Reality Theory

A client has just launched a game I developed, Excel Hero.  This game tests your skill at Microsoft Excel keyboard shortcuts.  Exciting, right?  Well, if you’re a hardcore Excel user, this game is actually pretty fun.  There’s a countdown timer and high score as well as a random selection of shortcuts to test your skill that get increasingly difficult.  I executed all the flash development in partnership with a guy who came up with the idea and Matt Coffee, who designed/illustrated the sweet landing page.

The simplicity of the game (and the strange requirement to click in a field below the game) mask a ridiculous challenge that the game presented: capturing literally every keystroke.  Of particular “joy” was the Alt (Option) key which Flash Plugin has no access to. Another fun thing that required significant hackery was the fact that  your web browser thinks it should be in charge of common shortcuts like Print (Ctrl-P) and the like.

What made this all possible was leaving Javascript 100% in charge of blocking and capturing literally all keystrokes and then handing their keycodes off to Flash to interpret as they related to the current challenge.  In the end, a triple-tag-team of Flash, Javascript and PHP ultimately provide a fairly seamless experience on both Firefox and IE.  Rumor has it Chrome doesn’t play well.  So it goes.  Good times.

While the visual template is none of my doing, I did provide Technical Direction and some of the actionscript implementation for the development of 6 flash-based eLearning courses, including the skinning of the PFI LMS and the buildout of flash modules which track score and completion in the LMS.  These interact with the LMS through a custom javascript API and the Flash ExternalInterface class.

I was contracted to perform all of the flash layout & interactive functionality for this Minneapolis law firm’s site: http://www.ethoslaw.com.

Based on approved visual designs, I used Actionscript to infuse a soft dynamic transition to nearly everything in the site, from the preloader to the page loads to interactive content regions to even the rollover effects (which fade between the various colors).

In addition, I used Actionscript to parse out dynamic XML content from a remote PHP admin site, giving the Testimonials and Articles content management capabilities that allowed the client to make subsequent updates.

While working as Technical Director at PFI, I scripted, formulized and directed the development of a flash-based advergame for VISI, Inc.  I also helped with much of the Actionscript 2 development.  Click Here to play online at VISI. Find out if you win an iPod Nano!

I tech directed this team effort to update our Pixel Farm Interactive website for the year. I also fine tuned some of the quasi-3d (x,y,z) actionscript transitions as well as add a few layers of “polish” here and there.

While working at PFI I designed the original site layout as well as developed the site actionscript including the Virtual Tour.  I also animated (via actionscript) the flash-based Windows Screensaver.  NOTE: the corporate colors & logo have been changed to the teal family since my original soft blue design but structure/code is identical.  Click here to view site

Here’s the virtual tour interface: