Stop-Motion Animation

I was really into Stop-Motion a couple of years back and I made these two videos. It has been a long time, and I have since lost some interest in doing this. But, I thought, just to post something, I'll put these on. ENJOY!!


Bloque

Snake Eater

Recent Work

First off, I'm going to post a demo for Auto-Warrior. I would appreciate feedback for this one. You can download it here.

http://host-a.net/Marcos_del_bauer/Auto-Warrior.exe

Here's an extra Screenshot here:

THE DRAGON

I also have some new Screenshots for some other projects I've been working on.

I know it's not much to look at and there has not been hardly any progress at all on this one. I've only decided to increase the resolution and add color. I have done a few attempts on some other engines for the project, but it keeps on being on and off again. I do hope to make more progress in the future.

AUTO-WARRIOR 2

I know that I'm starting on a sequel before I released the completed first one, but I couldn't help myself. I started off by just messing around with the original graphics and I liked the results. So now, I find myself working on the sequel.

So, there you have it, a few updates. I hope you all are looking forward to all this.

Two Movie Reviews

LAST CHANCE HARVEY

I rented this movie with high expectations. I mean with Dustin Hoffman and Emma Thompson as the leads, you would think it would a really good film. This is usually the case when you’re dealing with high quality actors of the like. But, Last Chance Harvey just ended up falling short.
The story basically follows a depressing old man (Hoffman) as he goes to his daughter’s wedding. After a couple of awkward, depressing moments in the film, he meets a woman (Emma Thompson) almost as depressing as he is. It’s depressing and I felt depressed watching through most of the film. The bottom line is that my expectations were let down time and time again. How could something that had so much potential fall short? I did laugh at a few parts, yet some things just didn’t quite make all that much sense to me.
I watched it with my sister-in-law and she hated it. I, however, somewhat liked it. However, I don’t really recommend it to anybody who wants to feel better about themselves or about life. It’s slow paced, and you do feel sorry for the characters sometimes. I just can’t help but feel that it could have been done so much better.
It was mediocre at best.

Rating: Bad – Stupid – Mediocre at Best – Good – Really Good – Excellent


GHOST TOWN

Now, Ghost Town was a big surprise for me. I really wasn’t expecting much from this film. As it started out, I thought “Wow, this looks pretty predictable.” Then, I was utterly taken off guard. The movie starts off with a “screw you” moment.
It’s a “romantic comedy” in that it’s a comedy that has a love story. It does focus on the comedy aspect more than the romance. I was actually surprised that the movie did have some heart to it; it was a bit touching at times. It wasn’t too depressing or emotional, it was well balanced.
It held my attention, and kept me going. It was the first movie in a long while that I had laughed so much. It was good, really good.

Rating: Crap – Stupid – Mediocre at Best – Good – Really Good – Excellent

Copyright (c) 2009

Games Update and Block Blocker's Maze Thing

I'm going to do a translation to Portuguese for Scourge: of the Dark Knight. I just started that today and I'll probably have that finished soon. There's not a lot of text in that game so the translation will be quick.

I also started working on a prequel for Scourge: of the Dark Knight. The project is dubbed "Prelude". Here are some screens of the engine so far:

I'm just working on the basic engine right now, so there's not much to look at right now.

Also, I'm releasing a Maze game called Block Blocker's Maze Thing. It's a simple maze game.

Download:

http://host-a.net/Marcos_del_bauer/Block%20Blocker's%20Maze%20Thing.exe

Play:

http://www.yoyogames.com/games/show/93067

Play my Games of Awesome Design!

Marley and Me Review

We rented some movies from blockbuster one night and neither of which I had heard very much about. As I looked at the covers I wasn’t very impressed at all. Especially not the cover art, it was all very basic and obvious. One of these movies was Marley and Me, in which my expectations were very low. It looked like any other run of the mill movies that the entire “family” could enjoy or some movie like My Dog Skip or something like that. However, my expectations were blown out of the way even though it was very similar to My Dog Skip.

I actually found the movie to be very entertaining and funny. It was a movie about life, not so much a cute animal flick. Anyone who has had to raise a dog while trying to start a family can relate to this story. If you love dogs or have ever owned one, you would also appreciate this movie.

There were a few things that I did not like so much, although I can’t remember too many right now. There was a long drawn out montage in the middle of the film in which I thought went on a tad too long. But, overall, I never really lost interest. It was touching and funny in many parts. I don’t think, though, that I would necessarily watch again, at least not for some time.

It was just a good movie.

Rating: Crap – Stupid – Mediocre at Best – Good – Really Good – Excellent

Copyright (c) 2009

Scourge: of the Dark Knight

I've just completed Scourge: of the Dark Knight. I hope it's all in working condition.

Download:
http://host-a.net/Marcos_del_bauer/Scourge%20of%20the%20Dark%20Knight.exe

Alternate Link:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/77n06c25us1scld/Scourge%20of%20the%20Dark%20Knight.exe?dl=0

Play it, I know you will like it.

Doing Some Writing

So, I've been living here in Salem, Oregon for a little over a month now, and I still don't have a job. This kind of sucks, but it has allowed plenty of time to work on some other projects, namely writing projects. I've done more writing in the past month than I have ever done in a very long time. Maybe even my entire life.

I'm trying to figure out now how I can make money off doing this, seeing how this is something I want to actually do for a living and I've wanted to do something like this all my life. So, I'm trying to find ways to get out and noticed. I started this blog and I'm trying to do some research on some freelance work and other ways to get my work out there and make money for what I do so I can pay for college and continue working on other things.

I'm going to be starting some articles and things to try to get going on this. I'm gonna try doing some movie reviews on this site in the coming days and also some other articles of the like, delving into movies and gaming.

I've also been working on continuing some screenplays and regular plays that I started when I was still in high school as well as some short stories. I've also been working on some ideas that I came up with while I was in Brazil. I'm just trying to build up a portfolio of sorts.

I would give more details as to what I'm writing, but I have this fear of people stealing my ideas, I've always been like that. So, I'm being secretive about some of the things that I've been working on.

But, this is what I've been doing in the writing aspect of my creative designs. I feel that I do need to work on these writing projects more.

Copyright (c) 2009

Some Updates on Current Projects

So, here are two games that I'm currently working on right now.

Auto-Warrior

This is a very basic RPG in which you control a warrior and fight monsters. It really has no plot, it's very oldschool. I wanted to try to make something very simple, I've probably only working on it for about a month.
The concept is pretty simple. You walk around and when you hit an enemy you get into battle, but the difference is that you don't control the character in battle. He fights by himself, so all preparation has to take place in between battle.
The basic engine is complete, so what is lacking now is just the basic completion and bug testing.

Scourge: of the Dark Knight

This is something I almost completed before going to Brazil. So, it was never posted anywhere.
I still had a few adjustments to make before posting. Right now I'm trying to finish the changes and make it suitable for posting. It's very much inspired by Castlevania and Metroid.
I hope to have the changes fixed soon and plan to have some people play test it before I get it posted. I want it to be good.

So that's some more of what I've been working on. If you want to help the play testing of either of these games, just say so. Also, The Dragon project has been put on hold for right now, at least until further notice.

Copyright (c) 2009

A Book Report From My Senior Year

So, I was going along through some of my older writings and I found an old book report of mine from my senior English class in High School. I was obviously unprepared and I lost the outline of what I was supposed to put on the report. So, I came up with this:

Mark Bauer
English IV
Book Report on Ender’s Game.
(Now done without the outline.)

1. Ender’s Game, Orson Scott Card (Born in August 25, 1951/uhh… I don’t remember the other info. (I lost the outline… heh… heh…)
2. Published in 1977
3. Umm… What’s next? Uh… Time/ Setting I guess. It takes place in the future. The exact time is unclear. It’s set a short time on Earth, then the main character moves to a space station.
4. The… uh… Plot Summary. The book starts out with a conversation. You don’t have an idea who’s talking until later. It basically sets the mood. It’s a nice effect. I liked it anyway. Anyway, the story follows the character Ender Wiggin. The world has turned to a somewhat communistic state where you’re only allowed to have two kids unless you get permission to. The government also represses religion. All this was caused by an alien attack. Therefore they increased they security thereby taking away their rights. Well, any who, they choose the brightest children to train to be leaders to fight against the next attack. One of these children is Ender. The children are transported to this training facility. There they play “games” to train them. Now, I don’t know how the book ends, because I didn’t finish it. But, it was very interesting.
5. What does it all mean? (Mark’s opinion.) When I was reading this book I couldn’t help but think of today. Today we are even debating on increased security. The argument is would it infringe upon our rights. This story is a good example of it. If we get to this state of military government, we end up focused on destroying the enemy. Also, it shows what happens when you take away a child from childlike things. Children aren’t meant for war. They are not meant to lead us. I think that was what the book was trying to emphasize. Even though it was written in the 70’s, it still can apply to us today.

Well, I think that is all I need. At least I hope.

So, there we have it. It was funny to me. I was surprised on what I actually put on there. But, I did eventually get around to reading ENDER'S GAME eventually. I got part of the idea right at least.

Copyright (c) 2009