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Blockland (video game)

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2007 video game
Blockland
Blockland Title
Developer(s)Eric "Badspot" Hartman, Ben Garney
Publisher(s)Step 1 Games LLC
Designer(s)Eric "Badspot" Hartman
EngineTorque Game Engine
Platform(s)PC, GNU/Linux, Macintosh
ReleaseFebruary 24, 2007
Genre(s)Sandbox, MOG
Mode(s)Single-player, online and LAN multiplayer

Blockland is a multiplayer computer game built on the Torque Game Engine, in which players build using Lego-like building blocks. It was developed by Eric "Badspot" Hartman and was released on February 24, 2007. The game is not endorsed by, or affiliated with the Lego brand. However, at one point, Lego was in talks with Eric about selling Blockland. It was spotlighted on The Screen Savers February 11, 2005, drastically increasing the user base overnight. Blockland has also been featured on Shack News November 1, 2007.

Gameplay

Structures can be built in a single-player or multiplayer setting. Using tools in the game, a player can add effects to bricks, such as lighting, specularity and animated particles, although these are not the only effects available. The game also features a variety of vehicles players can control, weapons, saving and loading of constructions, automated construction through macros and a mini-game system. The minigame system enables users to create configurable and self-contained game modes using options and then play in the world they create. These can range from a simple deathmatch to a zombie survival game to Capture the Flag. This system can allow players on a server to be in a minigame while the others continue to build. Any player who buys the game can create a server. A standard server is able to hold up to 32 players.


Blockland uses a trigger and event-based system to create basic interactive objects such as light switches, missile launchers, collapsing brick structures, or arcade-like games such as Pong. Players can also script triggers and events. Blockland features an add-on system to aid users in managing custom content, such as weapons, vehicles, types of brick effects, player commands and game modes. With the update to v11, a new physics feature was included in an attempt to bring a more realistic aspect to the game. This feature comes into play when a brick is blown up using weapons.

Demo

The demo version of Blockland is limited to exactly 150 bricks and offline gameplay. Players may also play on a Local Area Network (LAN) server with another person who has the full version, where the demo player is free of their brick limit. Demo builds that come with the game are under the demo brick limit and allow new players to explore some of Blockland's features. The demo version becomes the full version when a unique activation key is purchased from the Blockland website and entered into the game.

Retail

The very first public version of Blockland was v0002. The "Globe and Mail" wrote an article on this early version of Blockland in which Eric claimed the game had gained 20,000 users in the 10 days since it "became big". At one point, Lego offered to buy Blockland from Hartman and give him a job working on the game for at least a year. After not hearing back from Lego for some time, Eric went ahead with a retail version of Blockland having removed all of the copyrighted Lego content.

Modifications

Blockland allows users to write add-ons for the game to share with other players. Generally an add-on will consist of new building blocks, weapons, maps or items. These add-ons are packed into a zip file containing the script and art required and can then be placed into a folder for Blockland to automatically load into the game as it starts up. While Blockland itself is not open source, all of the default vehicles and weapons in the game use the add-ons system so new players can examine working examples to help them learn about how to modify the game.

See also

References

  1. "Blockland - Free Multiplayer Online Games". Play Free Online Games. Retrieved 2009-10-15.
  2. "LAMLradio #13 - Blockland". LALMradio (Podcast). James Wadsworth. 2008. {{cite podcast}}: Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
  3. "Pauly Shore, Blockland, Avion". 2005. Retrieved 2007-10-11.
  4. "The Games of IGC 07". 2007. Retrieved 2008-06-05.
  5. "Edge Issue #148". 2005. Retrieved 2008-06-05.
  6. "Blockland Changelog". 2008.
  7. "Blockland Events Demo". 2008.
  8. "Globe and Mail". 2005. Retrieved 2009-04-25.
  9. "Info on Hartman's contact with Lego". 2006.

External links

Torque video game engine games
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