Lars Doucet

Norwegian+Texan Eastern Orthodox Christian game designer with Tourette's Syndrome and Narcolepsy.

defender's quest

Details on upcoming GOLD version

EDIT: For everyone who's been asking, YES! If you have bought any version of the game so far, you will most definitely receive the GOLD edition as a FREE udpate. With Level Up Labs "Free Updates" does indeed mean free updates :) Hey Defender's Quest

business

Piracy and the four currencies, part 2

Cross-posted on gamasutra [http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/LarsDoucet/20120228/163145/Piracy_and_the_four_currencies_part_2.php] . My previous article, piracy and the four currencies [https://www.fortressofdoors.com/2012/02/piracy-and-four-currencies.html]seems to have caused a bit of a stir, so I'm going to

4currencies

Piracy and the four currencies

Cross-posted on gamasutra [http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/LarsDoucet/20120222/9501/Piracy_and_the_four_currencies.php] . Part 1 of a multi-part series. (Part 2 [https://www.fortressofdoors.com/2012/02/piracy-and-four-currencies-part-2.html]) The problem with most piracy debates is that the only "cost" they discuss is money-dollars.

dq1

Version 0.8.9 is ready!

Hey everyone! We've got a new patch out today and some news! First off, we're trying to commit to a patch schedule of one new patch every Monday.  This will usually be a bug-fix patch, but eventually as we finish new content and features we'

news

Forum and Wiki are live!

Hey everyone! Just a quick post to announce our brand new Forum and Wiki just went up! Here's a link [http://www.defendersquest.com/theforum/] to the forums. Here's a link [http://defendersquest.wikia.com/] to the wiki. The forums are pretty plain-jane for now, and

defender's quest

New patch 0.8.4 coming today!

Just sent out this newsletter: Dear Defender's Quest fans, An auto-update patch is coming later today! We've tested this feature extensively prior to release, but never with so great an audience. There's always the chance something bad might happen so I want to alert

PASSWORD? WTF?

Hey everyone, Some of you might have experienced a bug playing defender's quest where the game asked for a username or password when it tried to fetch updates, or the website was blocked asking for the same. I accidentally clicked something on my web panel, and screwed things

defender's quest

Defender's Quest Deployment Strategy

We just launched our new game, Defender's Quest: Valley of the Forgotten [http://www.defendersquest.com/], for PC/Mac/Linux, a few days ago, and have been pretty surprised at our initial success.  Only time will tell if that trend continues, but for now we've seen

defender's quest

Defender's Quest is RELEASED

[http://www.defendersquest.com/] You can buy defender's quest RIGHT NOW at:www.defendersquest.com [http://www.defendersquest.com/] We have a new demo version out too at:www.defendersquest.com/play_demo.html [http://www.defendersquest.com/play_demo.html] Also, please note we're also

defender's quest

Nearing Release

Sent out this newsletter just now: ************************************* Hey Defender's Quest Fans! We've got some news! The game is basically finished - while we clean up a few things on the technical side, we're waiting on our lawyer to finish the paperwork that will allow us

News! Facebook and Google+ Pages!

Just sent out this newsletter: Hey there Defender's quest fans! First of all, a huge thank-you goes out to everyone who signed up for the pre-release test. We've gotten some really great feedback and have uncovered (and eliminated!) many crucial bugs. If you haven't

News! Calling for Testers!

Just sent this newsletter out today: (REPLY TO: defendersquest@gmail.com) Hey Defender's Quest fans! First, thanks so much for being patient with us as we prepare for our preliminary "Beta Launch" this month, at a special discounted price of $6.99 ($4.99 for you

New Art Style

Let's talk a bit about the new art style we've been trying out.  The biggest weakness we have right now is that the team doesn't have a dedicated artist.  I (Lars) consider myself a half-decent artist, but I've been so busy programming,

News!

Sent this newsletter out today.  If you're not currently getting the newsletter, consider signing up! [http://www.defendersquest.com/] If you do, you'll get a coupon code good for a nice discount when Defender's Quest is released! On to ze newsletter: Hey everyone! It&

defender's quest

A Status Effect Stacking Algorithm

(Cross-posted on my Gamasutra blog [http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/LarsDoucet/20111101/8786/A_Status_Effect_Stacking_Algorithm.php] , which usually gets more comments) [http://files.fortressofdoors.com/images/poison.png] Status effects are a cool way to add strategic depth to both Tower Defense games and RPG's,

defender's quest

Lessons in Demo Launching

EDIT: Hillariously enough, my host's servers just went down. You can still play the demo with these links: Windows torrent [http://dl.dropbox.com/u/4196349/DefendersQuest/DefendersQuestDemo_v_0_5_0_3.exe.torrent]  (dropbox) Linux torrent [http://dl.dropbox.com/u/4196349/DefendersQuest/DefendersQuestDemo_v_0_

design

Designing an Anti-Incest Algorithm

(Cross-posted on gamasutra.com [http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/LarsDoucet/20110914/8440/Designing_an_AntiIncest_Algorithm.php] ) Once upon a time I was designing a game called Trondheim. [http://www.files.fortressofdoors.com/images/trondheim_title.gif] In Trondheim, you would guide a small group of nomadic fairy-folk, the "

defender's quest

RPG's, challenge, and grinding.

Cross-posted on gamasutra [http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/LarsDoucet/20110822/8248/RPGs_challenge_and_grinding.php] . As part of an ongoing series on our upcoming tactical RPGDefender's Quest [http://www.defendersquest.com/], I'd like to talk about RPG's, challenge, and "grinding." Let&

defender's quest

RPG's and Suckage

(Cross-posted on gamasutra.com [http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/LarsDoucet/20110412/7413/RPGs_and_Suckage.php]) As part of our ongoing series on our new game Defender's Quest [http://www.defendersquest.com/], I'd like to talk about suckage. When you say "This SUCKS!" you&

defender's quest

Upgrades, Equipment, and Skill Trees

Cross-posted on gamasutra [http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/LarsDoucet/20110401/7351/Upgrades_Equipment_and_Skill_Trees.php] . As part of my continuing series on the design of our new tactical tower defense / RPG hybrid Defender's Quest, I'm going to talk a little bit about upgrade systems,

design

Don't mess with RPG's

Cross-posted on gamasutra.com [http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/LarsDoucet/20110311/7208/Dont_mess_with_RPGs.php] [http://www.files.fortressofdoors.com/images/simpsons_mob.jpg] So, based on the great responses from the last article over at gamasutra [http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/LarsDoucet/20110309/7182/Rebooting_the_RPG.

defender's quest

Rebooting the RPG

Cross-posted on gamasutra.com [http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/LarsDoucet/20110309/7182/Rebooting_the_RPG.php] [http://www.files.fortressofdoors.com/images/rpg.png] In the Beginning Many indie game developers start with RPG’s, and thirteen years ago, I was no exception.  With hundreds of hours of classic RPG

Practical Game Design : The Rule of Threes

This is the first article in a series I'm calling Practical Game Design. (cross-posted here [http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/LarsDoucet/20100304/4562/Practical_Game_Design__The_Rule_of_Threes.php] on Gamasutra [http://www.gamasutra.com/]) The idea is to look back on the great masters of

Update

Hey guys, It's been a while, and this post is to explain where I've been this whole time. Last anyone was listening, I was hard at work on Super Energy Metropolis, the sequel to Super Energy Apocalypse, and doing some prototypes of that game. Well, life

Super Energy Metropolis Prototype 3 – Results

Dynamic Pollution So, it's been a little while since my last post, but I've been hard at work on both the analysis of Prototype 3 as well as the upcoming Prototype 4 code, which I'll post in a little bit. So, with Prototype 3