The Shell and Cactus

Ahhh video games. One of the main reasons I got into programming. Well I made one that is not too bad if I don't say so myself. I would have put it on the web sooner, but haven't been able to find a way to host it. Cause with all the files and everything its about 50 megs (including mp3 songs and the source).

So the backstory is that back in the winter of 2001 I was first learning Win32 GDI programming and decided to take what I knew and make a side scroller game. I actually got decently far before stopping, and had character interactions and some graphics working. But what got me was that I was trying to make the game waaaaaaaaaaaay to customizable. I got the idea from Civilization 2 (favorite game of all time) because it was so great to go in, and almost make your own game from the framework provided by the game engine. So I tired to do the same thing with my game... but that killed me. I almost had my own scripting language to control character interactions in the game done, but it just became such a bear to work with that I lost intrest, even though the engine part of the game was decently complete.

Now fast foward to May 2005. I have just returned from a trip to Japan to see my wonderful girlfriend. I know her birthday is coming up since she thankfully finally told me her birthdate ;) and I want to do something really special for her. I have been playing around with the idea of doing a game in C# and using managed DirectX when it hits me. I could use those technologies and redo the game I origionally did as me having to save her! Just like the good old Super Mario Brothers games, but with myself instead of Mario and her as the Princess. Add in some unique elements, like coke restoring health, and her annoyingly aweful co-worker Ito-san as the end boss and you have got yourself a great idea.

So I set out to make this game. Knowing I had three short months to do it so I had to work very fast. But I didn't really do to well with time managment ;) I spent too much time working on the level editor... and then playing Half Life 2 ;) By the start of July I was really rushing to get it finished, and the code kinda shows this, its definitly not my best work. But by the middle of July (deadline being the 21st) I pretty much had it done. I tested it for awhile, touched up some of the graphics, and sent it to her.

She really loved it too. Possibly cause I spent so much time working on it, but I think also because it is something unique that no one has (or very few guys have) done before for their girlfriends. Which is sweet, cause I was really hoping to wow her with it too. My only regrets are 1. not using my time properly, and 2. now I am not sure how to top this one on subsequent birthdays ;) But it was a great experince.

Anyways please try it out and let me know what you think. It is all in C# and uses Managed DirectX through and through. If you have any questions or whatever, again, send them to me and I'll try to answer them as best I can. Any suggestions or anything too. :)

The game, source, and managed DirectX runtime (can now be downloaded by using the link at the bottom of this post). All you need is DirectX 9.0c and the .NET 1.1 framework before you unzip the file. There are no real installation instructions (except for one minor ignorable thing), but glance over the readme.txt for info on how to play the game. Also I've found this site is kinda slow so if anyone else knows a good free place to host files let me know.

Update: Friday the 21st of October 2005:
Other blog entries regarding Texas Quest:
Screen shots of Texas Quest
First part of a Tutorial on how I did Texas Quest

Update: Thursday the 1st of December 2005:
Thanks to Kurt I have a new host for Texas Quest, please download it here:
http://coinop.org/KB.aspx/KB/ZZ-Hosted/