Good Morning Gato #43 – A Shoe Box Full of Gato

This is the very last edition of Good Morning Gato for the year 2010. And after 42 previous editions, I must admit, I’m proud that I was actually able to maintain an almost weekly account of Ska Studios’ antics over the past year. So, let’s finish off 2010 in style with one more picture of Gato (seen above) and one more blog-o-information (seen after the break.)

Proper Indie Promotion
As far as the indie development scene goes, we’re ending 2010 on a high note.

If you recall, our dear ZP2KX was included in the XBLIG community’s Indie Games Winter Uprising, a grass-roots promotion aimed at highlighting some of the best that Xbox LIVE Indie Games has to offer. Soon enough, a few folks at Microsoft caught wind of the promotion and wanted to throw their support behind the movement by placing an Uprising ad on the Xbox 360 dashboard’s Spotlight channel. Surprising? Yes. Crazy awesome? Definitely!

A huge thanks goes out to Microsoft for continuing to support indie devs and to Robert Boyd for organizing the Uprising. Hopefully, we’ll see more of this indie love carry into 2011.

ZP2KX Patch Plans
Last week, I made mention of a ZP2KX update that we are working on and also kinda targeted its release for a “soonish” timeframe. Well, with the holidays, the targeted “soonish” release will actually be a bit longer than initially planned, but the extra wait will be well worth it.

Not only will the ZP2KX update feature all the bug fixes and general game enhancements that we initially planned, but we will also be including a few value-adds as well. I can’t get into specifics quite yet (mainly because I’m not 100% certain of what will ultimately make it into the update), but be rest assured that the update will not just be comprised of bug fixes. There will be new content, but you’ll have to wait a bit longer.

And That Was 2010
With that, we say goodbye to the year 2010. Looking back, it’s kind of crazy to see what Ska Studios has accomplished in the last 365 days: We revamped the Ska Studios webspace, wrote 43 editions of Good Morning Gato, officially announced The Dishwasher: Vampire Smile (with the help of Fervor Shine), exhibited at PAX East and Prime, got Charlie Murder signed to an XBLA contract, released a bunch of new merchandise, celebrated Z0MB1ES‘ one year anniversary, added the Z0MB1ES tune to the Rock Band Network, released ZP2KX to XBLIG and so very much more. Basically, it was a fantastic year!

Happy New Year to everyone and get excited for 2011, if not for the sole reason that The Dishwasher: Vampire Smile will finally make its way to your Xbox 360 😉

Goodbye 2010. You will be missed.