Category Archives: Community

We’re Playing Monstrous And Spooky Games on Shockwave!

0
Posted by Yelena Kozlova on October 30, 2009 – 6:51 pm
Filed under Community, Download Games, Events, Online Games, Uncategorized, What we're playing

Halloween is almost here and I’m spending my last moments before Trick or Treating (yes, I still go Trick or Treating) with all the Shockwave Monsters.  I’ve gathered them all up in one place where they’re waiting to shoot, hit and run and finally R.I.P. Whether you’re up for a grave shift, in the mood to pop some eye balls, or want to become The Pretender I’ve got you covered.

If you’re not scarred enough, there are some Spooky Download Specials.   I’m enjoying some legendary stories by the campfire, peeking into the Dracula Files and getting hooked on the spooktacular Fishdom sequel.

However, I must confess that my all-time Halloween game favorites are the special treats found in Daily Jigsaw and The Daily Diff.  Check ‘em out, ‘cause the special images and game trophies will be gone once the ghosts and zombies return to their graves.

Happy Halloween everyone!

What We’re Playing: R&R With Spa Games on Shockwave

6
Posted by Yelena Kozlova on October 2, 2009 – 2:29 pm
Filed under Community, Online Games, What we're playing

Spa time: we all want it, we all need it.  Ah, the glorious minutes set aside to relax and think about the finer things in life like pretty nails, haircuts, and pedicures.  But these days, I find it so hard to make time to relax.  By the time I‘m done with work, errands and dinner, all the spas are closed.  So what’s a girl to do?   That’s when I turn to Shockwave for pampering and indulge in a wide array of free online spa games.

Here are my favorite Shockwave spa games, with some for our four legged friends, ’cause puppies need pampering too!:

Sara’s Super Spa
Sara’s Super Spa – Vegas Style
Belle’s Beauty Boutique
Paradise Pet Salon
Doggie Dash

Carrie The Caregiver: HELP!

0
Posted by Carrie on September 29, 2009 – 11:47 am
Filed under Community, Online Games

Did you ever have one of those days when you just wanted to crawl back into bed and fast- forward to tomorrow?

Well, today we’re firing up the new cooking pot. We sure do need it – business is booming, thank goodness – but it also means we have to step up our game once again. Chopping firewood, moving quicker, serving more customers, keeping ourselves in shape and simply staying organized takes a ton of effort. I know if I drop even one ball, the rest will come tumbling down. Yup, the pressure to stay cool, calm and collected is HUGE.

Between the chaos at the store, Will’s bad back, Pearl’s teething, Safi’s sullenness (sorry, sweetie!) and Peter’s girl troubles, I’m sort of feeling a little low on fuel. My emotional, physical and spiritual stores need to be topped up, A.S.A.P.

And that’s where my handsome and handy hubby Will comes in… by building us a fantastic new R&R shed. A place where we can all stop by every once in a while to get an instant fix of everything we need to keep ourselves in tip-top shape. (It really turned out great, too… no wonder his back is killing him!)

It’s my nature to focus on the needs of those around me first. That’s just who I am! But as parents, we also bear the brunt of everything that goes on in our families. That added pressure means we have a responsibility to take care of our own individual needs, too, or else we’ll be no good to anyone.

Don’t get me wrong – life with my big, fat blended family is fabulous… most of the time. But there are days when I simply crave some peace and quiet. No matter what, I am going to take a walk in the woods by myself after work today. The days are getting shorter and, pretty soon, winter will be here. I want to get out and enjoy the beauty that surrounds me.

That’s how I’m going to be good to myself this week.
—-

Play Carrie the Caregiver Crossroads!
Follow Carrie On Twitter!
Become Carrie’s Friend On Facebook!

Ahoy, Shockwave Hearties! It’s Pirate Time!

1
Posted by Jessie on September 16, 2009 – 4:52 pm
Filed under Community, Download Games, Events, Online Games

September 19th is International Talk Like a Pirate Day.

Why not take the theme one step farther? At Shockwave, you can also *game* like a buccaneer or corsair. Just weigh anchor, matey, and set yer ship’s course for these exotic ports. Fair winds and plunder await. Arrr!

Pirateville
Tradewinds Classic
Spirit of Wandering: The Legend
Carribean Hideaway
Sea Journey

Coming Soon: Redline Rumble 4

33
Posted by Yelena Kozlova on September 10, 2009 – 3:22 pm
Filed under Coming Soon, Community

There are few games out there that offer a hair-raising thrill ride with crazy twists and turns that  make you hold on to your keyboard for dear life.  The Redline Rumble series blew me away the first time I sat down to play it, and though I was a pretty terrible racer, I just could not stop playing as I was hooked on the thrill of the chase.  Now, it is my immense pleasure to announce that a new installment in this awesome racing series is coming out exclusively on Shockwave September 15th!  The game is jam packed with new surprises and features that are sure to thrill not just the seasoned Redline Rumbler, but pretty much anyone who’s ready for a great joy ride.

While we can’t yet take Redline Ruble 4 out for a spin, we can at least get the best inside scoop from the creator of this racing classic himself, Richard Smith.

The Spark: How has the Redline Rumble Series evolved over the last 3 games?

Richard Smith: The races have evolved from crude linear freeways to track like curves, and finally to a full open 3D world with working traffic flow encompassing a vast geographical area giving far greater gameplay variety.

The Spark: Yes, we’ve thoroughly enjoyed the Rumbling worlds that you’ve created for us!  So what’s new in Redline Rumble 4?

Richard Smith: Full multi layered environments are the biggest addition, enabling you to race around car parks, inside aircraft hangars, over roofs and under traffic tunnels. You can even play chicken with a landing 747 Passenger Jet!

The Spark: Wow, that’s crazy! You have a great imagination! What RR4 feature is your favorite and why?

Richard Smith: Boosting off the raised bridge near the dockyards is my favorite moment in the game, for sheer airborne thrills.

The Spark: From the little that I’ve been privileged to see so far, it looks like the game has a super interesting setting that is a combination of many famous cities.  Can you give us a quick tour?

Richard Smith: IgNitro City is in fact a mutant combination of real and imagined places and architecture. Cisco style hills, NY style financial district and traffic lights, LA style runway, Chicago style docks and so on, with some humorous parody buildings and fictitious companies to spice things up a bit. The Nerd Burger Ring pokes fun at the famous Nurburgring race track in Germany. The ‘Gould & Gates Bridge’ looks very familiar. Wellard Hardware has a sky scraper shaped like screwdriver. The cosmetics headquarters takes the form of a giant lipstick. Lunkopf & Stubbs has cigarette and lighter shaped building with an ash tray roundabout. I’ll leave people to work out what the ‘Sunny Pierce Toole’ Legal Office building is based on…

The Spark: Wow, the anticipation is totally killing me!  You must have had a lot of fun creating Redline Rumble 4! Can you share a funny production story with the Redline Rumble fans?

Richard Smith: I probably work in the smallest home game studio in the world (no prizes for guessing what use the room had before I converted it). My midi keyboard touches the walls each side. But like a techno-monk in my cyber-cell I have everything I need to zone out and create the complex code and graphics for each game. Things get really interesting when my 3 step-kids all pile in at once trying to help me ‘Beta test’ the current build.   :)

The Redline Rumble 4 production is racing up to the finish line, so I’ll let the creator and his team of testers get back to the game.  In the meantime, you can prepare yourself for the RR4 challenge by sharpening your skills on the first 3 Redline Rumble adventures: Redline Rumble, Redline Rumble 2: Detonator, and Redline Rumble 3.

Carrie The Caregiver: Let’s Lunch

2
Posted by Carrie on September 1, 2009 – 2:52 pm
Filed under Community, Online Games

My poor, sweet Safi.

I have a feeling she’s really struggling at her new school. She’d never admit it, because she’s such a private person, but I can tell she’s been a bit blue lately. I remember the feeling of not fitting in in high school… it can be such a difficult time for a teenage girl. Peter seems to be adjusting okay, thank goodness, but he’s always been more outgoing than Safi. Like me, she takes everything to heart.

That’s why Will and I decided to bring her into the store this week to give us a hand with the overflow of customers… hopefully we’ll also be able to get her to open up about what’s going on. As Grettle so wisely pointed out, a mother is only ever as happy as her saddest child, so I’m committed to helping Safi get through this transition.

I suppose that’s what this grand adventure is all about… spending more time together, focusing on our relationships and supporting each other through all the ups and downs life throws at us.

On a personal note, I noticed this week that Will and I have both lost a few pounds since we’ve been here. Running around in the store is running us down! I have to remember to eat to keep my energy level up while I’m working, or else keeping on top of things can be tricky.

Gotta go… the kids will be home from school soon and I want to fix them a snack.

–
Play it now

Carrie The Caregiver: A Girl Named Pearl

0
Posted by Ben De Ayora on August 19, 2009 – 11:25 am
Filed under Community, Online Games


This week Carrie fills us in on the newest member of her family Pearl! Things are staying busy on the farm and there always seems to be something going on!
–

A Girl Named Pearl
Well, this week should prove to be quite the challenge – Grettle has an old friend visiting from out of town, so she won’t be able to babysit as much. And since the big kids will be back at school, little Miss Pearl will be joining us at the store from time to time. How on earth am I going to handle looking after the baby and keeping the jam-fires burning?

Pearl!

Lately, it seems to be all mommy, all the time. Do your little ones also cry more for mom than for dad? I must admit, I’m sort of looking forward to her going through a “daddy phase” ;) One of the nice things about Pearl, though, is that if I tend to her right away, she settles down nicely and takes a nap, which should take the pressure off at the store.

Oh – and to make matters worse, the old kiln’s been driving us nuts… burning through fuel like crazy. We had at least a few cords of chopped wood stockpiled at one point, but now that production has increased too; looks like it’s time to add manual labor to our lengthening list of things to do :(

Fortunately, there is a plus side: Will’s biceps will be looking great in no time!
–

Carrie the Caregiver Crossroads Part 1: Carrie’s Country Jam - Play The Game
Carries Facebook - Add her as a friend!
Carries Twitter - Follow her!

Inside the Game: Tower Up!

0
Posted by Yelena Kozlova on July 30, 2009 – 4:52 pm
Filed under Club Shockwave, Community, Online Games

Tower Up is finally here. You’ve seen the “Coming Soon” teaser for this awesome new Club Shockwave game and now you can finally play it for yourself. If you’re anything like me, once you get hooked on a game (and this one is sure to reel you in), you’ll want to know about the people, the process, and development of your new favorite pastime. That’s why I interviewed the developers of Tower Up, Steve Bullock and Andrew Young at Adveractive, and the game’s producer, Michael Ruppert. Here’s what they had to say:

The Spark: Michael, where did you get the idea for Tower Up?

Michael: We’ve always wanted to have a great stacking game for Club Shockwave. But we needed to put a unique spin on the genre. I thought a lot about some of the more popular games for inspiration and it dawned on me that we needed to give you some purpose to explain why you really care about stacking these pieces. I thought, why not make a game where you don’t make the pieces disappear at the bottom of the screen and instead have them stack skyward and have the player build something? What better thing to build than enormous skyscrapers!

Read More »

Vive la Fête!

1
Posted by Jessie on July 14, 2009 – 10:22 am
Filed under Community, Download Games, Events, Online Games

This July 14th, get into the spirit of Bastille Day, France’s national commemoration of the 1789 storming of the Bastille prison that ignited the French Revolution. Try playing some great games with a French twist.

Mortimer Beckett and the Time Paradox takes you back in time to prerevolutionary France, where you’ll meet King Louis XVI as he tries to escape his angry subjects.

Then, help Edmond Dantes, protagonist of the French literary masterpiece, The Count of Monte Cristo , to avenge his wrongful imprisonment and bring his betrayers to justice.

Or, relax and take to the French skies in The Flying Trapeezees ; you’ll entertain the Gallic masses with a fun family of daring trapeze artists (and generate some Bastille Day-appropriate fireworks in the process!).

Coming Soon: Burnin’ Rubber 3

63
Posted by Yelena Kozlova on June 29, 2009 – 6:31 pm
Filed under Coming Soon, Community, Online Games

To me, there is nothing more iconic in racing than the smell of burning rubber.   You know that it’s not a good race unless there is smoke under your tires, and you know that some of the best online racing games are Burnin’ Rubber and Burnin’ Rubber 2.  But, what you don’t know is that on July 7th, Burning Rubber 3 is coming to Shockwave!


That’s right, the next installment of our favorite online racer is almost here, and when I found out,  just had to get the inside scoop to share with you.  I caught up with our producer on the game, Michael Ruppert, and the talented developers from Xform, who are currently putting the final touches on Burning Rubber 3.

The Spark: Michael, can you let us in on the back story of how the Burnin’ Rubber racer series came to Shockwave?

Michael Ruppert:  Part of my job as a Game Producer is to scour the web for top online game developers. During one of my routine searches, I stumbled upon a fun little prototype Kart racing game from Xform, a group of talented individuals from The Netherlands.  The game had lots of potential thanks to some great art style and track design.  I got in touch with Xform, and quickly found that we all had similar tastes in racing games and could create top quality racing content.  We released the original Burnin’ Rubber on Shockwave on December 4, 2007 to extremely positive reviews and it became an instant hit on the site. Xform really enjoyed the experience and were eager to start work on a sequel. For Burnin’ Rubber 2, they pulled out all the stops and added a ton of great features like daily races, hidden packages, and a bunch of new cars and tracks. Needless to say, Burnin’ Rubber 2 was an even greater success than the original and is still one of the most played racing games on Shockwave.

The Spark:  Pieter and Diederik, your work at Xform on the Burnin’ Rubber series has delighted racing fans on Shockwave since 2007!  Can you tell us a bit about the evolution of this awesome game over the years?

Xform:  Technically a lot has changed from the first one to Burnin’ Rubber 3, from what goes on behind the scenes to how we make our games in general. We stopped making tracks based upon laps. Instead the tracks are always a path from A to B. This allows us to build tracks with reusable tiles (big square blocks with a road and additional scenery) and makes for much cooler scenery as you speed down the racetrack. We first used this approach in Burnin’ Rubber 2 and it was a big hit.  In comparison to BR1 the other games have almost ten times the content.  BR1 featured 3 tracks and 3 cars. BR2 had 15 tracks and about 5 cars. With Burnin’ Rubber 3 we went completely overboard with content (a bit too much to be honest ;) ) Over 10 cars (all customizable), weapons, upgrades and lots of tracks!

The Spark: Wow, I can’t wait!  Burnin’ Rubber 3 is not just bigger and cooler; it has new features as well.  Just when I thought it can’t get any better!  What made you decide to put weapons in BR3?

Xform: There are two main reasons. First of all we had great fun seeing the traffic cars explode in Burnin’ Rubber 2 when you bumped into them.  Although not very realistic, it was great to see them burst into flames and fly away.  So, we were already thinking about how fun it would be to destroy more stuff during a race. Secondly, we wanted to do something more action packed than our previous games and thought that adding some guns and rockets would be a great way to do so.

So there you have it.  If you thought that your favorite racer can’t get any better, on July 7th Michael Rupert and Xform will show us that it can with Burnin’ Rubber 3.  I hear the game still has those awesome hidden packages that will score you extra goodies, the race will still get your adrenaline sky-rocketing, and now you get to customize 10 brand-new cars complete with weapons!  I’m told there are a few other surprises in the game, but we’ll just have to wait (impatiently) until July 7th to find out more.  In the mean time, I’ll be practicing with my old friends Burnin’ Rubber and Burnin’ Rubber 2.

Take a peek behind the scenes of Shockwave.com at The Shockwave Spark, an online gamers blog that keeps you up to date on the coolest titles, the hottest deals, and other newsworthy and buzz worthy tidbits. Get the scoop on the latest in online games, you'll have the chance to ask questions, comment on recent posts, and chat with the rest of the gaming blog community.

Of course, we appreciate your feedback on our gaming blog, including all your game suggestions. But, there's a lot of it! So, while we read every single one of our members' comments, we can only do so much. We'll get to as many requests as possible, but usually don't get a chance to respond to everyone individually. This is one popular online gamers blog! Check back each week and we'll post a response that addresses the most commonly requested games.

For even more fun, check out Club Shockwave and Shockwave® UNLIMITED. As a member of Club Shockwave, you'll have access to exclusive versions of the best games around, including Free Cell, Mahjong, Bingo, Daily Jigsaw, Solitaire, and more. When you play games, you'll earn tokens, win trophies and have a chance to play instant win scratchers or enter sweepstakes for big cash prizes! With Shockwave® UNLIMITED you'll receive access to exclusive online games and downloads for a low monthly fee, unlimited play on all downloadable games, no ad interruptions on all games, and brand new Flash games each week. Plus, you'll have full access to all of the great online features of Club Shockwave, including multiplayer games like Bingo.