SurrogateTV-Developed-Games
Both game scripts I have developed for SurrogateTV. The site went dark November 2021 forcing me to bring the games offline as servers also went dark.
SurroBros
SurroBros was launched on November 1st, 2020
Smash Bros Ultimate for the Switch was able to be played on the internet anywhere in the world by up to 4 players at a time. This was developed early in the surrortg-sdk development cycle when it was still in beta access. I was able to not only develop this but I was able to expand upon known ways to interface with the Switch through the SDK to allow up to 5 players at a time (settled for 4) off of a single Raspberry Pi 4 as opposed to the maximum at the time of 1 player per Pi.
This game was taken offline for good on January 21st, 2021 due a user finding a way to get out of the game, into my Switch's settings, and factory reset it (resetting over 500 hours of game data and saves outside of Smash Bros). You can see the inactive game page at https://surrogate.tv/game/surrobros
Reflection
SurroBros wasn't the best and most complex game but I will always be proud of it. Being that it was developed extremely early into the beta cycle of the surrortg-sdk, I had to figure a lot of stuff out on my own and develop new stuff to be later utilized within the SDK. The knowledge of being able to have up to 5 Trinket M0s running off of a single Raspberry Pi had not been previously done in my research for any purpose (SurrogateTV or otherwise). However, due to it being left fairly open and not restrictive like my later games, someone was able to get into my Switch's system settings and factory reset. To this day, I am still unsure of how they were able to crash into the home menu as there was no home button mapped through the site. The knowledge and experience gained from being an early adopter of the surrortg-sdk has allowed me to be a bank of knowledge in helping new users hook not only Switches but other things to Surrogate.tv.
BOTW
BOTW was launched on Feburary 5th, 2021
Zelda: Breath of the Wild for the Switch was able to be played on the internet anywhere in the world. Using the site's WePlay Model (Users get increments of time to compelte a game together), I made BOTW. Determined to not have the same outcome as SurroBros, I spent the between time setting up quite a number of IR trigger points to mitigate and stop users from getting to unintended menues and settings. Being that I was already developing a ton of IR triggers, I decided to make the game a more interactive experience, instead of the score on the site being "Games Played", I would have the game regocnize key points and items and hand out points. This would make it a competative, yet collaborative experience.
This game is currently running and can be played at https://surrogate.tv/game/botw
Reflection
The amount of time I put into developing this game in the way I did proved very effective in a modular way. The biggest issue plaguing it is reliance on custom made APIs which sometimes have IP changes on my local network, causing the game to become unplayable until I notice and fix it. Otherwise, everything has worked wonderfully and I have been able to utilize what I learned and developed to scale up and make a number of other games in a similar manner.
Super Mario Odyssey
SMO was launched on March 19th, 2021 and is part of the RePlay game catalogue
Super Mario Odyssey for the Switch was able to be played on the internet anywhere in the world. Using the site's WePlay Model (Users get increments of time to compelte a game together), I made SMO. Extending what I learned from BOTW, I was able to easily get frames of data that could be used as IR trigger poitns to mitigate and stop users from getting to unintended menues and settings.
This game is currently running and can be played at https://surrogate.tv/game/replay
Minecraft
Minecraft was launched on April 1st, 2021
Minecraft for the Switch was able to be played on the internet anywhere in the world. Using the site's WePlay Model (Users get increments of time to complete a game together), I made Minecraft. I used the development of this game to work on a tutorial to help others easily make these style of games that are locked down and make sure that the player cannot mess with stuff they shouldn't be able to. This game was also made free to allow new and existing users a chance to check out the system if they hadn't before due to the small cost per play.
This game was taken offline after changes in the UI that affected the IR triggers. Planning on redoing those triggers when I find time. You can access the game page at https://surrogate.tv/game/minecraft
Skyrim
Skyrim was launched on April 19th, 2021
Skyrim for the Switch was able to be played on the internet anywhere in the world. Using the site's WePlay Model (Users get increments of time to complete a game together), I made Skyrim. Due to the age rating of this game being PEGI 18, I had to find a way to allow users who were known to be over 18 to play as the site doesn't have a system in place to check that. Surrogate has a patreon system and I figured that all of those supporters would be over 18 due to the need for a payment method. I opened the game to them and supporters of my buymeacoffee. This game also proved a challenge in choosing proper parts of the UI for frames due to the use of white or transparent elements.
This game was taken offline after the Raspberry Pi crashed. I am planning on retiring this game for a new game. You can access the game page at https://surrogate.tv/game/skyrim
Animal Crossing
Animal Scrossing was launched on May 28th, 2021
Animal Crossing: New Horizons was able to be played on the internet anywhere in the world. Using the site's WePlay Model (Users get increments of time to complete a game together), I made Animal Crossing. This was the easiest game to hook up for several reasons. During the development of Minecraft, I worked on making an effective tutorial for other users to utilize to make games. I used that tutorial process to streamline how easy it would be to get a game working effectively. This game also was already quite restictive on what a user could access so I did not need to have a lot of fancy IR trigger points, in all reality, I only have something like 5 points, most of which are safe guards to lock down the game should the user get to those screens.
This game is currently running and can be played at https://surrogate.tv/game/crossing