East Meets West

Enemy AI is a tricky and complex component in a game such as Johnny Outlaw. The enemies must be smart, yet they must be bound by complex limitations to mimic human weakness. In many respects, our AI has been a success, and it is generally considered to be as smart as the works of Arhur Miller. But great intelligence, if left unmolded by a proper teacher, is merely wasted potential.

As I watched player after player go toe to toe with the AI, as bandito after bandito was outmaneuvered, exploited, and gunned down, I came to an astounding realization: had the AI but listened to the teachings of Sun Tzu, he would never have been defeated.

To the few uninitiated out there, Sun Tzu was the ancient Chinese equivalent of Gandalf. Just as Johnny Outlaw turned video games into an art form, Tzu showed the world that war could be aesthetically pleasing. Did you know that every war ever fought by man or beast could have been won by listening to the teachings of Sun Tzu? In fact, the only times in history that a war ever ended inconclusively was when neither side listened to Sun Tzu, or when both sides listened equally.

If man could learn from Sun Tzu, certainly machine could as well. To this end, every bandito was required to meditate upon the precepts.

Sun Tzu says:

The clever combatant imposes his will on the enemy, but does not allow the enemy's will to be imposed on him.

From this teaching the bandito will no longer be lured by the treacherous Johnny into positions of weakness. He will no longer repeatedly run into walls when Johnny is somewhere behind them.

In all fighting, the direct method may be used for joining battle, but indirect methods will be needed in order to secure victory.

The bandito knows that, although moving directly towards Johnny is powerful, it is only effective when Johnny is actually in the open where bullets can reach him. He will need to follow a clear path, no matter how indirect, to achieve victory.

If your enemy is secure at all points, be prepared for him. If he is in superior strength, evade him. If your opponent is temperamental, seek to irritate him. Pretend to be weak, that he may grow arrogant. If he is taking his ease, give him no rest.

The bandito knows that if he loses sight of Johnny and cannot find him, he can remain waiting in a safe position. He knows that when Johnny is attempting to hide, he must path around the terrain to where he last saw Johnny so that he might properly continue his harassment.

If your enemy is hidden behind a big wall, don’t stand there and constantly shoot bullets into the wall. Just stop shooting and walk around the wall or something.

The wisdom of Sun Tzu.

With the precepts in their programming, these new bandits will hardly seem to resemble their old selves. Had these bandits fought at Gettysburg, they would have never charged Cemetery Ridge. Had these bandits been Napoleon, they would have never invaded Russia. Had these bandits commanded in the Cola Wars, we would not have to suffer the existence RC Cola.

The Day of Reckoning

The long awaited hour is here at last.

Perhaps you heard that May 21, 2011 was to be one of the most important moments in history? And now it is here. Behold, the rapture - the rapture of experiencing the BRAND NEW JOHNNY OUTLAW WEBSITE!



A treasure trove of earthly delights, this new website delivers Johnny Outlaw's trademark rootin’ tootin’ cowboy fun in a way the blog format simply could never support. With Johnny Outlaw media, fan art, and character bios, it’s a wagon train of fun for all ages. Welcome to Web 3.0.

So don’t get left behind here at the Johnny Outlaw Blog, experience the website for yourself. Today’s the day! And if you haven’t already, download and play the newest release of the Johnny Outlaw Demo. Go ahead. It’s one decision you won’t regret come May 22!

Johnny Outlaw's Greatest Hits

We at Johnny Outlaw Studios are proud to present a brand new release of the Johnny Outlaw Demo, Playable Here .

This update heralds a new age of efficient code, an age without lag, an age with improved story and animations, but beyond and soaring high above resides the realm of music.

Today we celebrate the music of Johnny Outlaw. Artists, writers, coders. Their work is empty.

Images? What are images? Images fall short. They deceive and beguile. There is no honesty in an image. No. In them we find only the fallibility of human reason and the impermanence of all things.

Words? Words alone could never convey the vast oceans of emotion, the immeasurable depth of the human experience. In the face of such a task, what is the value of a mere word?

You see, when words and images fail, we at Johnny Outlaw Studios turn to Maestro Matt Dunn.

If music be the wine of the soul, then Maestro Dunn is the chalice.

To inaugurate this new edition of the Demo, the good Maestro has given us several new compositions. Here I will take some time to review a selection of two. I assure you I will not go easy on him.

“A Well Travelled Man” (Featured in the Menu and Map screens)

A Well Travelled Man - Johnny Outlaw: Gun for Hire

– The anthem of the American West itself, the spirit of Manifest Destiny bottled for the modern listener, sold as a snake oil. It encapsulates the fear of the unknown, the thirst for adventure, the longings for a past that never was, and the brazen hope for a future that may never be. At the heart of this composition is a variation on the Johnny Outlaw theme, and an impeachable darkness. Perhaps the demons of our better nature have at last come to light. Is this is but a foretaste of things to come? 5 out of 5 stars.

“Man Mountain” (On temporary exhibition in Coyote Canyon)

Man Mountain audio - Johnny Outlaw: Gun for Hire

– A salute, or dare I say satire, of the industriousness of the l9th century. Touched by an air of militarism and measured rhythm, this piece is in many ways a dirge for society, the luckless victim of mechanization and bureaucratization. The only corruption in this new order comes from a familiar twang, a sound that is synonymous with outlawry itself. Is it a sinister force at work beneath the surface, or is it the last thread of humanity in a dehumanized world? Man has fashioned himself a mountain. It cannot be blown away by the winds, eroded by the rains. It can only be destroyed by a catalyst from within, by dynamite in human form. 5 of out of 5 stars.

“Untitled”

"Untitled" audio - Johnny Outlaw: Gun for Hire

- A song without name, only adding more layers to the mysteries it holds. A calculating piece, not entirely sinister, but one which you hesitate to put trust in. Yet, it would seem that if you hesitate for even a second, the music itself will overtake you, and swallow you into an abyss absent of all life, where only rhythm and melody may find you until the end of days. Hypnotic, but only because the listener desires to be hypnotized. The intermittent, brisk piano runs are your only salvation from relentless seduction by this conspiracy of tone and cadence. 5 out of 5 stars.

There are many more compositions in place, but the words I put down are pestering gnats to the mind. Music is the only salve. You must play the Johnny Outlaw demo and listen for yourself.

Cloud Computing

Today for Johnny Outlaw Studios’ ten part series on game design we seek to delve into the most elusive, and misunderstood quality of a game- immersion. Immersion is the component of a game through which the player becomes a part of the presented game world. A very simple idea, and, throughout all of my research, there is only one real guideline to creating an ‘immersive’ world. The game must uphold and reinforce the rules of the game’s world. This means it must be internally consistent and not beat you over the head with the fact that it is a mere computer program.

It is very simple to pinpoint things that break immersion. Anything that makes the player aware of the ‘game’ nature of the world ruins immersion. Bad controls ruin immersion; lag ruins immersion, as do frustrating mechanics. Breaking immersion is easy. Even the worst games manage to do it. So let us not dwell on such things.

Long ago, Johnny Outlaw added in a new feature called the tumbleweed, a decorative feature which served no purpose beyond creating an immersive world. Yet this tumbleweed was more valuable than any boss fight, any game mechanic, and any meager menu option. Through merciless calculations of tumbleweed mass distribution, we created a perfect demonstration of this, the most iconic of western flora. The tumbleweed was a reinforcement of immersion. It made the world alive. It made the world just a little something more than “complete x task”. It was a world that existed and persisted without tasks. That tumbleweed represented the higher truth, the Platonic ideal of the Johnny Outlaw universe.

Immersion is far easier to destroy than it is to create, but creating it is as simple as reinforcing what already exists. We revisited the tumbleweed. Even in its perfection, there was room for improvement. It dawned on me that the tumbleweed was only the first step. In all my calculations I had neglected one simple truth. Without wind, a tumbleweed is just a weed. The world of Johnny Outlaw naturally is presumed to have weather. After all, there is a harsh desert climate. There is water to make the cacti grow and also to quench Johnny’s thirst. The only thing this world needed for complete immersion was a dynamic system of algorithms to produce true weather patterns.

Through extensive weather mapping and study of the atmospheric sciences, I modeled the real flow of air currents, chemical content, pressure, static charge, and temperature feedback systems. And before you criticize, let me say that yes, we did remember to account for the curvature and rotation of the Earth, and the influence and frequency of sunspots. This took what was already presumed to exist, weather, and made it a real and living part of the world. Now Johnny Outlaw is truly immersive, and all it took was a true-to-life system of wind currents and precipitation levels. Of course the average player may not take much notice, as the desert climate does not appear dynamic to the unlearned mind. But the subconscious will take note. It will acknowledge that the clouds drift in varying speeds according to the wind, that the changes in elevation cause moisture to consolidate. It will appreciate that this world is as real as any you profess to live in.

As the tumbleweed blows past, off to destinations unknown, the wind at its back and fortune at its feet, it will be like seeing an old friend. Familiar, yet changed, with a history knowable only by the course it has set. This is the gift of fully realized immersion.

Patronizing the Arts

A loyal fan walked up to me the other day and he said something very interesting. He said, “Mister, I sure do love Johnny Outlaw more than I love mommy, daddy, George Washington, and life itself. But Mister, my art teacher said that Johnny Outlaw is just a game. It isn’t real art".

You heard right. This is what they’re teaching in schools these days: Johnny Outlaw isn’t art. Blasphemy is being taught as fact. Now, I’m sure in time the curriculum will be adjusted to accommodate Johnny Outlaw, but this goes beyond Johnny Outlaw. All video games are victims of such prejudice. You have heard their cries. You hear them say that video games can’t be ‘art’. At least, not in the way that every other medium can be art. This is patently false. Once again, the art community has fallen behind as technology marches forward.

First they told Orson Welles that film would never be art. Then he made Citizen Kane.

They told Tom Wilson that comics would never be art. Then he made Ziggy.

They told Michelangelo that ceilings would never be art. Then he painted the Sistine Chapel.

At last they told me that video games could not be art. The rest is history.

Video games are nothing more than the next step. They are the cathartic paintings of cavemen refined for modern sensibilities. The fact of the matter is that video games have always coexisted and intermingled with the traditional mediums. Some of the earliest games found their roots in painting.

Look here, at 19^th century painter Francisco Goya’s painting titled Ganon Devouring his Son (Ganon is the Spanish name for Chronos, the father of Zeus). Over a century later, game designer Shigeru Miyamoto would base his most popular game off of this painting. You may know that game as Super Mario Bros. 3.

And look here, we already have films based on video games. Films such as “Resident Evil”, “BloodRayne”, “Pokemon 4Ever – Celebi, Voice of the Forest”, and “Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li”. Are not all of these films ‘high art’? Why can a film be considered art when the very video game it is derived from is not? Why are video games denied entrance into that pantheon of the arts? Do video games demand their own ‘separate but equal’ classification?

Now, I don’t know if video games have rights, but if they did, this would be an atrocity. Should we not then err on the side of caution? Should we not let video games be art?

Johnny Outlaw's Finest Hour

Today we stand at the precipice of eternity. It was one year ago that Johnny Outlaw made its first public appearance, and now, on the anniversary, we are privileged to look back at the triumphs and look forward to greater glory.

One year ago, this video took the web by storm and Johnny Outlaw quickly became first in the hearts of his countrymen.



Simple, yet effective, this was to be the beginning of something much greater. As you can see the mechanics were almost all there – health, energy, the bullets, the reflecting, the trick shots. Yes, since then Johnny Outlaw has become as spectacular as the greatest wonders of the ancient world, but it will forever stand thanks to this, its solid foundation.

Now, a year of Johnny Outlaw means more than just a glimpse into the past. A year of Johnny Outlaw is a celebration of a year of progress. And that progress has culminated in this the most glorious of achievements. As you may have heard in the news, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was amended making it a crime against humanity for us to withhold Johnny Outlaw. I must acquiesce. After all, Johnny Outlaw is hardly my property. It is the very will of providence.

Johnny Outlaw is for all of mankind and for all time, and on this the anniversary, we present the first playable demo!

Just click here to play! (Windows)

Now go. Play these first levels for yourself. And when you are sated come back and fill out a brief survey HERE. It is only with the your input that we can make Johnny Outlaw as great as we imagine it to be.

A Christmas Miracle

With all the wonders of the holiday season upon us, even Johnny Outlaw Studios can get caught up in the hustle and the bustle. As we work hard into the night, we forget about the people we are working for. We forget that there are people out there who depend upon us. People whom we can let down.

Little Billy and little Suzy are sleeping tight, dreaming of waking up to find a copy of Johnny Outlaw underneath the Christmas tree. I am sad to say that there will be no Christmas for little Billy and little Suzy. Johnny Outlaw remains unfinished. Yes, for you it's no big deal, it's "just another video game". But for poor little orphan children everywhere Johnny Outlaw is more than a game, it is that last ray of hope, it is a reason to believe.

Billy asked me today if Johnny Outlaw would make it in time for Christmas morn. I could see that fading hope in his eyes, but I couldn't lie. I told him we couldn't make it this year. And he looked up at me with those eyes, now all full of sadness, and said, "I guess miracles don't exist".

For all the little Billys out there, Johnny Outlaw Studios going to show you that miracles do exist! We pulled all of our resources, rallied every employee, and what has happened in this eleventh hour is nothing short of a Christmas miracle.

No, we haven't finished the game. But we have produced a brand new Holiday Skin Pack, which will be free to use for all those little orphans out there. I am proud to say that despite the unforgiving deadline, we never had to sacrifice quality.



The holidays are looking brighter already! And let us all remember that these are more than skins, these are a symbol of hope in a world that at times seems so hopeless. They are proof that even in our modern world, miracles can and do occur every day. Mostly at Johnny Outlaw Studios.