I’ve made six blog posts already, but now it’s time to announce a big change to the blog: it’s going to become much more interesting. How will I accomplish this? By violating something I wrote in the very first post of course!
I plan on making at least one post per week.
I wrote that post before I was on Twitch, Facebook, and Twitter. I think each platform can provide something unique. I want to pivot this blog so that I’m only posting meaningful content here, e.g. technical discussions, big milestones, etc. This is better than trying to shoe-horn a post in every week regardless of the quality. Plus, not many people have visited the blog:
If you still want a weekly dose a Bot Land, there are the recap videos on YouTube:
The core gameplay mechanic of Bot Land™ is coding, so you may think that you have to be a programmer to play the game. However, one of our key tenets is to make Bot Land accessible to everyone—coders and non-coders alike! If you don’t know how to code, you can either use our visual interface, Blockly, or you can make use of Quick Scripts and Quick Snippets in JavaScript.
Quick Scripts are complete scripts that have been written for you, so you don’t need to understand a drop of JavaScript to be able to use them. You can load them up just like in the video, but you’re free to make any changes you’d like after that.
Quick Snippets are small blocks of code that you’ll find yourself using a lot (e.g. the “if (willLasersHit()) {fireLasers();}” code). They allow you to code without having to weed through documentation to find the API you want.
That’s it for now! If you want to check out the development recap video from last week, you can find it here:
As promised, I started streaming last Tuesday. I didn’t know exactly what to expect, but I had a feeling it would be <10 people coming and going throughout the day.
What actually happened was this:
1,028 views, 213 follows
And it’s all thanks to you! I streamed for ~25 hours over the course of three days this week and it’s overwhelming how much support I’ve already gotten! If the stream didn’t get any larger than this, I’d still be a happy camper. I owe you all a big, sincere “thank you” for dropping in. 😀
Being brand new to this, there were some hiccups: the Internet cut out multiple times, my fan was apparently very loud on Friday, I didn’t have the usual chat bots or social media set up, et cetera. I’m doing everything I can to provide an entertaining and informative stream (as well as a fun game of course!), so expect some improvements.
Regarding social media, I made a Facebook and a Twitter, and although they’re relatively bare now, there will hopefully be more content in the next few months. I connected Twitch to Twitter, so a tweet will go out automatically every time I start streaming. I’ve also set up a YouTube account where I can post recap videos from the last week. Here is the first recap video:
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m-VTjaj6kQA&w=560&h=315]
Note that the recap videos are separate from my past Twitch broadcasts; I don’t plan on just taking a piece of my broadcast and using it as a recap video.
Finally, a small bit a real-life business to mention: I am moving in a week and a half, which means I have a lot on my plate right now. I plan on keeping up my streaming schedule, but all that time has to come from somewhere, so I will probably only be posting development recap videos for the next few blog posts.
My only foray into Twitch streaming was when I wrote my own version (now and forever offline) of Twitch Plays Pokémon. That project was a lot of fun, but I didn’t get to interface with any viewers. Heck, I didn’t even have a webcam running. How am I ever going to achieve my goal of Twitch fame if no one on the Internet knows who I am?
Well that’s all about to change…! The world will watch as my view-count soars into the double digits. That’s right, forget about PewDiePie and Kripp, Adam13531 (update from 2022: now “AdamLearnsLive”) is about to have upwards of 10 viewers!
Here’s the plan:
I’ll be streaming the development of Bot Land™. The majority of the code will likely be written while I’m on Twitch. The only work that I’ve already finished pertains to prototyping and research, so you get to see me produce the very first lines of real code!
I plan on streaming for four days a week. I’ll post a schedule on my Twitch page once I’ve got some consistency.
I’ll start mid-morning on Tuesday, 9/8/15 (roughly 10:00 AM PDT).
If you want to support me, you can do so simply by tuning in or following me. If you’re feeling extra generous then you could pass the link on to a friend or two.
I’m super excited for this! I’m looking forward to having a “workplace” again despite being at home all day. I also love sharing knowledge and tips, so feel free to ask me lots of questions. And I’ve got a couple of fun things in store for viewers…
