We made it! Just under the gun, Turdhead.com has a brand new game! So far, the one-game-per-month challenge has been met. Pathetically, perhaps, but still…

Truth be told, this one was done start-to-finish in a single day (today). It's a bit rough around the edges, and yes, I'll probably tweak it in the next day or so, but DAMMIT, it's here, and it met its Feb. 28 deadline. Barely.

So here it is, Bus Terminal Amusements, Vol I: Guess Which Hand. The name — and the game — may seem a little odd, but we hope you enjoy it as much as we do! It's that classic game of childhood, "Guess Which Hand," but it's been bummed up pretty well with a creepy old man in a bus station. How many quarters can you take from creepy Carl?

Flash 8 player is required! Enjoy, and feel free to let us know what you think about it! Thanks!

Update: I've spiffed up the game a bit, and moved it to its permanent home in the Turdhead.com Amusements section. Click here to play the game!

PSPHacks.net last week announced the results of a competition to create a SWF player for Sony's PSP™ (PlayStation™ Portable) handheld device. The result is just that: a "mostly" Flash Player 7 compatible player running on the PSP.

From the site:

The player supports Flash 7 action script. Not everything mind you but a good portion of it.

As for limitations, I would say that people will have to bare in mind that the PSP only has 32mb of RAM.

3mb of that is taken up by the program itself, so there isn't much room left.

Having complex vector shapes is also a bad idea as the shapes are triangulated and produce massive triangle lists.

The bottom line is, try it and see what works and if someone is creating a new animation for the player they need to keep testing it to see if it still works.

Site creators say they'll release the new player "on or about" Feb. 28., and they'll soon sponsor yet another contest to develop Flash content specifically for the PSP.

I've been looking for a legitimate excuse to get a PSP lately, so the announcement couldn't have come at a better time. I'm not thrilled about the specter of "nonstandard" Flash players in the marketplace, but it's good to see people filling voids where they exist.

Guess it's time to get my game on.

Thanks for the great submissions this year! The submission window is now closed! If you still want to show off your work, however, feel free to send it to us (or better yet, wait until next year's contest!) Thanks!

It's that time of year again: The 2006 ActionScript Poetry Contest is on! What's an ActionScript poetry contest?

To quote last year's entry rules:

Translate your favorite poem (any poem, but remember: "Nantucket" is not an accepted ActionScript keyword), and post it here in the comments section of this article before March 21 (which is UNESCO's official World Poetry Day). Once the deadline has passed, the judging will begin.

Judging will be based on several factors, including public reaction to the poem (as noted in comments here), its poetic appeal, creativity and the ungodly whims of our nameless, faceless panel of judges. Extra credit will no doubt be given if the "poem" actually does something in ActionScript, or if it somehow manages to retain some sense of poetic integrity.

Please include a link to the original poem in the comments of the script, so that the less literary among us can also figure out what's going on. And as always, keep in mind that this is not a call for Flash animations interpreting literary works, but a real, honest-to-goodness, geekfest in which the code itself becomes the poetry.

As inspiration, check out last year's entries or the original ActionScript Jabberwocky poem.

And to see what it takes to win, here's last year's winning entry, as penned by Ammocell:


   // El Dorado
   // Edgar Allan Poe
   //
   // Translated by Ammocell 
   // Original poem can be viewed at: 
   // http://www.mat.upm.es/~jcm/poe–shadow.html
   // ========================
      
   var elDorado = new Object();
       
   var knight = new Object();
   knight.bedight = ‘gaily’;
   if( sunshine && shadow ) {
      knight.gallant = true;
   }
   while( knight.journeyed > knight._x + 1000) {
       knight.singing[’song’] = true;
       knight.search( elDorado );
   }
       
   while( ground.spot != elDorado ) {
       knight.grow(age++);
       knight.bold = true;
       createEmptyMovieClip(’shadow_mc’, 1000);
       knight.heart.setMask(shadow_mc);
   }
     
   if( length ) knight.strength = false;
   shadow = new Object();
   shadow.pilgrim = true;
   knight.meet(shadow);
   knight.query(shadow, elDorado.land[where]);
       
   shade = shadow;
   knight.search = knight.seek;
   shade.reply = function() {
       if( knight.seek == elDorado ) {
           knight.ride = function() {
               moon.mountains._y++;
               shadow.valley._y–;
           }
       }
   }
   


For his prize-winning efforts, AmmoCell was awarded an ActionScript Jabberwocky T-shirt which we're sure he treasures daily (assuming it arrived). This year's winner will receive their choice of a custom T-shirt featuring their own poem on the back or the classic ActionScript Jabberwocky digs.

The submission window closes March 21, and judging will begin immediately thereafter. We look forward to seeing what you can do!

The contest begins… NOW! Just leave your entries in the comments form below. To make sure the code formats correctly, please add the tag [code] (in square brackets) at the beginning, and [/code] at the end.If they look screwed up; don't fret — we'll straighten it up asap. Thanks!)