

IGN agreed with Machinima! Z0MB1ES is the best Xbox Indie Game of 2009!

2 Comments December 15, 2009

Z0MB1ES wins 2009 IGA Best Indie Game!

We did it!

Thanks everyone for voting! Thanks everyone for playing!

1 Comment December 15, 2009

XNA, Flash and CD-ROM Graphics

I remember a conversation I had in about sixth grade, when CD-ROM was relatively new technology. My friend Andrew was trying to convince me that “CD-ROM Graphics” was, well, something that only a CD could bring you. Games like The Journeyman Project and 7th Guest definitely did things that you couldn’t do on 3.5″ floppies, but a graphic is a graphic, whether it’s stored on a CD, hard drive, laserdisc, etc. Anyway, the dialogue would go something like:

“The background in Diamonds looks good, but it’s not CD-ROM graphics.”

“You know a 1 MB image will look just as good if it’s on a CD as it will if it’s on the hard drive?”

“Well, it’s still not CD-ROM graphics.” (more…)

6 Comments December 15, 2009

Z0MB1ES nominated for 2009 Inside Gaming Awards Best Indie Game!

And I’m not quite sure I know how it works because, as far as I can tell, it’s a voting system entirely based on YouTube!

But, if you’d like to vote for I MAED A GAM3 W1TH Z0MB1ES 1N IT!!!1 (which would be super-cool), I think just watching this video accomplishes that. So vote. Please. Vote please!

You get to that video by following an embedded link from the Best Indie Games nominations (may as well have a look for fairness sake!). It took me way too long to figure all this out; I’m chalking it up to my terrific inability to accomplish simple tasks.

1 Comment November 30, 2009

Download I MAED A S0NG W1TH Z0MB1ES 1N IT!!!1

Because I get asked quite a bit, here it is:

James Silva – I MAED A S0NG W1TH Z0MB1ES 1N IT!!!1

(Probably want to right-click, Save As…)

I think I finally got the mastering to a “respectable” level, but no promises! Also, the first thing I noticed upon revisiting this mp3 was that without the game going on, the song is… empty. But hey, whatever, it’s free, so enjoy the heck out of it!

Update: Some wonkiness is afoot; if you can’t get the download working, just navigate to http://ska-studios.com/files/epicopus.mp3 and choose Save As… (unless QuickTime snarkily tries to play it in-browser!)

Update 2: I put it up as a zip too, that might be a better bet.

15 Comments August 26, 2009

Z0MB1ES is #1 on Major Nelson's List!

Title says it all, we’re #1! (top rated, too!)

And holy roundup, Batman:

Kotaku would pay $1 just for the theme song
Destructoid calls it this year’s “Still Alive”
Joystiq thinks it’s “astounding”
GameGirl is hooked
GamingAngels was blown away by the awesomeness of the game
TheXboxDomain liked the awesome music, addictive qualities, great replay value
IndieGames.com thinks it’s way too much fun for its own good

50,000 downloads, 6,237 ratings and an average score of 4.75, these are freaking excellent numbers. This was exactly what I had in mind when I heard Microsoft was rebranding XBLCG as Xbox Live Indie Games and switching the price points to let us sell games for $1. It’s indie! It’s a dollar! It’s the type of thing that would’ve seemed like a really bad idea if you were trying to describe it to someone you wanted to borrow money from!

And to think that Joystiq’s Andrew Yoon just declared that XBLIG is “floundering” (qualified by a 5-month old article, no less). Guess we can chalk that one up to Playstation fanboyism! Of course, if Sony created some sort of zero-entry-barrier developer-friendly platform (think XNA), maybe my PS3 could be more than just a protein folding Blu-Ray player… burn!

8 Comments August 25, 2009

High! Priority! Press! Release!

For Immediate Release:

Ska Studios LLC today announced a truly epic title in the true tradition of epicness with its latest video game entertainment product release, I MAED A GAM3 W1TH Z0MB1ES!!!1, set for release August 16, 2009 on the Xbox Live Indie Games for 80 Microsoft Points.

Presenting a familiarly themed, engrossing and stylized “game universe,” then adding zombies to that world, I MAED A GAM3 W1TH Z0MB1ES!!1 aims to completely revolutionize the videogames industry, destroy it in fire a thousand times, and resurrect it as a phoenix sitting on a unicorn atop a shiny city of golden gumdrops. As we say at Ska Studios LLC, “our games will pique your interest and defenestrate your cats.”

I MAED A GAM3 W1TH Z0MB1ES!!1 represents a culmination of years of intensive psychological research, bleeding edge engineering, and artistic collaboration by over two dozen internationally recognized art houses that may or may not exist, using such technologies as the HYPERMAGIC 3.0 engine to power never-before-seen eye candy and the MEGACORE X parallelization processor for smooth-as-glass presentation.

“You can make a game,” said Ska Studios Lead Engineer Gato Maria Hernando Rodriguez-Rodriguez in an exclusive interview with Chairman Meow Magazine, “but what happens when you put zombies in it? Nobody knows, but they’ll find out soon. We’ll all find out soon.” And, with Xbox Live Indie Games interest flagging under reports of poor sales, difficulty locating the section in the Dashboard while inebriated, and super-smart people saying super-smart things on web forums, the game couldn’t be released at a better time.

“We were following trends and noticed that most people were buying Xbox360s for the DVD player, the Xbox Live Vision Camera, and the Calculator app on XBLIG, but not for games,” Gato continues, “I MAED A GAM3 W1TH Z0MBIES!!1 will change that. You’ll be playing our game. It has zombies in it. Ok bye.”

I MAED A GAM3 W1TH Z0MB1ES!!!1 will arrive on Xbox Live Indie Games on August 16, 2009. It will cost 80 Microsoft Points.

19 Comments August 16, 2009